Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal Steven Nelson Zack Cohen 20240714

Uranium enrichment. What can expect from the administration . We heard from secretary of state. Omp pao pompeo i would expect more tough talk this week but President Trump is disinclined to intervene militarily a broad. There was a lot of talk recently about pompeo beating the war drum. We have heard less about john bolton lately. President trump has been warning iran but at the same time saying it doesnt look good. I imagine we will hear him telling it iran to knock it off. Something to cut this short. In your National Journal piece at the end of last week, lots going on. Foreign policy, defense dominate the senate. On iran you talked about senators rand paul introducing in thee in terms of Iran National Defense Authorization act, that the senate will begin to take up this week. It is the defense spending bill that Congress Considers and it is supposed to get a vote, procedural vote this week. On the full house floor, it passed out of committee a month or so ago. What senators including rand paul, tim kaine, tom udall, mostly democrats but including senator paul, they want to make sure any spending happens on or attempt to buffer them against military action has to go through congress, trying to make sure the white house doesnt try to use the 20 the 2001 war powers act to preempt congress and act without Congress Passed say so. Congresss sayso. Host a doozy of a session last week, 20 plus hours in terms of incommittee marking it up. Will we see any significant changes and defense policy now the democrats are in control in the house . Are they are posing significant alterations . Guest defense spending tends to be more partisan than other issues. There are questions about the total numbers and all of these spending bills, house is working on Appropriations Bills as well, that is happening before the topline numbers set. We can talk about that later. Democrats would like to spend a little less on defense or public and republicans want to spend more. Host the president will be launching his campaign tomorrow night in orlando, florida, the 2020 campaign. The news over the weekend was, the president fired a couple of his pollsters. That was announced sunday. Why did this happen . Says President Trump pulls can be fake like the news. He didnt like the results that were leaked out showing him in trouble in certain areas. Tuesday will be different than four years ago. It is a must for years to the day when President Trump announced in 2015 that he was running and people thought it was a joke, some sort of business ploy. He came down the escalator at trump tower to the cheers of. Aid actors who were given 50 in orlando you will be having tens of thousands of people show up. 70,000 people i believe he said will be coming. There will be an arena with 20,000 sikhs. It will be a packed house. It will be a different show than we saw four years ago. Issue leading up to , we saw a headline in the new york times, liberals want trump impeached. What is your gauge on where the issue is, understanding you cover the senate but where is the issue in the house among democrats . Guest i imagine President Trump will bring up impeachment when he has his rally in florida. It is something that gets his supporters fired up. Elections wee 2018 didnt see talk about impeachment from candidates are voters. There was more discussion about health care and Kitchen Table issues. In the house it is split. Nancy pelosi and other moderate democrats on one side argue, lets focus on investigations have properure we oversight of the administration, connect republicans to any sort of allegations of corruption or malfeasance. You have a vocal progressive wing in the house and nationwide house tourging the take up impeachment and potentially send over impeachment charges to the senate, where they would more or more than likely fail. Host the president tweets, big rally tomorrow night in orlando. Florida looks to be setting records. We are building large movie screens outside to take share take care of everyone. Great, far is doing beyond what the haters and losers thought possible. The president is tweeting on the polling issue, only fake polls show was behind the motley crew. It is too early to be focused on that. Make America Great again. We welcome your calls. We are joined by stephen and jack, talking about the week ahead on the hill in in politics. We have our democratic line and are independent line. We will get your calls momentarily. Stephen nelson, there were people talking, the members of the senate talking about ways forward on 2020 sending spending. We know if there will be additional meetings . Of these meetings arent really scheduled and if they are, they dont really have the full list of names in advance. I imagine we will be hearing more about spending. With President Trump, i guess the details work themselves out on capitol hill. President trumps meticulous in every facet of this. It is more outsourced. Republicanhink leaders in the senate are trying to button things up before they go to the president and go things from the white house it has been steven mnuchin, mick whoaney, and others, folks have been meeting with Congressional Republicans who are desperate to avoid another shutdown. That is what happened last year. The talks are ongoing to try to find some sort of Common Ground between the white house, Senate Republicans command house to raise the debt ceiling and this needs to happen before the end of the quarter to avert another shutdown and set up something for the next two years. Host they havent agreed on spending because of the mandated budget caps. They have to break those caps to come up with a budget. Guest the caps were set to try to tackle the deficit and the debt and if a deal is and reached to raise the budget caps, there would be automatic sequestration cuts to the fence nondefensese and programs. That is something we would like to avoid. We will have to see whether these parties can come together on an agreement in the weeks ahead. There are 20 session days left before the recess and that will stop any momentum if they dont come to a deal. Host zach covers the senate, works for the Washington Examiner. Com. We welcome your calls and comments. We will go to our independent line. Michael in imperial beach, california. Good morning. I was wondering if you could update us on the security clearance issues. I called him before about this but after seeing kushners interview, i was wondering if you could explain to us come are we ever going to get to the bottom of who has security clearances, how they got them command if you could update on that. The last time this came up, Sarah Sanders, who no longer does briefings and no longer has a position for very much longer, she told reporters they would not be discussing who has clearances and they wont be participating in inquiries. Her justification was discussing this would jeopardize everyone else who have security clearances. This is security clearances should be secret and handled confidentially. That limits the oversight and potentially creates issues. The white house over time has had many different issues with staffers. Some have credit card bills, some allegedly beat their exwives and that was allegedly problematic. Tensionll be continued over transparency with the white house not wanting to divulge much. Host i want to focus on the issue of iran and comments made over the weekend by the secretary of state mike pompeo. The headline this morning, asitary hit on the table response to attack on the oil tankers. I want to play you the comments of mike pompeo and followup up with a question. Here is mike pompeo. We are seen a number of activities not just, 4 other commercial chips ships challenge to the International Norms of freedom of navigation. The u. S. Has briefed the president and we will keep him updated. We can takedent action to restore deterrence, which is our mission. You say a full range of options. Does that include a military response . X of course. The president will continue everything. Have at want iran to Nuclear Weapon. The Previous Administration put them on a path where they could get there. Towardsoving ourselves a set of policies that will convince iran to behave like a normal nation. Attackingeen them international waterways, trying to drive up the price of crude oil so the world will cry uncle. If they are cashstrapped, why would they attack . Iran cant sell its crude oil. We put sanctions that have taken them from 2. 7 Million Barrels per day. This video was released purporting to show a revolutionary guard patrol boat pulling alongside the vessels and removing a mine from the ship. How certain are you this is the irgc . Will you present this evidence to our allies in the United Nations . X of course we will. We dont just purport. His was the real data we shared it with allies already. You had a chance to see it. Yesterday, icalls made more today. The world needs to unite against the threat against from iran. Host that is mike pompeo on face the nation. Who has the president s year on ons issue and more ear this issue and more broadly Foreign Policy . Guest mike pompeo and john bolton both have a reputation hawks. Theycks want to have regime change their. President trump seems to be pulling in the other direction. He is instinctually against largescale military interventions in the middle east. He talks a lot about iraq and the experience there. The threat of military actions, i expect we asear more but does with venezuela, President Trump said military options are on the table. Last time iran he did up a couple months ago, john bolton d he did up a couple heated up a couple months ago, john bolton put out a statement about a new deal. I would imagine President Trump will be confident. Host does the president pretty much have support of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Relations committee and other senators on iran, realizing it is a new issue in terms of the most recent issue . Do you think they have his back . The senate was briefed on the situation a few weeks ago and that was very important when the tensions ramped up. Senators said we arent sure why these escalations are taking place. Host this was before the mine incident. Guest when tensions first started ramping up. For warsnt been calls or anything along those lines. There are a couple examples, tom cotton on the same program said there should be action against iran following on the evidence of the cia and mike pompeo. I think they will push the administration to talk to them and make sure they are on the same page should any military action take place. Host lets go to our democrats line, from kansas city. Comment and a a couple questions. I joined the military in 1989, when the first bush was in office. Talk about the military. Lots of these guys, i was 19 years old so you join because you have no other option. You are not going to college, cant afford it. That is why i joined the army. You get sent to places to defend basically oil. You dont realize that as a teenager, but that is basically what you are doing, defending oil. As far as the spending and all that stuff, i have seen with my immigration,ar as there are lots of people that are here in this country that are not from mexico, they are from europe, india, everywhere else. We concentrate on the wrong perspectives of immigrants, which built this country. Our debt will never be paid off, ever. It will never be paid off. I dont even know why we are talking about that. , his last as trump two wives werent from here. The first lady now got over here illegally and worked and got paid. Nobody even thinks about all of that. Hour we spent the First Talking about the debt and deficit. On immigration, there is a push for border wall funding from the white house. Is that likely to be a sticky issue as they try to resolve a final budget deal . Is a two track plan. The Senate Appropriations Committee Meeting to market legislation that would take up the president s request for four point 5 billion dollars in emergency Supplemental Fund to go to the humanitarian crisis at the southern border, at least 3 billion for humanitarian aid. That a shelter, beds, personnel to take care of the migrants coming over the border in record numbers. Democrats are concerned that republicans will use the opportunity to pay for Law Enforcement and ramp up the physical barriers, personnel, technology that would stem the tide to the point they would prefer to see in a much more comprehensive bill. While that effort is going on, it presages the effort for a longterm spending deal which will include immigration and border spending. Host the white house announced a new legislative liaison last week. Can you tell us anything about that . Guest you are talking about the legislative Affairs Director . Yes, that is someone who has been in the west wing. He will be taking on legislative efforts. That office has a little bit of a diminished profile now the republicans arent in control of both houses. The ability to pass president ial priorities is greatly diminished. It is a different position, and he is supplemented by the former director of legislative affairs who is at the Vice President s office. Host on the tactical, logistics part, the headline we see, we had a guest over the weekend, this says when youre spending gap cap option one Year Spending gap cap option. Are you hearing anything from that . Guest i think there is interesting getting a longterm spending deal because that makes it host instead of the twoyear measure. Guest a oneyear deal would be right until the election. That would make it a more politically combustible situation. Host iris from michigan, go ahead. Caller i missed your old in washington. I see the panel behind one of the speakers that shows different views of the capital and the statue of Martin Luther king. When are you going to get back . There is too much diverge in. Who took theon picture of the boat taking the mine out of the ship . Where were the cameras . Of the see a long shot explosion, you dont see any boats in the vicinity. Where was the picture taken and why isnt it identified . There is so much going on, you cant keep up. Host good question. Do you know that . The secretary said something videothe veracity of the of the iranian mine being picked up. I dont know the source of the video to answer your question. We will hear from ned in alabama next. Lets talk about the iranian situation. Ship was hitat the by an object not from the water. Japan said nobody in their right mind would go into the water right next to the ship to get a mine out. Happensething like this , you want to understand first of all, you want to ask, who benefits from that . Area aregonist in this the following. United states, bolton and pompeo, and second, the arabs, and third, israel. Nobody talks about israel. President trump said we dont want the war. He said he is not going to go to war. Second, the arabs, all their water 100 across the miles from iran. Any missile from iran would devastate their own assets. Although the arabs would like the United States a hit iran to hit iran, they are not going to instigate the war. Host do either of you have comments about his take on iran . , with eventslly that seem to induce the United States military action, there are questions about the veracity. The apparent chemical weapon attack near damascus that seemed to cross obamas redline to intervene, there was a you when investigation that was unable to conclude what happened. There are questions that remain. There is the history of past u. S. Involvement, in a the intelligence was incorrect. The wallorting in street journal this morning, gears and motion for possible new tariffs. The office of Robert Lighthizer this week opening hearings on new tariffs, potential new tariffs on chinese goods. Your reporting, zach, is that lighthizer will testify before a congressional committee. What do they hope to hear . He will talk about usmca, the free trade agreement. In itsll replace nafta current form and lower taxes and have a new free trade deal between the three north american countries. Democrats will want to press the trade representative on issues such as labor, the environment, all things they would like to see added to the deal either in some implementing legislation that needs to work through congress over the next month and a half or so, and lighthizer will make the case likely that some of these changes will be toble to be added implementing legislation and would require reopening the deal and talking to mexico and canada , which is more complicated than most other negotiations. Host how close are they to getting to the floor for a vote . Guest nancy pelosi has sent her members to talk with the administration about changes they would like to see implemented. In the next few weeks, you will see legislation from the white house to congress to consider. But that will be after negotiations. Host here is michael from new york city on our democrats line. Caller good morning. Gentlemen, i want to ask you, how are we to believe this administration that has zero credibility . There is nothing that comes from this president or administration that has credibility. How am i supposed to believe these people . Thank you. Steven nelson, i will askt with you and then about the aftermath of Sarah Sanders departing as press secretary. Are there plans in the works to have somebody step in . Guest host what about Sarah Sanders leaving . Apparent momentum to find someone. But the press secretary job, you need someone to be the spokesperson, and right now, with Sarah Sanders announced departure coming this month, it has opened up something that kind of resembles the president ial primaries. There are a lot of people who want the job. Theres a lot of talk about who is in, who is out, who the candidate is, who is leading it is unclear now how that will actually shake up. Certainly, there will be someone who replaces her. That search in scramble and competition is just getting underway. Reporter, white house how difficult is it to get information, in terms of the way we see officials now in the so driveway stake outs. How predicable are they and how reliable are the in terms of your work in getting information and stories from spokespeople . Actually moree similar than some would say. They are generally shorter, but they happen more frequently. Generally what happens is Sarah Sanders or Kellyanne Conway or another spokesperson or prominent official goes out to the tv tents on the white house driveway, do their fox news or cnn hit, then they come back, and there is a group of reporters waiting for them with microphones, and they stand and talk for five minutes Kellyanne Conway can go 20 minutes. They talk about the news of the day. At times, they give information or statements. Sarah sanders mentioned the last call was put in putin there. Host on Kellyanne Conway, are we anticipating any congressional hearings or follow up on the findings of the office of special counsel robert mueller, overseeing the hatch act, in her alleged violations of the hatch act . Guest i have not heard anything to that degree. Its whatever mines we how congress functions, to add to Stephens Point where we can ask them various questions. It tends to offer some transparency in the middle of things. Let me go back to the callers question briefly and add that there are members of the emaciation who are more trusted on capitol Hill Mike Pompeo does have some clout with members there and lend some veracity to these claims, with the caveat that all of this needs to be taken with just a dose of skepticism to make sure that everything is accurate as we move forward. Int independent line, bill florida. Hello. Caller good morning. My question is this how come the iranians do not have a Nuclear Weapon . In other words, we developed a Nuclear Weapon in a few years during world war ii. How is it possible that they do not have a Nuclear Weapon . Which feeds into my question preventiran deal to them from getting a Nuclear Weapon or was it to alter their behavior in the middle east . What is going on now, has this altered their behavior . What does it have to do with preventing them to get a Nuclear Weapon, which i believe they already have . Is it behavior or a Nuclear Weapon . Host ok, we will hear from our reporters. Any thoughts . That, i would say obviously, the Iran Nuclear Deal was a major achievement for the obama administration, something that the president backed out of a few months ago. That is something that there are still talks on capitol hill, exactly how to either get a new deal or whether to expanded to include other countries this has been going on since the state of the union, i believe. Generally, Nuclear Proliferation is something lawmakers take seriously. There is a dedicated caucus to talking about these issues. I will be curious to see if that gathers more momentum over the next few months. Host and the additional story from iran, iran saying it will break its uranium stock mile stockpile limit in 10 days. We go to marlon calling from tennessee. Go ahead, marvin. Caller good morning. Thinking back on the comment made earlier, about the trust and the people we are dealing with in the white house, and giving the American Public the correct information about certain weapons of, once again, mass destruction, using these weapons against the United States i do not think the World Community does not know that any sort of electionyear will bring out these idle threats in yellow and all his own. The tremendous has a lot to do as to how they report this type of information and these fantasies coming out of this it idiots mouth and the white house. I do not think they understand how the American Public is constantly put in jeopardy by individuals that are native to some of their countries. Especially the arabs. I will give an example. Detroit, in michigan, is surrounded by arabs that have 30, 40to their city years ago, that have camped out there and are sucking all of the resources in the inner community. Every Grocery Store in the inner city was owned by arabs host and you are saying they should not be there . Caller i am not saying they should not be there. I am saying they have a tremendous amount of influence in our communities. And when they get to stop and go back to their jihad philosophy, that is born and raised in them, the black community, specifically the inner cities, are at risk because of the things they need and control. Tot all right, we will move augusta, georgia, and hear from ralph. Caller good morning. There are two points, one on their previous call and one i have for myself. Number one, they did not respond to the fact that their ship that removed a live landmine the other is the japanese say that they saw a project out the air. They did not respond. My thing is trump may not want to go to war right now, but he he did not negotiate. And if you got your two Main Advisors keep bumping into you that a reason to go to war, he will give in. Ive been in that situation, where we make a recommendation to the commander, and then a decision is made. Would you please answer those questions . Host we are joined by steven nelson, White House Reporter for the Washington Examiner was quote and zach cohen from the National Journal p or coat Foreign Policy is not your forte, but nelson, White House Reporter for the Washington Examiner and zach cohen from the National Journal. Foreign policy is not your forte, but can you comment . Guest the president is so nded by hocks bolton has some degrees in the National Security council, rotated out old people and put in his new, so there is concern, especially among the president s supporters, that his advisers are pushing towards war. Of course, the president is independent minded, and he speaks to a lot of people who are not in his administration, so there is that counterpoint. Guest this is a concern shared on capitol hill. The relationships between the staffers and some of the around dennis extending, and this is something that has been going on for a while now. This will certainly be a job for the new legislative rector for the white house to find a way to bridge some of those gaps. Part of the problem is, over the years, congress has increasingly seen its authority on ceded its authority to the white house, giving the commanderinchief more control over the armed forces. So it will be interesting to see what, in the short term, congress can do to rein in any push to military action or any longterm action to change the laws. Host in your reporting of what is coming up this week, you are writing that the Foreign Relations Committee Held a hearing for kelly knight craft it has been sometime since we have had a permanent u. N. Ambassador, since nikki haley left. This comes up who is she . Guest she is the former ambassador to canada, a kentuckian, so somebody that Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell is very interested in seeing. So anything that Mitch Mcconnell wants to happen in Congress Typically can at least get some attention. Because nominees are a big party for the senate oneadays nowadays, one of the few things they can do without consulting with house democrats, i imagine that would be a priority for the conference going forward. Host house and Senate Democrat have been hammering the Senate Majority leader for his attention on nominees. Speaker pelosi easily famously had a chart that showed Mitch Mcconnells grave of legislation that passed the house but has yet to be taken up in the Senate People we see legislation outside of budget stuff, where there may be some sort of work in the senate . Guest there does seem to be optimism about it create trade organization with mexico and canada. There is talk about an infrastructure deal. But it is more difficult when youre talking about a spending package that large. There are talks about lowering health care costs, targeting pharmaceutical drug prices. That is already working its way through the senate, from democratic senator patty murray, so there are certainly ways to bridge that gap and find Common Ground. Line, el paso,n texas. This is steve. Caller good morning. I absolutely trust the president. There are some questions about that. I believe what is behind all of this distrust is it started as wrongdoing during the obama administration, where they were using the fisa court and spying on a president ial candidate a bunch of lies and innuendo came out. This was kept up by democrats by for two years. Hopefully, there will be a report from from the people investigating the investigators that will exonerate total exonerate trump. I think he was exonerated in the mueller report. A lot of fake news going on. You gentlemen, as part of the media, need to help to get the truth out. Also, i believe trump is gods man, and whoever god is for, who will be against it . He sought happened before and you will see it happen again in 2020. Host thanks for your call. What are the stories from your side we talked about the president s launch tomorrow. One of the main stories you are focusing on this week . Guest youre putting me on the spot. It will be interesting to see. Ater in the week justin trudeau, the Prime Minister of canada, is coming to it it will be interesting to see exactly what he says and whether he will be able to smooth over tensions with the usmca. Is a bit of a liberal icon i am certain democrat so the whatever he has to say on the trade deal. Host and what are you looking at . We talked about some of the hearings coming on the floor, but what are you keeping your eye on . Guest the other angle of the iran question we have not talked on is senators are working on potentially privileged resolution that could make its way to the senate floor that would lock the Trump Administration from selling arms to saudi arabia and the united arab emirates. It is yet to be seen whether those will get a final vote, but that is something democrats and republicans alike would like to pass whatever he has to say on the trade deal. Host and what are you looking at . Essentially, the Trump Administration claimed an emergency and said in light of aggression from iran, we will expedite sales to these middle eastern countries, and a lot of senators are not pleased with that and what congressional say on where those arms are eventually going. A lot of this goes back to the murder of Washington Post journalist jamal khashoggi. Host this is richard, democrats line. I have twod things i would like to talk about. One is the ships getting bombed over there. The gulf of tonkin if you could our cia being the ones doing this or israel or some arabs that want to get us going to war . We have to watch this real close. The other thing is, in the lette mcconnell will not anybody vote on any of the bills if they do not get a chance to vote on what we want or not, how will we know what our senators will do . Will the senate this week the largely focused again on nominees . Guest yeah. They have a couple of votes, starting tuesday, one on an executive nominee and another on, i believe, strict or Circuit Court nominees. The senate hasng been focused on peer there are a lot of empty seats in the judiciary. To the callers question, i believe he was referring to Election Security bills there was a push by democrats, unanimously passed a gestation, that would have made a requirement to report foreign contacts to the four Election Commission or the fbi, and that was blocked by Senate Republicans. Most Election Security ledges agent has not passed the senate so far, except for one, that would make election interference a crime punishable by deportation or blockage from entering the country in the first place. Host lets hear from robert, plattsburgh, new york. Caller good morning. The gentleman from texas answered most of my questions. I am for the president. He is doing a heck of a job. He is about the only president we have had that will protect our country. I hope the attorney general does find out that the democrats and president obama and Hillary Clinton is behind all of this stuff and get to the bottom of this and prosecute them for treason. I am sick and tired of hearing negative things against our president. Because he is doing a great job. Up news media needs to step and start helping out and making the facts straight instead of being onesided for the democrats. If not, we are going to have a civil war on our hands. That is what i see coming. I appreciate you taking my call. Thank you. Have a nice day. Nelson, wen mentioned the president to florida to kick off his campaign tomorrow. We have any indication of what is ahead in terms of rallies, a plan for the campaign in the next week or so . Guest not so much in the next week or so, but you certainly will expect a lot of rallies. They are the president s opportunity to give himself the platform for 90 minute speeches here, there, and anywhere. His campaign does strategically picked the locations pay depending on where he want to perform better the next time around, he certainly sees a priority in the rest out states and in traditional swing states. Florida is a choice for the kickoff that is not by mistake. Florida is a very important state for his reelection. Certainly we will see a lot more of this. Host in one of the issues the president will run on, the planks or success points, is the passage of the tax cuts in 2017. But your reporting on the house side get ready for another round of tax extender drama. The ways and means is set to take up new legislation that restores or aspires republican tax writers are not happy with what democrats have in store. We have seen some of this in terms of debate on the house floor, on appropriations. Republicans decrying the increasing of the debt or deficit, and democrats responding, saying some of them saying it is partly due to the 2017 tax cuts. Is there an area that democrats may find success in repealing a piece of the 2017 tax cut . Guest the deficit ceiling is the leverage point democrats have been looking for as a way to potentially rollback or reform some of these changes that went into law over the last year or so. I heard this months ago, when we started thinking about what are some of the big legislative fights coming up. Lycra publicans you the debt ceiling to tackle spending, democrats can now use the deficit ceiling, essentially that cap on how much the federal government can borrow at any given time up to 22 trillion, i believe they can use this opportunity to say if we bring up revenue and tax more than we can afford to pay for the programs that we think are important i can imagine you will see both smaller parts of the tax code looked at. There are fixes to the original tax code that Congress Wants to get through, including the goldstar family loophole that made its way through, and there will be bigger debates about the tax cut and jobs act as we go forward. Next from georgia, republican line. Had a question about immigration. How are the officials in sanctuary cities and all able to circumvent better rolloff and not have any recurrent hessians federal law and not have any repercussions from it . Guest there is legislation in congress to tackle sanctuary cities. The governor of florida signed legislation to ban sanctuary cities a few days ago. I do not see it making a lot of headway on a national level, although we could see action on the statebystate level, even as her publicans republicans are losing seats in state legislatures. We will see if there is more piecemeal action on that. In the meantime, each municipality will decide how it wants to handle its own Law Enforcement. Host we have about 10 minutes left with our guests. Steven nelson and zach cohen. We welcome your comments. 202 7488001 for republicans. Democrats, 202 7488000. Independents, 202 7488002. Robert on our independent line. My question is i am 40 seven. Finally register to vote. The most disturbing thing ive seen has been in my own country. The people that are running the how i do not understand they can make decisions when we just keep asking our government to take care of us. Us. Lose clothe the more the government does, the more we are into the government. The more taxes we pay, the more everything all of these programs we pay for. If the American People take care of ourselves. We do not need government to tell us this and that. My question is how can we trust our government, when we have seen everything they have done . How can we trust what they say . I love my country, but i am questioning the people running it. Thank you. Host thanks. Guest more than swings between republicans and democrats over the last few cycles, you have swings against the parties in power. There was an interest in outsiders, not only in the presidency but inside and house races. There is a lot of interest in bringing in new actives to washington. I imagine you will see a similar message play out over the next few months, both from the president ial race and down ballot races. Because spending does tend to increase under both democratic and republican administrations and congresses. It will be interesting to see what a democrat accounts, Republican Senate and republican white house, how that disappointment with washington manifests itself. Host any thoughts . Guest it will be an interesting election, with trump trying to maintain his outsider persona while competing against joe biden, who is presumably the Democratic Front runner right now, who is quite an astonishment figure. We will get your calls momentarily. 202 7488001 for republicans. 202 7488000 for democrats. Independents and all others, 202 7488002. We have talked a little about the appropriations process getting underway in the house. There were a couple of late sessions in the house last week. One maneuver was, on the republican side, by encouragement from texas, calling on both on almost every amendment coming up, slowing down the process considerably, raising the issue of Border Security spending in 2020. Whether that tactic will be displayed this week . Guest my colleague that cover the house seems to think this will happen again. Much moree house is a busy legislative chamber, it does tend to allow members to bring up these various procedural votes, unlike the senate, where a lot tends to happen by unanimous consent on the floor level. I imagine, because republicans would like to see more border spending, and the disaster package or in previous spending packages, things they are upset by i imagine they will continue to do so. Congressman roy was the same one who blocked disaster spending. This is something that took a wild to get through congress. There were obviously blocks to that before, that spending package, that would help states recover from disasters in 2018 and 2019. But this is something that i imagine House Republicans will continue to do. Is speaking later today at an event the cspan networks will be covering today. There were a couple of incidents where ted cruz and reppo tentative alexandria ocasiocortez, particularly on lobbyists and postcongress careers whatever happened to that . Was a movement on the two of them working on legislation together . Guest i had read the staffers are working on legislation that congresspeopler to enter lobbying orderlies have a coolingoff period. It usually does not get too far, generally because members of Congress Like the sea and offramp if they decide not to run for reelection or lose reelection, and obviously lobbying is a lucrative business nowadays. And it does bring up a valid first memory concerns. That of the lobbying happens is registered in the form of consulting, so where do you draw the line between consulting and speaking your mind on an issue if you are a member of congress that was a chairman of a Major Committee on an issue . They are still working on legislation. I cannot imagine it will go far. Host mike on our republican line from atlanta. Caller i have a question on your guests. I am a black guy for the first time i voted was for trump, the first time he ran. Supporthink trumps with black voters have gone up . I think you will get i did not want to get beat up saying i am a trump supporter in an urban city, but i think immigration is a major issue for black americans. Guest immigration is something that the president clearly thinks is an opportunity. He also talks about the black Unemployment Rate being low. Then we get chris criminal justice reform. It was talked about for years and years. It was actually passed under president obama under President Trump edie called on Mitch Mcconnell to call on a vote when it was not clear he would do it. He get some credit on that. Also depends, the president share of the black vote, depends on who it that she is running against. If he is running against joe a history biden has of social a Bernie Sanders supporter who said that if biden gets the nomination, trouble get of blackmajority support. Anst South Carolina is early voting state, so i imagine whoever comes out of that primary, whether it is former Vice President joe biden or someone else, they will certainly have a strong contingent of support among that community. Republicans continue to bring up the economy is something that could help the president. It is going decently well. The Unemployment Rate is low. He continue to see job growth, although at varying levels. If that continues through the 2020 election, that could be a boon. And if it goes south, that would obviously hurt his chances, not just among african immigrants but all voters. Host you can barely do your job without bumping into a president ial candidate at capitol hill. Does the fact that they are candidates and have speeches and rallies and events, does not legislate interview with them and able to do their jobs as members . Guest there are seven senators running for president. They are not always in every vote. They do to attained to skip votes in order to go to campaign events. The partisan divide in the senate now is such that folks can miss a few votes and it will not actually change the outcome. So we have not seen the president ial contest really change the way the senate, at least, is functioning, other than maybe them hopping onto more progressive pieces of legislation to things like medicare for all and weighing in on immigration. Call. One more louisville, we will hear from susan on our republican line. Caller good morning. I would like to address the comment about the iran deal that obama made. Anyonet believe that thinks that is a good idea. Continually that it hates the jews, hates israel and seeks its destruction. Obama circumvented congress to go around and make this deal. , if he is a christian, which he states he is, he knows how iran feels about israel. That would be like the United States making a deal with hitlers, knowing how he felt about host we will end it on the issue of the middle east peace reportedly being developed Jared Kushner they are. Guest there is the bahrain and talk coming up about giving money to the palestinians. The details of the kushner peace is the not out but one investment in the territories to mprove the situation economically and seeing that as part of it. Issue is the israeli and ions then ramadan continued turmoil in israel. Will come remains to be seen but there will be a conference. Thanks for being with us this morning. A lot to report tonight, we are on capitol hill talking to exhibitors from an event gives members of congress and staffers an advance look at newtek products. Technology is moving so quickly and so many technologies are affected. All of this Amazing Software will make a difference in how we live, work, and play. Congress has to be aware of it tackle issuest can like privacy because we are in a battle with other economies like china. Communicators tonight at 8 00 eastern on cspan2. Look at our primetime schedule on the cspan networks. Starting at 8 00 eastern, remarks by several Democratic Candidates at the Poor Peoples Campaign president ial forum. Eastern, the health and Human Services secretary speaking at the Global Leadership summit. Cspan3,astern on senator ted cruz taking part in a discussion on freedom of expression and online speech. Washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Tuesday morning, the Washington Institute distinguished fellow will be with us. He will talk about recent tensions between the u. S. And iran. Dixon, whog us, matt talks about President Trumps Campaign Rally tonight where he is expected to officially announce his 2020 reelection campaign. And then, a discussion on term limits. Be sure and watch washington journal live tuesday morning. Join the discussion. From u. S. , testimony trade representative Robert Lighthizer on Trump Administration policy. He will be speaking before the Senate Finance Committee Live at 10 15 eastern on cspan. The house and senate are in recess today. The chambers return tuesday for legislative work. The house gaveled in at noon to continue work on 2020 spending including education, defense, state, and foreign operations. The chamber continues debate on amendments with a title vote possible tomorrow night. You can watch the house live on cspan. The senate gavels in at 3 00 eastern to continue work on nominations. Most of their week will be used to start debate on the defense setsrization bill which Defense Authorization for 2020. President trump who do i look forward to running against . Tuesday, President Donald Trump holds a rally in orlando, florida, officially launching his campaign for a second term. Watch online or listen live on the free cspan radio app. Annext, the epa hosts endangered species act meeting in washington. We hear remarks from david bernhardt,