Transcripts For CSPAN Washington 20240702

Law enforcement shot and killed the suspect who the manhunt is still underway as federal enrcement is trying to find the person who shot and killed 22 people. This morwe are asking if you u. S. Un laws should be changed and if so,. Phone lines are split differently, gun 202 70, if you dont own a gun, 202 7488001 and Main Residence, 202 7488002. You can also text us 202 7488003. You can also comment on facebook. Com cspan. You can start calling and then we will show you front page of the Portland Press herald out of maine this morning. The banner headline Vice President Kamala Harris spoke about the shootings at an event with the australian Prime Minister. [video clip] last night, lewiston became yet another community torn apart by senseless can violence. Once again, routine gatherings, this time at a Bowling Alley and a restaurant, have been turned into scenes of horrific carnage. Doug and i mourn to those who were killed and we pray for those who were injured and grieved with so many whose lives are forever changed and impacted by what happened. The Bidenharris Administration will continue to provide full support to local authorities. As we gather details, we must continue to speak truth about the moment we are in. In our country today, the leading cause of death of American Children is gun violence. Gun violence has terrorized and traumatized so many of our communities in this country. Let us be clear, it does not have to be this way. Host Vice President Kamala Harris yesterday from the state department. She also put out a fuller statement afterwards. This is what the statement continues to say that is from the full statement from the Vice President s Office Released yesterday. When it comes to mains gun laws, usa today with a wrap up of the states firearms laws that is from usa today. The new speaker of the house mike johnson also talked about this renewed question over gun laws in the wake of the mainmast choosing shootings. [video clip] i just want you and the American People to know that all the members of the house are deeply concerned about the families involved and we pray for the Law Enforcement officers doing the hard job. You talk about the human heart. If someone was to kill innocent people, there are many ways they can use beyond using a gun. Im sure this will become a bigger issue in the days moving forward. Is there any specific gun law that you would look at her any new legislation you would look at . Ive been on the job for 48 hours so we will see. There will be lots of discussion as there is after these tragedies. In europe and other places, they use vehicles to mow down crowds in parades and have done that in the United States. Its not the weapon, its the underlying problem. We have to address the root problem in these cases and Mental Health is a big issue we have to address that as society and as a government. There are a lot of issues pending on that as well. Host the new speaker of the house sat down with hannity last night. We are taking your calls this morning and asking you if gun laws should be changed and if so how. Our phone line is split this way, if you own a firearm, 202 7488000 if you dont own a firearm 202 7488001, and that special line for Main Residence 202 7488002,. We will start in california, good morning to you. Caller good morning. Heres the good news about the killing, they were all white people. Host why would you say thats good news . Caller when you shoot blacks, hispanics and gays, nobody says anything and now that you shoot white people, now there might be a change. Weve got to get rid of the semiautomatic weapon. I served 20 years in the night United States marine corps and i know it that weapon does. Anyone who says anything about any law, if they dont get that semi automatic weapon out of the hands of people, were just going to continue this. Hopefully this is the last time we hear this. Host thats larry out of california, joseph in glen bernie, maryland emma the line for gun owners. Caller good morning. I hope this is the last time i have to hear about the craziness in california. As a gun owner, the underlying thing is responsible gun ownership. This guy was not responsible. I understand he was part of her Military Reserve and it sounds like they need to deal more with Mental Health not responsible gun owners. Host one of the ideas of a red flag law is to be able to take firearms away from the people who may pose a threat to themselves or others or maybe in a Mental Health crisis. What are your thoughts on those laws and expanding those laws statebystate. Maryland i believe has those where you are. Caller quite honestly, it concerns me because as a responsible gun owner, all it takes is other people to decide that i have an issue to start putting the ball in play with that and thats not good for me as a responsible gun owner and is plenty of criminals out there who have guns nobody knows about and nobodys going to go after them. I understand the point behind it and it makes good sense and it sounds good but i think it will be used in inappropriate ways more often than not. I think the people that have Mental Health issues should step up and do something. Host this is the story from the wall street journal this is joe, Huntington Station new york on the line for those who dont own a firearm. Caller i grew up in new york city and when i was a kid, the major problem you would see in the papers was someone Walking Around with a knife. When the new speaker of the house says the underlying problem is people, he is correct but the availability of semiautomatic weapons, someone can do more damage in 10 seconds then they could do with a knife. I just feel thats the problem is the weapons that are available have to be limited and the scope of damage they can do. Host how do you do that . Your talk about semiautomatic weapons, all semiautomatic weapons . How about magazine capacity . Whats the answer . Caller i feel anything that limits the ability to do a lot of damage in five or 10 seconds is great. When i was a kid, you had a gang fight that would break out in a good or bad neighborhood with one or two people that got stabbed and they were killed. Having a knife was such a big deal 30 or 40 years ago now a guy can go out 20 people in five minutes. Its insane. The availability of semiautomatic weapons in any form whether its a magazine is just horrible. It should be stopped. Thats the way i feel even though i never owned a gun. If you go out and hunt, thats fine. You own a rifle but theres no point in shooting up a deer with 50 bullets and five seconds. There is no explanation for that in a rural or suburban area. Having a knife is been enough but it cant do that much damage. How many people can you stab in 10 minutes . Its insane. People walk into a suburban mall and you can shoot up 20 people in five minutes. It it causes way too much damage. Host thats joe in new york. This is from that same usa today story this is shannon in South Portland, maine. How close is South Portland to lewiston . Caller its about two hours. Host whats been the reaction there in South Portland . Caller theres been a lock down. The colleges have been closed and the schools have been closed. Portland itself has been a ghost town. Besides that, this is the second time ive been through Something Like this. I was originally a veteran and pensacola when the shooting happened. I was only a block away and its crazy to see how this can happen again. I thought i can move up to maine but this has been to shootings previously where some guy shot someone in a car and there was another one where someone got just shut up the interstate. Its craziness. Its time to get rid of these host remind people about the pensacola shooting. Caller it was a shooting on december 7, 2019. It was a saudi arabia and, a guy who picked up a gun, went into the Training Center and shut up the school because i guess they were making fun of him or something. Its the same mess, its the same thing. He went and grabbed a gun and decided to shoot people. You think a military base, it would be hard to penetrate but its not. Its like a Bowling Alley, you cant go bowling anymore. I tried to go out that night and i had to cancer might just cancel my plans. Its not a way to live, its time to get rid of these weapons. Host if you can stay on the line, this is the focus on maine members of congress on that from your maine representatives in congress, your thoughts . Caller i will take both. I will take both simultaneously. Im done with this. Ido seeing crazy gun owners , the Second Amendment, you can amend that, cant you . Host are you asking me . Something that can be done with another amendment . Caller thats my call. Host this is richard in massachusetts, gun owner, good morning. Caller good morning. I hear we need more laws. The trouble is people are mentally retarded. Their family should be responsie for putting them away. Not the military. Its not the military business, its private. Its the family that does it. They talk about semiautomatics. [inaudible] when i used to hunt, used to have five rounds in the magazine, thats all we were allowed. Host doesnt make sense to have magazines that have a 30 round capacity . Caller i agree with that. 10 rounds, thats fine. 10 or 15 rounds. When you go to the shooting range, we do it spraying and praying. Host if we are talking about a new law banning highcapacity magazines, in the area of a restriction of 10 rounds and under, is that a national gun law you would support . Caller yeah, i support that. I support that. Host richard in massachusetts. This is rick in el paso texas, the line for gun owners. Caller good morning. I served in the military for 22 years. I never owned a personal firearm until the year after i retired. I purchased my first firearm only because of a principal, because i didnt like the rhetoric coming out of the administration at the time. Host which administration was that . Caller the obamaBiden Administration. I served my country honorably and this is a right that all americans have. I served to protect and defend the constitution of the United States with enemies foreign and domestic and they did that honorably and i was true to my oath. I purchased my first weapon out of principle but now i enjoy going to the range. To me, its a sport and i enjoy it. I also feel i made the right choice to purchase a weapon because it so happens that its become much more dangerous. Criminals do not follow gun laws. To put this in perspective, in washington, d. C. , they severely restrict Second Amendment rights and they have over 222 deaths just this year due to gun violence is because criminals dont follow laws. They are carrying the weapons illegally. Its impractical in my opinion even if you pass a ban on highcapacity magazines as people call them, 30 rounds or 17 rounds magazines for pistols and rifles, its impractical. There is millions of magazines in basements and gun lockers, etc. Across the United States. Youre never going to be able to confiscate all of them. Unfortunately, the majority of the people who have those magazines are lawabiding citizens. Host this is Nicole Russell and todays startelegram out of texas caller she makes a good point. I was thinking about that when i heard about this terrible event that happened in maine. I feel for the people in maine. There was a lot of people in that restaurant and that Bowling Alley. I am shocked that not one of them was carrying a concealed weapon or was able to respond. Im not familiar with the gun laws in lewistown maine. I made the assumption that potentially in lewiston, the lawabiding citizens gun laws are constrained so you didnt have a person who is armed. Host you can conceal and carry in maine which is one of the states with the least restrictive gun laws in the northeast. The investigation is still ongoing so there may be more details about what people did and didnt have on them at these places. We should probably save the assumption until after the investigation. We are just having a conversation right now about gun laws in this country. Is it a topic we should be revisiting now and if there are additional gun laws in this country, what would you support . A special line for maine residents, north berwick, maine, how close is that to lewiston . Caller yes, two things i like to say quickly, theres never been a gun made thats that had its own working brain. It has always taken a human hand to pick it up and make it work. Number two, youd get these you give these antigun people and inch and they take a mile. When is it going to stop . I cannot believe there was no it armed, caring in those two places in lewiston they couldve taken this guy out. He is going to be a very hard man to take out for Law Enforcement because of his outdoor background, he is a hunter and a fisherman and supposedly a firearms instructor. Hes a National Guard guy. He will be a tough nut to crack. Host to your point about gun laws, once you set a precedent, it doesnt stop. In this country right now, its hard to own an automatic weapon. There is a lot of restrictions on that. That is something the federal government has taken a stand on and added restrictions on. Thats even amid the Second Amendment to bait. Is that a place where you see gun laws stopping or too much of an encroachment by the federal government . There are some restrictions in this country on the Second Amendment. Caller its been illegal since the 1930s to own a full automatic gun. Thats a military firearm. Yes, there are semiautomatic firearms built on a military platform. Its a style, thats all it is, a style. Thats the key word. I will say it again host do you think that style of firearm should be banned in this country or restricted . Caller no. Host ok, thats andy in maine. This is estella in oregon, good morning on the line for those who dont own a firearm. Caller i dont believe anything should be changed. Oregon has pretty good laws. I dont own agon but i will get one. Its getting bad here. I dont know about anywhere else but the more people crossing that border, the more people we have there are homeless everywhere and there are things going on with breakins. With everything that happened in israel, if people had been armed , maybe they couldve protected themselves a little bit. Theres no way im giving up my gun. Host that was the line for those who dont own guns. Its unclear if she currently owns a gun. This is georgia, gun owner. Caller good morning. Host go ahead. Caller yes, i inherited two guns. [inaudible] its a little bit like a saturday night special. As far as these the government has already come out in one of the judges said it was ok for them to have these types of guns. The courts are letting people go. I dont agree with that. Host letting people go for what . Caller for changing the gun laws they just made. They are letting them go out of prison. They have those guns and Everything Else. To me, semiautomatic pistol, you put the cartridge in and it holds about 10 bullets. I think its fairly safe. Most people go to target practice with those. They dont want to shoot other people. Host thats beverly in georgia. Theres been discussion about the idea of soft targets. I wanted to point to the bob greene column in todays wall street journal. He is the author of once upon a time, the miracle of the north. He writes thats bob greene writing in todays wall street journal. It is 7 30. M. On the east coast and we are talking about gun laws in this country in the wake of ose attacks in maine with 18 dead in maine with 18 dead and the manhuntontinues. That attack has sparked a debate over gun laws, should they be changed. The phone lines are sit this 202 74880 if you are a gun owner and if you dont, 202 7488001 a four Main Residence, 20 7488002. As you continue to call in, the shooting in lewiston is talked about in washington, d. C. Yesterday as members of the house and senate were on capitol hill. This is Hakeem Jeffries, the marty leader in the house, the democrat from new york yesterday speaking about the shooting. [video clip] killing and slaughter once again of innocent americans, families broken, individuals injured, fighting for their lives and we stand with the people of maine and will do so in every way possible, moving forward. Its also important that we stand by our Law Enforcement individuals and the Law Enforcement community, First Responders because there is an active manhunt underway. Hopefully, the murderer or the suspect will be apprehended sooner rather than later and thereafter we can enter into a conversation about how we try to confront gun the gun violence epidemic that continues to devastate immunity after community. Here in the United States of america. Host House Minority leader Hakeem Jeffries yesterday on capitol hill on the others of the capitol in the senate, senator student senator Susan Collins. [video clip] our hearts are so heavy today. This heinous attack which has robbed the lives of at least 18mainans and injured so many more is the worst mass shooting we could ever imagine in our state. This is a dark day for our state. I am grateful for the expressions of support and offers of help and condolences that i have received from my colleagues and friends across the nation as well as from the administration. I have had conversations both last night, throughout the night and early this morning with President Biden, secretary mayorkas, attorney general Merrick Garland and special advisor to the president , tom perez who has been particularly helpful in mobilizing resources for the state of maine. That way this killer can be captured. Host Susan Collins of mate speaking on the senate floor speaking with you about gun laws may be changed in the wake of this mass shooting that involve two incidents at a Bowling Alley in a restaurant in lewiston, maine. This is from the gun violence archives, the numbers for 2023. You can compare the latest numbers and it goes back to 2014. This is scott in dallas, texas, the line for gun owners. Caller hi, this is scott in dallas, texas, thank you for taking my call. I am a gun owner and i think we should have some kind of ban on automatic weapons. It would be interesting since we banned them i think in the past, the statistics to mass murder compared to what it is now and see where we were we really safer with the banning of these semiautomatic, highcapacity round weapons. Host you said automatic at the beginning and now youre talking semiautomatic. Are you talking about comparing the assault weapon ban that happened during the Clinton Administration to now or automatic weapons that goes back decades and decades sooner . Caller the semiautomatic and you can still purchase automatic weapons in the United States. Its very easy and there is two ways to do it. You pay a 200, whats called a tax blue stamp. Your previous caller was mistaken. You can still own these fully automatic weapons, class three weapons but yes, you can still own those in the United States. Host this is lori out of the Buckeye State on the line for those who dont own a firearm. Caller good morning. I am totally against automatic weapons. Nobody needs to own one. Too many people are getting killed. I have three grandkids or go to School Every Day and i worry every day. Host in this case, we are talking semiautomatic, one trigger pull, one bullet and automatic as you hold the trigger down it keeps shooting bullets until you let the trigger go. Are you focusing on automatic or semiautomatic weapons . Caller the assault weapons, the ar15. Does that make sense . Host many of those the people classify as assault weapons are semiautomatic. Caller ok, i dont know much about guns. I just wondered what will congress are people who are for these weapons if this happened to their child. This is something morbid to say but i think congress should take a field trip to these morgues where the kids and adults are laying and see what it does to the human body. Im afraid to go to concerts or be around large crowds. I dont want to be stuck in my home but it crosses my mind. I used to go to stuff all the time but it crosses my mind. Our governor in ohio truck pretty much every gun law. Ive already called his office quite a few times because i just dont understand this. Now you can open carry, no red flag laws and know nothing. I dont see the reasoning behind. Host go wheeling, west virginia, dave on the line for gun owners. Caller hello. I have a comment about the existing laws. They are already strict enough. I think what would really help would be instead of more laws, i think a mandatory psychological test before high school graduation. I think that would solve a lot more problems than any new laws. Host thats if you want to own a firearm or other things as well . Caller i have three rifles, a shotgun and a bunch of pistols. Here is an interesting side comment. I made a machine gun when i was 17 years old. I entered in the science fair at our high school. I brunch a school to show our physics teacher and he encouraged me to enter it in the regional science fair. It won first place in engineering. I think any of your callers who listen to this will know who i am. It made i won a trip to the naval facilities in rhode island as part of the prize. Host what year are we talking about . Caller i dont have it anymore. I presented the gun to my High School Shop teacher who was one of the ones, he was our physics teacher, he was one of the ones who encouraged me to make it and enter it in the science fair. Host that stephen west virginia. Back to gorham, maine. How close are you to lewiston . Caller i think its about 45 minutes from here, within an hour. Its a little bit north and east. Host whats it been like in gorham since wednesday . Caller its kind of quiet. Im spending a lot of time at home, im dealing with an illness but i got out to a bakery just yesterday morning. That was about 10 30 a. M. And they put on the television for customers and we watched our governor, its a little nerveracking talking but she was on air and we watched that. Its heartbreaking. To tell you the truth, i am not surprised that this happened in maine given the times we live in. Im not surprised, it was a matter of time. I cannot believe we were watching this on television the other night. Its heartbreaking. But im not surprised given where our country is. Real quick, i am it i married a man who is a gun owner into the shooting sports like hunting. Over 20 years ago, im a pretty strong democrat, i didnt know much about guns or weapons and i was educated. Ive been to the shooting ranges in the area. He represents a good, responsible gun owner in what he does. Ive had an education. Im liberal but i believe in the right to you know have guns or rifles or whatever but to be responsible. I think the way the nra approaches gun rights legislation, they need to back up and look at the big picture. There is never any thought or compassion when we see these horrible shootings. They keep talking about the constitution and its their right in other states and i notice is changing, they want to, they dont think they need to go through any safety classes which is wrong. They think they can just wear their guns to show off. They want to live in the wild west in maine is liberal with their gun laws and i think is a gun owner, you have to be responsible. You have to lock them up. Host do you think this changes anything in maine when it comes to gun laws were red flag laws or restrictions on magazine capacity . What are your thoughts on what happens after this . Caller representative golden in the Second District is a brave politician. I watched him live say he is sorry for his votes. The Second District is northern maine and right now they will come after him. Host this was on the assault weapons ban, saying he would now support that in the time has come for him to take responsibility for this failure and he said i ask for forgiveness. Caller right, im not even sure again, ive gone to the shooting range myself and its kind of fun, i have to say and i am a liberal democrat but we have to use common sense. I want the progun people who dont want any type of legislation to open up their eyes and see. Host what is common sense legislation . What can everyone agree to . Caller i think maybe you have to be 21 years old maybe for certain types of, maybe the ar types. A full background check, maybe more courses and educational training that one should require. People think because its constitutional, they dont need to go through any of that stuff. They dont want to do the hard work or extra time to just get a license to carry. Host Something Like a drivers ed type class . Caller thats common sense. If i could read one thing, i have a friend whose spanish from barcelona and she used to live in auburn about 20 years ago before she went home. I just emailed her, i texted something if i could read that host auburn in the United States . Caller she is heartbroken about this. Her daughter is living in portland going to school so shes in touch with me but if i can read this real quick i told her i was not surprised by this and i said tenuous times in our country, each one of us has a responsibility to change their attitude and be kind and give it helping hand, to talk and that scream about our differences and stop the us against them and that we are better than them. Our country keeps labeling everybody, conservative, liberal, white and black, queer, straight, i am sick of it. These labels are killing us, its divisive and we have to stop this. Its very toxic out there. People are not following the rules. We see more and more around here in Southern Maine is growing there is more people and more traffic. I am lifelong from maine. I have seen the difference and the attitudes. People drive through red lights all the time. All these little things. If we are not paying attention to general rules and regulations or laws, basic laws in this country, inch by inch, we keep breaking these, its us. We have to look at us. Host thanks for the call. About 15 minutes left. This is jerry out of florida, gun owner, good morning. Caller good morning. I think the problem is that people need to number one be nice, behave and if you dont start anything, there wont be anything most of the time. They talk about gun laws but how about enforce the laws we already have . Im sick of turning on my television and i swear to god, it looks like an apocalyptic movie when i see young teenagers beating the hell out of old people in the subway or icy women getting attacked in supermarkets and people being violently attacked all over the place. You have to have a way to defend yourself and your family. These same people like Hakeem Jeffries you talk about new gun laws, they are the same people who were screaming about defunding the police and talking about that all of our police were racist murderers. You have got to be able to defend yourself and your family until help gets there. You see what happened in israel. If those people had been armed, it wouldve been a different story. Those stories repeat themselves around the world. Host have you read the story of the people fighting off some of the hamas attacks . They were not all unarmed. Caller right, and the ones that had guns, their families are better off than the ones who werent. You have a better odds of survival. Its like a fire extinguisher. Its better to have it and not needed than needed and not have it. I do not want to be carrying in the corner of a restaurant hoping the gunman that he runs out of those before he gets to me or somehow guarding a child or laying over my wife, hoping the guy shoots me instead of shooting them. I would rather be able to return file fire and of more people could do that, maybe we could shut this nonsense down. When i so what happened in uvalde, texas and the police were out in the hallway im x military and understand. At certain point, you have to be willing to put yourself in front of the bad guys to protect the people you love. They keep talking about when we are going to love people. Gun owners love their families. Its truly important to defend the people you love and stop trying to take guns away from lawabiding citizens and enforce the laws on the criminals. Keep them locked up. If they need Mental Health services, give them that. Lets stop coddling these maniacs. Host one more question for you your thoughts on these red flag laws, laws that would make it legal to take a weapon away from somebody if they are deemed to pose a danger to themselves or others. Caller the only problem with the red flag laws i dont know how you would fix this, weve got something called swatting in america. If summer lee doesnt like you, they call in the sweat team to your house. I believe people would do the same thing with people with guns , all of a sudden, they would report them and it would be a nonsensical thing that would cost the person a bunch of stuff. I dont know how you fix that. Obviously, crazy people should not have guns. This kite was locked up in the mental institution. He had a severe break and they didnt report that and he went to the Bowling Alley and shot everybody. I dont know how you fix that but taking the guns away from lawabiding citizens, you know, its not the answer. Host we got your point. This is eric out of braselton, georgia. The line for those who dont own a firearm, go ahead. Caller i think a lot of the laws we have a really bad. If you really want guns or at least good laws for guns, you can look at other countries and see what they do. For example, limiting the magazine to five instead of 30 would be good. Overall, it should be at the National Level. It should be statebystate because people are saying they can go to another state and get guns they want and even minors can get weapons in certain places at gun shows. I dont own a weapon but i do like guns. I like going to the shooting range with my friend. But i dont think anyone should own like 30 guns. I think there were pictures of people who owns so many weapons. Host if youre going to restrict the number of guns people own, what is a fair number or what is too many . Caller the number of guns . Its an issue in but i think its the regulations we have the needs to be at the National Level so if you have mental issues, you shouldnt be able and that just drive to another state and get a gun. It should be reported and we should be able to stop people over Mental Health issues of getting a gun. Number two, have Mental Health services for free. [inaudible] host you are going in and out. Let me get to rick in jamaica, new york, the line for those who dont own a firearm. Caller good morning, cspan. The caller before, the gentleman from georgia is a white supremacist. Why folks understand host we try not to read into callers too much or name call so what are your thoughts on this issue . Caller the issue is this keep your guns. Gods going to come back and melt all that. It wont work. You just need guns to kill black people. You all know that. Host ed new jersey on the line for gun owners. Go ahead. Caller yes, guns are not the issue here. The issue is Mental Health with robert card. When they had two red flags, first the army sent him to the hospital, Law Enforcement and the army should have investigated that further to take his guns away. This is nothing about race. The black teens and dce use guns to carjack people. They steal their cars and when they go to prosecute them, they are juveniles and they cant prosecute them. What they should really do is go after the criminals like the gentleman in allendale, florida said. I have the right to protect my family. Im a responsible gun owner and i shouldnt be penalized for some Mental Health issues. I do support red flag laws. If maine had red flag laws like maryland has, this would never have happened. Thats my opinion, thank you. Host harold on the line for those who own a gun. Is it florida . Caller yes, good morning. A lot of these people calling in have no idea about whoever. I have been in the marine corps. [inaudible] host i think we lost that line. This is virginia next, charles, gun owner. Go ahead. Caller good morning. My heart is broken. I am sick and tired of seeing this in the United States. This is ridiculous. We must remember that a firearm is but a tool. This man should not have owned any weapon. I dont know what the manner is to figure out whether it be a cast iron frying pan or a firearm, he should not have been able to hurt other people. Its heartbreaking. We must maintain our bill of rights, every single one of them. They are taking away our First Amendment and have attacked the Second Amendment for a long time and the next thing is they will put troops in our houses. My goodness, i pray for the poor families, i pray for the people in the state of maine. Host thats charles in virginia. From the Associated Press host the line for those who dont own a gun. Caller my name is lori and i guess my feeling is the laws that are already in place are not being enforced. If hunter biden could obtain a gun, lie on his application, thats one aspect of doing it illegally. If people want to get more ammunition they can. People can get more magazines. Host is there anything that can be done with the laws for this mass shooting problem . Caller i feel if they enforce the laws they have, you can tell people you can only have 10 rounds in your gun but people want more are probably going to find a way to obtain guns illegally, people that obtain them are going to find a way to get the ammunition. Host if we passed a national restriction on magazine capacity and made it 10 rounds and then enforce that law, that would be on the books. Do you think that would work . Is that something you could support . Caller i dont think it would work because you are only talking to a population of people who are willing to do things legally and responsibly. Host does enforcing the laws on the books right no matter because people only legally responsibly respond to laws and therell be people who will find their ways around the laws there on the books . Caller hunter biden light on his application. What happened . Host time for one more call, last call from sanford, maine. Was it like there this morning . Caller its quiet. No school. Schools have been closed across the state of maine. Hi. Host what are your thoughts on this . Caller there is no School Across the state. Im about an hour and a half from lewiston maine. I am a gun owner. I feel that its not the gun, is the person behind the gun that pulls the trigger. In the state of maine, you dont need a gun permit to carry a gun. I guess i will get to the point. I think somebody in the state of maine messed up. This gentleman should never have been able to get an ak47. I know in my community, if there is a domestic and theres firearms in the home, or Police Department confiscates is firearms. Should the law be changed . Yes. I do not know why anybody would want to own an ak47. I think it is ludicrous. I feel bad for everybody. Excuse me. For everybody in lewiston. Maine is the state, it is the way life should be. It is gotten to the point where in portland, maine, just all over maine it is every day we hear about shootings. This one has really hit me hard. Host thank you for the call. Our last caller in this first segment of the washington journal. Plenty more to talk about. We turn our attention to Foreign Policy challenges facing United States. That roundtable with the Heritage Foundation james James Carafano and mara rudman. With about a year until election day, federal and state officials are working to ease concerns about federal and state elections. We talk with Benjamin Hovland about those efforts. Stick around, we will be right back. Listening to programs on cspan through cspan radio got easier. Tell your Smart Speaker play cspan radio and listen to washington journal daily. Important congressional hearings and other important events throughout the day. Weekdays at 5 00 p. M. And 9 00 p. M. Eastern. 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James carafano is the current senior counselor of the president of the Heritage Foundation and served in the linton and obama foundations and is the center and at the center for american progress. To your assessment of the response so far when it comes to the outbreak of war in israel, what should be the priority right now for the administration . Guest so i think President Biden has done an incredible job in a challenging situation. And his priority is i believe it should be, ensuring that israel knows that the United States is committed to their security and their ability to go after the hamas military in the way that they have, and to maximize the ability for humanitarian Aid Assistance to get into israel, and at the same time to ensure that American Military that is dispersed to try to keep the region from further blowing up is also sufficiently protected. Host how do you balance all of those things and is the priority in that order as you laid out . Guest not in that order, thank you. Because the First Priority for the president of the United States is protecting u. S. National security and National Security interests. That involves, however, all three or four areas that i laid out. And they have to be executed concurrently, not sequentially. Host on protecting u. S. National security interests, we saw u. S. Strikes to our iranian targets in syria according to the pentagon, just a statement from the secretary of defense overnight. In the attacks by iran proxies continue, we will not hesitate to take further measures to protect our people. These narrowly terror tailored strikes were meant to solely protect u. S. Personnel. They are separate and distinct from the ongoing conflict between israel and hamas and do not constitute a shift in our approach to the conflict. We can send you we continue to urge all state and nonstate entities to not take action that will continue into a regional conflict. It is go it is useful to go back to American Interest because that is the metric. If we could just pull back, the u. S. Is a global power with global interests and global responsibility. We are not the worlds policeman or babysitter or the rulesbased order. Our job is to protect the interests of the American People. There are three really important parts of the world that link the world together. Western europe, middle east and the indo pacific. It is in the u. S. Interest that those parts of the world remain stable. That is how we can get to our interests and protect them when those places are peaceful. What is interesting is in each parts, the u. S. Has a partner which really is the era replaceable ally and the anchor that the u. S. Is always assured that we have a partner sharing logistics and supporting Everything Else. In europe, it is United Kingdom and has been since 1918. In the indo pacific since the 1950s it has been japan. In the middle east it is israel. It is ironic because israel did not start as a vital interest. Our altruism was used was just an impulsive response to the suffering of jews in the world. In the 1950s we were equivocal on whether the arab states were going to be our partners or the israelis and it was really during the cold war when russia start sought out the arabs that the United States said that if we are going to have a partner it is israel. It has become our indispensable ally in the region, so there is as far as america is concerned for us to influence the region without having to send armadas, divisions and Everything Else. So the survival of israel is a class above its own and of vital interest to the United States. Which, how does that relate to the strikes you mentioned . The answer is a little bit not too much. The presence in both iraq and syria today is really a holdover of the global war on terror that started decades ago. It was a recognition that there are still largely ungoverned spaces particularly in syria where isis and similar radical islamist terror set terrorists groups threaten the stability of the region and do out and do operations outside the region. The United States has maintained a modest presence to work with partners and allies to do counterterror investigation operations. But we were doing in afghanistan until two year ago. People generally leave the u. S. Forces alone because they are not so crazy about isis either and because we have always demonstrated a capacity to protect ourselves. It is absolutely true that has been reported that there are dozens of reported attacks on u. S. Bases and this is directly attacking the facilities on american bases and here is how these things actually do tied together in a major way, which is, iran has been very aggressive very specific reason. They want to build a logistics pipeline through that space. So they can support hezbollah in doing military operations against israel. So, it is interesting why these attacks now against the u. S. From iranian sponsors at a time when iran is pushing to open this. The one thing we both agree and guarantee is be we have two carriers in the gulf. That is a big difference because with two you can do major staying sustained campaigns you can fly over and bomb the heck out of stuff. If has below opened a second front the u. S. Might conduct military strikes on those facilities in syria supporting hezbollah and they are run by the iranians. Host your thoughts on the strikes from yesterday and what it means for the potential for escalation. Guest concerning. I have i agree and disagree in part with what james laid out because i think this goes back to iran and the point i was making about the United States and how it is critical to maximize a critical u. S. Interest in regional stability and security. And iran is a significant robert tour provotour to the extent that they knew about the horrific attacks in israel. And iran is continuing to stir things up and make things difficult for the United States. You saw that in the attacks that you mentioned and the hutu attacks that affected the u. S. Military coming out of yemen and they are supported by iran. So it is a very fragile period, the United States is resolute but i would see these statements as part of the immediate picture of what is going on and the possible reactions to that and not hamas. Host we have an hour for this segment so plenty of time to chat. The numbers split as usual. Republicans, 2027488001. Democrats, 2027488000. Independents, 2027488002. Having this Foreign Policy conversation around this friday. Let me shift the perspective to the israel perspective, what does victory look like for israel right now . I do not think we disagree because the great threat is iran and in this thing we talked about hamas and Everything Else and they were all surrogates of iran and i think we all agree with that. The one thing that any Israeli Government has to do is demonstrate that they can protect the population of israel and territorial integrity. That is nonnegotiable. What is really interesting about this if you think back to the relationship between gaza and hamas in israel, i think it is 2008 when the u. S. When the israelis went into gaza into a major way. Guest the transition between administrations. They experience massive cries casualties and the israelis did said they do not do that again. So we cannot eliminate threats by permanently being in the middle of gaza and it is insist unsustainable so we have to be outside that. The hamas response was we will keep antagonizing the israelis i firing rockets at them. And the israeli response was essentially to create an air defense relative protect the people of israel from attacks which led to iron dome and the other systems. It has let the israelis control the pace of escalation. So hamas can shoot rockets but the israelis can shoot them down and protect the population. So they get to decide. They went back to 2013 when they briefly did raids. So this has been, essentially taking hamas ability to poke when they wanted to off of the table. This recent attack is something strategically significant. They found a way to get at the one thing that the israelis could not tolerate, kill israelis, invade their territory and escalate. And do it the oldfashioned way. Walk across the line and kill people. Host what does victory look like . Victory is that they have to go back to demonstrate to protect the israeli people and territories, and what that means is they have to demonstrate that they can take hamas a sense of capability off of the table. I do not think that anybody thinks they will do a military operation to get rid of them. What is feasible is that they can do an operation to significantly degrade offense of capability but there is no end stage. Existence is a constant challenge. And the end stage is when people stop trying to destroy them. And the people trying to destroy them they get to decide that. Host what does victory look like . Guest i have a different take and what had has taken. I think the challenges in what victory looks like in terms of being able to eliminate the threats that hamas military actions present, the challenges getting it right is shown in the difference between what Prime Minister netanyahu said which was we are going to eliminate hamas which i agree with james, very unlikely to be possible. You know who else disagrees with him, a former Prime Minister and defense minister who has talked about the challenges in figuring out how to most effectively carry out a ground offensive in gaza. That is part of the reason we are seeing the delay and there is a variety of reasons but the delay on the border of going into gaza. The kind of operation that is needed just to be able to reduce the military effectiveness of hamas is extraordinarily difficult and involves tough choices which we can go into. In addition you need to have a day after plan for how gaza gets governed, what can happen and let us be clear there is a lot of responsibility i think the United States can do some of that. Host is out a plan you need to communicate to the world beforehand . Guest i do not think that Public Communications is most important, the most important is happening is having a plan and strategy and how you will execute on it. And often times quiet conversations are the best way to get to that but it is tough to do that at the same time you have to plan and extraordinarily challenging process. Host let me bring in some callers because we have plenty already. James carafano and mara rudman are guests. You will know them if you have watched cspan, they have both been on plenty of times. Taking your calls, this is joe in missouri. Republican, up first. What is your question or comment . Caller the war in israel is not our fight. Ukraine is not our fight. I do not want to spend my taxpayer money on any of them. I do not want to american boots on the ground in either place. I have been through the vietnam war and this government will waste your money. I am afraid that all of the equipment that we left and afghanistan might be used against the israelis, americans or anything else. We should have never left all of that. Even the bullets we should have brought home. Host that is joe in missouri. Not our fight . I think it is worthwhile because we are talking about interests and how they should guide Foreign Policy. There is a distinction between israel and ukraine. Ukraine is not a vital interest to the United States. Look, through the entire cold war ukraine was owned by the russians and we survive. Now, is the survival of a free and independent ukraine important to the United States, yes. It is a russian steppingstone to destabilizing Weston Europe western europe. Should we do things to support ukraine, yes. We can debate how to do that and Everything Else. Israel on the other hand, the survival of israel is vital to the United States. Having said that, neither one of those say we are going to put american troops in combat. And i would say there is no, in both cases, there is no scenario where it is likely or prudent for the u. S. To have combat forces on the ground in either place. In israel, when they talk about deployments, they are for a couple of reasons. We are talking about forces in iraq, we have to defend our forces. We have embassies and some of them have already been attacked. So we want to have a Response Force for that. And then the rest of it really about logistics and intelligence support. Those are not people who are going to go in and fight. We should not put troops on the ground and i do not think anybody well. Host ukraine, not our fight . Guest it is our fight because again, if we go back to where james started which is what are the u. S. Security interests at stake, a country or a nonstate actor like hamas that engages sovereign territory of another democracy and does it without reaction, and does it freely can lead to not only those entities or those countries taking further action elsewhere, but can inspire many other countries to do the same, and let us be clear in terms of russian what they have done to ukraine, the nato countries are all around ukraine. As soon they did the same sort of three thing to ukraine as nato countries than the United States is involved with boots on the ground. So our interest, the interest of the caller as well as many other americans, we are protecting americans by what we are doing in ukraine. Host someone we ask what does victory look like for israel, what does victory look like for ukraine . And can this war happen with Russia Holding on to any part of ukrainian territory or crimea . And could not still be victory for ukraine . Guest that is a decision for ukrainians not americans to make, not unlike israel. Host deal with opinion do you have an opinion on what the right decision is . Guest i do not, you have to be the ones on the ground and executing in the fight, and who is and whose immediate people and treasures are at stake and Going Forward to be able to make that call. I mean when we Say Something is an interest, that is the opening to the conversation because then it gets to him what is the most efficacious way to do that or what you are trying to protect and what is important to you and what is the appropriate thing to invest in terms of risk, capability and resources. Russia has already lost. What is important to nato in the United States that russia stops, and it has been stopped. It is not going to conquer ukraine. Having said that only russia can decide when the fighting stops. The reality is that this is going to end in a cold peace, this is going to look like west germany and west germany in 1945 or korea in 1953 or even israel in 1967. The forces at some point, and then the same requirement, it is not going to be about how do we recapture the territory, because if you want to stop, then ukrainians are going to have to acknowledge that in order to have continued support from the west, they are not going to take offensive action to regain territory. And what is important is, you have to be able to sustain the defense of the country and protect your people and grow your economy. And that is the conditions on which western support will be sustainable. Host 25 minutes and and i am already behind. Margie from pennsylvania. A republican. Thank you for waiting. Caller good morning, two quick questions for either guest. How could there not have been any knowledge of the attack . Had they gone back to strictly verbal communications . I mean like the government here would know if i took a walk to town, so how could that be, number one. Number two, hamas could dribble out those hostages hostages one by one for a year. And they could use that time to completely rearm. I do not recall any discussions about let us all be humanitarian during 9 11, so im actually for going in because host let me just take this time, hostages and then intelligence failure . Guest im going to do the intelligence failure because it was political and intelligence failure and a cultural failure. In other words i have heard from a number of former u. S. Intelligence officials whose judgment i trust that the issue is that israeli officials had the data, they saw the activities in terms of what hamas is doing, testing and things like that. The failure was on a couple of fronts. One is quite lately a certain amount of hubris and not understanding their adversary and the capabilities. And thinking that i had a armour boss saying i am too smart by half, a former boss saying too smart by half. And they thought they could divide between the Palestinian Authority and hamas and they could give hamas goodies like palestinians being able to work in israel and that would temper it, not understanding just what hamas game was, and they were clever. In an in understanding the israeli mentality so they had data points coming in into the ms. Into the Israeli Military intelligence and political leaders and they were not acting on them. Host does that mean a complete overhaul of intelligence in the wake of this . Guest fair question. This goes to the other point of failure which was that the Israeli Military and israeli Political Leadership are the most fractious point and have been for a year partly because of their very significant threats to israeli democracy poise posed by which the way that Prime Minister netanyahu put together a very far right coalition and had people in National Security positions that did not have military background and experience in a way that would have been typical of past Israeli Governments whether right or left, so faction issues meant that civilian and military leadership are not talking to each other. Yes, and overhaul will certainly be coming and there will be commissions and Lessons Learned and there are very few people that inspect that Prime Minister netanyahu will remain Prime Minister after that overhaul. Host talking about hostages . To me this is the most troubling part and the reason for that is that it is very clear that when hamas started the campaign hostagetaking was part of the strategy which means that they might have a clear conception about what they want to use them for and how to manipulate that. So these people lives are in great danger and they are basically slaughter for whatever hamas decides. And it is very difficult to rescue hostages. It is going to be a troubling part. Host what can we draw with how they will use them from what they have done in the Historical Context . There are a lot of different scenarios, everything from the concept at the music at the munich olympics they were always going to kill the hostages. The iranian hostage did not start out as a government plan but than the government found that they could use the hostages essentially to humiliate the u. S. Administration. The point is that hamas has options on how they play out the hostages. And an area that we would disagree is that how we should respond to this is that we should not have gotten into the situation in the first place. We can debate with the set up and military theory that i had that i think that the u. S. Does not have responsibility and maybe we disagree. I think this administration has a conscious policy of using engagement as a way to deescalate and they are significantly engaged with iran and allowed them to get tons of money and pumped a lot of money into it. They still talk up a two state pollution solution and all of that sends out weakness. Guest im not going to respond to that because there is nothing quick about what everything that is wrong, but what i will say is that on hostages it is another example of hamas knowing its adversary well. Israel has traditionally have a great deal of sensitivity and gone to extreme lengths to be able to free hostages and you saw that. And they released hundreds of very dangerous hamas prisoners who were in exchange for one israeli soldier. That is part of the mentality and tivos. So it is hard harder. I understand why you are saying israel should go in regardless, that is not the israeli mentality and not what the israeli people should expect in terms of doing Everything Possible to bring back innocent civilians and soldiers captured. Host in california, james on the live for democrats. You are on. Caller good morning. I spent 20 years in the u. S. Navy from 1980 until 2000. My question is that why under donald trump we had no war in israel and no war in ukraine, but hunter biden we have two wars . I think host do you want to start with that . Guest i find that a troubling statement and highly inaccurate in terms of how the world works and functions. Under donald trump we had russia wildly empowered in its actions in the world and thank god that President Trump was not present when russia invaded ukraine this time because we could easily have seen all of nato involved and had a president of the United States that might not be protecting us against russia. So further emboldening russia and china, the most serious threats to u. S. National security that we have. First of all, thank you for your service. We completely disagree, i do not think it is a surprise but it gets to an important point. We can argue different versions of what Foreign Policy is, but it does remind the most important thing which is that the president of the United States, Foreign Policy job one. They are commanderinchief and they make Big Decisions regardless of the makeup of congress whether it is republican or democrat. And in so many elections people say i am voting for taxes or inflation or i am voting for i dont know, but you know what, they are not. They are, they are always voting for a commanderinchief and it is shocking how may times when you talk to voters how little they think about that when they make their decision. Guest the one thing that we can agree on what i would use different language is the first job of the president of the United States is protecting the security of the American People and National Security interests which is not national Foreign Policy. Foreign policy is a tool, and it is one of the tools of doing the job of the president to protect the interest of the American People and their security, safety and prosperity. Host in the wake of these issues that Foreign Policy will play a much bigger role in campaign 2024 . Or will people go back to the pocketbook issues . In the debate we have here we are a very polarized country and the tendency is that we will stick with our team and we do tend to vote on domestic issues. And that will be true. People look at inflation, crime and Border Security which is a major challenge, and i think those are people thus those are things that people will not look to aside from anything catastrophic. The iranian hostage situation did help think jimmy carter and the korean war frustrated the reelection troops of truman and johnson. So the question is when something happens and if the americans really feel it is directly affecting their peace and security, the interesting thing here and it is more domestic issue on the israeli issue is we see this incredible surge of antisemitism in the United States and around the world. In many ways that issue is more disturbing and troubling to americans as an aspect of this war and people may be and people will vote on. Guest i do not see the divide in foreign and domestic in the way that is suggested which is why i talk about talk protecting the security of the American People. The reason i think it is a Campaign Issue is that americans are concerned about their economic future, they are concerned about the safety and security of their children, they want their next generations to have a better hope for the future than they had. And how the United States is set up in the world is a key component to how americans feel about their everyday lives including a very significant legislation passed in the first two years of the Biden Administration that some folks will look out as infrastructure and some folks will look at how we make our Industrial Base stronger and better, but those things also very much affect how the United States is set up to compete with china and the world to take on russia and do other things. Host let me bring in catherine, springfield, massachusetts. Democrat. Good morning. Old man jacob had twin boys. Where are the other 11 boys . The other thing, solomon built the temple. Host please bring it up to present day from biblical times. Caller it is my under station that joshua host in the beginning is not present day. We are just focusing on what we are talking about now, u. S. Foreign policy challenges. This is michael in plainfield illinois. Independent. Good morning. Caller yes. Is it john, i forgot your name, the hose. Do not cut me off please. Because im really tired of cspan advertising themselves as wellbalanced and all this stuff and then we have programs on like this that are actually distorting the truth and history. Regarding the middle east, this is only the most recent battle of a war that has been going on for 75 years which the u. S. Facilitates because we protect israel, even when they are totally wrong. They are committing genocide right now in gaza, and that seems to be ok. They have more than 2 Million People held hostage in gaza, no one says anything. There is only one solution to israel and then i will get to ukraine. Unless and until the u. S. Is willing to force the israelis to give back the entire west bank, let them keep gaza and they can give the palestinians an equivalent amount of man contiguous with the of land contiguous with the west bank. Host let us stay with israel for a second and the comments about the gem it the genesis of this. Guest so, i have worked on these issues for longer than i might care to admit and i have been on the ground and i have been in gaza a number of times over the last 30 years and in the west bank as well as throughout israel, so i take issue with a number of the points that michael has made. I think that there is responsibility to be shared, all around for what it is like to be a palestinian in gaza and the difficulty for many palestinians in the west bank as well. The solutions that i still firmly believe is through a path to a two state solution. I actually think in a perverse way some of the challenges being faced right now could open up further a path to creating a palestinian state. Without it we will have an ongoing existential threat to israel. And there are steps to it that to that that we could take right now. I take issue with the language that we you that you use. But highly problematic and frankly unfair. Look, no nation on earth conduct military operations where they try as hard as i to avoid civilian casualties than the israelis. The israelis were attacked with 1400 people brutally murdered. The notion that somehow this is israels fault is beyond important and completely wrong. One area that we do disagree is this notion that somehow the solution is a two state solution is fatuous. If and President Biden did call for this in his speech. If we could create a state tomorrow, we would have a tool of iran, a sworn enemy to the destruction of israel, a state sponsor of terrorism and a people run by an administration that is completely corrupt and oppressive. That is not a solution to anything. The economic, political and security reforms needed to make life livable for most People Living in poverty with hundreds of millions of property and resources and 340 plus Million Dollar milliondollar military budget. If we can address all of those issues, what the political lines look like is irrelevant the problems of the people of gaza is under in abhorrent administration and giving him a country is bad. Host when people talk about a two state solution, what would that look like . Would that exist in the west bank and gaza, would one of those go away . What do people envision . Guest the closest that the parties came to this was something that president clinton proposed in december of 2020. It is west bank and gaza conjoined and for a variety of reasons no one should be under any illusions that gaza can be a completely separate place. That is part of the missed perception of arrogance an arrogance that led to that contributed to the situation where we are now. Just be clear on that point. It is the west bank and gaza. There of been a different of iterations on how to conjoin. One governing body, absolutely. And again, in the clinton proposal from december of 2020 that i am sorry, back a decade, two decades at the turn of his administration in 2000, that proposal is also involved land plots so you could effectively get to the 1967 lines for palestinians, and that was a much safer and secure future for israel that was what which was offered right now. I dont disagree with that,. Guest so let me please continue on that point. Which is that it would have led to a safer and more secure israel and preserved israeli democracy. So james has completely brushed over that if you do not come to a resolution with palestinians you have one state from the mediterranean to the sea that is just as problematic as some of the pipedreams of hamas and what they are trying to do which is one state from the seed to the jordan river which would not be a democracy. In either scenario. It would require the discussion of israel. Guest one state that you suggest that does not involve the west bank and gaza together or a separate palestinian state, how would that be different and what kind of democracy would it be . I do not agree that there would be a palestinian state that would support the interests of israel. That is why we didnt get to a solution. This leads us to another problem which has always been that reading the two state solution is a solution to all of the problems and everything had to be held in abeyance until we solve the palestinian problem. As much as you hate the palace the last ministration they achieve more in the middle east. What they really required is a normalization between israel and the arabs. When that happens that creates the palestinians. Host i do not think this comes to a solution. I have 15 minutes left. This is chuck in colorado. Thank you for joining. Caller thank you. And thank you for cspan. I think two states is the only solution because the status quo has got us nowhere. I have been watching this since jimmy carter. And it is the definition of insanity. It is akin to assault weapons on the streets of america. Weapons of war. It just isolates us and makes us afraid of each other, and the thing these two both have in common is the nra took money from the russians to help get trump elected. And maria was sent by the russians. Host before we go back to 2016 and russia, let me keep it to the middle east. Are we at status quo . Caller i do agree that i do agree that we are thankful for cspan. It is great to have this balance. So i do not think it was the status quo. I do think that normalization was the greatest significant potential contribution to peace and security in the region. And i will say that we can talk about this political solution all that we want. But look at what we are dealing with, and Iranian Regime that is funding hamas and hezbollah to kill children and behead people. We are dealing with regimes that are currently corrupt that divert humanitarian aid to make weapons to attack israel. So these are not partners for peace, and the reality is that you have to deal with the threats that you have. And as he really pointed out correctly, the greatest source of instability in the region is iran. Iran is funding hamas, and hezbollah and the hutis. They have been the greatest force of instability. And if you do not deal with them and i will argue that the engagement strategy has failed. Host what happened it was what happens if israel attacks iran . It depends on the conditions that it occurred under. So right now, when you have not won the war you are fighting you would not start new ones. Now israel has a military operation against hamas so they are going to do something. We will have to see how deep it goes and what the goals are. They are going to do something. They have a potential second front with hezbollah which is what the iranians would love to see blowup. Right now the israelis are trying to prevent the second front from happening. That is going to be their party right now in the nearterm. Guest i would put the i think on the iran point, yes in different words. I want to go some i want to go back to something that was alluded to in that james mentioned earlier which was the impact of the Abraham Accords in the region. Because first of all that really was led and instigated by the mri the mri these the emirates. And they were the first country to join the Abraham Accords with israel and part of their price was israel not continuing to expand and annex further settlements in the west bank. So that is an interesting mechanism. The Abraham Accords now where there is a lot of talk about bringing in saudi arabia which is tabled. That is an opportunity as well to not take the palestinian show off of the table because there is no part of the Abraham Accords that it was possible to have arabic countries in the region come to agreement with israel because of the iran threat. And we are also addressing the palestinian question. And what the recent issues have been has given further opportunity or when we get back to discussions of bringing saudi arabia into the Abraham Accords arrangement which is a priority in the Biden Administration and getting to a more realistic path forward for palestinians. Host massachusetts. John on the line for independents. Caller thank you for taking my call. Hello . Host what is your question or comment . Caller i have a comment and then question. The same families that funded napoleon, the same families that funded all of the wars through the wall street banks, the rockefellers, j. P. Morgan and all of the families are the same ones that had family that came here from england. Which every president has been related to, the monarchy is. Host i am not sure where you are going, so let us go to new jersey, republican. Good morning. Caller how are you. Im going to direct my statement to the woman on the panel. Host mara rudman. Caller im sorry i did not get her name, no disrespect. She was knocking netanyahu about democracy in israel. What other democracy in that area . You go up to the only democracy in the area because she had a problem with the judiciary and some of the things they are doing. The second point is is ukraine, what kind of democracy are they . And we are spending money for the past two years. And the third one i want to say. Host let me get to those two. Guest ukraine is a democracy and it has a democratically elected president in president wolinsky was doing an admirable president zelenskyy who is doing an admirable and heroic job. In terms of israel i am a strong believer in israel as a home for the jewish people and i also believe that part of that requires and i come from as a jewishamerican, that requires also including Democratic Values and part of its basic youth those. Ethos. Israel has been an important and strong democracy in the region that other times the only democracy which is precisely why how Prime Minister netanyahu put together his cabinet and has a very far right coalition that does not have the support of the israeli people and his attack on the courts which was a judicial overhaul in a way that led to half the country being on the streets and in protest and much of the military and Military Reserve. It shows how important it is to many israelis to hold onto the important aspects of democracy which involve a court an independent judiciary as well as a strong parliamentary system. And that is part and parcel of part of the fragility of where israel is now and what Prime Minister netanyahu has to deal with. Host james in the eight minutes left, i want to get to your thoughts on the white houses supplemental emergency funding proposal, 61 billion for ukraine. 14 million for israel. 14 billion for Border Security. Aid for the Indo Pacific Region. Any chance of it getting through congress . There is zero, quite honestly. He gets back to where we disagree. I do believe that americans vote on domestic issues and Foreign Policy has become a domestic issue because the number one thing that i think concerns a lot of americans and when they look at their paychecks and inflation and the state of the economy and the state of the world is incredibly runaway unsustainable debt and now we have the servicing that exceeds the defense budget. That has become a mainstream issue in a way that it has not been in recent years. What it has contributed are some of the things we have mentioned. We have a number of very large bills with a lot of spending, a lot of people disagree with it whether it is efficacious and supplemental bills that do not wind out being about the core issue. Most people would support military aid to ukraine because they see a more peaceful europe and u. S. Interest that there is so much more in terms of other kinds of spending. This is a good example, not just money for israel and ukraine, there is also money for Border Security, most of which has nothing to do with securing the border. We see all of this additional spending, it is not fiscally responsible. Host what is the 7 million for the Indo Pacific Region . Taiwan. Why is that an emergency spending bill . We have full budget bills already in the senate. I would say 80 of this would accept and argue that there is money that israel reads needs right now and it could be dealt with in regular appropriations. And when you do not have regular appropriations you lose fiscal responsibility because the president throws the package together and deals get put together and it does not get questioned and i think it has greatly contributed to ballooning debt. Host the Christmas Tree that they hang their projects on . If there is a case for emergency spending they would like to see spending on the emergency item and then have that be voted on. I think having an emergency spending bill for israel would pass without a problem. A ukraine emergency spending bill would pass, even though i disagree with a lot of things. I think that people are really upset about fiscal irresponsibility and using crises in foreign parsi Foreign Policy and ways to exacerbate that. Host the Current National debt, 33 trillion and counting. Guest this package is roughly 100 billion in change, not small and not huge but not small but huge and critical for supporting u. S. National security interests. Our guest this is a challenge and we overlooked that inflation is coming down. And we as a country not only can afford this, but must do this to protect the American People. And so getting back to basics and being able to explain that, i actually think Border Security is a pretty immediate thing. I actually listen to you so i would appreciate you listening to me. I just dont appreciate that you would misstate what i said. That i do not think that money is for Border Security. Guest i was giving my own viewpoint and i was not referencing anything you said so please, if me the time. So Border Security, incredibly important, i would say at a crisis point and i think the president shares that view, similarly the money for ukraine, which is the dominant part of this package as well as the money for israel, needed for the United States to be able to fulfill our commitment to those countries without putting u. S. Troops on the ground and without so protecting our interest at a relatively low cost compared to what both of those countries are investing in the security that they need to protect. And then the taiwan money is also similarly china and russia are about sign the scenes, may be, but very much have the United States and their sites. They are watching what we do and ukraine and israel, kind of playing behind the scenes to make it more difficult which makes taiwan more vulnerable. Host why include that in the package, just to the point of this is an emergency supplemental and we are hearing about ukraine and israel, we have been hearing about the border you make the point that this is needed now. So why put the money they are people who feel like too many of these things get thrown together . Guest not all emergencies are things immediately in the headlines, and the threat that china has been very clear about how it used taiwan. The threat that taiwan is under is ever present. Let us just talk about the percentage of semi conductors that come from taiwan that are critical to what the United States needs and this goes to the part of my point about the lines between domestic and foreign are blurred. It is a direct United States interest be sure that we diversify that supply chain but also that the Taiwan Semiconductor industry is protected. And so that has become a critical issue when you have a bill in front of both. I think the senate understands that. And it will not come out as the president has sees it. The question is whether a very small group in the house will able to be legislated. Host we are close to running out of time. Alan has been waiting for about 20 minutes. Good morning. Caller good morning, and thank you for having me on and finally taking my call. One quick note, your new studio that you have, it is horrendous. [laughter] whoever designed it is making a strong point for bringing back public flogging. Ok, i will move past that. Host let us go to Foreign Policy. I have about two minutes. Caller i was just so disgusted. [laughter] i will turn the tv off. I agree with the first caller when the gentleman said 1400 israelis were massacred, however, since the bombings that israel has throwing into the kill box that they call gaza, over 6000 palestinians have died. 2700 of whom are women and children, is that not a tear to be shed for palestinians . This whole problem began 75 years ago and it would be the occupation. I believe for the jewish people they had nowhere to go after the war and the United States had a ban on them and we did not want them here but it does not make it right to invade someone elses country and push them off and persecute them for the next 75 years. Host host well go to ou. Guest two, the loss of innocent lives and civilians is a tragedy whenever and wherever it occurs. And i hear President Biden making that point quite clearly. The 1,400 israelis who were slaughtered, the many innocent palestinians in gaza who are being killed, a tragedy without question. The problem is the way in which hamas has governed gaza. They absolutely use and embed themselves around the civilian population. So lateral, i do believe, is pursuing and following the rules of law. The rules of war, sorry. Which often involves following the rule of law. That means they are doing Everything Possible to ensure that their military ends and means are aligned and that they are minimum mizeing to the full he minimizing the full extent possible the loss of civilian lives that. Doesnt make it any less of a tragedy. But i want to make clear how israel is pursuing this and how the United States and others are dealing with it. Guest i think this election will be about real debate. You cant just waive your hand and say National Security, spend more money. 99 of the bill could have been done through regular order. Thats where you get oversight, accountability. The Border Security is a good example. As a separate stand alone thing it would not pass the test in the senate and house. Its been a great debate. Your fiscal prescriptions is what got it into unsustainable debt. Host senior counsel to the president there. Mara rudman, senior counselor, always appreciate it. Coming up on the washington journal in about 20 minutes well talk about the Election Assistance Commission. Well be joined by Benjamin Hovland of that organization talk about their efforts ahead of the 2024 election. But for the next 15 or 20 minutes our open forum. Any Public Policy you want to talk about. Any political, state issue its your time to lead the discussion. Phone lines for republicans, democrats, independents are on the screen. Start calling in now and well get to your calls after the break. As part of our new series we are asking you what books do you think shaped america. Is the sound and fury. Pilgrims progress. To kill a mockingbird. Join the conversation by submitting your pick for the book you think helped shape this country. Go to our website, cspan. Org books that shaped america n30 seconds or left tell us your pick and why. Be sure to watch books that shaped america live every monday at 9 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Jon hancock is one of the most famous signatures in the histry of the United States. Most people dont know much more than that about him. Rick, who is the founder of ye olde taverns tour of boston wants to change your perception of this american signer of the declaration of independence. His newest book called king hancock. He got that moniker back in the middle of the 1700s. The author writes, quote, his stature eventually rose so high that he became known by both his friends as enemies by that name. Author brook on this episode of book notes plus. Book notes plus is available on the can now free mobile app or wherever you get your podcast. A healthy democracy doesnt just look like this, it looks like. This. Where americans can see democracy at work. When citizens are truly informed, our republic thrives. Get informed straight from the source. On cspan. Unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. From the Nations Capital to wherever you are. Because the opinion that matters the most is your own. This is what democracy looks like. Cspan, powered by cable. Washington journal continues. Host open forum, any Public Policy issue, political issue you want to talk about. Now is the time to call in. Republicans, 2027488001, democrat, 2027488000. Independents, 2027488002. The house and senate not in today. But what event you may be rest in watching here on the cspan networks at 11 30 a. M. Eastern, the Ukrainian Ambassador to the united state is giving a talk about the ongoing war in ukraine. And addressingilitary reporters and editors at the conference taking place here in washington, c. Watch it on cspan, cspan now app, and of course cspan. Org. 11 30 a. M. Eastern time. To your phone calls. This is katherine in cleveland, ohio. Line for democrats. Good morning. Youre up first in open forum. Caller hello. Good morning. The two guests you have on are complete fascists. They are spewing american lies because we do propaganda here for oral wars. I might be speaking out of turn, but you know what i mean. Have a good day. Host next out of pennsylvania, republican, good morning. Caller good morning. Host whats on your mind, nancy . Caller i wanted to comment my one and only time that i ever call up like this, but i have wanted to say the whole country is in a mess. And the only reason its in a mess is because of when we dont have our own oil. When that was cut off. And the open border. Those are the two things that happened, and thats the reason we are all in a mess right now because of oil and the border. Host before you go, do you think americas best days ahead of us or behind us . Caller well, it all the oil is over there and we have to try to get it. That started everything going. Why cant the democrats chew gum at the same time. Why couldnt we have our oil. They want the solar stuff. We could have had both at the same time if thats what they wanted to do. No, they had to stop our oil and that started everything went downhill from there. Host nancy in pennsylvania. This is todays washington times. Jennifer harpers inside the betway columns. Show highlights. The Americans Values survey of some 2,500 u. S. Adults, 75 of u. S. Adults believe that the country is going in the wrong direction. 90 of republicans, a 1 of independents, and 59 of democrats. 52 of u. S. Adults agree that the United States best days are now behind us. Thats 67 of republicans. 55 of independents. And 35 of democrats who agree on that. More from that survey at the American Values survey. This is marlene out of galveston, texas. Independent. Good morning. Youre next. Caller hi. I just want to say that, you know, america loves its genocide. In fact, the whole reason we did that with native americans and when world war ii happened, we didnt go into world war ii because they were committing genocide on stkwraouish people. We went in there because the japanese came and attacked pearl harbor. That is the fact. We love genocide in america. Thats what we are doing to those poor palestinians out there. Everyone from people like Hakeem Jeffries should know this. Thats all i have to tell you. Have a good day. Host marlene in texas. David, reno, nevada, good morning. Youre next. Caller good morning. Please allow me to speak for my 90plus seconds without cutting me off. I believe we are looking at subjects from a daytoday outlook. I think we need to pull back for more of a 30,000 foot view. I believe 1492 columbus discovered black jewish people in america. Black jews, excuse. And whites are jewish people which are two separate religions all together. I believe we the people of the world in our 6,000 year power structure known as the cabal, which equals sole owner. Tur irk, ukraine, is all ashkenazi host all right, david, nevada. Frank in silver creek, georgia. Republican. Good morning. Caller hi. I just want to try to make two quick points. The wars, the middle east im for the war in ukraine. Im for. Thats your problem. They never paid their fair share in nato. They need to take the role in that. The head role in repelling russia. As far as her saying, miss rudman, about our economy being so good, its mainly because there are 10,000 People Per Day turning 65. That trend will continue up until 3033. Social security and medicare is going to go broke. Nobody thats something we need to be concerned about. Are we going to save Social Security or medicare or not . The situation in the middle eas host you mind if i ask how old you are . Caller i am 65. Be 65 in november. Host you think Social Security and medicare will be there for you for the rest of your life . Caller i think we are going to have probably have to take a cut in Social Security. By 2033 if we if this is not solvent, everybody will take a 25 cut in Social Security. For her to say the economy is doing well with inflationary spiral. We keep spending all this money on all these wars which we should have nothing to do with. Thats one thing. Israel, i just want to get this in real quick, moses and his have existed for 5,000 years. Moses was in that country. The israeli identities israel kwrao euts were in israel. We didnt go in and take palestine. Palestine never existed until the romans conquered israel. Somebody needs to get their history straight. Especially the nonbelievers. They dont know about biblical processes. Host this is armando in san antonio, texas. Independent. Good morning. Caller good morning. Host whats your comment . Caller how you all doing. Thanks for taking my call. I just want to quick comment on first of all on ukraine. I think we got to keep the ukrainians, they are hell of a fighter. We got to stand with them until the end and get rid of the dictator putin. Host thats armando in texas. Jason, saint cloud, minnesota. Good morning. Caller good morning, america. Good morning, cspan. Thanks for everything you do. Wonderful discussion again this morning. I want to go back to the people that talked about the rights and how important they are. The Second Amendment says everybody has a right to bear arms and have a well armed militia i believe is how its put. I did a little bit of googling search, i think most states have already put laws against massachusetts hreurbas out there. I dont think a militia is a legal entity anymore. I need help on this. People, correct me film wrong. If they have already done that part to the bill of rights, right, the Second Amendment, why cant they do something about the guns . I know this has been brought up before. When it was written you had to be scared of the british coming in. Now people are saying, im scared of my own government so i need this. If we are talking about people owning pistols or people own long guns or even shotguns, the amount of death is so much smaller than these military grade weapons. Its also the equivalent of whether when they wrote the amendment, they didnt have a canyon. Go ahead have a canyon at your house. They knew that was the wrong thing to do. Again a weapon back then so much different than the weapon now. People, a sister in maine, all these things hit close to people because we we are the United States. We used to be. We had a lot of friends and family across the area. We are just looking at each other saying, somebodys got an m16 or ar15 in your town, i dont know if youre safe. People can take them. That person people snap for weird reasons. Maybe we can do a buyback. Maybe people can come with those guns you give them three times what they are worth and you have a threeyear program like that. Afterwards if you have one, man, the hammer comes down on you. The hammer comes down hard. Something has to happen. I agree with steven could he bear, one of the things he said was could he bear colbert, this is time for prayers, this is time for all this. We can do prayers. We can do prayers. But they are the lawmakers. They are the lawmakers. This is their responsibility. 86 of americans want something done. The n. R. A. Has such a small hand of people. I they maybe five Million People are n. R. A. Members. That is such a small percentage of americans. There are 365,000 of us. Five million against change . Lets do change. Host jason in minnesota. For the history of the constitution, the writing of the constitution, great place to go is the National Constitution center. Great place to learn about it. The wording of the Second Amendment, well regulated militia being necessary for the security of a free state. The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. This is eddie in south carolina, republicans. Youre next. Caller good morning. Thanks for taking my call. I talked before a couple times, please dont cut me off, the lady on earlier talking about the israel situation, you could tell she was a flaming liberal. She could gettagery every time someone would challenge her. You could tell she was a biden lap dog. Why are we looking at 61 billion discrepancy and only 14 billion for israel. 61 billion for ukraine. We want to continue to prop up that corrupt country. Its been recognized the most corrupt country on the face of the earth. The other thing real quick you keep saying that you cover republican hearings on cspan or cspan, you put them on cspan. Org or cspan3 which most people dont have. Put them back on cspan one. Quit being so partisan and leaning toward the democrats. Host just so you know, when the house is in session, the commitment that we have made is we will always show the floor of the house when they are in session on cspan. When the senate is in session, we will always show the floor of the senate on cspan2. Thats our chance to show you some of those other hearings what they are not when policy makings are happening on capitol hill. We try to show as many of those as we can. They are all available on cspan. Org. Cspan3 is a place where we can get those hearings on when the house and senate are in. Just so you know how the programming works around here. Does that make sense . Caller its a joke. The American People see t we see how partisan you are. See how the people you bring on your shows how partisan they are. Host ok. You can finish. Caller a bipartisan station. Youre not. Host all right. Well do our best to bring you various viewpoints, various perspectives as oven as we can. We do it every day on this show. This is ray on the line for independents. From pennsylvania. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I did watch mara ruddman with interest, especially when she used the term arrogant, because if anybody or any person was arrogant its her. As it relates to the two states solution with israel, how can you not with a twostate solution when one of the twostates involved is unalterably committed to the destruction of the other state and the murder and death of everyone in that state . Its not possible. But the philosopher said if you dont learn from hatred you are doomed to repeat its failures. History said, with either germany or japan, when youve got an opponent like that, you have to destroy them. We firebombed dress dan dress continue. We destroyed the gentlelady from everyone there was either guilty of being a participant or allowing it to happen. That is the way hamas is. Thats what gaza is. It has to be completely destroyed. Unfortunately, its horrible, but there is no we went from 1944 having two opponents committed to our destruction to 1946 after two allies. The answer was allies. The answer was we destroyed by wait there were thousands of american prisoners in both cases. And in certain situations, unfortunately, we may have to take the approach and say, look, there are 200 hostages, they are dead. Host ray in pennsylvania. Our last caller in this open forum on the washington journal. Stick around, more to talk about this morning. About 40 minutes left today n that time well be joined by Benjamin Hovland, vice chair of the u. S. Election assistance commission. Well talk about next falls elections and the e. A. C. s work there. Book tv, every sunday on cspan2, features leading authors discussing their latest nonfiction books. At 6 30 p. M. Eastern, New York University professor martha host shares her book, my high jacking, where he recounts being taken by a 12 in 1970 by a palestinian group. Young turks founder argues that america is a more progressive country and offers his thoughts on how to advance a liberal agenda for his book, justice is coming. Watch book tv every sunday on cspan2. Find a full schedule on your Program Guide or watch online any time at book tv. Org. Live sunday, november 5, on in depth, author and former aclu president joins book tv to talk about civil rights, free speech, censorip, and more. Shes the author of, defending pornogphy, hate, and the recently published free speech, what Everyone Needs to in a moment a guide to free speech law and the debate surrounding it. Join the conversation wh ur phone call. Facebook. And text. Indepartment with nadine live sunday, november 5, at noon eastern on book tv on cspan2. Cspans student cam documentary competition is back. Celebrating 20 years. With this years theme, looking forward wall considering the past. We are asking middle and High School Students to create a five to six minute video address one of these questions. In the next 20 years what is the most important change youd like to see in america . Or, over the past 20 years what has been the moss important change in america . As we do each year, we are giving away 100,000 in total prizes with a grand prize of 5,000. Every teacher who has students participate in this years competition, plus an opportunity to share a portion of an additional 50,000. The competition deadline is friday, january 19, 2024. For formation visit our website at student cam. Org. A healthy democracy doesnt just look like this, it looks like this. Where americans can see democracy at work. When constituents are truly informed our republic thrives. Get informed straight from the source on cspan. Unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. From the Nations Capital to wherever you are. Because the opinion that matters the most is your own. This is what democracy looks like. Cspan, powered by cable. Washington journal continues. Host we are joined for the first time on the washington journal by ben hovland, vice chair of the Election Assistance Commission, or e. A. C. As its known in d. C. Speak. Mr. Hovland, on the e. A. C. , background, how long has it been around . Whats the mission of the Election Assistance Commission . Guest thanks for having me. The Election Assistance Commission is a small federal agency. Not everyones heard of it. We were created by the help america vote act of 2002. Which was Congress Response to the florida 2000 election. So they created the agency as an independent bipartisan agency. There are four commissioners. Im one of those four. We were charged with a handful of missions. First, to test and certify voting equipment. To serve as the clearinghouse for best practices in Election Administration. And to provide a number of surveys and Research Across the elections. The reality is elections are run at the state and local level across the country. Our elections are very decentralized. Part of our role is to look at the different ways that americans are getting registered. Is that at the d. M. V. . Is that online . And how they are participating . Are they voting by mail, early in person, on election day . We study that and look for best practices across the country to support Election Officials. Host you know that elections are very decentralized in this country by designed. Why . Guest part of that is just the basics of federalism. Again how we are set up with 50 states. There are its really interesting to see from the Vantage Point to look at the different ways people run elections. And see how those can support voters. One of the things that i think about is a lot in 2020 during the pandemic as more voters than ever were looking to vote by mail, that meant Election Administrators had to respond to that. And we had the ability to learn from those states that had who had previously moved to full mail how they had those Lessons Learned. We are able to share that across the country and it made a big difference for Election Administrators and voters. Again, theres really that advantage of looking around the country. Seeing the different ways that elections are administered across the country. And using that to inform future policy. Host you mentioned the main job of the e. A. C. Is certify voting equipment. How confident are you in the voting equipment used in that very decentralized process around the country . All the different types of voting equipment that it is working, working properly, and well get the proper counts . Guest im very confident. Part of the testing of certification process to start off ill say that the standards that we set are called the voluntary Voting System guidelines. Part of that again is federalism and the states are in charge. Then the states that choose to use our program, we run that equipment through rigorous testing. And thats on a number of issues. That is security, of course. Its also usability. Accessibility. There is hardware testing. Making sure the equipment is physically safe to use. I think one of the things that a lot of people are unaware of is we do have this testing and Certification Program. And really all of the rigors that this equipment has to go through to be certified. Host does every state use that program . All 50 states . Guest not all 50 states use t the vast majority of states use it in some way. And that is either some use voluntary Voting System guidelines as i mentioned, they use that wholesale. Some use it as a baseline and add on state requirements. Others use as part of our testing and Certification Program we also accredit test laboratories. Some states have their own standards but use our accredited test laboratories. Again, every state does things a little bit differently. Those are the main varieties. Host you mentioned the concept of federalism a couple times. Why not make this like the minimum wage . Where the federal government sets a minimum standard for voting, and the states choose to go above those standards. They can do so on their own. Why not have a baseline that says this is a basic system that works and you can trust and that everybody can feel confident in in all 50 states . Guest in some ways that is what we have. When you see federal legislation around elections, its fairly rare. But when you see it its providing that baseline. The Voting Rights act of course ensuring that all americans can participate. And things like the National Voter registration act, which is more commonly known as motor voter. That was providing a baseline for access to Voter Registration. The help america vote act that created the e. A. C. Again did a number of things. It was about creating baseline standards for things like statewide Voter Registration databases. Making sure that all voters could vote independently. Making sure it was accessible equipment in the polling place. Things like provisional ballots we have across the country now. Sometimes those are cast in a light in the negative, but what they do ensure is everyone has a failsafe. If you have shown up on election day, at a minimum you can cast that provisional ballot. That provides Election Officials with time to figure out if you were eligible. That is a safeguard for the voter and a safeguard for the integrity of our system. Host i guess i was thinking more about the mailin voting which caused so much controversy after the 2020 election. Why wasnt there a baseline of heres the standards for mailin voting . Then states can go above that if they want. Therefore people can feel confident in this expansion of mailin voting. P. Guest there is a baseline for military and overseas voters that the uniformed and overseas citizens voting act, that provides that baseline. Then again you have states who choose ranging from full mail ballot driven votes, to absentee and exused absentee. One of the things we know was voting by mail wasnt new in 2020. We know in 2016 nearly a quarter of americans voted that way. We saw it spike up in 2020 to almost 45 of americans. Went back down some in 2022. I expect for 2024, while i dont think it would be as high as 2020, it will be higher than it was in 2016 probably in the mid 30s. If i was going to guess. Because thats a trend we have been seeing. Its how Many Americans want to participate in the process. Thats really a big part of it is thinking about how americans want to tphaeufpblgt how they want to engage. How they want to participate. When i think about Election Administration, i think about its about Customer Service and how are they able to participate . You have seen an expansion of early inperson voting. An expansion of vote by mail. Thats a recognition for Many Americans, tuesday in november isnt the best day to vote. Give them that option is really key to helping americans participate in the process and make their voice heard. Host about a year, election 2024, we are focusing in this segment on the work of the Election Assistance Commission. Ben who have lapd is our guest. Vice chair of the e. A. O. Former chair. Here to take your phone calls and questions. Phone lines call in as usual, republicans, 2027488001. Democrats, 2027488000. Independents, 2027488002. Go ahead and call in. Ask folks calling in, ben hovland, what do you think is the biggest threat of the integrity of the u. S. Elections in 2024 . Guest i think that one of the things that we have seen post 2020 is that there has been a lot of confusion about the process. I think its important to help provide that information and transparency for voters. I think traditionally so Many Americans turned on the news on election night, checked the results, and that was sort of the end of it. And i think that you have seen more people take an interest in the process of Election Administration. Its a very involved process. There are the people who run our elections across the country, the men and women in local jurisdictions across the country, are professionals. And they have so many checks and balances in place. And i think for a number of people that is new to them to learn about the behind the scenes work that goes in to ensure the accuracy and integrity of our elections. Host greg out of florida line for democrats. Good morning. Caller mr. Hovland, i heard something very troubling to me when donald trump was in new hampshire. He said in his rally, dont worry about voting. That we have plenty. What was that supposed to mean . Thank you. Host you want to take a stab what he was talking about . Guest i wouldnt im not sure that i would be able to guess. What i would say im a big fan of voting. I think its critical for all americans to make their voices heard. Again, a big part of it is being aware of how you can participate. Making sure that you are registered to vote. Making sure that registration is current. We skipped ahead to 2024, but the reality is there are elections there are americans Voting Rights now. Early voting in municipal elections around the country. States like virginia and new jersey have statewide elections. Its important to make sure that you are able to vote in all those elections that you know when these deadlines are coming up for registration. Again that you are registered at your current address. And that you know how to participate. Certainly anyone out there who is looking to do that i encourage them to check out e. A. C. Gov vote. A great way to get connected to their state officials. Host milwaukee, wisconsin. Kerry, republican. Good morning. Caller good morning. I have a lawn mower going on outside. First of all let me assure you that i fully understand that there is absolutely no proof of widespread voter fraud in the 2000 election. I dont believe the gray line perpetuated by trump and his trumpies. Im a diehard republican, but i dont like trump. I have two very thoughtful questions. The first one is, regarding the dominion Voting Systems. Again i know that they won huge in a lawsuit against fox news. But if people google dominion, there is a great number of articles on there talking about the vulnerabilities that they have found. Even post election in the dominion Voting Systems. Although they said there is absolutely no proof that its contributed to any fraud. They do acknowledge that there were a number of vulnerabilities found. Secondly, as far as registering. Since we have an even greater number of noncitizens, undocumented adults living in the u. S. Right now, what safeguards besides the fact that people who a lot of them who speak a different language do certify and they sign something when they register, whatever, attesting to the fact only citizens are allowed to sroefplt besides that what is there to prove that only u. S. Citizens can vote . I have never been required to provide a birth certificate to register to vote. Let me just last say i think the greatest risk integrity of our Voting System Going Forward is the mass media and social media. You get extreatments on both ends. Which makes it very difficult find out the truth about what the actual candidates and their parties stand for. I appreciate the answer to those two questions about the dominion voting host i got them both. Thank you for the questions. Mr. Hovland. Guest thanks for that call. I think there is a couple things there that i want to make sure to hit on. First, the difference between a vulnerability in a system and somebody exploiting that. All computers have vulnerabilities. Thats just part of technology. Then the question is, has that been exploited . As far as the Voting Systems go, we have seen no evidence that any votes have been changed. Anything has been exploited in that manner. Again, i have full confidence in that. I think, again, theres been a lot of talk about this. And certainly no evidence has been provided to show that. Host because nobody tried to exploit them or because they whats your assessment knowing about these vulnerabilities now, why we dont see any evidence they were exploited . Guest i think there is a few things there. One is, again, as i was talking about earlier, sort of the totality of the process and safeguards in place. The checks and balances in place. You have, to the degree that you have voting equipment, you have also physical security. So whether that is the seals and locks on the equipment itself. The locked warehouse or cage its in. The requirements usually around the country for bipartisan teams to access that. All of those are layered security. In the security world they talk about defense in depth. Thats what that means. You dont have one sort of single point of failure. You are able to layer your security. We have seen that across elections. There are also safeguards in place on things like post election audit. And pre and post election logic testing. Thats a mouthful. What that really is tests that Election Officials put in place to make sure that the equipment is working the way its expected to. To again make sure that it is trustworthy and they can have confidence themselves. Host the other question from the caller was against registering noncitizens to vote. Guest again, citizens are who are allowed to vote. Every Voter Registration in the country asks you if you are a citizen. That is under you are signing that under penalty of perjury. It is a felony to lie on those forms. And again host we have plenty for calls. Ben hovland is our guest. Hes the vice chair of the u. S. Election assistance commission. You have been working on election issues and voting issues for your entire career . Guest yes. Host where did your interest in Election Administration come from . Guest i will say i did start out on the campaign side of the house a little bit. And knew that wasnt for me. So i went to law school. Then i ended up working in the missouri secretary of states office. I was working on both some Ballot Initiative litigation and through that process got sort of more and more exposed to Election Administration. And really liked it. I think that host what did you like about it . Guest Election Administration, and i think one of the things that we see a lot is that Election Administration in campaigns, the lines get blurred. We have seen too much politicization of Election Administration. To me Election Administration is the separate process of about how we make sure that americans are able to express their voice and their vote. And for me, Election Administration was sort of close to politics but sometimes they talk about it being politics adjacent. You can see that, but more than it being about who anyones voting for, its making sure everybody has that opportunity. Sometimes they talk about in the context of being a poll worker. If you have never been a poll worker, a great way to get a lot of confidence in the process. You are that Customer Service space of our democracy. It doesnt matter who someones coming in to vote for, its simply that your neighbors coming in and youre able to help that person to participate. I have done that in a number of i have done that a number of numbers. Every time has been rewarding. Particularly some of those folks that you see that maybe need extra assistance. That 18yearold voting for the first time. Maybe they are a little nervous because they are not familiar with the process. You can help them. Give them that i voted sticker. Similarly, the Senior Citizens whos been voting longer than maybe you have been alive, but you can help them through the process and make them feel proud that they participated in our democracy. Host did you vote when you turned 18 . Guest absolutely. Host have you ever missed a vote . Guest probably at some point along the line. Certainly when i was younger i maybe didnt have as much of an appreciation for the importance of local elections. I probably had that classic focus on president ial elections that so Many Americans do. But again since we are in early voting around the country and the number of places for municipal election, ill give a shout out to the importance of your state and local elected officials in participating in all elections. Host ben hovland with us. About 15 more minutes left in washington journal today. Taking your questions. This is gary in montgomery, texas. Independent, good morning. Caller good morning. Thanks, mr. Hovland. I appreciate you being here. There are some things that have been very uncertain. My question is this, you say that there are safeguards and audits for all the various voting equipment and all. What type of safeguards or audits are there towards the actual ballots that are presented and used when people are voting . I mean mailins primarily. There are so many of these cities where there were dumps in the middle of the night. Im beginning to wonder what about all these deadmen in the envelopes. Do they audit people that are actually alive versus dead . Or is there a way to identify that . All these cities where lots have been burned out. They are sitting vacant. They have been like that for years. The last owners im wondering if they are using those titled owners as voters with these mailin ballots . Is there a wayway to audit that . Guest thanks for the call. I think there are a couple things there. One, i have never seen dumps. There are safeguards in place all throughout the process. When you talk about the mailin balloting process. One of the things thats really important to know is that across the country there are safeguards. Most states use a signature verification process. So they are comparing the signature with your mailin ballot to the signature thats on file. Thats the primary thing that we see. That is verified by people and teams. There are also there is an accounting that goes in. You have a certain number of registered voters. You have the people who have either if you are in a mail state, everyone sent a ballot. You are making sure who has returned that. If you are in a request state, you have that accounting. At the end of the whole process there is something called the canvas and certification process. And thats where Election Officials go through and they do all of the math, basically. They make sure that the ballots they started with the ballots that were used, the unused ballots all add up. There is an accounting for all that that takes place. Make sure thats just part of the safeguards that are in process. Just one thing that i would flag to garys question. Its rare but the add dress issue he but the address issue he raised. One of the things we do occasionally see with our uniform and oversea voters, military voters, many of them military voters overseas citizens are able to use their last address. So sometimes if they have been in the military for a while or overseas for a while, their address may not exist. We do occasionally get calls about issues that have come up about a particular address or somebody not being there. So many times that person is serving in our country abroad. Host 10 minutes left this morning. Sheri out of dallas, texas. Line for democrats. Good morning. Caller good morning. All the things i really have to say is this. I think that everyone should be allowed to vote. As well as i think that the only reason that we came up with any of these issues is because the republicans lost the election. They refused to accept it. All the conspiracy theories and the mailin ballots. All of these is just a mess because the republicans lost. The couple people that they found that voted that were dead were people who voted for trump. Accept the truth. The truth is, trump lost. Period. Host sheri in texas. What do you want to pick up on from that . Guest thanks for the call. I think that, as i mentioned earlier, we have seen too much politicization of the Election Administration process. For me when i talk to Election Officials across the country, republicans, democrats, independents Election Officials first and foremost care about running a smooth election, serving their voters. And making sure that the election is secure and accurate and has integrity. I see that all over the country. Again across party lines when aim working with Election Officials. Again you see so many safeguards in the process. One of the things that i think about, all of our election laws were the parties not trusting each other, thats not a new thing. Our election laws are written with those safeguards in mind for that exact reason. Host you mentioned the Election Assistance Commission, which you are vice chair, was borne from the controversy of the 2000 election. And that help america vote act. The controversy that people feel about the 2000 election, why did we not see a help america vote act 2 come from that . Guest the help america vote act of 2002 was a couple years after the florida 2000 election. Anything certainly is possible. I spent five years with the senate. Sometimes Congress Takes time to work through these issues. One of the things that i think is critical any time you are looking at election legislation is to have those conversations with Election Administrationor administrators. Make sure you understand the process. Make sure there are not unintended consequences. And ultimately it be bipartisan. You saw that with the help of america vote act which was overwhelmingly bipartisan. I think if there is an issue we can get to agreement on, you could see a path forward. Host what is an issue you think we could get to agreement on . Is there a date to change that you would advocate for . Guest at e. A. C. We are not in the business of legislating. Again i think that to me when you look at Election Administration and you think about that baseline that i talked about earlier of Good Governance and Customer Service, how do you serve voters . When that is your framework, you can find a lot of areas of bipartisan agreement. The e. A. C. Is a bipartisan agency. Everything that we do as an agency we have to have bipartisan agreement on. There are so many things in this area that are really just about serving voters. Host laura is in spokane, washington, republican. Good morning. Thanks for waiting. Caller yes. Good morning, mr. Hovland. Thanks cspan. My concern with the voting thing is what i have heard and have some reason to believe is that they are using a new system called equity where they throw out a certain number of votes in favor of their candidates. And how this is done is by friends of the politician managing the office. And also i want to know i have forgotten everything. Sorry. Can you tell me, can you tell me for a fact we have lost trust in our elections. That the fraud that was committed by biden and the media and covering up his history, who he is, what he was. And saying this is misinformation. How can we call that last election a legitimate election . Guest thank you for the question. I would say first and foremost that the 2020 election i was the chair of the e. A. C. At the time. The credit and sort of just the real story of the 2020 election to me was the amazing work that state and local Election Officials did across the country. Obviously we are in the early days of the pandemic. And Election Officials put their health and safety on the line in service of our democracy to make sure that their friends and neighbors and citizens of their communities were able to vote. And it really was the best administered election i have seen in my career. We saw a record amount of turnout. If you look at just the administration of the election, they did a fantastic job. In the aftermath of that, there has been an array of confusion about the process. I think one of the real take aways for me is to know where to get your information from. There is a lot of information out there. A lot of Information Online that is not trustworthy. But your state and local Election Officials, those are the best sources of information about how elections run in this country and reaching out to your local Election Officials is the best way to get Accurate Information about how elections are run in your community. Again the caller was from washington, they are a mail state. Maybe not as many opportunities to serve as a poll worker there. But in states where you can be a poll worker, great opportunity to see the process firsthand. Also election offices, all the ones i have been to are very transparent. They like to give tours. So its an opportunity to see the operations firsthand and bill that confidence build that confidence i know election offices have across the country. Host how many states are mail in . Guest it depends how you count. There are a few flavors. Everything depends. The earliest dates were oregon and washington. They are more of a traditional old mail. They mailed a ballot to every registered voter. Then you have i think colorado that do that, but they also have an in tkerb person component with vote centers. Utah is now largely mail driven. We have also seen hawaii and vermont move that direction. Then you have states like arizona that have a significant portion of the population on their permanent mail list. So they are not a full mail state. But they have 730 , 830 70 , 80 voting that way. Host inperson voting for somebody whether its next year in the 2024 election or all the state and local elections happening now, and in the coming months, somebody going inperson and talked into the poll place, wherever that is. What should they look for to feel confident that this is a well run election, can i trust whats happening here. If they i can trust whats happening here. If they look around the room, what should they look for . Guest i think that number one, first and foremost, the thing that you see so often when you work when you walk into the polling place, is citizens just like you from your community. Who are running that election. You go in and you check in in the poll book. That may be a paper poll book or electronic. Again that is a recording of all the registered voters. That will later be used in that canvas and certification process that i mentioned earlier for an accounting. And then youll be given a ballot. That may be in most places now thats a hand marked paper ballot. In someplaces youll use a piece of equipment that may have either mark paper ballot for you or have some type of paper up trail. So youll go through that process. And if its a hand marked paper ballot, a lot of the times youll put it in the scanner or ballot box. Maybe that will be scanned later at the polling place. What you have seen through that process is citizens from your Community Walking you through the process. Taking care to record each step of that process that will then later be accounted for to make sure everything adds up correctly. Youll see bipartisan teams that make sure that everything is going as its supposed to and following the processes and procedures that are set out in the law. Host well end it there. For much more on the work of the Election Assistance Commission, its e. A. V. Gov. Wh can viewers find . Guest there is a lot of information abo Election Administration. All times of Election Administration. And then eac. Gov vote, there are links to your state and local Election Officials. For state specific information. Host check it out eac. Gov. Ben hovland is the vice chair of the u. S. Election assistance commission. Appreciate your time this morning on the washington journal. Host that does it for thus morning. Well be back here tomorrow morning at 7 am eastern. Its 4 a. M. Pacific. In the meantime have a great friday. 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