748-8001. a couple of other ways to take part in this program. you can send us a text. please leave your name and where you are calling from. dial this number. texts this003 four morning. @cspanwj is our twitter handle. one of the biggest newsmakers is something that did not make news last night. it is the much awaited for des moines register final poll before the iowa caucuses. the headline and politico says the des moines register poll has been scrapped after an apparent mishap. they write that the widely anticipated poll at the register, cnn, and media, put out of likely democratic caucus-goers was scrapped shortly before it was set to be released after complaints from the campaign of pete buttigieg about how it was conducted. west desnsors and moines-based pollster seltzer & co. means the results of a historically accurate survey will not be released before the caucuses. haspolitical media universe been left dumbfounded. aboutg serious concerns the pole with cnn and the register with one source. a senior advisor to the buttigieg campaign confirmed on twitter that the former south bend indiana mayor's campaign was in touch with media outlets about the issue and hailed their decision to withhold the result. according to two sources theiar with the poll, font size on the monitor potentially cutting off names on the randomized list of candidates. -- the des moines register deciding to scrapped this much anticipated poll. reaction coming in. the new york times this morning writing that at least one candidate has spoken out immediately seeking to exploit the uncertainty arising from all of this. taking the stage in a des moines hotel ballroom andrew yang told an audience that the sudden cancellation has spawned all manner of rumors. they said they are not releasing it and we are like what happened , mr. yang said. a rumor they had gotten was that they did really well in that pole. -- poll. the washington post following candidates making their final push. joe biden used closing arguments to present himself as the status choice for voters worried about finding a nominee who can defeat president trump. likeor elizabeth warren other senators stuck in washington this weekend with the impeachment trial made an explicit appeal to women in priest herself as one who can and will unite the party. the buttigieg campaign tried to rally the party around a call for generational change while bernie sanders used weekend concerts and rallies to mobilize what many strategists consider to be an army of dedicated. hasually every campaign come to predict that sanders could turn out more than any other candidate. -- we have been hearing from jane sanders, the wife of bernie sanders. as i have gone around the country with him and talk to audiences i recognize that same feeling in people when they are listening to him. and of times people come in they are just here to check it changing you can see a in even their stance, they might be listening at first and they are leaning forward. somebody toey found speak for them. i am so proud to be at his side in this campaign. let alone in his life. i am a very lucky woman. i thought he embodied everything i believed in back then and i still do. i can tell you as somebody who has known him for almost 40 honest as he is as the day is long and consistent as the sun rises. i think it is important for voters to know that, because we have all gone through campaigns where we hear people say what they believe today on the issues that are important to them or that are important to their audience today. what i believe we need especially in this campaign is somebody that we know without a doubt will consistently follow through on what he says. that he believes what he says, he means what he says, and he carries it out. bernie is that man. bernie sanders on his way back from washington to iowa. we will hear from many candidates over this next 45 minutes as we cover a lot of events. we will be covering more today. before we get to calls, the sunday review section. the new york times asking the same question we are. each ofgins, shots of the leading candidates. at the bottom of the paid to they ask which of these candidates can take on donald trump? democrat from aurora, illinois. who do you like? warren i like elizabeth but she seems to be lagging right now and that is regrettable to me. ideas as far as reconfiguring the financial structure of america as far as , as far as student loans. that is a bernie platform plank. why do yous lagging, think that is? because people don't have enough trust that a new as far as health care is concerned has a chance of performing the way that it is being conceptualized. because theettable insurance companies are there just like michael moore has point out, they are there to say no. stop and lowerto and minimize available coverage -- i am going through it myself. areve an injury and they slow walking me as far as the promise that is proffered as opposed to what in reality happens. that people dole not have enough -- i have seen elizabeth warren for two decades performing on the political stage and i do trust her. host: thanks for calling. david from akron, ohio. david, what do you think, who can beat president trump? caller: good morning, thanks for taking my call. i am a bernie sanders supporter. trumpk he can stand up to better than any other candidate. he has been consistent his entire political life, he has never flip-flopped on social security like biden. he has never misrepresented his heritage like elizabeth warren. i like his ideas but bernie to me is the only one i completely trust. host: there are a number of stories this weekend and they express angst in the democratic party about bernie sanders possibly winning the nomination. the word socialist is put out in those pieces. what do you make of that critique? caller: here is what i tell my friends. first of all we have a lot of socialistic programs right now that are very successful. if we were living in a small not going toe were each build an individual bridge, we pool our money and build a common bridge, that is democratic socialism. in the building of that bridge we have engineers, and everyone. that is free enterprise. free enterprise and democratic socialism complement each other. the thing about enterprise is you have to have rules that protect the community. if i'm a paint manufacturer i should not be able to dump my waist in the river hurting another community downstream to maximize profits. moneynow the big interests have captured the legislature and written laws that are lax and that is why we live more in an oligarchy than a democracy. host: david, thank you for calling here. thehe new york post, fear bern, democratic elite terrified of a sanders win. they are in a panic over this with polls showing him pulling away from the field in iowa and new hampshire. theing that if he wins nomination the heart of the party will form a never bernie coalition and stay home, both third-party or for trump said one aligned democrat. as far ashe numbers real politics as they do their poll average. in iowa, bernie sanders, 28.3%. joe biden 20%. elizabethgieg 15 and warren 15.6%. sanders leading the way in the combined polls. elizabeth warren in iowa. making her closing argument to voters. warren: 2020 is our moment. i am asking you to commit today to caucus for me. do someto volunteer and phone banking and knocking on doors. go to elizabethwarren.com. get in this fight. history will not come our way again. , dream big,moment fight hard, and win. >> taking comments from democrats only this morning. who do you think is the best candidate to take on president trump? voting in iowa is tomorrow. about 1700 precincts over the state, schools and church buildings and other public places and private homes they will be caucusing. livell have two separate actual caucus events on the air tomorrow. one of them on this network, c-span from the des moines area. another one from a more rural part of the state on c-span two. barry is calling from new york. caller: good morning, thank you for c-span. the previous caller i think did a great job. he hit pretty much every point i was about to make. the one thing i don't think he addressed was what you brought up which was what i believe polling showing people are a bernienervous about being a democratic-socialist. been knocking on a lot of doors and collecting a lot of petition signatures for him so i have met a lot of people. the subject has come up once or twice. probably the most dramatic case of a groceryfront store and an older gentleman saw me there with my sign collecting and he pulled his expensive german car up to the curb and jumped out and started admonishing me for supporting a socialist and told me that after the war he had been in some soviet bloc country and didn't -- and wanted to buy shoes and couldn't because he size 10.only had all irnie once and want is for workers in the united states get health care. bernie does not want you to have to give up your german car in order for everyone to get it. he may want someone like jeff bezos to give up one of his super yachts, but someone who is actually going to a grocery store to buy groceries is not in that category. believe bernie is the best. dedicated most volunteer base and the reason for that is bernie is trusted. you really have to ask yourself on the scale of bernie to trump, who do you trust the most? host: perry is calling from annapolis, maryland. democrats only this morning. who is your candidate? who has the best chance to beat president trump? caller: i think bernie does. the country is looking for change. , they are not at the washington or wall street level. bernie is not a communist. he's not even a socialist. if he gets elected he has to deal with the congress. moreover there is no socialism possibility in this country. won.alism the problem with capitalism is it is not responding to the people who are responding to bernie. flow --money and the inequality -- all the money is moving up. it is not the way it used to be when you had effective unions and the money was spread around more often. i am not saying the government should decide where the money goes other than taxation. capitalism isat not working for the working class in america. 80% of america -- they need some help. i don't mean giveaways or anything else. wealth and power in america has shifted to the top and people are tired of it. elected because there is a revolution in this country. bernie was there with trump and they were both talking about changes. trump succeeded because he appealed to the working class. thoselinton characterized people as the deplorables. when she said that i was finished with her. she was up on wall street shaking the big money tree where she came from. i am quite angry. speaking of bernie, everything in the washington post beats up on bernie. what is going on in this country. host: let's hear from john from saint clairsville, ohio. caller: thank you. i have called myself a yellow dog democrat all my life up until 2016. i voted for bernie in the primary and i voted for trump in the general. i am voting for bernie again. my dad had never voted in his entire life. my mother, first time i ever saw her take an interest in politics was during the anita hill trial. she told me after that trial, don't ever ask me to vote for biden because i will never do it. they came out with the boat on the iraq war, i set i will never vote for anyone in the primaries, any democrat that went along with the war which is hillary and biden. me withlly did it for biden's the social security thing. i heard on the pbs newshour that he had been for cutting social security. i checked with four libraries to check it out and found out he make cuts to it and raise the age to collect it. i got a library that joe biden has called for social security cuts three times, by sean williams. the people that put out the article, it agreed with the biden cuts. this is not complaining about it. on other books you can get biden's dealings, the price of politics by bob woodward talks about the deals when biden was negotiating with the republicans . he is pushing for that kind of thing. he sounds more like a republican than a democrat. there is a book called secret empires. there is a chapter in there. there is corruption on both sides. there is a chapter on biden, the bidens with the present have thing -- anyways. i guess i said most of what i wanted to say. host: john, we appreciate you calling in. a text from bill this morning, texting from paris. bill is a u.s. citizen. he says pete buttigieg is the way forward, he is a genius. not one of the senators running will convince a -- could convince them to vote for witnesses. he makes points with intelligence and clarity. he can govern. from new york city. unfortunately only caucasian males can be trump, biden or bernie both have to start taking to talking a lot louder. gazette has the story, hopeful storm iowa in last page for support. taking a favorite is still elusive for some democrats, too many candidates to choose from. the chicago tribune tracking the action in iowa. hours, four candidates, one city, democratic front runners make final iowa caucus pitches in cedar rapids. a shot of elizabeth warren there. a shot of joe biden down here taking selfies with some reporters. was the subject of a conversation with jody ernst, the senator from iowa, she was speculating on how the impeachment trial might impact joe biden's prospects in iowa. caucuses are this next monday evening. i am really interested to see how this discussion today informs and influences the iowa caucus voters as democratic caucus-goers. will they be supporting vice president biden at this point? senatorwas jody ernst, from iowa earlier this week. we hear from the former vice president and senator joe biden in this next clip from iowa yesterday. he is making closing arguments to voters and reacts to what joni ernst brings up. did you hear what you're senator said, jody ernst? iowa caucuses are this next monday, i am interested to see how this discussion today where they were going after me on the floor of the senate with lies -- this discussion today informs and influences iowa caucus voters. will they still support joe biden at this point? [laughter] [applause] you have to give her credit, she is really subtle isn't she? will respond and read the ithington post headlines, says trump and republicans join forces to attack biden ahead of iowa caucuses. it's pretty simple. i wonder why they don't want me to be the nominee. i wonder why he is so concerned if i am the nominee, he is just defending the republic. nominee if i am the will beat him like a drum. host: joe biden from iowa yesterday. the front page of the sunday des moines register, in addition to the story about the pole being scrapped they have this story. questions the iowa caucus will answer as the cycle ends." we have beverly on the line from bedford, ohio. who do you think can take on and possibly beat president trump? caller: believe it or not i the lawn patrick. is inthe right age, he his mid-60's. he is the former governor of massachusetts. a normalto have marriage, you know what i mean? i don't know his policy, he has not been on tv much. he would be the best. i think he could be trump if people get behind him. most of these democrats are too far left. i don't think any of them can be donald trump. the one who is not front left is biden but he is up in age. bernie is as well. at that age he may have dementia. he will be 80 when he gets in office. val patrick is in his mid-60's and he is a politician, that is what we need. is there a particular policy that you are aware of with governor patrick that you like? what else does he have that can be president trump -- beat president trump? i have note i said seen him on tv much. i think i've only seen them on tv two or three times. talks, i think he has only been married once, he is concerned about his wife, his wife had cancer. he is the right age and he is a former politician. we need a former politician. he is not a billionaire. we don't need these billionaires. host: what is wrong with having a billionaire? caller: money changes people. a normal income salary -- we know donald trump because he is a multibillionaire. we had so much trouble with him as a multibillionaire. host: all right beverly. let's hear from john. who is the best candidates to take on president trump? we have to think about the ticket. mccain would have one if he did pick sarahe did not palin as a vice president. but i think heg should be the vice president and klobuchar should be the president. host: what do each of them bring to that ticket? buttigieg dohen another -- he knows eight languages. he has more experience. --uess klobuchar pete buttigieg ticket. host: you put amy klobuchar up top, she would be your preferred candidate. what would she bring to a race with president trump? does she have that suggest she could be the president? caller: because she has already area.publican she has already won against republican -- textbook republican area. voice of john the there, campaign 2020 coverage live coverage continuing today. we will have amy klobuchar campaigning in cedar rapids, iowa live at noon eastern time today. later in the afternoon at 3:00 p.m. eastern it is tom steyer in iowa. as you heard over the weekend he is going to take some phone calls once he is done with that event. if you want to call back in later for tom steyer you can do that. coverage of the caucuses tomorrow night at 7:30 p.m. eastern time. caucus event on c-span and c-span two. we will be in milo, iowa. democratic caucus live on c-span2 at 7:30. p.m.ll join you at 9:30 eastern for caucus results. you can watch that today and tomorrow night on the c-span network. pierre is calling from washington, d.c.. who do you like? caller: i like a lot. anyone of them could be trump, anyone has to be trump. -- beat trump. any democrat that gets the nomination has my vote. my eyes are on the prize. i have donated to a few like pete, and klobuchar, and biden. if any of them gets nominated they have my vote because we have to get this guy out. i am on board. host: a couple of texts. i have been a buttigieg supporter since the beginning and he has only cemented that support. lobuchar is my second option. trump will eat sanders alive. mike bloomberg is featured here in the new york post, unveiling a $5 trillion tax plan. mike bloomberg is feeling philanthropic, this time with your money. the 2020 presidential candidate unveiled $5 trillion to promote new taxes as part of his sweeping domestic program that would pay for infrastructure projects and investments in green energy and affordable housing, education, and health care. raises rates on wealthy individuals and corporations, closes loopholes, crackdowns on tax avoidance, reduces the tax advantages that investors have over workers. the candidate said in a statement from the new york post. we have the former mayor of south bend indiana, pete buttigieg, a couple of colors and textures have talked about this morning. he is in autumnal, iowa. -- such a big opportunity to win in the white house and the state race that it sends a shockwave to reignite congressional republicans with their conscience. that means having the right nominee. i don't think we should have to choose between bold ideas we are excited about and what it takes to win. iowa has a remarkable track record when it comes to expanding american's imagination about what is possible in our politics. the first time i was in this area was 12 years ago as a campaign volunteer knocking on doors for a senator with a funny name. yous here in iowa when changed what america thought was possible by delivering that historic victory. i was not here in person in iowa but i was watching the news when you all gave me permission to believe that one day i would have the opportunity to wear this wedding ring i have on. iowa has a way of making history. [applause] that is what i am asking of you now. canjust a president you look at and feel your blood pressure go down instead of up through the roof. that is a public health bonus. speak to these issues and never forget that politics is personal and it affects our lives. every election is about one question, how is my life going to be different with this president? on, i amy to take him never going to let him change the subject. the less we talk about him the more we talk about you. host: back to your calls this sunday morning. democrats only, who is the best candidate to take on president trump? mark is calling from cincinnati. yes sir. i believe that biden all the way. a foreign relation understanding and how to deal with that, climate control knows how to deal with that, i believe all three times, biden, biden, biden. commanderecome in chief and do the right thing and do a good job. host: on the line from jacksonville, florida, hello, connie. are you with us? caller: i am here. bernie sanders would be an excellent candidate to help pull this country back together. he policies, the things that has done in the past will help unite this country. i think he would be the best candidate. he energizes the youth, the middle-age, and we seniors are getting on board. of his people because they were so angry that bernie did not win, they did not vote. i feel the same thing would happen this time. thank you, that is my comment. host: here is a bernie sanders story from the huffington post, bernie sanders once the iowa latinos to join a political revolution. whether they take them up on the offer could determine his fate in the iowa caucuses. in terms of demographics in iowa , in that state according to whitetes in 2019, 85.3% 6.2% african-american, 2.7% -- lynn from massachusetts says the only candidate i think that can be trump is joe biden, the republicans want bernie sanders or elizabeth warren to be the nominee because they think they can beat them on socialist beliefs. theher text, if bernie gets nomination donald trump will walk right back into the office. fromn is on the line clearfield, pennsylvania. who do you like on the democratic side? caller: i will tell you right now. [indiscernible] to be interesting to see who goes a i had in the polls in pennsylvania. it's going to determine who wins the nomination and who is part of it. this might be the year we have a first woman democrat president. that might be elizabeth warren. i saw her campaign on c-span. she has some good ideas and people keep putting her down. have something in mind that might help this country get back together again. this country has never had a woman president in this country's history. wouldn't that be something? host: what do you make of the fact that she has dropped in the polls quite considerably at least in iowa? i can understand what you mean they are about she has dropped in the polls. i will tell you something now. she knows what's best for this country. she has campaigned in almost every state. i know she is behind in votes in iowa. i saw that this morning on my laptop computer. not have the caucus in iowa. host: alright calvin, thank you so much. on facebook, susan, she likes elizabeth warren, she works hard and has a plan for everything. kathleen on facebook says "i would like to believe any democratic candidate can beat the president but who knows, i will vote for the democrat." vaughn is on the line, go ahead please. is the i think bernie standout. talks been talking the that he is for the common everyday folks for a long time. i have heard him on tom hartman every friday, i love the things he says and i love the things he stands for. i believe that if we get anybody else -- what we need is a new deal like fdr. for this country. if we get anybody else it's going to be status quo. i can't trust elizabeth to tell the truth. i don't know if i can trust her. and then biden? i am sure the republicans are saying, you want to trade one crook for another rook. bernie, all the way. we need a manufacturing base in this country. we need to get it back. he is talking about that. that is a big deal. tell me what isn't socialism in this country? what isn't socialist? is a big week here in washington as well as in iowa and on the campaign trail. the iowa caucuses are tomorrow. tuesday night is the president's state of the union address, we will be on the air at 8:00 with a preview program. also is the impeachment trial, completion of the impeachment trial. the senate will come in tomorrow withinal closing arguments lawyers for each side of this case, the litigant in each side of the case. they will open up the senate floor and a regular senate session for a couple of days so senators can make their comments on the whole case. they will get 10 minutes each and we expect that final vote on the articles of impeachment on wednesday afternoon around 4:00. the senate in session monday, tuesday, and wednesday, part senate trial and part regular floor action. pam is calling from providence, rhode island. pam, who do you like? caller: good morning. i am for bernie sanders. first humanitarian and environmental reasons as well as many others. that he was born more evolved than many of the other candidates have become. debate lookould a like between bernie sanders and donald trump? that bernieink sanders would make donald trump look like the more on he is -- moron he is. i would embarrass him and think trump is afraid of bernie sanders. vocabulary.rs has a host: all right, pam. we want to talk about money. trump and the rnc flush with cash, spending over 9 million in they had 195 million dollars on hand for his reelection campaign. in the final quarter they spent over $6 million on digital at. in the washington post today, all polls -- with less january cash on hand than the previous quarter. point 2anders had 18 million, buttigieg 14 and a half million. elizabeth warren $7 million and biden had $5 million according to new fec filings. they spent $517 million total in the fourth quarter of 2019. the last couple of calls before we move on to the guest segment. chris from st. paul, minnesota. 2 caller: thanks for having me on. orould go with biden klobuchar or buttigieg. i think they are all great. it is hard for me to pick. i worry about bernie sanders, not because he is not a good candidate because i think he is, but he is a terrible candidate against trump. -- oftire point of the this should be a referendum on trump and if it becomes a referendum on socialism that is a dangerous place for democrats to go. congressmanr and who is trying to run against asmp will be branded a socialist. host: doris is our last call from ocean gate, new jersey. caller: good morning. i am interested in elizabeth warren. i think she has a dynamic. i like her plan. away fromuld not back the ideas. may be none of them will all come about, but we should not worry about it. she will get as much as she can. i like her fight. i like her can win attitude. americahe fact that needs a woman sometime, make it now. thank you. host: the comments of doris there. coming up we will take a short break. we will get a state race and a preview of the iowa caucuses with sean trende senior election analyst for real clear politics. we will look at the national race in iowa. later we will talk to iowa caucus expert and political scientist david redlawsk about his book titled "why iowa?" c-span is in iowa ahead of the monday caucuses. we had a chance to speak with a gentleman named jake who was icefishing in a town in iowa. >> do you have a candidate for 2020? >> i am going to support trump again. >> what do you like that he has done and why are you going to vote for him? on trade his take policy with china right now. it's not going ahead like everyone wants it to or should or everyone thinks it could, but he is gaining ground i think. i think it will help the agfa community -- ag community in the long run. >> what has been the impact on the communities as far as trade and what is your confidence that it could be better? >> right now with china they there lot of disease over with their african swine. have lost a third of their population. positive trump in the to get a more positive trade deal to support products. as far as trade policy. >> is that a major conversation around these parts? >> yes. especially the ag industry and what is going on, trade deals. >> what have you caught so far? >> some blue gills. >> how long will you stay out here? -- >> what do you like about this? >> it gets me away from things and it is relaxing for me. i have been doing this for a long time. it's just a hobby. >> explain what you have around you. >> it's just an over rice shelter that thermal insulates so it keeps the wind out and keeps you warm. got a heater and a little fishfinder. announcer: washington journal continues. host: joining us from ohio is sean trende senior election analyst for real clear politics. thank you for joining us. guest: thank you. host: what do you see as the electoral landscape in iowa and around the country? how are things shaping and trending? guest: a couple of crosscurrents going on here. in iowa we are seeing a surge from bernie sanders. we will get polls today that will give us an idea if that surge continues. nationally we are seeing his numbers rising. job approvalmp's is up, head-to-head numbers with democratic contenders across the board have improved. the race is looking more competitive for november than it was a month or two ago. host: here are the real clear politics pulling averages for the democratic presidential nominations. bernie sanders in iowa leading joe biden by 3.5 points. you can see the new hampshire numbers, bernie sanders at 26.3, biden at 16.8. 27.2,ally joe biden at four points ahead of bernie sanders. talk about the biden sanders match up these polls. inst: what biden has going the long term is that he has strong support among african-american voters, which is probably what is pushing him ahead. bernie sanders has closed the gap and lead in the most recent polls. there just aren't many nonwhite voters in the iowa caucuses or new hampshire. those are good sanders states. unfortunately for sanders they go first. biden might have to wait until south carolina for his first big win. host: numbers on the screen. democrats, -- .epublicans (202) 748-8001 democrats (202) 748-8000. .ndependents (202) 748-8002 we have a special line for iowa and new hampshire voters, the first states that will be voting. you can call on that line as well. we will get your calls in a couple of minutes. one thing to talk more about the rise of bernie sanders, a lot of our viewers in the last segment really support him, they see the surge, they like all of that. wanted to get your thoughts on why bernie sanders is rising. first we will take a look at him from an event last weekend in ames, iowa. sanders: we can have our differences of opinion, that is the core of democracy. we do not need somebody like donald trump in the white house who forces parents to turn off the tv when kids are in the room. us is an embarrassment to all over the world. number one is to make sure that together we defeat donald trump. [applause] context there is a lot of discussion about electability which is a fair question. which campaign, which candidate is best able to defeat, trump? why i submit to you believe our campaign is the campaign most likely to defeat donald trump. why is that? todefeat trump we are going need to by far the largest voter turnout in american history, that is a fact. [applause] i do not believe, i simply do not believe that the same old same old politics is going to generate the excitement to create that turnout. you cannot generate excitement when you are busy going to new of moneying large sums from millionaires and billionaires. people want change. i think that what our campaign about is the ability to speak to working people, many of them having become disillusioned with status quo politics. people are working longer hours for lower wages and they are tired of the political establishment and they want a government that stands up for them and not just the 1%. we can talk to those people. [applause] host: sean trende of real clear politics, more about bernie sanders. why the big surge? guest: there are a couple things going on. voters are consolidating. there has been some decline in elizabeth warren's vote share, i think some of that has gone to sanders and buttigieg. sanders is striking a chord in the democratic party. there is a strong subset of the party that feels like barack obama upon presidency was a disappointment. he did not push for single-payer or do a number of things. they want progress and bernie sanders channels that energy better than any other candidate. call,before we go to the on earlier caller said bernie sanders is a good candidate but would be a terrible candidate against president trump. what do you see? argument is that he would generate increased turnout, there is something to be said for that. the problem is, when democrats took the house in 2018 they did so because moderates and center rights voted for them. he will face us back from democrats in the suburbs that maybe one that her health care but don't want to go in for the full socialist moniker. i think it will be a wait on him. donald trump is unpopular enough that it might not matter, but it is the calculated risk on democrats part to go sanders. california, you are up first. caller: good morning. god bless c-span. i don't know what we would do without you. mr. trende i like your opinion. i raised $55,000, me and a lot of people for mr. obama, president obama's first run. the second run i did not raise a dime, because he did not perform. i am a trump supporter now all the way. i am tired of the democratic party playing us, playing us ok. playing with the american people, trying to steal my vote. when i supported president obama it was not very popular in the far reaches of the mountains of northern california. i was almost ill when it was done. someone blew up my computer. i put signs 20 feet up on a telephone pole and they would be gone the next day. -- i will never vote for a democrat again. biden, asders and joe far as they go i consider them stale tuna. they do not have a candidate that could beat him, that is why they besmirched him for three years. host: let's hear from our guest. guest: at the end of the day you have to look at doll trump's opulent ready nationally. it is inching into the mid-40's. that is getting close to where he would be the favorite to win against most and it it's, but it is not there yet. as of today democrats would give him a tough run, but i think he does speak to something broader which is voters who have been historically demings rat who switched toward the republicans in the obama presidency. democrats would like to get these voters back in addition to the suburbanites they brought into the fold and 2018. i am not sure the candidates we have are well-positioned to do that. >> you mentioned president trump, it might be too early to answer this, but has impeachment helped or hurt the president in terms of his standing, stature, and re-electability? guest: if you look at his job approval numbers it is hard to sort out impeachment from what is going on on the democratic side and with the economy. his numbers have improved over the last couple of months. it may be that is tweeting and such are out of the spotlight. it may be that the economy is back after a bit of a dull drum in 2019 and seems to be coming back to life. hard to say but his numbers have improved. from detroit, democratic caller. caller: my opinion, i would go with joe biden. i think joe biden would be the best candidate for the rust belt states. on those states, they are never going to vote for somebody like sanders, that is my opinion. host: thanks for calling. same question i asked about the president. how about joe biden and this whole impeachment episode? his name to involvement in all of this. is that helping or hurting? guest: i think it has caused heartburn among democrats. people remember the email issue with hillary that nagged her throughout the campaign. there is a concern that hunter biden could see something -- or joe biden. i think joe biden's polling average has been pretty stable. there have been other candidates that are surging towards the end. probably a little bit of damage to him but nothing widespread. host: moving the conversation forward with joe biden. we have talked about iowa and new hampshire. the combined bowls you published have mr. biden winning in nevada and south carolina. the next two voting days that come up, can you go through the states for us? guest: we have to be careful with those states, they have not been polled recently. nevada is a caucus state. it is very blue-collar. a lot of the casino workers vote in the caucuses. it's a good test of biden versus sanders. then we get to south carolina where you will have an overwhelmingly south american -- african-american electorate. f bernie does win the first three states this sets up joe biden winning in south carolina. to weaken among african-american voters because of the results of the first three states, that is where sanders starts to become a pretty heavy favorite. here is a headline in the -- iowa voters flocked to joe biden out of practicality not passion. practicality -- passion argument against it joe biden again. what do you make of it? there arem not sure people who would crawl over broken glass twice to vote for him. you definitely have that with bernie sanders. there are some polls showing biden ahead. it comes down to a question of who the pollsters think is going to turn out. carolyn,'s hear from republican caller. sayer: i just wanted to that in reality, anyone with half a brain knows that there is not a democrat that is going to be donald trump. the democrats have shown their true colors. when heant to know is is impeached and reelected, what is their next plan? is nancy pelosi going to go with "mentally unfit"? host: thank you, carolyn. what would be the best way for a democrat to take down the president in november? how do they approach this waste whoever wins -- race whoever wins? guest: someone like joe biden will run on a return to normalcy. myu may not like all policies, but i will not be tweeting at 2:00 in the morning." a majorwill be making change pitch, trying to win back some of the blue-collar support of donald trump. at the end of the day, this election will be a referendum on donald trump. there will be a toy sauce backed to it -- choice aspect to it, but -- host: let's go to matthew in emerson, new jersey. independent caller. thank -- caller: thank you and good morning. and congratulations to our british cousins for gaining it independence from the eu. congratulations to donald trump and us the american people that this boring, unfair impeachment circus will soon be over courtesy of mr. adam schiff's proven lies in -- and the fake news media is kowtowing to the democrats. the gooded to tell things are president has been doing on the economy. the democrats and all their candidates have the problem of high taxes, high crime, which people do not want because they let out criminals that are violent and go on to commit more criminal offenses against criminal people and people do not want to their guns taken away also as they are trying to do in virginia and getting pushback. i would like the comments from your guest. allt: i think those are important issues that are going to be raised in the campaign. i think some of the social stuff that democrats are being aggressive on plays better in blue states than in purple states. there has been a little poking of the bear that well probably thatesk help donald trump turnout from voters who are not crazy about him but see it as a policy election and decide to turn out this time. at the end of the day, i think this is a referendum on the president himself. a lot will depend on how he does and how he acts during the next 10 months. host: back to bernie sanders. i went a deeper take from you about this whole notion featured in the new york post and elsewhere -- democratic elites terrified of a sanders win, fear the bern. socialist the vermont pulling away in iowa. party insiders warned that donors, moderates, boomers will form a never bernie coalition. they will stay home says one person. they will vote third party or maybe even vote for donald trump. take me deeper into this battle within the party over bernie sanders. were warningshere that this would happen in 2016 if trump was the nominee. there was some of it but at the end of the day most republicans voted for donald trump. the problem that sanders had is the people who built clinton back in 1990 two and 1996, silicon valley people, big donors do not want to get taxed 60%, 60 -- 70%. there is going to be a big pushback from democratic elites against a sanders run. maybe he can make it up with grassroots energy -- that is the gamble. --t: politico and elsewhere debaterhauls were -- requirements opening the doors for bloomberg. what did the dnc decide to do and what will the impact be? thet: to date to make debates you have had to have a certain number of donors donate to your campaign. it is supposed to be an indicator of grassroots support. of setting been sort these thresholds as they go. there has not been an announced plan from the beginning. for this debate they have eliminated the donor requirement, which has one major impact -- it allows mayor bloomberg to come into the debate. there is some sense to it. if you are not getting delegates , that is an indication you do not have grassroots support. the optics of it are just terrible. it looks as though they are changing the rules to allow michael bloomberg into the debates into the sanders and warren wing of the party is going ballistic. int: let's go to milton roslyn, new york. democratic caller. caller: hello, gentlemen. i just wanted to refer to hillary clinton's remark that nobody likes sanders and i wanted to know how your guest felt about that because he only has a few of the house democrats endorsing him. that is the main reason. that my takeay away from the impeachment trial is guilty.mp enough, it was not bad for them to impeach him. i think many republicans felt they were afraid of of getting into mr. trump's limelight with the twitter. if mr.er question is, trump is reelected, where do we go from there? are we going to have another erdogan or will he be like putin? what will we have if he gets elected again? host: thank you for calling. a lot there you can take. on this question of what happens if donald trump on daye is a lame-duck one of his second term. he is probably going to have a democratic house that prevents him from getting much done on the policy angle. it will be more of what we have seen the last two years. the democrats will investigate him, the republican senate will mostly focus on confirming judges, potentially supreme court justices depending on how the next five years turnout. there is a good chance of a recession, which will complicate things for the republicans if it does hit in the next four years. second terms are typically not kind to incumbents. is at least some cause for apprehension among republicans for that. host: as we look toward iowa voting tomorrow, we know the president did a big rally in des moines last week. what was the purpose of him going to that state at that time? there is nominal competition there for him for the nomination. what was the point of him going? guest: iowa is a swing state. as we get into the presidential campaign, he wants to be there. donald trump likes the limelight. he has a theory of the media that comes from him being in the new york media for most of his life and it explains why of part -- part of why he always punches back the way he does. there is no such thing as bad publicity. he wants to keep himself in voters minds and it is a thumb in the eye of some democrats. he goes there and has a big rally and it is a reminder that it is a state that he won by almost 10 points in 2016. host: this big des moines register final poll -- cnn decided not to move forward due to problems with the accuracy of the pole or the methodology. what do you make of this -- of or the methodology. what do you make of this? guest: i don't think i can say on air what i think of it we were looking forward to it. it is the gold standard of polls. it is an important piece of information that us forecasters are not going to have. it appears that at least one voter -- and we are still trying to sort out what happened -- but it appears that at least one voter did not have pete buttigieg's name read, so there is a concern that he may have been left off of one version of the questionnaire. so out of an abundance of caution they decided not to release the results. anis disappointing, but understandable decision. least one candidate took advantage of this. a audience that this has funneled all number of rumors. "what happened," mr. yang added. we did really, really well in that poll. do expect more rumors to fly? this is the perfect chance for candidates to exploit this to get their voters and through. this is not a large electorate in the iowa caucuses. if you can convince a few thousand voters to turn out for you, it makes a huge impact in your boat shares. every candidate will say, "this poll suggested we were doing really well." host: let's hear from dennis who is in toledo. republican say how trump is so popular. please explain to me why did the republican states of kentucky, louisiana vote for the democrat for governor when trump campaigned for the republicans? he came and campaigned for the reelection of bluhm and they both got beat. this popularity of trump is hogwash. host: dennis, are you still there? i think dennis left. you make ofo dennis's question? trump is notent particularly popular. his job approval has continuously been in the range -- 42% to 45% 45% . the argument that i hear that president trump has 55% of job approval is not supported by evidence. there is a nuance with kentucky and louisiana, which is those estates all featured emma kratz -- democratic candidates who are well fit for the states. john bel edwards was a pro-life democrat with a famous name in louisiana. same thing with the governor of kentucky. if he went down ballot -- if you go down ballot, republicans win -- won the down ballot races pretty handily. you have to -- host: we have talked about the early stage -- iowa, south carolina nash move beyond that. the next big date would -- move it beyond that. the next big date would be super tuesday on march 3. what other dates are you watching? guest: there are a lot of things going on on super tuesday. if biden underperforms in south carolina, which has one of the most heavily african-american electorates, we will be looking at states like texas where there will be a substantial african-american electorate. if biden is underperforming, a state like texas could be in play for sanders. thatof the northern states were heavily sanders in 2016, but are no longer caucuses, we want to see how well bernie sanders can do in northern primaries with a broader electorate then you see in, say, new hampshire. on new prize -- big prize super tuesday will be california where we see a tight race between sanders and biden. there are hundreds of delegates at stake there and especially if you see something where biden south, sandershe wins the north, california is where the bragging rights will be found. ast: ohio has been battleground state in recent cycles. is it safely in the gop column this year or are you seeing cracks there? say that,is early to but you have to look at 2018, which was a democratic wave. the republicans managed to hold onto their vulnerable congressional seats. the republican candidate for governor surprised everyone by winning fairly easily into the down ticket republicans all one. even sherrod brown who has one -- one pretty easily in 2012, had a tight race in -- won pretty easily in 2012 had a tight race in 2018. the rural areas are trending red. unless the election really starts to get away from the republicans, it is probably a republican state in the fall. , you are on the phone with sean trend. e. -- i thinkout being health care is going to be an important issue this year. i say that as a republican. ofas slapped with a bell $1488. of $1488.ll the point is i am struggling to get by due to these expenses. i still have to print -- my neighbors came here illegally from laos and i kind of wish they hadn't. president trump should implement a total ban on immigration altogether. couple ofrought up a different points. to what extent is health care being talked about both by the voters. let's start in iowa. and by the candidates in their speeches. guest: i think someone has been watching king of the hell. -- king oflth care the hill. to votersders speaks who get these large bills and have lots of out-of-pocket expenses. voters really like their health care. they may not like how much they have to pay for it. you have a candidate like bernie sanders or elizabeth warren who threatens individuals private health insurance and has to convince them that they will like what the government has to offer them more, there is resistance to that. whether that is enough to cost them the presidency is something we could debate for hours. from josephine colling livingston, new jersey, independent caller -- calling from livingston, new jersey, independent caller. bernie sanders has a myocardial infraction. he has already had one heart attack. they pulls all the candidates -- all the candidates and of bernieowers -- 52% sanders followers said that if he does not get the nomination, they are not voting democratic. that is concerning to me. trump's problem is that even though they will have the great republican cover-up, there is one problem coming about -- two things come out of it. bolton's book and the lev parnas tape. they correlate, each other. that will drip and for us independents it is going to finally put the nail in his coffin because everything that book is in bolton's correlated by the lev parnas tape. he has a lot of issues and the idea that he is worried about us the consumer? keep in mind right now in the pre-existing condition coverage, which 21 governors are on the threshold of getting eliminated, they have told the courts, "do not rule on it yet because i have to get elected." are tryingemocrats to vote on it because they want to eliminate it. host: your response? guest: there is a lot there. there are two things i would kind of focus on. the first is i do think most of this impeachment stuff is baked in for the president at this point. people have their opinions on it and i do not think there will be any more evidence that will change people's points of view one way or the other. i do think with sanders, the health issue, most people have decided whether they are comfortable with a presidential candidate or president elect who has had a heart attack. the question is, what happens if bernie sanders wins the first three primaries, but then joe biden pulls it off on super tuesday in south carolina? there is a risk that some faction of -- a fraction of sanders voters will decide it illegitimate and it decide not to vote in the fall. that could be decisive. i do think sanders voters not showing in the fall, at least just a fraction of them is a legitimate concern. host: back to the topic of polls, here is a text from a shane in ventura, california. why should we listen to you or any other polls when you got it so wrong in 2016? guest: that is not entirely true. the national polls showed hillary clinton winning the vote -- popular vote by 3% and 2%. other votes were not sampling enough whites without college degrees. split between whites with college degrees and whites without college degrees was much more consequence joel than it had been in the -- consequential then it had been in the past. stopare not going to pulling in the upper midwest like they did in 2016, but at the end of the day, the 2018 polls were pretty good. that gives us some confidence that pollsters have identified the issues from 2016 and addressed them. host: how do you advise viewers on how to assess and read the avalanche of poles we are going to see over the next few months -- polls over the next few months? guest: the big answer we give, and this is not just of the company line, is that you should not get -- look at an individual poll. if you flipped a coin 1000 times, you would almost certainly not get 500 head. you might get 510. you will not be right on the money. even the greatest pollster cannot do anything about that. what we say and what we have shown over time to be true, is that you should look at the polls in aggregate. you should average them. that will give you a much better view of what is going on. if you see a poll that has major media sponsorship, a poll that has been around for a while, that will generally be more reliable. in 2012 we had a lot of pollsters pop up that we had never heard of before and i think you can be justifiably skeptical of those pulling -- polling outfits. host: let's go to joyce in wyoming, michigan. caller: good morning. host: what would you like to say? you are on the air, joyce. it -- caller: it seems to me that trump uses people as examples. dingell whendebbie he had helped her enter then she voted for impeachment, he alienated her. romney because he voted against the witnesses -- for the witnesses rather. he is punishing him. he cannot go to c-span like the other republicans and all this. , the ones whoff have actually spoken from the heart and from the truth of what allowng on, he will not alton or any of the others who thet -- bolton or any of others who might speak from their truth to say a word. his attorneys will not allow him to go on the stand because they know very well that he would lie . i am beginning to think that this stuff is propaganda rather than lies. it is just propaganda and people are eating it up. the russian with bots, those stories come through and people believe them. his trump rallies, people believe that. --has so against the media is so against the media, calls it fake news. not socialevision, cnn, nott msnbc, not fox. i do not have those channels. host: thank you for sharing your thoughts. guest: there are a couple of things. the first is that on the fake political scientists have looked into this and what should be-- and this some comfort for people -- at the end of the day it does not have a whole lot of impact. the people who click on those sites are those who are favorably disposed toward the president in the first place. we do not have a lot of evidence that it actually changes minds. it's not that we shouldn't -- it's not something that we should not be concerned about, but it is not the game changer people make it out to be. there is no doubt that one of the things the president is good as in i mean good effective, not necessarily morally good, belittling his opponents and bringing them down into the mud with him. the nicknames that he has for crude orhey may be something we do not like, but they tend to be on point. they tend to form a narrative and one thing donald trump is very effective that is very -- creating a negative narrative around his opponents. sean trende, as we wrap up here, what else will you be looking for in the days and weeks ahead to tell you how things may be shaping up in the race? guest: if biden does well tomorrow, he is probably going to be the nominee. wins,ario where sanders then we start looking at where does biden finish? if biden finishes in second this will be a long, ugly slog. what happens if a biden slips to third or fourth? of as -- is there a stink loser attached to him? do they start looking for another establishment friendly alternatives like buttigieg, klobuchar, or bloomberg? trende is a senior elections analyst at real clear politics. learpolitics.com is the place to go to read their polls. throughbout halfway this sunday edition of the washington journal. it is february 2. the iowa caucuses are tomorrow. coming up we will talk to a caucus expert and political scientist. his name is a david read lost. we will talk about -- david redlawks. book, whylk about his iowa? a short portion where he talks about the role of the iowa caucuses. first -- i was first in the nation status is challenged. make the case for people around the country -- why does it deserve to be first? >> it is first because that is the way the party set up its rules. partly i think the iowans in the -- after the 68 convention and in 1972, they did not know what they were doing in terms of setting up the earliest event. they never anticipated that this thing would morph into something like this. there was some talk that harold hughes, who was then a democratic senator from iowa, was thinking about a presidential run in 1972. there was some talk of doing this event to help him. firstct is -- that it is continues because the country cannot agree on a different way to do this. inertia just keeps it going. a kit -- campaigns that have a vested interest in this process. , it isarting now significant to me that mike pence, vice president pence is going to be in iowa before the caucuses doing a bus trip in western iowa. he has visited the same flood twice. we already have the beginnings of the 2024 race. in case the democrats do not win the white house, there will be about 15 people who have spent time here in iowa as candidates. the idea of changing the rules will not go over well with them. a minute, i have an investment in iowa and new hampshire," so they are not interested in changing the rules. gete are some presidents to there on their second go. we are seeing a lot of political figures who will be political leaders in america for the next generation. they are not interested in changing it. no one can agree on a different way to do it. some of the criticism comes from people who lose campaigns here who are jealous of the influence that iowa and new hampshire has. agrees -- everyone can obviously the demographics of this state -- it is a really white state, rural. the argument is made that that is not all bad. first of all, it did provide a big boost to the first african-american purpose -- president. it did elevate hillary clinton some with an early victory in 2016. on the republican side, ted cruz, marco rubio, cuban-americans have come forward and one. iowa right now with pete buttigieg is poised to give a big boost to the first openly gay presidential candidate. the feeling that a lot of islands have is, begin -- iowans white, butah, we are this is not a hostile place for deaf what is the alternative? -- what is the alternative? the iowa -- host: the iowa caucuses are tomorrow. 2016 hillary clinton won the iowa caucus on the democratic side. on the republican side it was senator ted cruz. sk.ning us is david redlawks thes a professor at university of delaware. question right to this that you are asking in the book -- why iowa? why are you asking the question and what is the answer? good morning. the question why iowa seems to be asked every time there is an iowa caucus. we got asked that question so many times it seemed like a logical title for the book. why iowa? is first.a because it it is first because of summer rules changes that happened 68 -- 1968. the bigger question about why small stately why a like iowa that is about 3 million in population, mostly white population, relatively rural economy although -- why should it be the place to start the nominating process? in the end there's not a great answer to that question. just because it simply is and it is hard to change once it is set. iowa voters in our research are really aware of what is going on and they pretty well represented the ideological and policy issues in both parties, both for republicans and democrats. host: how predictive is the iowa party for who wins the nominations and ultimately who wins the presidency? bag.: it is a mixed in 1976, jimmy carter won the awa caucus, and came in second. the caucuses propelled him to the nomination into the presidency and it generated this myth that iowa really mattered. over the next several decades, presidential candidates have come to iowa. it was quite rare that anyone winning iowa went on to become president or in many cases to get the nomination. since 2000 for the democrats, it seems to be highly predictive. every democrat in a contested iowa caucus since 2000 who has won iowa has gone on to become the nominee for the party and of course barack obama went on to become the president. for republicans that is not the case. it seems to be far less predictive for republicans. split our phone lines for republicans, democrats , and independence and we will keep one phone line for iowans. we will keep those phones -- phone lines on the bottom of the screen. you are a professor at the university of delaware. you have been on sabbatical in iowa for the past couple of months. you recently wrote an article saying that iowa feels like a parallel universe. what are you saying there? guest: with impeachment in washington and the national focus on donald trump that seems to pervade the media generally, i sit in iowa, going to candidate events, listening to questions and answers from iowa voters, i have done about 100 candidate events since august, and it rarely has impeachment come up. in many ways, from the standpoint of the voter question and answers, rarely has donald trump come up. health care, climate change -- you could go around to debt -- candidate events and you will hear candidates talk about donald trump, but it is not the primary focus of their presentations. the impeachment stuff, well it does not disappear entirely on the stump. for the most part voters do not ask about that either. host: we are reading about the potential for record turnout this year. can you speak more to those stories? in 2008 the iowa democrats had 200 39,000 people turn out. --t was by far a record 239,000 people turn out. that was a record turnout. drop-off a significant in 2016. everything points to turnout in the 2000 date range or significantly higher than that. range or significantly higher than that. to beance at events seems higher. the level of interest in the caucuses seems to be higher. we have been doing some survey research for academic purposes, not for public polling and more people tell us that they will be attending. all signs point to very high turnout. it is very high turnout for a caucus -- caucuses like primaries do not generate turnout for a majority of the voters. caucuses in particular, the wasest turnout in 2008, about 40% of registered democrats in the state at the time. even if lots of democrats turn out, the doubt -- republicans are holding caucuses as well. the expectation is that relatively few republicans will turn out, so across iowa, the turnout will not look like it does at the new hampshire primaries. the: what do you make of critique that iowa just represents a small fraction of the folks out there in a predominantly white state? when you look at why iowa and the importance of it, tell us about why people think this is important? part, it ise last important literally because it is first. it is the first place where voters will cast a vote. very first place anyone will say, "here is who i am voting for." should be important and this question of its representativeness as been a question for years. as the caucus becomes more popular, the voters who come are better representations of iowa voters generally. in the case particularly of the democratic party, they represented the policy interests voters nationally. they represented the split in the party between those further to the left, the progressive wing, and the center left wing. that is a very real split here in iowa in the polling. half of the voters are looking at progressive left candidates and half of the voters are looking at centrist candidates. the piece that iowa cannot do at this point is descriptively represented democrats across the country. it is more white than the country as a whole. you were -- if you were latino-americans, fewer voters. representation is important, but think of the first four contests as a group -- south carolina, nevada, new hampshire, iowa. when you put them together, they very well represented the diversity of the democratic party. iowa republicans do descriptively represented the republican party as a whole. michigan,sa, republican. you are up first, teresa. about: i have a question the people who called president trump a dictator. my feeling is that any one of these 20 candidates in the first place was bent on telling me how i am going to live my life, what i am going to have a job, health my life.thing in i care about freedom. any one of them is out to snuff out freedom. why do people believe that president trump is a dictator and to then listen to these people? teresa.ank you, david, read lost -- that perspective does -- somet in some places ways the ideological differences between the parties. republicans put a focus as the color said on freedom and to democrats put a focus much more callerlity, -- as the said on freedom and the democrats put a focus much more on equality. example theme for health care debate even in the democratic party. the debate on health care right now on the campaign is between positions like bernie sanders medicare for all, which tells everyone, "your insurance will come from the government, there will be no private insurance." on the other hand pete buttigieg or joe biden all take positions that suggest there could be a government option, but no one would be forced to pick it. it would instead get to choose whether to take that or private insurance or what have you. those debates are playing out in iowa even within the democratic party. how much government intervention there should be in things like the health care system. host: let's hear from jean in pennsylvania. caller: good morning. supporter and i agree with you 100% that iowa does not represent the swing states out here. seniors are concerned about social security and about the medicare advantage plan, which we support into know that mr. biden supports it. the impeachment is a disgrace and i am in favor of the witnesses and evidence and i am very embarrassed by mr. toomey's remarks. those of us above 85 want to see some peace and quiet in these country. this is a lack of peace in country. there is a lack of kindness toward each other. i strongly think that because mr. biden is not loud and it does not call people names, does not mean he is not qualified. iowa does not represent pennsylvania. thank you for taking my call. host: thank you, jean. let's hear from our guest. guest: it is interesting because i think this is pointing out to the debate that has been intense warren between elizabeth for example whose event i was just at in iowa city. yesterday she uses the phrase big structural change in her speeches. it is her hallmark -- "the country needs big structural change, we need to overturn what we are doing basically." democrats and independent voters as well are fairly nervous about that idea. big structural change as opposed --a more moderate move makes --e some changes in make some changes in tone and stability as the color was saying. -- caller was saying. is this the time to take advantage of what democrats think is the -- upsetting the apple card that donald trump has apple cart that donald trump has done. or do we need to return to normalcy? that is the best way to define how joe biden is making his pitch. host: our guest is david theawsk who is the chair of political science department at the university of delaware. he is joining us from des moines this morning. is the author of a book called "why iowa?" remind us how a caucus actually pray -- the 1700 precincts. there have been some changes recently. can you lay those out for us? guest: i should make very clear that the democrats and republicans have a different caucus processes. we have been very focused on the democratic campaigns, but to be fair joe walsh and bill weld and president trump have all been in the state of iowa in the last few days. both weld and walsh are in des moines today. there is a campaign on the republican side, it just does not get any attention. republicans will come into their caucus. both parties will do party business in the caucus. that means they will elect local party leadership. they will elected delegates to their county convention and talk about potential platform planks for what will become the state party platform. they do that in similar ways. where they diverge is how they do the presidential stuff. in,republicans will come sit down generally. a representative from each campaign may say a few words and then pieces of paper, ballot slips will be passed out. they will write their preference, dropped it in a box. it went the votes have been cast, the chair will counter the votes and report them. it is just like voting, just pricings --e 1700 precincts around the state. notcratic -- democrats will sit down. they can, but they will generally be directed to a part of the room for the candidate they support. candidate precinct captains will come in early, bring in cookies tryake, put up signs, and to create a bit of an exciting aspect in their corner of the room to attract people to come. we will come in, sign in, go to a corner of the room. what democrats call the alignment starts. democrats will potentially move around the room to the candidate they have decided to align with first. the important point here is if you your candidate -- your candidate does not get 15%, your candidate is the clay are not viable after that alignment. viable afterd not that alignment. ater that you have to go to different candidate. after that, the alignment is done again. a count is done again and the number of delegates that each candidate will win in the precinct is announced by the chair. each of the candidate groups that is viable then elects delegates to the county convention. that is the broad process. it makes it sound much more cut and dry then it is. in that realignment process there is often a lot of discussion, a lot of efforts by candidate precinct to leaders to bring people over to their candidate, but one thing that cannot happen anymore, a potentially important change from a candidate strategic point, is that if you are in a viable group in the first alignment, you are locked in. your choice is your choice and you cannot move. why would you move if your candidate is viable? previously you could move in order to help a different candidate become a viable for strategic reasons that get a little complicated. that cannot be done anymore. the most important implication of that change is a voters who come in and say i do not know who i support right now -- and there may be a lot of them -- use to go into a group called uncommitted in the first alignment. they would then look around and make a decision about where to go. if uncommitted becomes viable, they are locked as uncommitted voters and they will elect uncommitted delegates to the county convention. that could be an odd wrinkle if it were to happen. that is the biggest in caucus change. the other big changes the iowa democrats will report the actual vote for the first alignment, the actual vote for the second alignment, and the delegate count for each candidate. in the past they only announced the delegate count. our: back to calls for guest -- from our guest note -- back to calls for our guest. mr. redlawsk, i was concerned not so much about the iowa caucus, but in iowa election for the presidency as well as other states. the problems that come up with elections like gerrymandering and minorities not getting to , themn the right places changing election places and , its and days, you know probably would not happen so much in iowa, but i am wondering about that and the elections that are done via computer. i am concerned about those isngs in the election that coming up for the presidency. just wanted to know if you had any comments on that? host: thank you. david redlawsk. candidatesave heard talk about that on the stump on the democratic side. for example, they are calling for restoring the full voting rights act, part of which was struck down by the supreme court . in general, i believe nationally ,hat election administrators elections officials are trying to do a good job into they are genuinely trying to do a good job. running elections is tough. ,ecause it is a human endeavor there is always error. what you hope is that the error is random and that it does not rise to the level of making a difference in the actual election. there are always challenges and to some of the challenges have to do with access to the ballot. is one ideological position that suggests that it is really important that only people legally allowed to vote actually vote. there is another ideological "everyonehat is more, who can vote should be able to get to vote." " we doirst one, it's not want anyone illegally voting." in the second one, it's " someone illegally voting is not as bad as denying the vote to someone who legally can vote." if you believe it is more important that two there are no votes cast that should not be cast, then your approach is to have the strictest regulation -- voter id. if your belief is that everyone who can vote should be able to vote and if there are some mistakes, it is not a big deal because there are not that many, their lust interested in things like voter id -- they are less interested in things like voter id and more interested in getting people to the ballot. are issueshile there and there have been problems particularly in many minority communities where there are not enough voting places where there is confusion about where the location is, more generally, nationally i think administrators as opposed to say state legislators really try to do their job well. host: our guest comes to us from a studio in downtown des moines, iowa. i want to thank heard realty from hot -- for hosting us there . our next caller comes from gabriel. guest: -- questions.ave two the first question is a general line question and the second question is about iowa caucuses in particular. the first is in reference to what was the more powerful implementation or i guess salient feature that was deterministic in the 2016 election and then going forward in regards to these two -- ises, one being more it more powerful for voters to vote against something for a candidate they feel is dangerous versus a voter who is voting for someone they agree with? that is the first question. to put it in the context of the iowa caucus, if that makes sense . in the iowa caucuses in particular, there were some questions about how the independent candidates would do in that situation. 10 you elaborate on how different it is for a third-party candidate -- can you elaborate on how different it is for a third-party or independent candidate? thank you, gabriel. let's hear from our guest. -- back to beginning part of the question, i lost the thread. i know the second part was about the independent candidate in the iowa caucuses. the first was about voting for or against a candidate. it took me a moment. it is early in the morning here. against -- theor political science research suggests what gets us out to the polls more generally speaking is enthusiasm. enthusiasm is an emotion that makes us move forward. it makes us do things. anxiety as an emotion makes us pay attention to things. when we are worried, we try to figure out why we are worried. ,nger, to use a third emotion can do both. it can make us pay attention. it can get us to mobilize, to try to do something to stop the thing that is causing the anger. from the standpoint of an election, it really is the case feelinghusiasm as a that gets us moving forward, gets us out to vote, i think it carries more weight than negative emotions. voting for a candidate versus against a candidate seems to be more important. if we look at 2016, it is the case that donald trump's supporters were through the asterix supporters. -- enthusiastic supporters. his pitch was attracting their interest. hillary clinton did spend a lot of time on the negative. not that trump did not. trump attacked literally -- hillary regularly. what she did not do as well as trump did was generate enthusiasm among democrats, particularly among certain graphics, -- demographics, to get them out to the polls. she did make the point about it being a dangerous situation from her perspective, that he might win. she often did not focus on positive reasons why voters should get out there and support her. i do think that matters. it is not a single axle nation. there are many explanations for 2016. enthusiasm part matters. it matters in iowa, particularly getting out to vote at a caucus, which requires you to show up at a particular place and stick around for a while. it is different from voting in a primary. it requires a certain level of enthusiasm. when we study caucus-goers, we have asked weather they came to vote against a candidate or for a candidate. overwhelmingly they came on the positive side. they were there because they were enthusiastic, not because they were trying to block somebody. to that independent question, bernie sanders, who calls himself an independent but caucuses with the democrats in gets away with this because vermont does not have partisan voter registration. he could not register as a democrat in vermont in any case. he has managed to get the democratic party to essentially embrace him as if you were a democratic candidate. i find that slightly all it is a political scientist. as a political scientist. parties should have the ability decide who is a member of the party. there is a process for independents to run. independents have a limited shot of winning the presidency because of the system. for sanders, it makes more sense to run as he does. there is a wing of the democratic party in iowa that is progressive, very much in bernie sanders's camp. host: we have a little bit more than 10 minutes left with our guest, david redlawsk. we talked about changes to the caucus process earlier. also reading about these satellite caucuses, a newer trend getting criticism. how does a satellite because six -- caucus work? guest: it is basically a caucus. they came about because this question of accessibility, to show up at a certain place in your precinct at a certain time. more than a year ago, the i would democrat party suggested they would move to -- iowa democratic party suggested they would move to a virtual anderence at certain times days to register your vote using a ranked choice ballot. seems like a good way to deal with the accessibility on the presidential side while still maintaining caucuses for party business and for those who wanted to caucus for presidential candidates. the democratic national committee ultimately, with only a few months to go, next -- nixed the idea on security issues. the democratic party in iowa expanded something they tried last time call the satellite. there are 99 of them. most are in iowa and places like workplaces or senior communities or community centers where people gather naturally. they will still mostly happen at people do not have to get out on what might be a chilly evening to go to their precinct. they can caucus in their community. a number of these satellite caucuses are outside of iowa in states like florida, where there are groups of iowans living. that is a first. there are several overseas. all will operate like a caucus. people will express their first preference, second preference, and have delegates allocated based on turnout. independent caller. good morning. caller: good morning. i had to laugh when the professor said it was early where he was. it is 4:00 in the morning here. i am in the second district in hawaii. my congresswoman is tulsi gabbard. in 2008, i supported and contributed to president obama's campaign. in 2016, i voted in the primary, democratic primary, which we are allowed to do, choose which primary we want to vote for. i voted for bernie. in the general election, did not vote because i did not want to vote for clinton and was apprehensive about trump. this year, it will be interesting for the professor trende, to see how we independent voters go. i will vote for bernie in the primary. honestly, i am not sure how i will vote if bernie is the candidate versus trump. i am tending toward trump. i could also say if bernie is not the candidate then i will vote for trump. nobody else on the democratic side. that is my input. kudos to c-span for keeping us informed. i am going to go out and watch some whales and get away from all of this chaotic mainland politics. host: that sounds pretty nice. that snowywsk with scene behind you, anything you want to add? guest: i agree. paddling away sounds nice right now. it has been a long slog. athink the caller represents certain amount of what we saw in 2016 and could see this time around. the survey research we have done shows that bernie sanders supporters are very intensely supportive of him, less likely to be interested in any of the other democrats as a second choice. know if theyly to will vote for the democrat if it is not burning. i would -- bernie. i would suspect a certain number would not. that is a challenge for the democratic party and it is part of the debate here about electability, who can beat don't trump. -- donald trump. voters in iowa are confused about that question. it is hard to know who is electable. host: jeff is in new york, republican caller. i wanted to say they --eached the president hunter biden, joe biden have done a lot of things wrong with burisma. why don't they look into what joe biden has done? joe biden should not be running for president. had bernie sanders and other people that are senators there. they should recuse themselves because they're running for president. i do not understand why people like that are on the jury. they are running for president. host: thank you for the point. let's go to patricia in new jersey. i have two questions. ofior citizens, the majority us are military retired wives. trying to figure out the caucus, we understand how it works, but when did it start? what happened to the one vote, one person when it comes to that? the second one has to do with us in new jersey. waypresident came and the they left that little township was ridiculous. yet the mayor was told he could not come because he was democrat. this is hearsay. now on who isng to pay for the cleanup and extra security. i know this may not pertain it mattersi'm hoping not who you vote for. just get out and vote. thanks for taking my call. host: she is wanting a little more understanding of the history of the iowa caucus. iowa has used caucuses to organize their parties since it was a state, and maybe before it was a state, which means into the 1840's. a caucus is a meeting, an old word for meeting. it basically means gathering together to do some kind of business. in iowa, parties use the caucus to do the party business and did that for years and years with no connection to the presidential campaign at all. in later years, they would have a straw poll about the president, but it did not matter much. it happened at a time when no one paid any attention and nobody showed up to the caucuses. there were not very public. it might be that party leader lou says we are going to caucus in my living room and do the party business. after 1968, the democratic party made some changes that required things like caucuses and conventions be publicly announced, be advertised at least 30 days ahead of the event. this meant they had to be more public. in 1972, the i would democrats democrats moved the caucuses early partially because of advertising requirements and partially because of the then governor. they moved the caucus ahead of whichw hatcher primary, -- new hampshire primary, which had always been first. in 1976, jimmy carter exploited that. it created an environment in which the caucus seemed to matter and we have gone from there. at its base, the caucus has existed for a long time. it has been about organizing political parties in the state. the caller was from new jersey. i used to live in new jersey. i was an elected official. as an elected official, i had no way to contribute what my party did in terms of its platform or how organized itself. a regular voter, you can go to your caucus and participate in party business from the grassroots up, which is different than a lot of states. parties in iowa are organized from the grassroots up. that is what the caucuses are about. the presidential stuff has overwhelmed that history. host: tina, amherst, massachusetts. caller: it is gina. respond to quickly -- there was a previous caller who was talking about how the republican party stands for freedom and how the democratic candidates are trying to take away our freedom. i think what most people do not realize or what a lot of us do not realize is big businesses and corporations do the same thing as politicians in terms of manipulating our thoughts and opinions through advertising and lobbying. veeran independent, but i toward the left. in the primaries, i would love andrew yang or bernie sanders. living in massachusetts. i cannot vote in the primaries. but not have that choice, those are my candidates. i know andrew yang does not have a huge chance, but maybe we will be surprised. hopefully. host: thanks for calling. actually, i want to make a quick point about yang. i have been to both candidates multiple times. their crowds have been similar in many respects. andrew yang draws a lot of young people. he draws a lot of young men to his events, people who rarely caucus. i'm talking 18 to 25-year-old. this is a group that without wouldg would be -- yang be bernie sanders supporters. he has also drawn more men than women. yang might be taking a bit of that away from sanders. yang is not viable, it will be interesting to see where his supporters go. ast: david redlawsk is professor and department chair at the university of delaware. he's also a co-author of a book iowa" joining us this morning to give us insight on the iowa caucuses. we will take one more short break. when we come back, we will be joined by laura belin, covering i will politics for the progressive website leading heartland. first, here is more from iowa -- brawner.greta she spoke with an ice fisherman about campaign 2020. -- >> you are not voting for president trump again? not.obably right now i am >> why is that? [inaudible] >> you don't have a candidates in the democrat field yet. are you a registered democrat? [inaudible] >> have you ever done it? [inaudible] >> what are your top issues? [inaudible] >> we are making some decent headway. we get somewhere and then go backwards. >> what about after that? [inaudible] >> [inaudible] >> you are icefishing on this saturday. what can you catch here? >> a little bit of everything. >> [inaudible] >> for people who have never seen icefishing, tell them how it works. >> it can be a simple or complicated as you want to make it. [inaudible] [laughter] >> absolutely. >> during this election season, the candidates beyond the talking points are only revealed over time. since you cannot be everywhere, there is c-span. our campaign 2020 programming differs from all other political coverage for one simple reason. it is c-span. we have brought you your unfiltered view of government every day since 1979. we are bringing you an unfiltered view of the people that steer our government this november. in other words, your future. this election season, go direct and unfiltered. see the biggest picture for yourself and make up your own mind with c-span's campaign 2020, brought to you as a public service by your television provider. tonight on q&a, kathryn sullivan, the first american woman to walk in space, talks about her book, "handprints on hubble. " >> we have learned that we have so much more to learn. we have also learned a ton more about what they are, about how galaxies, stars form. we have been able to look into stellar nurseries where stars are forming. we have been able to look back in time because of the power of hubble. it is a big part of what hubble is unlocking. >> watch tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span's q&a. another look at des moines, iowa, or tomorrow folks throughout the state will take part in the caucuses. three candidates since 1972 have won iowa and later the white house. those are jimmy carter, george w. bush, and barack obama. studio is from our laura ballin, editor of leading heartland, the blog site. this new site, bleeding heartland. is a: bleeding heartland community website. i am the primary author, but i publish work by more than 100 authors last year and the or before that. generally i focus on iowa politics, which includes , statens and elections government and state legislature. that.nterested in and also social, environmental issues. and issues such as racial disparity. it is broad-based with a wide variety of voices and generally covers news, commentary from a progressive perspective. host: tomorrow, gatherings around the state and the voter preferences there. this story out of the gazette in eastern iowa, picking a favorite seems elusive for some democrats. folks not quite ready to make a decision. is that uncommon or is it common this close to the actual caucuses? what are people thinking right now? guest: it is fairly common. we know from exit poll data that before the 2008 caucuses half made up their minds in their final month. in 2016, when hillary clinton and bernie sanders were the main candidates and martin o'malley was a distant third, 40 percent of people made up their minds in the last month. my own husband is undecided. i think that with a field this large and with a lot of highly capable candidates, generally a lot of i would democrats like more than one candidate -- iowa democrats like more than one candidate and that is holding them back. it is possible to caucus uncommitted, but i do not expect many people to land on uncommitted tomorrow night. will leave phone numbers on the bottom of our screen for our guests. who has impressed you the most in terms of organization in iowa , crowd enthusiasm? tell us what you are seeing. guest: that is a few different things. bernie sanders has drawn the largest crowds, but elizabeth warren and pete buttigieg have had large events this cycle. even joe biden and amy klobuchar have had some large events. if we are just talking about crowd size, howard dean was upwing large crowds leading to the 2004 caucuses were he finished third. i will be hesitant to say somebody has a great organization based on crowd size. sandersd, i think the and warren campaigns have a tremendous organization and are reaching beyond the list of regular caucus-goers, people like myself who always are there , regular participants. i know people who are registered republicans or no party voters who have never been to a caucus before and yet they have had canvassers from the worn campaign or sanders campaign or both at their door. i know pete buttigieg's campaign is also reaching out independence and moderate republicans. i would say those have the strongest organizations. the biden campaign and klobuchar are behind that. i have had canvassers at my door for both of those campaigns. yang has had a lot of people out knocking doors. overstate how engaged people are here. weather fory february. it will be in the 40's today. you cannot ask for better weather for canvassing in february. there were lots of people out in my neighborhood and neighborhoods all over iowa yesterday just trying to reach those last undecided people and bring them around. host: will that weather add to the turnout? guest: certainly. the forecast is still pretty good for tomorrow night. we hold caucuses in the off years even when there is not a presidential campaign. in 2018, we had caucuses for party building. there was a terrible snowstorm. year that we all would not have something like that come up tomorrow but it looks like snow and ice should not be an issue that keeps people from getting out. there are other barriers that keep people from attending a caucus and those have not changed, but at least the weather looks like it is going to cooperate. host: the des moines register scrapped its final poll last night. there were problems cited with the methodology. is that a disappointment to voters in iowa? do they count on that for? -- poll? guest: i feel terrible for everyone at the register. mistakes can happen. it sounds like that was an issue with a vendor doing some of the phone calls and not a problem within the register. wass disappointed because i interested to see which candidates were on the move. one of my regular guest authors, a student of the iowa caucuses, has pointed out the final des moines register poll has a lot of influence in setting expectations going into the caucuses and affecting the late shift in the new hampshire primary electorate. it was a disappointment. i feel they made the right decision. if there were questions about the accuracy of the poll, especially since the register has endorsed elizabeth warren, it would cause too many problems if they came out with a pole and people said there was a methodology issue. i commend them for having the integrity to pull the plug on the pole. that cannot have been an easy decision given the work and money riding on it. those are some of the most viewed articles they publish on their website and their reporters had already put in the work to write the analysis. those are articles that can never see the light of day now. it is a tough situation. anyone who has worked in any field has had something catastrophically go wrong at some point and you feel awful. brian is up first in cedar rapids, iowa, democratic caller. caller: hello. i remember that 2018 caucus. that night, it was icy and cold. i really wanted to go to that caucus but we had to stay home. it was a drag. anyway -- guest: we made it two hours but i almost fell. maybe you did the right thing by staying home. caller: it was an off year. i love laura. i read bleeding heartland all the time. she is a treasure. thank you for your service online. tomorrow i will be caucusing. i have committed to amy klobuchar. i do not think she is going to get viability, so i will probably move on to elizabeth. guest: do not fill in the blanks on that. she has a lot of support in cedar rapids. in my precinct in the suburb of des moines, -- he was not viable in my precinct. precincts are variable and i expect amy klobuchar to be viable in a lot of places. presence of four candidates in washington for the impeachment trial affect their standing in iowa? guest: i do not think that had much of an impact. they all would have rather spent more time here, but i think they managed to make it work and had surrogates to events. people are still giving all the candidates a close look regardless of whether they were tied up in washington. you can argue it anyway. in some ways, the impeachment helped joe biden a little, especially when our junior senator came out to speak, literally laughing on camera the idea that maybe what happens during the impeachment might drive democrats not to caucus for biden. it was very unseemly and unprofessional. i feel people were paying close attention. bill is calling from tennessee on the republican line. caller: good morning. call.eciate you taking my the question i had for your between the difference our primaries here in tennessee, which are closed primaries where you have to declare which one of the parties who will vote for in order to vote in a primary. it is not like that in the general election. in a primary, you have to go one or the other in order to get a valid. i have to -- ballot. mail, so iote via just filled out mine last friday. what shedering considers our methodology for doing what we do in tennessee. guest: most states have primaries. the biggest difference between a primary and caucus is here you have to be in a specific location at 7:00 p.m. on this monday night. you cannot mail in a ballot. you cannot phone early. you cannot stop by earlier in the day. you cannot drop off a ballot and leave. you have to put a significant amount of time into being there. for that reason, it excludes people who might have to be a caregiver for a family member or maybe have a disability or do not drive at night. declaration,arty you do have to declare a preference for either the democratic or republican party in iowa to participate in the caucuses, but you can change that on the night of the caucus. published a guest post by an author who worked for two republican governors for many years. he is planning to change his registration monday night and caucus for pete buttigieg. at that time.p there will probably be a few republicans or no party voters who decide to join the democratic party to participate in the democratic caucuses. . . that is possible in iowa. some states have a close primary where people cannot change. other states have an open primary where people who are not already affiliated can participate. the iowa caucuses are combination. do have to be a democrat to the democratic caucuses, but you can become a democrat at the caucus. the biggest difference between a caucus and primary is you have to be in this room. it usually takes an hour at least to participate. it is very public. in a primary, you have a secret ballot. in a caucus, everyone can see which part of the room you're standing in. host: there were changes made to the caucus process. concernsyour biggest about those changes. guest: on the whole, the changes are good. i wish they went further. i was excited about the virtual caucus, which was an opportunity for people to participate by phone. i thought that would open it to tens of thousands or 100,000 people who cannot physically attend at 7:00 p.m.. the democratic national committee decided that was too much of a cybersecurity risk. in general, changes are great. the fact that we will know the wrong supporter numbers for each candidate gives us -- raw supporter numbers for each candidate gives us -- it has always troubled me. we do not know how many iowans came for each candidate. we only in the past have known the delegate count. i have heard people fretting we could have more than one winner. that is ok. in 2004, john edwards, a surprisingly close second place finisher, was a winner along with john kerry. that is all right. if one candidate gets more raw supporters but those are concentrated in a few counties and do not have as many elegance, that is ok. that we are going to know the numbers on the first alignment and after realignment, that is when to show us who gained the most support from people who had to make a second choice. that could give us clues about who is a better candidate to unify the party. there might be someone who does well on the first count but does not pick up support after that and someone else who perhaps overtakes the third or fourth place candidate based on second choices. that would be good information to have. i like the changes. you probably talked with david redlawsk about the technical issues. in general, i would like to see the caucuses go further to be more inclusive to people who cannot be there, but all the changes they did make it better than it was before. host: there is one fewer who tweeted-- viewer who about the most unfair and noninclusive elections ever. it would be a caucus. point.it is a valid i have been writing since 2007 about the various -- barriers to participation in the caucus system and knife advocated for an absentee ballot we have not been able to do that because it is perceived as being too much primary.imary this -- this is an issue julian castro raised. he had a town hall talking about problems with the iowa caucuses. -- he said if i knew nothing about the system you would think a republican designed the system to keep people from voting. i have not volunteered for campaigns the cycle, but i did before the 2008 caucuses. it is heartbreaking to speak to people who are passionate about your candidate or another they will notknow be able to attend the caucus because they have to work or for some other reason. it is very hard. i wish we could have a more inclusive system. that is a valid criticism. host: we have a caller from coralville, iowa. good morning. caller: thank you for taking my call. first, i want to say thank you to all the people that are here in iowa. whove had people at my door are from far away, washington, colorado, lots of places for different candidates. i appreciate that they are so concerned about the future of our country that they are coming to iowa for a winter vacation, which is really not the most opportune place to go, especially the last few weeks. i have met awesome people. i have met broadcasters from across the world. people are coming here just to hear candidates because they are so concerned. people do not understand that and people sometimes say i do not like these outsiders. they are bringing a lot of vitality and passion. i want to thank laura. she has a good newsletter. i have been a caucus-goers since 1972. i was 18. i walked to my first one. i had no idea what it was like. people complain about them. they are not tidy, but democracy is not tidy. democracy takes people to get off their chairs and do what they can. i agree about sometimes people cannot get there, but i have who are in florida for the winter. they have a caucus site. they have 60 people and can only hold 15 people so they rented a space. that is how passionate people are about having a new president. i will end on that note. you foryou -- thank having -- c-span has had so many knowledgeable people. have a good day. thank you for c-span. host: any thoughts? she brought up the satellite caucuses. people able to attend a satellite caucus is going to be a few hundred or thousand, probably not the totality, but it is nice that option exists. they neverinnovation had before this year. i agree with mary. i love when people come here to canvas. i know some people complain about knocks on the door or phone calls. i think it is inspiring sony people want to get involved. i always thanked people, even if they are supporting a different candidate. what other stores or trends are you following in that democratic primary? perhaps talk of a progressive split between bernie sanders and elizabeth warren. what else are you seeing these days? guest: i am interested in the variability and different kinds of precincts and counties. we have seen a shift in iowa. there has been a population shift. we have 99 counties and 90 of them are losing population. we have seen a shift in the suburbs, which have been getting populations. -- gaining population. they have been trending blue. i am interested to see which candidates do better in some of those classic blue-collar democratic areas and which do ander in the growing trending democratic areas. for the firsthat time we are going to have raw supporter numbers. i am curious to see who picks up more support. sanders in many respects are competing for the same voters. i feel elizabeth warren has more broad appeal and the party and probably will pick up more support on second choices. on the other hand, bernie's campaign maybe is reaching farther beyond the people who have caucus before. i will look at the overall turnout and how many people everybody is able to get in their corner. there are a lot of storylines to follow. the trend within the state of that used to be blue are now read. that is something i will be look at great -- be looking at in great detail after the caucuses and once we have a markedly picture of results. host: a washington post story, in search of caucus-goers, candidates try to allocate resources to the right parts of iowa as they scramble for votes. our guest is laura ballin, editor of leading heartland. -- bleeding heartland. democratic line. caller: thanks to c-span. i have a question. you go to listen to them, is recent --aging reaching voters compared to that isal messaging used across the state of iowa? , goingas the most impact to see the candidates or getting the message? guest: definitely personally seeing the candidate. there is a joke in iowa. are you going to caucus for me? i do not know. i have only met you twice. i know people who have attended 10 or more candidates events this past year. -- a large fraction of people who caucus tomorrow will have seen more than one candidate and person. iowans like to see how people field questions. i think a lot of candidates come across differently in person. even though the campaigns are spending money on tv ads, i think by far the in-person events are the most important. people do spend money on direct mail, but i do not know that that is as impactful. one question that people sometimes ask -- what issues are most important to caucus-goers? it does not seem like people are talking much about impeachment. i would say people tend to focus on issues that highlight the differences among the candidates. that is one reason that health care has been very prominent in the primary discussions. there is a split between the candidates who are supporting can -- medicare for all or the candidates who support improving the affordable care act with a public option. closely democrats are following impeachment, but because the candidates are all basically an agreement that what the president did was on acceptable and impeachable, it is not really something that can distinguish one from another. it is different from the campaigns before 2004 and 2008 when the iraq war was a major fault line. you had candidates in the field who had voted to authorize the war and candidates good -- who had opposed the war. -- became a salient issue for iowa caucus-goers. going back to original question, i think there is no substitute for seeing candidates in person. i wish everyone across the country had a chance to go to some of these town halls and see people in action. you do get a different sense from watching it on tv. >> we know the president did a rally in des moines. what was his message to voters? i have to be honest -- i did not watch his rally. his message is always the same. bombastic, misstating a lot of facts, insulting his enemies. i did not watch. i really do not think -- it will be interesting to see what the republican turnout is like. traditionally when there is an incumbent on the ballot there is not much of the reason for that party to caucus. the trump campaign have been trying to drum up turnout. they have been doing phone banking and they have surrogates all over the state trying to get people to show up to express their big support for donald trump. i'm curious to see how well that works. i do not expect a lot of people will attend the republican caucuses, but i could be proven wrong. host: democratic caller for laura belin. caller: you were speaking about accessibility as it relates to the caucuses. i was receiving text messages about candidates who will be here and all that. because of accessibility, i was not able to come. it is a real issue when it comes to caucuses. d.c. right now because of my health. that there is one here, but i cannot come to that one. host: i think there are two-- guest: i think there are two washington, d.c.. caller: you had to register by the 17th of january, so that makes me not able to come to that. i could not go anyway because i have a mobility issue, but i will come back to having some way to do the virtually or calling. i would tell people that who were texting me, and they would say call the dmv. that is a real problem. guest: is a big problem. caller: that is taking people's rights to vote, to express themselves. calling.nk you for senator tom harkin introduced and championed the americans with disabilities act. we are the party that does support accessibility for everyone, and i know the iowa democratic party and county democrat organizations have tried hard to get the caucuses that arein buildings ada compliant, but it is not always feasible for people to leave their homes, to be in a certain place. some people have other issues that prevent them from participating. i am sorry to hear that sue has had those issues. that is one reason i would like to see some kind of early voting absentee voting possibility in a telephone, if option is too insecure. it may be. i am not a cybersecurity expert. host: we have been reading that the iowa house recently denied you press credentials. you have been covering the legislature for years. can you claim what is going on? guest: it is not just the iowa house. i have been covering the legislature since 2007, but before 2019i never formally applied for credentials. i decided last year i would probably be spending more time at the statehouse and it would be nice to have a place to work there. it never occurred to me that my credentials could be denied. the iowa house tonight my credentials. republicanb -- senate appeared to process my credentials but never allowed me to work in the press gallery and change the rules to make sure i would not be able to apply for a temporary pass. then the governor, her office declared they have a policy that i'm not considered a credentialed member of the media because i'm not credentials in the iowa house, which is strange because the policy does not exist in writing. it seems like a policy that was made up to keep me out of her press conferences. i have applied again this year. there is a new iowa house speaker and chief clerk. it was the same result. they did not give me any specific reason. the iowa senate top staffer declared they do not consider me a member of the media. he did not respond to my follow-up questions. it is disappointing. i do not think it is constitutional. i'm surprised. host: what recourse do you have? guest: i haven't ruled anything out. the institute for free speech commissioned a memo by robert a lawyer.r, it was about the issue of the nile of rentals in the iowa house. that was sent to the members of had noislature and effect. i'm considering all options. i would prefer to resolve it without legal action. that may not be possible. it is farcical. i published hundreds of articles a year. i have written more than 7000 articles on my website and hundreds have been about the iowa legislature. i cover happenings in great detail. for them to say i'm not a member of the media is ludicrous. host: new york, independent caller. hello, dominic. i have seen that footage withe biden point ukraine aid. biden is part of the swamp. bernie sanders, medicare for -- they areing free the ones that are going to get hurt with that. i watched footage of elizabeth warren talking to nine-year-old children in school and talking about transgender. she is not just far-left. she is far out. nine-year-old children? that is their whole life. host: you are calling on the independent line. who do you like in the race? caller: you know what i mean? i watchedhink -- trump's rallies. he is talking about keeping jobs in america, protecting americans. he is doing what he has to do. to vote for somebody, it would be amy. you, dominic. amy klobuchar coming up in the polls a little bit in iowa or not necessarily? guest: she has been in several of the recent polls. it is factual to say she carried a lot of areas in minnesota the donald trump also carried. she does appeal to a lot of people. i would have to correct what dominic said about keeping jobs in america. there is no evidence in iowa. the farm economy has not been helped by president trump's policies and anyway. that is why his approval rating here is no better than it is in wisconsin even though he carried iowa by a wider margin in 2016. i guess i would take issue with that perspective. amy klobuchar, that is the main selling point she has. that is something she emphasizes in her speeches and debate performances. she can appeal to these people in the middle who might be more favorably inclined toward trump than hard-core democrats are. name beingoe biden's attached to the ukraine story hurt him? guest: i think overall it helps him more than it hurts him because it demonstrates how desperate the president was to find a way to take them out of the presidential race. there is not a shred of evidence that joe biden did anything inappropriate in ukraine. he will international community wanted to have that prosecutor replaced. joe biden did nothing wrong. the fact that senate republicans voted not to examine documents and take witness testimony -- we would not be talking about any of this with ukraine if the president did not hold up ,ongressionally approved aid violating the law to try to get some dirt on joe biden. it is so inappropriate. i think it is something biden has been talking about. it shows i am the one the president is afraid of. they spent tens of millions of dollars on ads. the fact that our senator, joni ernst, was smiling and looking happy about the idea that impeachment could hurt joe biden -- she just made his case for him. this is all about domestic politics. that is because the republicans are afraid to run against him. i have heard people argue it hurts him, but honestly i feel like it helps some more. host: bruce is in pennsylvania, republican caller. questions --f my biden's done. he is finished. he has not gotten to the chinese woman -- what is going on the democrats right now is pattycake. trump's going to ask real questions like how many -- to iran -- with roadside bombs? how much influence does a with anire have to buy american president from the chinese? things like that are going to be commonplace. iowans, i feel bad for them. questiond be a definitely i will be asking. do you think they will get there before the election? host: any thoughts? again, there is really no evidence that joe biden did anything corrupt or wrong, but there is evidence that donald trump and his family has used the office of the presidency to enrich his company and properties. we spent millions of dollars so the president can golf it is properties -- at his properties. i do not think he is in a position to point fingers other people. joe biden, would hurt some more in iowa than any of what the caller mentioned, is having less organization than the other candidates. -- when the phone in option was killed, i believe we will never know, but i think that hurt biden more than anyone else. his polling showed he did the over 65, theniors people most likely to have mobility issues. thousands who would have caucused my phone will not be there. host: i meant to ask you about the billionaire candidates on the democratic side of the race. who how do iowans feel about those? guest: michael bloomberg has bypassed the state. i do not think anyone was hoping that he would get in. people who are undecided or undecided because they like more than one candidate not because they do not like anyone in the field. i do not see any constituency for michael bloomberg. as for tom steyer, he has spent a lot of time here. people who have gone to his events have been generally impressed. he has gotten good endorsements. it is such a talented field and i think he is going to struggle to reach that viability threshold in the precincts. to do well enough of the polls to make it onto the debate stage. other than that, not seeing a likely move toward him. i do not have a good sense of where his supporters would go if they had to make a second choice. generally, when some of the options are people who have been around for a long time, i tend to think they will not pick up as much support on second choices. if people were supporting them, they would already be for them as a first choice. host: billy is calling from brooklyn, new york. retort i am calling to the last callers, who seem to be living under a rock. they are saying joe biden cut social security. are they aware that trump's budget from bozo cuts billions -- proposal cuts billions from social security and medicare? callers made an offensive remark about asian americans, saying there should be a moratorium on immigration to this country. mantra used to be illegal immigration bad, legal immigration good. the trump administration's policies are cutting legal thegration and reducing number of legal asylum-seekers and refugee seekers. they discriminate against immigrants from lower incomes. thatatin immigration bill was republican supported in the house would have cut legal immigration by 50%. phobic --wing is xena xenophobic. regarding bernie sanders bing socialist, trump michael bernie sanders a socialist, but he is -- might call bernie sanders a socialist, but he is too much of a more on to note socialist means -- moron to know what socialist means. guest: i think is anybody's game. iowansto emphasize that who are undecided are undecided because they like more than one candidate and they are having trouble picking. they are not undecided because they do not like what is on offer. i agree with the last caller that immigrants strengthen this country. iowa would be losing population if we did not have immigration. immigrants are keeping businesses open, schools from closing. that therehensible president and some other republicans demonize immigration the way they do. us is laura belin, editor of leading heartland. thanks for your time. -- bleeding heartland. thanks for your time. we will be back tomorrow for more washington journal from iowa. several candidate events today from iowa iola. stick with this network to watch it all as we follow campaign 2020 and our live iowa caucus coverage tomorrow night with results and candidate speeches. we will see you back here tomorrow. ♪ announcer: tonight on q and a, catherine sullivan, the first american woman to walk in space talks about her book. >> we have learned we have so much more to learn about the and we have also learned a ton more about black holes, where they are and what they are. how galaxies form, how stars form. we can look into stellar nurseries where storms are forming -- stars are forming. andplace in the universe how the universe works, a big part of what hubble is unlocking. announcer: watch tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span's "q and a." the democratic presidential candidates have campaign throughout iowa, canvassing for votes leading to the iowa caucuses. now it is time for results. watch our live coverage of the iowa caucuses monday starting at 7:30 p.m. eastern. >> victory is not winning for our party, victory is winning for our country. [applause] >> president trump delivers his state of the union address from the house chamber. :00 p.m.day at eight eastern followed by the democratic response with michigan governor gretchen wittner and texas representative veronica escobar. live coverage on c-span. host: joining us from boston is stephanie sure he she is president of evelyn's list. clearfield, associate editor of the washington journal. >> thank you. let's start