Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 09032019 20240714

Investigative report on u. S. Disastere joins us to discuss a report on u. S. Disaster response. We will take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter as well. Washington journal is next. Host it is tuesday, september 3, and this is washington journal. The house and senate in for pro forma sessions. They will likely face new requests for more disaster aid money in the wake of Hurricane Dorian. As we begin the program, we americans to ask are have we become too reliant on government assistance during and after disasters . Andou live in the Eastern Central time zones, that number is 2027488000. Mountain and pacific, that line, 2027488001. If you live in a disaster prone area, particularly if you are anticipating Hurricane Dorian, that line, 2027488002. Also looking for your posts on facebook. Facebook. Com cspan and your cspanwj. Well at we will talk to florida congressman on the coast and fema. The front page reporting of usa today on the hurricane, bahamas blasted. Storm stalls dangerously close expected to swipe the east coast. We will also look at the wall street journal, hurricane hammers bahamas near u. S. Florida power light saying it had 17,000 utility workers ready to respond to outages. States of emergency in effect for georgia, florida, South Carolina, and virginia and the track of the storm from the wall street journal as of last night, we will try to keep you updated on that. Some comments on facebook already on our question, are we too reliant on government aid . Yes, we are, personal responsibility for extra food and water, preparing us to be the best of our ability. Have the glenn beck survivalist kit i bought two years ago. I dont want to have to rely on the government, so i take care of my family and help friends if needed. This is the clearest example of the need for organization. We choose government as an organizing tool to develop, maintain, and advance society. , brockmer head of fema long, was on face the nation on cbs. The headline on the hill, we have to stop looking at fema as 911. Here is some of what he had to say. [video clip] faceshink fema Unrealistic Expectations by congress and the American Public and the standards by which we declare emergency declarations need to be increased. 50 of the disasters fema declared, they are less than 7. 5 million. We have to stop looking at fema at fema as 911. If we want to respond better, we have to refocus the training upon how we ask citizens to be prepared, not just having supplies for 5 or 7 days. Teaching them insurance is the first line of defense. Bolster stateo and local capabilities. Until Congress Starts to incentivize putting building codes in place, Incentivizing States for ensuring public infrastructure, femas job is impossible. We have to set realistic expectations for the agency and bolster capability from neighbor helping neighbor all the way to the federal Emergency Management agency. Host brock long this past weekend on face the nation. Ahead of anticipated landfall or affects of Hurricane Dorian, are we too reliant is there too much reliance on the government during and after times of disaster . Is the line for those in eastern and central time zones. 2027488001 in the mountain and pacific time zones and for those of you in disaster prone areas, weather the earthquakes or out fires in the west or certainly to hurricane anticipated strike the east coast this week, 2027488002 is that line. Want to look at craig caplan tweeting this, we mentioned congress is in for a pro forma session. He says special elections are scheduled one week from today to fill the remaining two vacant house seats as Hurricane Dorian heads for the u. S. Coast, including North Carolina. We mentioned disasters have been declared by governors in those states. Florida, georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and virginia. Just a couple things about what has happened so far in the bahamas. They write the bahamas, a country that long prided itself on withstanding positive storms revamped building codes, adopting some of the most stringent resiliency standards in the region. During heavy rainfall combined with the low lying islands vulnerability to flooding raised fears of huge losses. We saw what a category 5 hurricane did in the british. Irgin islands we are looking at a situation where we have a similar category 5, a large storm sitting much longer than maria on these countries. Calling in this morning, you are first up. Caller maybe this isnt the most uplifting comment i have to i am really disappointed with a paid, government person describing how we have to rely on ourselves when there is an emergency. I thought that is what tax dollars were for, to pay professionals to help us in emergencies. I dont think i can go out and do firstaid on somebody that has a broken leg or somebody that is drowning when i dont have a boat. It seems to be ridiculous coming from our government, but i am not surprised. Former femaas the administrator, brock long. Caller thank you for taking my call. Thanks for cspan and my comment was about i read a biography one time andlidge it was a time period when his attempt after Warren Harding y had a recension recession and his attempt was to. Ut spending and taxes he resisted the attempts to spend money on anything. He thought the states could take care of many of the problems that existed and at the time, they had severe dust storms in the u. S. Midwest and flooding and there were a lot of calls to pull them out of these disasters and he said when he thought it was proper, he said we cant help. Even his own state of vermont came to him and said we need help with all the flooding and everything. His answer was no and it resulted in one of the greatest periods of prosperity our country has ever known, when more people had jobs and prosperity and all kinds of things and a growth period great period of growth and low unemployment and i think that is what we have to get back to. Helpuch expectation of from the federal government for everything that happens to us is unrealistic. Host thanks for that. We are opening our phone lines by region. Eastern and central, 2027488000. Mountain and pacific areas, 2027488001. Those of you in disaster prone areas, 2027488002. Goesticle in the hill that back to the fall of 2018, but certainly still relevant. Disasters become a big chunk of the u. S. Deficit. Congress approved 15 billion last september to pay for damages from hurricanes harvey and irma. The following month after Hurricane Maria devastated 36. 5 rico proved another billion. Billionlast year, 140 nearly triple the amount appropriated for the department of Homeland Security. It also amounts to 18 of the total deficit for fiscal year 2018. Conservatives have long argued Disaster Relief should be offset with spending cuts. Hurricane aid should not be added to the debt. That is akin to going to the emergency room and pretending the bill is never going to. Rrive louisville, good morning. Caller good morning, sir. This 1937d to reveal hearing. In 1941 and dad during his life, he never talked about anything but the it destroyed the city of louisville. Water was from 6 or 7 miles from the river all the way up to the hills of iroquois park, which is about 6 or 7 miles south of downtown louisville. There was a fire downtown where the water was. It destroyed the buildings down there. It was an electrical fire. Wiresad these electric and somehow the wires and the electricity caught on fire and it was devastating. It took years for them to get over the 1937 flood in louisville. Host do you know what role the federal government played in that . How much the state of kentucky chipped in or how much the federal government had to chip in . Caller my next comment, the city of louisville basically all the people in the city of louisville got together. Did the itself revamping of the city. As far as the state goes, in 1937, that was the middle of the great depression. As far as the federal government goes, the same thing. My opinion, the government the reliance on the government in todays term, it is a different ballgame today. There are certain events in life the city cannot do, the state cannot do, organizations cant do, churches can do. The federal government, that is one of the reasons we have a more Perfect Union in the preamble. Thats why we have the federal government and that is why it is important for us to be united whenthe government so events like that exist or happens, that we can come together as a government, as a people. As far as the bahamas go, we dont own the bahamas. I think Great Britain owns that. Independents is an nation, former british territory. Is is therequestion too much reliance on federal government . Not toosay there is much reliance. I used to work for the red cross. The red cross told us when an event like this happens, they have a fund, the red cross has a. Und say it is a billiondollar devastation, the red cross puts up the billion dollars, but the government comes behind that and stands good for the billion dollars. Donate to the federal government to the red cross, it is not the billion dollars it is in addition to redbillion dollars the cross stands good for and the federal government stands good for. Host the International Red cross is reporting this morning that 13,000 homes have been destroyed in the bahamas during the storm. A couple of quick notes from fema on the level of spending, this is the most recent hurricane spending we have gotten from Hurricane Michael, 1. 3 billion for recovery including 146 million in individual assistance, 217 million in National Flood Insurance Program and 642 million the federal government paid 117 million through other agencies to help with other response and recovery. That call dropped on the line. Want to show you the comments of the acting fema administrator. Gaynor, weve peter will show that in a bit. We talked about the figures in 2018 from fema. What fema covers in disaster aid, the overall their , housingurview assistance, temporary rental assistance, financial help to and lodgingce expenses, reimbursement, the assistance will not make you whole. It is designed to help survivors move forward. Medical, dental expenses, funeral and burial cost. Repairing or replacing vehicles and other necessary expenses and public assistance. They reimburse state and local governments and certain nonprofit organizations and repairing and replacing disaster damage infrastructure. That is the fact sheet from fema. 2027488000 is the number to call if you live in the eastern and central time zones. 2027488001 mountain and pacific and if you are in a disaster prone area, that line is 2027488002. We will talk to the author of this report. E e news. Ted from i wanted to read more about this investigation and why the disaster industry isnt ready for disaster catastrophes. Fema has wasted more than 3 billion and misused employees by responding to floods, storms, and other events states couldve handled on their own. An investigation shows fema has underestimated the capacity of states to respond to them. Those errors triggered 300 25 unnecessary deployments of money and personnel since 1998. The errors resulted in homeowners and businesses receiving 725 Million Dollars in low interest disaster loans from the Small Business administration. Fema deployed staff to small disasters for decades even as federal auditors warned it was sending emergency workers and money to states that may not need the help. Federal law says fema is supposed to assist with disasters only when they threatened to overwhelm the state possibility to respond. Climatefemas change is intensifying hurricanes, floods, thunderstorms, and wildfires and as development is expanding in peril prone areas. Many of the events that trigger aid are becoming routine, raising concerns that it will be unable to respond to the growing number of large catastrophes if it continues to Waste Resources on smaller ones. News. S from e e want to show you the testimony fema director, peter gaynor. [video clip] femas preparedness training and Grant Programs which helps states and communities prepare for Natural Disasters, terrorist attacks, and other high consequence events. It does not appear the risks have waned. Can you explain the basis for the proposed reductions . Maam. We have had a historically constrained Operations Support budget over the years and, frankly, there are few paces places to cut. We look at the potential programs and resources we provide an preparedness is a shared responsibility. Over the past 10 or 12 years have dhs and fema, we some of those grants have turned in overtime to entitlement. Rants we think it is fair and equitable to ask states and locals to offload that for their own budget so we can keep up with new threats and innovation. When it is a constrained budget, it is hard to find hard to reduce the impact. I was a local and state emergency manager, i know how much locals and state directors. Epend on that we believe preparedness is a shared responsibility. Host peter gaynor in a recent testimony. Are we too reliant on government aid during and after disasters . 2027488000 eastern and central time zones. Mountain and pacific, 2027488001. And for those in disaster prone areas, 2027488002. Lets hear from nat in baltimore, maryland. Caller thanks for cspan. Was tasked to be the head of fema. It was a Little Agency in western maryland and really very large, unmanageable by states organization. I just heard the statement made tenorthough the general of the statement was accurate, one thing is absolutely wrong. That is the Natural Disasters have not increased. We have not seen a single hurricane that was as big as the one that got galveston over 100. Ears ago we are normal in all weather conditions now. The only difference is we get reports for every single rainstorm that occurs anywhere. The current hurricane is a problem because it has stalled. Can predict accurately which way it is going to go. Host when do you think that changed . You mentioned being there early on in the 1970s. When do you think that changed and fema took on an early role . Caller early 1980s. During president reagans administration, there was a big drive. It, fema hadall done such an effective job on a couple of jobs that were needed that there was a big push to expand the agency. The director i was of r d for naval Systems Command and i moved onto another job. I turned it down because i am meteorologist. Werend early expansions very good, organized well, they were hiring people who were very accurate on logistics and support for people that were out of luck. Aroblem is it became fishbowl to get money out of and that is when they resulted in buying plywood that was gluenous because they used big moneyt became a pot. Have had the theral experience, are states too reliant on federal aid . Caller absolutely. The large percentage now of they scare tactics and response, political, of the just President Trump, but all the previous ones, is they get criticized so badly for not being there 2. 5 hours before the storm hits. Politically, they automatically allow emergencies. The emergencies federal emergencies should not occur until there is an absolute confirmation that the state is beyond its means. Conway, are going to South Carolina. Go ahead with your comment. Caller i would like to speak to the issue you are discussing wes morning and i think denigrate the government too much and it is causing a problem for the whole nation. I think the government should step in whenever people are having problems like this and instead of spending a whole lot of money on travel and throwing allway and giving people this money to go here and there and run across the nation because when people of the nation need help, the government should step up and do what they can to help people, that is what it is for, government for the people, by the people and whenever people are having trouble, i think the government should do their part. Yes, people should volunteer and do what they can to help, but i think the burden really falls on the government because it is the people and by the people, so people should be able to spend their own money when they need it. Host how close are you to the coast . How worried are you about this storm . Aller we are 13 miles away i am really not as concerned stormthe wind from the except maybe flooding and so forth may give us problems. As far as the wind is concerned, from the way it looks now, i am not sure it is going to affect us that much. Host this piece from the houston tribune texas tribune, the federal governments hurricane response needs an overhaul from the mayor of houston. Sylvester turner writes reforming the federal governments handling of responsibilities will save taxpayers money and perhaps relieve some of the physical and psychological pain of disaster risk fibers disaster survivors. Rapid delivery rather than current bureaucratic procedures of multiple audits. Lets go to carla in tax bill, florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. I am so glad i was able to get on the program. I am constantly ranting and raving in front of the tv and my husband is getting bored with me. I wanted to comment i am beginning to learn that Good Government starts from the bottom up. Everyone seems to be referring from the top to the bottom, but when we talk about Citizens Rights and voting rights, all of these things, i am encouraging more of my friends and neighbors to vote and be aware of what is going on in our own neighborhood. Host in jacksonville, you are right on the coast, so you have not been asked to evacuate . Caller fortunately, we live in an area where people evacuate to. I am about 10 miles away from the coast and our area has been fortunate. We tend not to lose electricity. We are not close to the river or the beach. Host thanks for your call this morning. 2027488002 is the line for those of you in disaster prone areas. Susan posts this on facebook. Assistance during a Natural Disaster is always going to be needed, but people need to use common sense and prepare, heed warnings and have insurance. Too many people think the government will take care of it all and save me. Beach property is an issue, floodplains, et cetera. Fema money went to wall builders who probably misuse the money and buy beach houses. Why should folks in utah be taxed to rebuild beach houses in florida . This is richard. Good morning. Yes. R i wanted to call and let everyone know in florida and much,a not to worry too President Trump has paper towels brand. To florida, bounty he will solve the problem, so it all out. Is next host richard joining us from massachusetts. Caller good morning. The cities and the states and federal government, from all the taxes they collect from the country,ving in that they should every city should have a little fund, the state should have one and the federal government. We get hit with snow, but that is about it. We could have some responsibility overseeing it. Every numeral for months and announced to the people on tv or the papers how much they have in the fund. Keep track of it. Just stolen. People get paid so much, it is unreal like the head of these organizations, they get big bucks. That is what i think, i think we should have our own fund for disasters and help each other. Host we have been focusing on Hurricane Dorian with the states affected, florida, georgia, North Carolina, virginia. This piece on the front page of the Washington Times about mitigating and anticipating dangerss, wildfire down, the weather helps with projects in the west and they right after years of can destructive blazes, the wildfire season has been below average. Interior department has undertaken 2500 fuel mitigation projects in 10 western states. Officials are working with locals to clear brush, fortify fire breaks, and thin forests on public lands in accordance with President Trumps december 18 executive order on reducing wildfire risk. Those efforts have benefited from a cool, wet year that has tamped down wildfire outbreaks in the lower 48th. This ischusetts, sandra, go ahead. Thank you. Caller i just got out of the hospital and this brings a terrible bill to me, the hurricane because i went through hurricane audrey as a little girl and i was very frightened. My father was in the service and he had the duties of taking care of a time a town that was 15 miles from us, got completely devastated and the thing of it is the calm before the storm would come after the storm and sitting there waiting to see what the storm was going to bring, it would bring down trees you would never believe, people you would never believe. It made people blow away, we will never see them again and on top of it, the water drowned so many people, it was the drownings because people would not get out in time and people nexttying people to their to prevent them from drowning and stuff like that. Andgators and the moccasins everything like that were all stirred up. It was 15 miles from where i was in alexandria, louisiana, and it was the most horrible storm i have ever been through and never want to live again and i dont hear much talking about it. They said the winds were terrific. You would never believe what we went through. Host you are talking about it as if it were yesterday. How old were you when this happened . Caller i believe i was about 13 or maybe a little younger. My father sat out in the car when it was taking place. He said that was the safest and i dont know if it was or wasnt, but we did make it and it was 15 miles from where we lived and the city had to be cleaned up. Had to clean it up, 15 miles from us and it took three months and the stink from the bodies and everything were ridiculous and air force guys had to do it, it was their duty and it was terrible. The families, we read about it for months. We had to read about what we went through. Host thanks for that. Appreciate your input and experience with that hurricane. Asking you about u. S. Government aid. State aid, too. Are we too reliant on the government in times of disaster . 2027488000 for eastern and central time zones. 2027488001, mountain and pacific. And for those of you in disaster prone areas, that is 2027488002. In june, a House Oversight subcommittee held a hearing looking at the effects of Climate Change and preparations for disaster. All former fema administrator, james witt testified on reforms to fema. Here is what he had to say. [video clip] working with all the state directors and we had 340 93sidential disaster thed, 95 burning at building in Oklahoma City and numerous hurt equate hurricanes and tornadoes in between. Of the keys that helped put in a policy working with the state directors and policy management where they would do estimates and get them to us as quick as they possibly could with a request for a president ial disaster declaration. We would advance them 50 of that estimate upfront so they becauset debris removed. Hey would be audited anyway it made a difference in the recovery efforts. One of the things you consider one at, fema has the of the things i would highly recommend enclosing is fema be brought out as an independent. Gency again host deadly storm on floridas doorstep. Lost fired that day from his job and he as and his employer called police after his termination. State troopers who called him over for a Traffic Violation were unaware he could pose a threat. Authorities said monday seth ator contacted police and the after he was let go from basically they were complaining on each other over the firings. Ator did not make threats of violence. He left a rambling statement with the fbi tip line and did not make a specific threat. They are writing about a bit more from that story on the that ator did not go through with the background check. Spread across 15 crime scenes. He previously failed to pass attack with a National Instant background check system while trying to buy a gun said john wester. His previous interactions with Odessa Police were minor. From overseas wrapping up his poland, Vice President pence holding a News Conference saying u. S. Allies must be wary of russian interference in elections around the globe. A warsaw press conference that featured a 5g security pact to box out subsidiaries of the chinese government. Eddlin elections across europe and around the world, now is the time for us to remain vigilant about the intentions and actions taken by russia alongside polish Robert Mueller concluded russia had used social media campaigns and hacking efforts to interfere in the 2016 u. S. Election and boost President Trump over Hillary Clinton. The Vice President returning home, but not before a stop in ireland. Toce defends his decision stay in ireland. Amid criticism by democrats that he is enriching trump at taxpayer expense. Back to our calls and government in general disaster aid. Lets hear from alan in South Carolina, go ahead. Caller hello. Over you the year, the occurrence in Natural Disasters i think ancy lot of it, these natural are a result of Climate Change and our government, especially this calm to theon, as conclusion that Climate Change has could be the effect of these things. You have to realize people, especially South Carolina, the income ranges from welltodo modern class pay scales, these people on the lower end of the paye could barely afford to monthly rent and put foods on the tables. Toy dont have the resources afford be able to toparations for disasters supply sandbags and all that. Host how concerned are you about Hurricane Dorian or the effects of the hurricane hitting your area of South Carolina . Caller i am very concerned about it, that is what prompted my call. I am in the charleston, south is supposeda, which to have a major effect. Some ofconcern me that the people that are already. Nder dire straits financially i think fema and some of the other organizations that deal to lendproblems organ it assistance to these people. Host thanks for your call and stay safe. You are on the air, lloyd. Caller i would like to say regarding the topic, too much duringe on Government National disasters, i would sit there is not too much reliance on the government. I think it is a quote to the abyss en, e poor pluribus unum. When one of us is in need, we should all come to their help. Host devon is next, uniontown, ohio. Your reliance on government aid. Caller i want to make a comment ut the Facebook Status thatnk that is really sad somebody is in thinking about the peoples lives, the moms and dads and kids who live there and just thinking about the property. Alue host do you think those states that are really prone to disasters such as hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes in california, should they take a larger browned, larger piece of the financial responsibility from the federal government . Because whatss yes is the other option . Are we going to move everybody out of florida to utah . Host appreciate your call. Sidney next in alexandria, louisiana. Go ahead. Caller yes. We worry interesting about these people in these dangerous areas and we dont mind starting wars all over the country. We dont mind spending on our military more than we spent on poor people. Why dont we get off this war kick and as far as interfering with elections, if you check American History, read a little, you will find we interfered with everybodys elections. Thank you. Mountain and8001 pacific and if you are in a disaster prone area, that line, 2027488002. On twitter, jamie dupree who covers washington for wsb in atlanta tweeting while we wait for Hurricane Dorian to move, there are other tropical systems being watched for development. John says it is not the purpose of the government. Homesweet saying 13,000 talking about the bahamas, very sad, but thoughts and prayers will not save us from global pollution. John in North Carolina saying if you build on the water, buy flood insurance. In golden from anne valley, arizona. Welcome. Caller good morning. I believe it is up to the states. They should not be allowed to build and if they do build, they should build Something Different, stronger. You just made a comment about president donalds properties. I remember when he became president , he signed over his properties to his children. He doesnt own anything. I am tired of people saying he is making money. He is making money for the American People and when people say you are biased, i believe they are saying you are biased because when somebody says something against president donald, you have no problem bit of whatttle somebody said. When we say we dont want waters up there, you dont show her spewing hate. When we talk against them, why dont you show the soundbites of them . Host we appreciate your input, thanks for the call. More of your calls coming up. We are joined by Michael Waltz of pennsylvania from florida joining us, the 6th district on the coast. Thanks for being with us on the program this morning. What can you tell us what you are hearing from local and National Authorities on where the storm might go in relation to your district . Myler my district guest district runs the northeast florida coast. Right in thee were bullseye right in the path of the storm. Sadly and unfortunately for the bahamas, the storm has stalled right on top of it and is pounding those folks with water and wind. Was some bitthat of good news because the stall means it is turning and turning to the north to parallel floridas east coast. That is the same path matthew we will not sustain a direct hit from a massive storm. There is still a danger and concern of what happens when a slowmoving storm turns off the coast. It pushes a lot of water inland, thatvers and streams and means it ends up flooding a lot of inland places that would feel Tropical Storm anything toare not be dismissed. We are ready. The good news is we have had a lot of warning. The county administrators are the ones that make the calls and the lowlying areas have been under mandatory Evacuation Order and now we are simply waiting. Host you are a florida native, you grew up there and represent the sixth district. You mentioned evacuations. Our people heating that advice from local authorities . Some are,me guest especially elderly and specialneeds. Those timelines to get those folks moved, timelines and nursing homes. Shelters yesterday and one of them was a special needs shelter. I think some people are waiting issee which way this thing going to go and our message from senator desantis, marco rubio, and on down say please do not wait until it is too late because if this thing takes a little bit of a turn, we could be in a dangerous path again. It is not worth the risk. Guest host the house comes back monday, when will you spend the next couple of days in your district . Is due it is guest it to pass wednesday thursday, so i will be here either the Emergency Operations center or a shelter with my constituents and after that, we will see what kind of damage we have. So people can make any kind of inims they need to make helping pick up any pieces in the aftermath and separately, there is a lot of moving pieces. There are Power Outages as well we are expecting, Hurricane Matthew followed about the same track offshore and because it is moving so slow, it is able to pound the coastline and we will be here with whatever federal resources we have. And could take a moment on our national guard, we had units coming overseas from extended training units when they were away from their families and homes and businesses and jobs and they did not even go home before they turned right around for hurricane duty and cannot say enough about those heroes. Host how would you rank the average citizen in terms of preparedness . Caller folks that have grown up in florida and been through a lot of these like i have, i think they are ready and have a. Ood sense of what to expect we have to remember florida is gaining 1000 People Per Day from all over the country. Those of the folks that i worry about a little bit more. They are moving down from the northeast to the midwest and they dont quite know how dangerous these storms can be and if it changes track, how quickly things can change. Hurricane irma was dead set toward miami and Fort Lauderdale until 24 hours before and shifted to the west part of the state and Hurricane Michael last year was a little bit of a shoulder shrug and within 24 hours, it upgraded to a category 5 and was absolutely devastating. Thanks for joining us this morning with the up they at least from the 6th district. Reporting from the New York Times in terms of how this is affecting the travel industry, travel industry scrambles in storms path. Which are closing . Hollywood international, Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach international and Orlando International expected to close at 2 00 a. M. And remain closed today. More than 200 flights were 160eled and an additional canceled into and out of Fort Lauderdale. Palm Beach International suspended commercial flights. A few more calls on our topic on reliance on the government for financial relief. In michigan, thanks for waiting. Caller good morning, cspan. It good morning, america. There is a lot of. Eforestation around the world should look at planting a Million Trees and building houses out of brick to withstand the storms and so forth. All you have to do is look at the change in weather. Thank you, have a good day. Host charlene in North Carolina, go ahead. Caller hi. Personally,to say, i got nothing from the federal government or the State Government and it is terrible to think we pay all this property insurance and they dont pay us either. I am not going to hold you up, i widow7yearold goldstar who has spent 13,000 trying to recover from the last three hurricanes and Straight Line wind. Also, we need to think about to thesen highways Barrier Islands in North Carolina while not supporting the citizens. Host thanks for your call this morning. A story from a public executive couldne, the transfer spur congress to cut off the Homeland Security secretary flexibility spending. They write the trump administrations decision to transfer 150 5 million to Immigration Enforcement out of a fund set aside for Disaster Response has drawn scorn and threats of retribution from members of Congress Though official said the move is unlikely to affect the governments ability to respond to hurricanes in the immediate future. We will talk more about this issue. Up next, a look at the 2020 election. Matthew weil will discuss Election Security and thomas frank discusses the report on federal Disaster Response and capabilities and their shortfalls. Campaign 2020ns coverage of the democratic cap president ial candidates at the convention. Our live coverage is saturday at 9 00 a. M. Eastern, online at cspan. Org, or with the free radio app. How thiss the story of whole new economy was built, and i have always been interested, ever since i was working in washington, about how business and government interact with one another. They have an antagonistic relationship but also a collaborative relationship. The real story in American History is public and private partnership. Is ahis was the story great way to get into that. University of washington history professor discusses her valleyhe code silicon and the remaking of america. In 1979, a Small Network with an unusual name pulled out a big idea, let viewers makeup their own minds. Topan opened the doors washington policymaking for all to see, bringing you unfiltered Congress Contest of congress and beyond. A lot has changed but this idea is more relevant than ever. Cspan is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up your own mind. Brought to you as a Public Service by your cable or satellite provider. Washington journal continues. The matthew weil is election project director of the bipartisan election services. He is here to talk about security ahead of the 2020 election. Are you ready . Where and what are your concerns . Guest i think we are ready, i think they will be better than in 2018. We learned a lot about our elections process. Policies, more early voting, and more technology. It does not mean that we do not have vulnerability still. That is the focus of congress and the State Governments who need to run better elections. Host how much federal money has been put into securing the president ial election . Guest in 2018, congress appropriated 2018 20 million. In march of 2019 march of 2018, and just because of the way that money goes to the states and how states get money down to the localities, a lot of that will impact 2018. The states are doing a great job of making sure the money gets spent before 2020, and it means about 95 of it will. There are a lot more needs than are available currently. Host where are states focusing their efforts and dollars . Guest the states are focusing on the voting systems, the way that americans are interacting with the voting process. They are focusing on the Voter Registration databases, the databases that we do not see that hold our voter histories, and how we interact with systems. These are the systems that were attacked and tried to be infiltrated. They are older and kind of being held together by duct tape. The states need to be putting money towards that, and those are the kind of things that we will be doing in 2020. Host since the 2016 election, we have seen these hacking attacks by foreign and nefarious interests on cities like baltimore that did not pop up so much before the 2016 election. Of we likely to see more those and how concerned are you that this will be a precursor to potential interference in the election in 2020. Guest i believe that is one scope of the vulnerability, but states and localities are focused on. I think it is one of the questions, and some localities, especially smaller ones. They have one i. T. System for their entire government which means the elections process is run on the same system as the police or fire stations. That is a vulnerability. Whether or not federal money can be sick can be used to secure those systems is one questions that one question that states have. Host you are the elections projects direct there, what does your director, what does your group do . Guest we are focused on creating voter centric policy that works with administrators and the voters themselves. We are working on ways to improve the Voter Registration process, and ways to improve the vote and the vote counting and auditing process. Some focus on the federal level, but mostly working on policymakers at the state level. Host looking at the federal level, what do you think the federal governments role is in securing elections . Guest they have a role, that is clear. There is a lot of debate about what the role is. I think there is a lot of agreement right now on funding the security of elections. We were attacked by a foreign adversary, no one expects the to repelflorida attacks from a state like russia by themselves. They need full federal backing because the expertise necessary to successfully defend against attacks will come from the federal level. The department of Homeland Security has done a huge amount of work to secure elections and help states become more aware of their vulnerabilities and to assess them. That is a great role and i hope that continues. Host going back to the state level, if you could pick one or two states that are exemplary and the things that they are doing, and a couple that need improvement, where would you point . Guest across the country, states are really focusing on this process. I do not know if there are one or two better ones. You have the state level and the local level administrator who actually has to be on the ground on election day. The states are taking this seriously. The states that had legacy missy machines that date back to 2000 are finding ways to pay for them, states like ohio are doing a great job being proactive. They spent 100 million to improve their voting system. With that said, other states are being a little bit slower to react. I think that is leaving them a little more vulnerable. Host in terms of voting systems, is there a push to look for that paper ballot backup in systems that are done electronically . Guest yes. I think it is one option. I think 20 years after the passage of the massive federal thatthere is a realization paper ballots are better for security. Americansms and most are going to vote on paperbased systems and in 12 states they will use electronic voting systems that have no paper backup. I think that is over the next two cycles a thing of the past, but it is a vulnerability for 2020. Host we welcome your calls for matthew weil. Of you8000 for those the eastern and central time zones. 2027488001 mountain and pacific time zones. The issue of russias interference in the 2016 election came up during Vice President pences News Conference. He reiterated the fact that they interfered in the 2016 election. There other international countries, adversaries potentially, that you are concerned about . Guest any. It does not matter who is doing the infiltration attempts, i think it is how we react to them. What the federal government has done through the department of Homeland Securitys help states secure some of their online connected systems, especially the Voter Registration databases. The first time, we were we are going to have a lot of information that can be passed down to the states so they can understand what is happening in california, and they can share that information with new jersey. I. T. E, it will allow the managers to shut down addresses as nefarious. These are new options for elected officials that did not exist in 2016. Host we have rick in louisville, ohio. Good morning. Old, and im 62 years grew up 11 of the population had no wealth when 1 of the population had no wealth. In the 16 the 1960s and 1970s in detroit. A viable election system in place. Populationf the controlled 60 of the wealth, that is called fascism. We have no election system in this country. You saw what happened with bush or the lastflorida, election you had hillary actually rigged the election against Bernie Sanders. The way that all of his works, and i have written three books about this, it is that all of the power in this country is in texas, california, and new york. New york and california is referred to as democrats, you have wall street, banking, the insurance industry, in new york. California has hollywood, silicon valley, so, if you look theyese three states, owned 100 of the media in this country. It is headquartered in new york, texas, or california. The last five wars host do you have a comment on Election Security . What is your thought . Caller the state of ohio will spend 100 Million Dollars for onction security, but election day, what they will do is manipulate whatever they have to manipulate just in order to figure out who gets enough votes to get elected. Host we will let rick go in ohio. Any comment, and what is the average figure spent to secure elections . Averagehere is no figure. I think states need to be doing more planning. So many of the voting systems are pieces of technology. Shouldt think that state always wait for the federal investment. Federal government basically the appropriation was not much. States really need to take it upon themselves to be planning for the replacement of the machines that they are buying right now. Host let us hear from jerry, new jersey. Good morning. Caller good morning. Caller that the called prior. I am a registered democrat and i have so many concerns about the party. Tryinge Hillary Clinton to take Bernie Sanders out, you coming out against President Trump, how the democrats colluded together to try and take him out not only prior to the election, but during his presidency. That is all going to come out. The Democrat Party is so corrupt that you will not get a fair election. This will be a nightmare. They will use the russia story if trump wins again to say that it was russia. You have to get this Democrat Party straightened out, it is a mess. Not you particularly, but i think the media and everything start better start waking up to what is happening. People know it, we all know it. I am a registered democrat and i know it. It is horrible and it has got to be straightened out. The democrats have to be shown to be as corrupt as they are. Host for people like her, how would reissue what reassurances can you give them about the security for the 2020 election . Guest i do think that with this toest collar, when i talk local Election Officials, sometimes they have ds or rs runnd their name, but they the election process in a nonpartisan way. They are concerned about running it in a fair way and not in a partisan way. I think that when it comes to the actual process, how the votes are cast and counted, that is a nonpartisan process that american should be proud about because i think it is a good example to the world. Looking for some of the funding, these are the total grants available, 380 million, s. A. F. E. Act would authorize 70 500 million to bolster and sustain Election Security. It would require implementation of cybersecurity used in the use ofbar Wireless Communications and require electronic Voting Machines be manufactured in the u. S. As that had has that passed . Guest congress is coming back next week, and they will be doing appropriations. This includes 600 million for new grant funding. I do not know what the senate will do. I think there is willingness to find a way to make more funding available for states in this latest process. The question will be, what is the restrictions on the funding, what is it used for . I think those are the questions that Congress Needs to discuss in the level of funding that they will agree to is up in the air. Host one of the pieces of that seems to be a nobrainer, not allowing cell phones in the polling place during an election. Guest i think that is more referencing the electronic or wireless communication of the actual Voting Machines. It is not that common, and i think that some states are using modems or Wireless Technology to share results, and that has pros and cons. Americans really want results quickly. Some jurisdictions are large. Resultscannot transmit electronically, they will be a delay in getting that vote record to the local jurisdiction for publication. That said, it is a vulnerability, and that will have pros and cons. Host and commerce and the things we do online, americans become trusting on their interactions online, sometimes with the consequences of being hacked. Apply withing would elections. People say we want to the Election Results fast. Watching them on cspan and elsewhere at night. Are anotherions example of something that people are becoming more comfortable with. They want results quickly, and what we are seeing is that when they do not get it quickly, they think there is something nefarious going on, and that is not the case. I do not think that elections are going online, i do not think we will see that anytime soon, movehe move right now is a away from Electronic Voting Technology where the machine counts the vote. Host because of what happened in 2016, did we see a rise in 20 early voting and absentee ballots . Guest i do not think we can have a causal relationship between that, i think there has been a rise in voting before election day, and i think we will see that. Voters like the convenience. Again, this is not an electronic problem, we have more vote by mail ballots and more in the mail system. That is a vulnerability that i think Election Officials are aware of and policymakers are not as aware of. They are focused on the big ticket items. Host let us hear from william in new york. Guest caller my question is for matthew. I hear a lot about russia interfering with our elections, i want to know that russia russia actually add or subtract votes, or how did they interfere . Could you answer that question . Guest i am not the one who is saying this, this is the federal government who have said that russians interfered with the elections, but that no vote totals were changed. That is what i have heard consistently from the secretaries of state and local Election Officials. The ways that it was able to interfere, he did not do a whole lot of interfering. A whole lot was getting into the systems and looking around. The systems that are most connected to the Voter Registration system, they could have, in some states changed records, but they did not. They had access. The question is, what would they do in 2020, and the impact of changing those records is chaos on election day. If you have been voting in new york your entire life, you assume that your Voter Registration records will be the same. Is able toable change the record and move it around to a different precinct or deleted completely, you will go to the polls and not be able to vote. That will backup the polling disruptingthat is the system. Host after the Mueller Report came out, the special counsel briefed members of the house and senate. You and your colleague ray read the piece of what the senate needs to ask. After that briefing, what did you hear from senators . Guest i think that they are still focused on scoring political points on the federal level. We were going to have these disagreements, but the role of the federal government is going to always be a partisan issue when it comes to elections. Comes tohat when it the federal government declaring elections as critical infrastructure. That was done by the outgoing obama administration, but there was a lot of distrust. What does that mean . Will they say this is how you have to run your elections . You have to have this kind of early voting or absentee voting. I think that the federal government has been a big resource, that said, while they are focused on partisan point scoring, they are letting the ball go by. There are vulnerabilities, we know about them, we did a good job in identifying them. Run, it was a better election. My concern is that people say we did not see the nefarious actions in 2018, so we fix the problem, we know that is not how this works. Any company or government that has internet connected databases should be aware that they are always under attack and they should staying uptodate and on par with those act errors. That requires with those actors. Requires resources Going Forward, consistently. Host let us hear from charlie, from texas. Waser one of my questions answered relative to nefarious activities of russia. Generallways hearing comments about russian interference but never exactly what form or fashion it took. Is in thesestion battleground states, what is being whatt is is being done to protect the voter rolls . The environment in washington the last couple of nothing would surprise me about an effort to defraud the American People of the most precious right that we have for political purposes, what is againstne to guard these battleground states about illegal border registrations. Benow it probably has to on the local jurisdictions and other things. Host we got your question. They were able to connect russia to what they try to do. But when it comes to Voter Registration, i think it is a mostly state function and there has not been a whole lot of action has had to do that. The states have banded together to create what is called the to create a program which has about 30 states in it. It is voluntary and the states funded themselves. Sharingram is state their Voter Registration lists through a secure server to make sure that voters are not appearing on more than one states Voter Registration rolls, so they can get removed to the federal process. It also does a little bit to identify people who are likely to be eligible but not registering where they are currently living. This is an example of a program that is really helping states create accurate and secure lists. Host from greenfield, tennessee. You are on the air . The way i think you can do this is a back to paper ballots. During the 2006 election i voted, and my ring jumped from ump pence. Reported it to the office because it was rigged. I do not think russia had anything to do it. Big money is running it. We need to do Something Different about that. And then we can get something done with the electoral system. Host her experiment her experience, is that argue for a printed ballot . Guest tennessee has one of those states that still has a significant number of jurisdictions voting without paper records. The voting systems, the ones that are touchscreens, we do not have to go back to far, it was all the rage, that was what people wanted, and that was the new technology, we wanted to get those before we got ipads now we are realizing that there are problems with it. It should not be surprised surprising that there are calibration issues. Ands do a lot of testing, states do a lot of testing so that when you touch the machine, it shows up right. To me that is not the biggest risk with these electronic voting systems. If you were to be touching the machine and showing your actual selection, and yet behindthescenes it is recording for someone else, that is the real reason why states and most voters want to away from the electric electronic machines. This you mentioned earlier, cell phones are obsolete in four or five years. States are finally becoming aware that they need to update those as frequently as other technology. Awareness,e is some but i do not think states are really prioritizing elections the way they need to. The reason is obvious. If you look at the local level pot local level, the local election is i do not have estimates at the state level. You are competing resources lownst resources against income individuals or disaster preparedness. It is difficult to prioritize, which is why the federal government has a role to play. When the federal government gives money to the states they have a match to the funds, which means an increase to give more of a stick to the states. That is something we should be considering. I think that states need to be taken more seriously. Typically elections are run locally, and the counties and districts are finding that election. Guest the state has varying degrees of control. Of localmajority jurisdictions have a significant outlier. Int let us hear from robert maryland. Mexico, ands, new arizona, that is 53 elect oral votes. Electoral votes. Illegals toing virginia, i do not know what virginia is worth. We are having illegals invade this country on the southwest border. The vulnerabilities that we have are the democrats are corrupting our system of voting. They are locking in the that is thetes, reason why we are having the illegals coming into this country. I have not heard you mention that at all. If you lock in those three states plus virginia, which they are shipping these leaders from texas to virginia to lock in these electoral votes. That is the biggest vulnerability. The illegals and foreigners voting in our elections that have no business voting in our elections. If they lock in those states, that is the end of that. Host how prevalent is that, somebody who is not a citizen voting in the u. S. . Guest it is rare, some states quit jet do a good job of putting out reports. They do it well. Ohio is a good example of a state that has a rigorous report that they put out shortly after each federal election. They do prosecute. There are bad ways of doing this texas earlier this year made a lot of news about potential noncitizens voting. Matt raised confidence issue that raised confidence issues in the system. Once they started investigating, a lot of the noncitizens were citizens, and the numbers were low of people who have not registered. Democrats are having concern over technology. The chairman of the dnc killed plans for a virtual caucus, saying that the plans for a virtual caucus in iowa and nevada are dead as the chairman said the results would be vulnerable to hacking and abuse. Thechairman declared position to plan for telephone voting submitted by the early key voting states of iowa and nevada envisioned as part of the efforts to increase participation in the 2020 nominating. You surprised . Guest i agree with that. Those kind of systems are vulnerable bill. I do not are vulnerable. I do not think that American Voters see the difference between the caucus and the voting process. Caucuses are not run by Election Officials. Election officials know how to do voting, which is why would support more primaries. Laws that cover elections do not cover caucuses. Host they are run by the party. Let us hear from eric in washington, the nations capital. Caller good morning. Good. Amazing that all these saying that all of these illegal people voting and getting shipped to virginia. You have a gentleman in the white house, and then you have these people that say that the democrats are doing all of this stuff to our voting. But you have a republican running the white house. If there is a legal stuff going on, then it should be corrected. But these people with these crazy theories and saying that the democrats are not democrats no more. The problem is that the toocratic party is going ground on these people. The only corruption we have going on in the white house. That is our corruption, that is what it comes to. I appreciate it, but show these people the truth. They are doing a falsified, and you should speak that. Are limited on what but please, let these people know what you are saying is the truth. Host i appreciate you for i appreciate that input. Hown we have from twitter, secure is the early voting process in manipulation in from manipulation and single party controlled areas . Open for have centers an extended period of time, sometimes they are brought back sometimes they are secured at the site. Andnt think the one Party Two Party problem are different, the vulnerabilities are the same. We have ballots out there that have to be brought back. I want to take issue with the caller and say when i speak to democrats and republicans across the country, the people who are running the elections take this very seriously. I think it will be embarrassing thaty state defined proof people who are not citizens or not registered are casting ballots. State,wants that in the and that is important for voters to hear because it is not happening. Host this is james in san diego. You were on. Caller good morning. I totally disagree with you about illegal voting. Voter registration, in california, and a lot of ballots were sent to illegals. You cannot prove a negative negative. You cannot go to everybodys home and say are you a citizen and eligible to vote. Motor voter was a concern. It is because of the illegals in the state of california. I have two residencies. I have a residence in california and texas. I received ballots in both of those dates. I realize i can only vote in one of those two, but i have homes in both of them. That is called double voting, and i understand what you said. Host the question about motor Voter Registration. Guest if you go back to the original in 1990 three, we are 25 years in implementation, it has vastly improved, but there are some limitations. It was passed in a different environment where we did not have the internet or online Voter Registration. There are a lot of good things that motor voter made Voter Registration a lot easier, and a little more standardized to how to remove voters. Sometimes it takes four years to beers to re removed if they cannot independently verify. California allow noncitizens to have a drivers license and is that a concern. Guest i think it is a concern, but where this is becoming more of an issue. One of the very popular policies is automatic Voter Registration, which means Different Things to different states. In california they are trying to register as many people as possible. When you do that you will hit people who are not eligible, and it is incumbent on the people that they are trying to get registered. You are not a citizen, you should not be in this forum. They are asked very early, but it is possible that voters are being added to the list. But we do not have proof that these people are casting ballots. Host mike, from los angeles. Caller hello, and thank you for taking my call. I believe that russias interference in our election is truth. Donald trump is not our real president and the peoples real joys. He got to power with russias help and i believe our democracy is in danger. Unfortunately the traditional system did not do good, and it ruined the Peoples Trust and reputation. People around the world think that the u. S. Cannot have a real such a countryw can be the leader of the free world, and i think we should we cut the election and do not vote until election systems are repaired. And now your guest sits here and says that everything is ok, it is absurd. Please say the truth. Thank you. Host your thoughts . Guest i do not said that everything was ok. There is a lot of vulnerabilities, but the process is better today. I think the strength of our system lies in the fact of whether you like or dislike the president , the president has no role in the elections process. Host was there evidence that russia changed votes . Guest everything that we have heard from the fbi, from Homeland Security, and the states is that they are no votes weret changed in 2016. Host where is the status in voter id laws. It seemed like a number of states were adopting that. What is the trend . Guest i think the states that were going to do and have done it. Certainly there are different kinds of voter id that has survived legal challenges. So, that is not the focus anymore. What we are seeing is more legislation on the state level about Voter Registration processes, about how much more if they should have early voting. Should voters be allowed to cast ballots. Those are the things happening more now than voter id laws. Host how much does your organization help the states . What is your role in getting the states to improve their systems . Guest they are made up of 21 local and state Election Officials from across the country. Half are democrats and half are republicans. They represent small and large jurisdictions. We think that when it comes to creating better election policies, the voices that are being drowned out are the Election Officials who have to implement elections. A lot of groups out there are very strongly pushing for their preferred changes to the process. Some of them i might agree with top liney, some of the of policies that i mentioned on that Voter Registration or early voting, these things happen over time and states get their there by changing underlying laws to build up to top line policies. My concern is that you will see a wave of the policies passing across the country that are not implementable. We are making sure that policymakers are aware of those issues and if they want to go in that direction they can do so in a successful way. Dorothy, us hear from from michigan. Caller good morning. My comments regarding the statements that the people are making saying that the democrats are corrupt, i do not believe it, because i watched the republicans, and they let you know that they really do not care about the system, all they care about is winning. In the democrats are not that way. And, i again just do not believe that the democrats are as corrupt as they say. There may be some corruption everywhere, but the republicans are more corrupt. Thank you. Host al is next, from new york. Caller good morning. In theterested statistics or facts regarding the last president ial election. I have been told that in terms of Voter Participation or where clintonhat got about 63 million votes, and trump got 61 million votes, that there were about 90 Million People who did not vote who could have voted. Are those statistics about right . Right,that sounds about and certainly we have a system that does not force and importance to vote. That said, what we are seeing is a steady increase in participation rates. A record voter turnout during the midterms in 2018. Why i want to focus on voting security at the policy level, i do think that one very misunderstood and not focused on issue that could happen is a return to some of the long lines we saw in 2008 and 2012. We saw a turnout in 2018, states, some of them will be implementing new technology either this year or for the primary next year so voters will be unaware of some of the systems that they are voting on. There will be more voting ortems and available in 2016 2012. We will have the same number of systems, and more voters. That could lead to turnout concerns and long lines. Long lines are just as good at undermining confidence as any other problem. Host we have not touched on this issue, the issue of false ads on facebook and social media platforms. This is a piece on the wall street journal, saying executives publicly touted their efforts ahead of brazils president ial election as evidence as the companys progress in stopping it. Ide the company the what is your take . Guest it is a big concern and has been an issue for the long time for a long time. Things,e said the right it seems like they are not always meeting all of the targets they set for themselves. Right now it is a little bit of the wild west. As companies and broadcast companies have some requirements on stand by your ad so that candidates and groups cannot just say whatever they want, they have to take ownership. That does not exist online. Anything the platforms are doing is at their own interest. I believe the platforms, google, twitter, snapchat, and facebook, if they cannot figure it out in 2020, we will see a lot more legislation Going Forward about how they interact with the election process. Host this is james, and mississippi. In morning. Caller good morning. I wanted to ask you a question if you were familiar with what is happened in the recent gop runoff in the state of mississippi . Guest are you referring to the changing of the candidate on the electronic voting machine . Caller yes sir. I figured it was a very good realworld example of what happens when old technology, or older to knology is lamented in a realworld election. Guest i think you are right. That is what it was, i do not believe it was nefarious. I have no evidence of that myself. These are old pieces of technology and they need to be calibrated correctly for the voter. A time intensive process, and it is not perfect. When voters are facing this and are able to take their phones into the voting booth and share it widely, these are not they doad issues, but compromise electronic voting systems and that is why we support voting systems that have the durable paper record. Host after that election, what did mississippi say about what they would do with the issue . Caller immediately that day, Election Officials say that they were rectifying the problem. They brought out paper ballots to make sure that everyone had a consistent vote. Many precinct this was in many precincts. Level, there is a serious debate about dating a lot of these machines, and many of the in many of these precincts. Host your thoughts on that . Guest this is one of the areas that voters are concerned about. It is the part of the process that they are most in touch with. They actually vote on these machines, and they do not trust them. I do not know how much more policymakers need to hear and the voters are not trusting the technology they are using to spur them to invest in better resources. Host the Associated Press filed a report, new election systems use vulnerable software. People have to Learn New Technology it seems in some cases, there must a bit of a learning curve for all of us. Guest it is a learning curve, and i think states try not to implement these things in federal election years when they know that turnout will be high. The said, last year, federal government made another significant investment in the voting process. Those machines are probably going to be implemented hopefully by the primary, so voters can get a little bit of a Comfort Level for the president ial election. Host carrie, in virginia. Caller hello. Can you hear me . Host we can. Caller i would like to make a couple points. Backup they should have paper ballots that should be compared to the electronic ballot to make sure that there is nothing that should match. Woman saidhat the about the democrats. I am a democrat, and i feel like the dnc has become corrupt and that they changed their Mission Statement from what i read to not only say that their mission is to elect democrats, but to protect incumbents, which sounds insane. That is not their mission. I will not donate to the dnc ever again until they get someone in there that has a moral compass, i guess. Regarding bespoke, i am concerned about facebook i am concerned about deep fakes, when they can make pictures that are so real. Older moree 65 and likely to not research to find out if they are true. I worry more about what americans are doing to our system than russians. Host we will wrap it up with carrie. Guest facebook and the deepfakes is something im confirmed about concerned about. That is a little bit out of my area of expertise. I do think that congress is not up to speed on how to regulate these internet companies. I do think it is coming and americans expect it. It is not just an election, these are issues that will transcend policy areas across ways americans live their lives and i think it is an important issue. Host elections project director at the bipartisan Election Center bipartisan policy center. Back to the issue of Emergency Preparedness during times of disaster. We will talk to thomas frank and a new investigative report on the u. S. Federal Disaster Response capabilities and their shortfalls. Your calls are welcome and your comments are to as washington journal continues. Campaign 2020ns coverage of the democratic president ial candidate at the New Hampshire Democratic Party convention. Live coverage is saturday at 9 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. Org or at the free radio app. This is the story of how this whole new economy was built, and i have always been really interested, ever since i was working in washington on how business and government interact with one another. An antagonistic relationship and a collaborative relationship. The real story of American History is one of Publicprivate Partnership in ways that are unseen. This was a really great way to get into that. University of washington history professor Margaret Omara discusses her book. Sunday night at eight eastern on q and a. In 1979, a Small Network rolled out a big idea. Let viewers make up their own minds. Cspan opens the doors to washington policymaking for all to see, bringing you unfiltered content from congress and beyond. A lot has changed, but today the big idea is more relevant than ever. On television and online, cspan is your view on government so you can make up your own mind, brought to you as a Public Service by your cable or satellite provider. Washington journal continues. Host tom frank is a staff writer with e e news and the author of a report on u. S. Federal Disaster Response. The headline, why the u. S. Disaster agency is not ready for catastrophes. What prompted e e to investigate . Guest i covered fema for a number of years going back to the bush administration, george w. Bush. I have been aware that there is been this ongoing issue for years that fema response to events and disasters that are not really disasters, and i decided that after all of the damage that occurred in 2017 with hurricanes harvey, irma, and maria, that it was a good time to look at how much fema personnel and how much fema money were being diverted to things like snowstorms in New Hampshire and tornadoes in oklahoma, and were not available to go to massive flooding and incredible debit damage in the Virgin Islands and puerto rico. Host why is fema set up to respond to lesser emergencies like that and not focused on the major catastrophes that hit the country . Guest it is a long story that i told him 3000 words. Version iss digest it is statutory and regulatory. Onlyby statute response to major disasters. What is a major disaster . Fema has historically defined it as based on a dollar amount of damage, and that dollar amount has historically been very low. Some ways, has put itself in the situation by setting the threshold very low for when it comes to the rescue and help states instead of saying the states, you can dig your way out of that snowstorm, we do not need to help you. Host shorthand version is that they have not adjusted for inflation. They seem to be playing the nice money thatamount of they give to states. They have not adjusted that metric. Guest they have not. They have not adjusted the metric in a way that keeps up with inflation, or that actually accurately measures whether fema needs to come and help, or whether a state can take care of it on its own. Some of that is not necessarily playing the nice guy, but fema is a political agency, and it response to pressures from states and members of congress who are some of the biggest cheerleaders for fema, and among the last people who want fema to say, we are not going to help your state. Appropriators say how are you helping on that disaster in missouri, you do not want to say, i am sorry senator but we will not help. Underlying legislation , the stafford act, created away for the federal government to assist state and local governments. How far back did you track the money and response that fema over the number of years . Guest back to 1998, and i stopped at 1998 only because fema puts a lot of great Information Online and has all of the spending information going back as far as 1998, i could have gotten more going back more years, it wouldve required open records requests that would have taken a long time, and the point was easily made over 20 years of spending data. Host tom frank is our guest. His pieces focused on fema and the response to emergency and why the agency is not ready for catastrophes. We welcome your calls and comments. You can call us at 2027488000 if you are a democrat. Republicans can use 2027488001. For independents, there is 2027488002. We touched on some of the political pressure that members of congress feel, governors push in terms of a response, why have states upped the amount of money that they are responsible for in responding to disasters . Guest to some extent they have, they have not done it enough, partly because they know that the spigot is very is easy to turn on, and that is a security blanket that means that states now that when something really bad happens, when Hurricane Dorian hits florida, georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, that the federal government will be there with money, personnel, and a whole range of assistance. Dependency,ed this and breaking the dependency is hard to do. It is not something you can say, tomorrow we are cutting you off. It is something that a lot of Emergency Managers think should be done, and want to be done, but they do not know how to do it. Host explain the process. A pending disaster, the disaster declares a area. How does the process get started for fema to come in and for that funding to be provided . Guest the process starts with a letter from the governor, it has to, a letter from the governor to the president through the fema Regional Office. The Regional Office reviews the numbers, the governors request will say we estimate our state has suffered 20 million worth of damage. , they willeview it either go back to the governor and say, your numbers do not work it is not enough, or they say that the numbers work and they will send it to the white house. The white house reviews it, and that largely involves the office of management and budget, which attention to close any spending request and then recommends an approval and rejection. As a matter of fact, if fema recommends approval, it almost always gets approved. People says that the president approved it, it is not like President Trump is sitting down and reading the 20 page letter. A statutory power that president s have. They largely it is largely pro forma. Femashe cost is responsibility or the states . , and primary the states that creates a conflict of interest. The states have a great interest in getting aid, which means if they have to meet a certain damage threshold, then every motivation they have every ovation to overestimate damage. Fema goes over the numbers, but fema does not have the time or itemnnel to do a line scrutiny over every road and sewer repair object . Host do they audits the numbers . Guest after or before the fact . I do not know that they do. Fema knows that the governor will estimate 50 million of damage and the damage will end up being 20 million. There is no penalty or claw back. I think fema is of the mind that it happens, it is not a perfect system, but we would rather err on the side of helping. Guest,om frank is our and we welcome your calls and comments. 2027488000 free democrats. Four for republicans. We saw theekend, former fema administrator on face the nation. I want to play you his comments about how often fema is called upon and get your reaction. [video clip] faceshink fema Unrealistic Expectations by congress and the merrick in public. The standards in which we declare need to be increased. At 50 of the disasters, they are less than 7. 5 Million Dollars. In some cases we have to stop looking at fema as 911. If we want to get better and become more resilient and respond better than we have to refocus training on how we ask citizens to be prepared, not just having supplies for five to seven days, but teaching them how to become financially resilient, that insurance is the first line of defense and teaching them tangible skills like cpr and they face active shooter events. We also have to bolster state and local capabilities. More importantly, until Congress Starts to incentivize putting building codes in place, landuse planning, and Incentivizing States and locals for ensuring their Public Interest infrastructure, femas job is impossible. We have to set realistic expectations for the agency, and really bolster the capability from neighbor helping neighbor all the way to the federal management agency. [end video clip] host what did you hear . Guest i hear him saying something that he said while he was fema administrator from mid2017 to march of this year. I hear him making a point that his predecessor made, and that a lot of people in the agency make. Said, femas he cannot respond to everything. As disasters become much more intense and much more damaging, fema really has to focus on the Hurricane Harvey and the Hurricane Maria, and not the snowstorms that dump 12 inches of snow. Host we will get to your calls momentarily. The u. S. House is coming in for pro pro formas forma session. Next up, we will take you live to the house floor for a few minutes