And talk with people at different backgrounds. Its an opportunity to hear firsthand from conservative leaders. I think mark meadows is certainly a conservative leader. After 27 years as a successful Small Business leader, he decided it was time to do something in washington. He iran for office and was elected in 2012. He has been representing the good constituents of the 11th district of North Carolina since that time and in his third term. He serves on the House Oversight and government reform committee, the House Foreign Affairs committee and the house transportation and infrastructure committee. Over a year ago congressman meadow was elected chairman of the House Freedom caucus, a group of about 40 members who are really committed to making sure those who think their voices are not heard in washington are indeed heard. Congressman meadows is a champion of all things conservative. He is a champion of fiscal responsibility, of a government being accountable to the people, he is a leader when it comes to prolife and profamily policies and he is a strong supporter of a Strong National defense. The representative has been committed to conservative issues for many years. He and his wife debbie have committed themselves to conservative causes in the conservative movement for many years but i know that firsthand because they been big supporters of one organization that ive been a part of and its been a pleasure getting to know them. Its a pleasure now to welcome him up to the stage for the ladies and gentlemen, congressman meadows. Thank you genevieve. Obviously any time you get to come and talk about conservative causes, its a good day. But, particularly today to be able to not only have the honor of getting to speak to so many of you who have been in the trenches, fighting for conservative causes for a long time, but to do it at a time here on capitol hill where i guess every day is a new headline with regards to shut down and tax reform and whats going to happen, i found it extremely not only in honor but also a privilege to see whats going on behind the scenes. As we are here live, we will make some news that hasnt been reported. We will have some conversation but i went over with this. Its interesting, when you are chairman of the Freedom Caucus , you get either the credit or the blame for anything thats happened that is opposite of what one party or the other wants to happen. For conservatives, they feel many times a number of the Freedom Caucus members are the few voices on capitol hill that are willing to speak up for them. Its the forgotten man or woman. Its important that we restore our confidence back in government, that it is a representative form of government. Far too often they forget that they represent a little over 700,000 people and the voting card that we have, i often say this is our voting card, this one has my picture on it and a lot of members think once the picture gets on their voting card that belongs to them, but indeed it does not. Mine belongs to the people of western North Carolina and the more that we remember that and remind our members that it is not their voting card but it belongs to people, i think the more conservative the policy we will get and certainly, as we look at, today i want to talk about perhaps i guess what we would say is twopiece. The policy and the pragmatic way that we get it done, policy and pragmatism would be the two areas that we do, but before we do, i thought it would be interesting, i got this bloomberg alert the other day, mike medications director sent this to me and anytime you get mentioned on the floor of the senate, it is normally not a good day for a conservative member of congress, but on this particular one, what i think was what we took as a compliment, and it says Senate Democrat leader Chuck Schumer says that House Speaker paul ryan needs to stand up to the House Freedom caucus because its trying to derail negotiations on a longterm Government Spending plan. He went on to say that he believes the military, of which i am a strong proponent of a National Defense and for National Security reasons believe that we need to increase the spending there, but he went further to say that the military and domestic Economic Growth portions of spending need to be treated equally. So what he is essentially saying is we need to increase defense and we need to increase every other aspect of the government at the same level. Now, he is saying that regardless of a need. We have a lot of facts that would suggest our military men and women, because of his sequestration are following way behind. Some of our enemies abroad, and we need to do that. Democrats and republicans were otherwise making Good Progress on the spending talks until the Freedom Caucus got involved. I think he meant that as a negative. Avidly we see that its fighting for the millions of men and women who believe what we have to do is start to get some type of control of our federal spending. We are in the midst of a tax reform debate. I think it could be a few days earlier than that. Its time. Its time that we start giving we give taxpayers money back to them. People started talking in ways that we truly dont talk about in North Carolina or any other state when youre on main street. I think they teach their kids here in washington d. C. How to start counting billion one, billion two, billion three instead of one to three. They raise the numbers in such a way. They talk about a rounding error being two or 3 billion, and yet for my constituents and for the people in this room and certainly for the people that you know, it is your money. It is not the federal governments money and we need to be wise, efficient stewards of that. Some of the drama, i think one of the headline said there was drama on the house floor on monday as it related to a vote to go to conference. Would you guys like to know kind of the back story on what happened that particular night . So heres what happened, i was actually out for a run on monday morning with my wife, we were running and trying to get rid of a little bit of turkey and dressing and so as we were out for a run, i was thinking about how do we make sure we get a tax reform bill done because we in the house have been complaining about the senate for a very long time. We said if they would just go with the 50 vote threshold, get rid of the 60 vote cloture, we would be able to solve a lot of things because there are a lot of people who said, you know what, you ask for the senate, we gave you the senate. You add the house in the senate and you can get things done. Then you said if you just give us the house, the senate and the white house we will get things done. So what did the American People do . They gave you the house, the senate, and the white house, the expectations were unbelievable and then the delivery was less than desirable. And so here we are today with this frustration that says people giving their hard earned dollars to support candidates, people who were out waving sign signs, perhaps making homemade signs to make sure we took over all the branches, both the house and the senate, and certainly the white house, and yet, the results continue to get held up in the senate so for me, when i saw that they actually got if the one votes in the senate for a tax reform bill, i said you know what, we need to not play around with this because you never know when theres one senator or two that will go rogue and decide to change their vote and go the other way, so i got with my good friend jim jordan from ohio and i said really, what i think would be the best plan would be actually to not officially go to conference. Lets leave that bill sitting there were technically the house could just signed the senate bill and send it too the president. It needs fixing. It needs help, but the worstcase scenario, we would have some relief, we know the senate bill, we could pass it and send it on, but by going to conference, what you automatically do is you take that off the table and you take it back where you put it back in the house and the senate and you still are at the mercy of one or two senators in the senate. So we felt like if we actually didnt make a motion to go to conference but we allowed that conference to happen in an ad hoc way, that we would actually have the best of both worlds. We would have a bill that had been passed on the senate that we could pass in the house and send to the president , but we could continue to negotiate and make it better and everybody would have the same incentive. So, as many of you have read, we went to the house floor to hold up enough votes. The free caucus wanted to make sure we focused on tax reform and kept it there and we had enough votes to make sure we didnt go to conference. Welcome you will read about that you know that part but just a few minutes before the vote, i get a call from the president aboard air force one who said he was concerned about not going to conference and that we needed to reconsider. Anytime you get a call from the president , you not only take it but you normally start out by yes, sir and i understand sir and so if he was sharing some of his concerns, i started to lay out what i just laid out for yo you. I said dont you think, mr. President , that it would be a good idea if we kept a bill that potentially is still being able to be acted upon in house and so i have those kind of conversations with him. He was thinking about it, obviously he was in transit between places out west and coming back to the oval office and the speaker was actually not here in washington d. C. And so i committed to do that. You may have seen the drama on the house floor and the votes are not there and were holding up our votes and i went out and talk to the speaker, we had a long conversation, and for us, it really boil down to two things. One is, we believe that we need to be very fast about getting this tax reform done. We dont need to open it up and negotiate every single aspect that we been negotiating for the past ten months. We need to keep it narrow in my opinion we need to make sure that middle income wage errors get real relief. We need to make sure Small Businesses actually get the tax relief and not just a few Small Businesses, we believe some of us, that the mortgage Interest Deduction should stay where it is today cannot be lowered like it was in the hospital, and so there were four or five components that we put in there in terms of fixing things that we saw at odds with the two, but as we looked at that, i shared that with the speaker, there was one other area. This whole idea of spending, and as you know now history from yesterday, we passed a shortterm spending bill through december 22 and that is to suggest that we didnt know that the december 8 was on the calendar for three months and that the deadline would have been december 8 and , i think its time that members of congress have a plan to get things done and not wait to lastminute. You dont run your household or your businesses that way, it is certainly not appropriate for running the largest economy in the world with a speed up, stop, and hope for the best strategy. Here we were, the conversations were going off, actually had another conversation with the president that night and im always cautious to not share the details of conversations with the president , but here is the back story. Ultimately, the president and the speaker encourage us too go to conference so indeed, we released the votes, the House Freedom caucus supplied the votes so that we could go to conference, you now know the senate voted yesterday to go to conference so we are officially there. And yet, at the same time i think theres a clear understanding on a couple different points. One is we need to get tax reform done in the next week 10 days, the land in the time of promise for future victories is over. I dont know about you but ive heard too many times we are going to fight for something the point in the future. Thats only to be disappointed. There is another fight thats coming up that you really need to be aware of that based on Chuck Schumer and his continued direction in one way, that they are going to require every federal Government Program and agency across this town to levels that we have not seen since the obama stimulus was voted into law. That is troubling because when you are looking at numbers, you are looking at members that could close if you add in the supplemental for puerto rico in texas and some of the legitimate needs that are there, you look at a spending bill that is close to 200 billion. When you look at levels like that, it is unsustainable. What we need to do as conservatives . We have to understand the policy, but the pragmatic side of this, and actually getting things into play means that we have to set realistic deadlines, i do not believe that decembe december 22, 3 days before christmas makes for good decisions other than what youre going to get for your son or daughter or gon grandson or in my case my new granddaughter. Those are the kind of decisions you need to make a few days before christmas. My wife would say long before a few days before christmas and so heres what i would ask all of you too do. You have been involved in the conservative movement. You truly have a conservative, not only credentials, but at your very core what you believe to be right and wrong, and yet in that, how does that get watered down in this place . What we need to be doing, and heres the pragmatic side of things, we need to be putting together bills that make people vote on things that perhaps they wouldnt normally want to vote on. For example, when we did a relief package for puerto rico and florida and texas, why did we not put in some kind of reforms to the Flood Program that has been underwater, pun intended, for a long time. Why do we not put that on there and then dare our democrat colleagues to vote against it in the senate . Why do we not start to couple things to make the decisions difficult. Here is my ask of all of you. As we start to look at this, i have no special gift other than the fact that i have negotiated all my life and i look at pressure points and when you have those pressure points, those are the only times you get concessions. Those are the only times you get people to truly start to come together and say i want to give you this, you dont want to give up that, but if we come together we can make that happen. For far too long, conservatives have conceded that policy ground because they are being pragmatic and saying what we just gotta get something done. We are a basketball state in North Carolina. What we call that is going into the four corner prevent defense when youre down by 20 points. The only thing youre doing is guaranteeing you will lose by less points than you would have before. I think its time that the American People see a win. It is time we actually start to make for those difficult votes. Does that mean will have all kind of conservative wins . No, quite frankly there will be concessions i have to be made, but better the concessions be made in the middle of negotiations where you have a difficult vote then where you just dont put it on the table at all. I would ask you to reach out to your senators and your members and encourage them too not only take tough votes, we say the senate takes more naps than they do votes but it is time, that will be a quotable moment. I can tell you that. But we often say that the house, they need to take a few more votes and even if it fails, what the American People want to see us do is fight and try to do that. So, i know weve got a lot of good questions and so heres what i would give you one more behindthescenes story. As we look at tax reform, so much of what has come out on tax reform has been because of what we call in the Freedom Caucus, the power of negation. Its not the fact that we have all the power to suggest that were going to get this thing done or that thing done because quite frankly, a lot of members of the Freedom Fighters are not on the committees of jurisdiction, but because our bylaws allow us to take official positions and Stay Together and say that were not going to vote for something until we get it right on behalf of the American People, ultimately what happens is we get brought into those negotiations and so i would ask you to be part of the power of negation because when you say no to something, what happens is theres power in that. Now you cant frustrate people and you cant say im going to be no always will never get brought into the negotiation, but we have to make sure we are there. Sometimes things are not always as they seem and i share this story over and over again and ill close with this because we will have plenty of time for questions. Sometimes things are not always as they think that when i got congress i thought all you had to do is come up with a good healthy, a pragmatic way to get there, and ultimately everybody would come together and embraced that idea. Thats what happens in business. It doesnt happen in washington d. C. So the true story from the mountains of North Carolina, we were about 45 minutes away from the closest walmart. You know were in the middle of nowhere if we are 45 miles away from walmart. We were 45 minutes away from walmart, the episcopal priest wife was going down to give a womens speech. As she traveled down the curvy mountains, she realized she didnt have any pantyhose, and wanting to make sure she made a good impression on the lady she was speaking to, she decides to pull into the walmart and buy some pantyhose. So she parked in the parking lot, jumps out of the car, runs into the walmart, by some pantyhose runs back out, and gets in her car and realizes there is not a place to put them on between the walmart parking lot and where shes going to give the speech so she makes the decision to put them on in the front seat of her car. So without getting too graphic, you can kind of imagine how difficult that is and so all of a sudden she got this weird sense that someone was looking in the window at her. She looks over her left hand shoulder and sure enough there is a person looking in the window at her. She opens the door and says what do you want you pervert. He said i dont know maam, but you are sitting in my car. True story from the mountains of carolina so sometimes things are not always as they seem. I guess what i would ask of each one of you is to be engaged, be close enough to realize that when you read a headline that you can see behindthescenes and maybe open that up just a little bit to say you know what i dont believe that. We need to make sure we stay forceful in our conservative principles. Im here to tell you, having traveled from maine to california, from michigan to florida and everywhere in between, this is a conservative country even though many in the media would have you tried to believe otherwise. And so, i want to thank you for being committed month after month, year after year to the conservative cause and making a difference on capitol hill. I can tell you your advocacy not only makes a difference in policy, but also is starting to change the pragmatic part of giving people like me in the Freedom Caucus the courage to stand up for the forgotten man or woman. Thank you so much but i look forward to your questions and we will open it up right after that. [applause] think you i just wanted to confirm, why is it that you feel by the t the spending bill might be past and what can we expect after the 22nd, whether its pastor not so the 21st is really where i believe, by the 21st to be tax reform but i believe there will be a spending bill that we were actually bring up in the house before the 21st. Our leadership is committed to that so we are working right now to try to come up with a package that we can pass out of the house before the 21st. If it does not receive the attention in the senate, and there are some who would suggest, myself included that the package we believe is adequate and appropriate will not receive the attention of the senate. We passed 12 appropriation bills for the first time in six years in the house. He went over there and sat in the senate and Nothing Happened with it. I fully expect that if that does not, if the spending side of that does not get done by the 22nd, that you will have two outcomes, perhaps a new outcome or new tax deal that would be at levels that most conservatives would object too, and perhaps a very shortterm cr that gets us from the 22nd of december into maybe the first part of january. The reason i think on tax reform, being on the president s desk by the 21st , all of them are working very hard, i know i had a conversation with at least one senator and two house members this morning on trying to fix some of those things, and i think everybody believes this is not a fine wine, it doesnt improve with time and we need to narrow that out and make sure we get it too the president s desk before we leave for christmas did you have a followup question i just wanted to know if there are any concerns that you or other members of the Freedom Caucus have that might hold up the vote necessary for the 22nd i think we all have expressed those, as you may have seen on the house floor since your reporter, yesterday im sure you saw this, we waited, in terms of only providing enough votes to make sure we didnt have a government shutdown. We had more than enough votes in the Freedom Caucus to make sure that we didnt pass the continuing resolution, we could have stopped it, we talked to the leadership, this was their play call, this is what they believed would happen so what would happen there, if you get a spending bill that has 150 or 250 billiondollar plus with the daca fix in it and a number of pfizer reauthorization that some of us have a problem with, we believe there needs to be some pfizer reauthorization reforms before we, that is for the foreign surveillance, those things getting added in could be very problematic and yet, just to be truthful, if you plus up spending enough, the Freedom Caucus is a non leverage point because you will get enough democrats to come across and vote for it yes, maam i am a graduate of Leadership Institute and a member of the commonwealth republican womens club and the Virginia Federation of republican women et cetera what you sound like one of my constituents. God bless you. Yes, sir. What im concerned about in the tax bill, can you speak to how it will help seniors because theres a big body of seniors, the baby boomers, that are retiring and we need a livable wage as prices keep going up and to support ourselves. What is the tax reform going to be doing for us as Senior Citizen i think thats a great question. Its probably one of the things that when i look at the democrat, the demographics of my district, that we have been perhaps more focused on than anything else. When i look at my district, i represent the western part of North Carolina, and so im not running for senate so i can say its the pretty part of North Carolina and its the mountainous areas, but we have all kinds of people that retire there. So with that, we are looking keenly about those who are on fixed incomes and as we start to look, the dea doubling of the standard deduction does help but its also one of the reasons why some of the senate levels probably get adopted, we went from three levels in the original proposal in terms of income levels in the house, we ended up at four in the senate is at seven. Part of that is trying, will probably end up with more to make sure that we can get those down so that every level actually gets a tax cut, but that brings up one other area. When we are looking at, or those were about to go on to medicare and those who are on medicare, Health Care Costs is one that can obliterate the savings we are putting their so to completely ignore the repeal of obamacare, to completely ignore the copays in the additional premiums that will come with medicare is ignoring what we are doing. We give a break here and we allow, i was talking to somebody in their 60s just the other day and they said their insurance premiums have popped up by 500. Month. Well, 150 savings and tax still puts them in the hole in real dollars, and thats what youre talking about, by 350. On tax reform, i do believe will get it right, there is a big push back on some of it where were were with medical costs and not allowing that to be deducted. I know thats gone back and forth in real rigorous debate on how we address that to make sure that doesnt penalize those that are either retiring or about to retire were still working on seniors without the same level of earning potential. We will repeal the individual mandate in this tax bill, and by repealing that we will start hopefully to work with the administration to bring down some of those premiums that have the biggest cost. The big problem i see with costofliving adjustments, we sometimes figure those, iphones and cars and all kind of stuff, when a lot of people that are on fixed income, its more about groceries and gas and the things they buy each and every day than the way we figure that. My mom is 80 years old, she reminds me on a regular basis that we need to get this right, but thank you. Any others good afternoon. On your bio i noticed you were dedicated to giving a voice to those forgotten by the government. I am one of those people because, number one i live in the district of columbia. Basically no representation. Secondly, my family and i arrived here from Eastern Europe legally. We became naturalized citizens where in Eastern Europe latvia. I struggle to earn my education. I am quite educated, all i got was a plaque thing i did a wonderful job in school. No help with my education hel cost, no Job Opportunities and as i apply for jobs, im seeing that h1b visa holders and green card holders are getting those jobs that i actually applied for and qualified. I feel like im the forgotten, unemployed, educated. What can be, what is Congress Planning to do about people like this because all im hearing our protest from the other side. In fact, there are days those protests wont let me out the door. Im very affected by it. What help is there . So let me hit that into different pieces and ill hit the one that probably, if youre in washington d. C. , is not good news, i see very little, if any chance of their actually looking at a statehood, i know the mayor is in support of that and most of the residents of d. C. Are in support of that. Both constitutionally and really the way that we look at that particular issue, i dont see statehood in washington d. C. Because of the way that it was originally set up to be our nations capital, and taking property from maryland and virginia and the like, im on the committee that is over washington d. C. So this is something ive had a number of conversations about. Just there is no help that is on the way anytime soon on that particular issue. There been some who say we will be glad to give you representation and take half the people from washington d. C. And put them in maryland and the other half back in virginia and you could actually get representation in terms of your members of congress from a voting standpoint. Eleanor norton is the delegate from here in d. C. , i serve with her on two different committees and we have a great relationship, but obviously, we are very different on this particular subject in terms of how we come at it. Let me just go to the other side of that, there were many people who believed that your ability to Lobby Congress is actually disproportionate because of your location and the fact that youre here today may actually validate that, that you can be here where someone from perhaps florida or california may have a more difficult time having a oneonone with a member of congress. When it gets to the visa issue, where there is 81 beazer h2 bee bees, i think theres 87 different types of visas. We are looking at all of this in the context of doctor and dreamers, but we really need Immigration Reform. We need to make sure that as we look at being an open society that brings in the best from across the worlds, as u. S. Citizens and welcomes them in, that we also dont disadvantage those who have come here legally from Eastern Europe, and who have been educated to work the same. I would say three things. One, full Immigration Reform that allows for a speedy process for illegal immigrants. One of the frustrations i have is there is more of an incentive to break the law and come here then to go through the normal process, both from expense and a time standpoint, and we can do better than that. Weve made it so bureaucratic that if you have something that works, i think it deemphasizes illegal immigration the minute that you have a legal path to do that. The other is to make sure from a job standpoint that were not importing talent at the expense of the talent that we have here. Weve seen that and some of you mentioned the h1 b, where they bring in h1 b visa holders and what theyre doing is, they can get that cheaper than perhaps paying you, not always, but sometimes they can , and in doing that is taking those who have come through the legal process, u. S. Citizens, at their expense. One of the proposals we had was to work with the Employment Security commissions which, thats what they call it my state, but where unemployment gets weeded out, where you make sure that if you have a need for foreign labor that it gets placed appropriately, but not at your expense. The last thing is, we still live in a country that is the american dream. Yesterday i talked to a ceo of a fortune 50 company and she shared with me her ability to come here with nothing with her family. It changed from the horrors of nazi germany, as she has come here, shes educated, shes not only came here and worked the american dream, but it was really her ancestors who bought a small piece of property in a very undesirable place in new york and started to build a real estate empire because we are the land of opportunity, and yet now she is the ceo of one of the Largest Companies in the United States, i think the highest paid female executive in the country and this is a story about someone who came here and who lived the american dream. Im a big proponent of doing that, but im also one of understanding that there is a cost associated with anything. When you go, if you hand out everything, the value of that is not necessarily what everyone would take hold of. We need to make sure we are not a socialized education or healthcare entity, and many of the people who can see the advantages or disadvantages of that come from countries like yours and others, some of the most patriotic people in florida, those who came from cuba who had escaped communism in cuba, and they didnt want have anything to do with it because they had experienced the lack in cuba, thats a long answer to try to answer very complicated thing, but heres what i think we do. Legalize the maker legalized immigration system much more robust and quick, at the same time, not at the expense of u. S. Citizens in first and the last thing is to make sure that when we do that we put in a system in place that doesnt allow future bureaucracies to take it too a point where they just keep adding on. I see no reason to 87 different types of visas. Why dont we have, i can work it down to ten categories and say okay this is a visa for the spread once you get that large, he can manage it. But, ill be glad to have a followup conversation with you and get your details and see how we can help even though i am not your representative here in d. C. , i represent the United States and our great country in the constitution and ill be glad to help. Thank you. This is more of a philosophical question. Im just curious of the younger conservative, as i talk to them, the feeling of getting involved in politics in washington, the morale is very dismal and theres not a lot of inspiration or hope. Just curious, are there great thinkers, are there historical figures that you particularly turned to to look for inspiration, hope during this time as a member serving in congress that we might also find some hope and inspiration in as well this can be a very depressing place and thats the first time ive gotten this question, here it is, i would say i am a person of the christian faith, and for me my hope is not really in this place, my hope is in my have only father and thats for me personally, for some who may not have that faith, heres the hope for conservatives. There are a lot of things that supposedly will never happen, that happen every single day around us. When you think about, i can remember, youre not old enough to remember this i wouldnt think, but i can remember when i saw president say mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. Now, that was a historic moment, but no one believed that the wall was going to come down at that point. Now i can tell you, i was in berlin a few months ago walking where that wall was, and its not there. There are little pieces of it there that are a reminder of what was there in the Morning Museum context, but when the president says mr. Gorbachev tear down this wall, he was told not to say that. You may be embarrassed because nothings going to happen, you dont want to take a bold stand. Im here to encourage you, as a young conservative to also believe that the unachievable happens each and every day in america. Its the fact that a guy who came from very Humble Beginnings and actually has lived the american dream, and ultimately served in the most powerful place on the face of the globe. I guess, what i would do is not leave all the people who say nothing will happen. I tell the story in the rotunda of the capital just a few blocks from here, there is a picture of some of the pilgrims who came over for religious per persecution purposes from holland, and as there there, there is one particular ship where the rainbow is actually red, white and blue, its not the normal colors of the rainbow, and theres a person that has a bible thats open and they were showing that they were escaping because they wanted to come to a different place to worship freely. I share that story because that particular person is william brewster. Elder william brewster, that maybe the first time weve ever heard that name, but in my lineage, its not the first time ive ever heard it. Its actually my 11th greatgrandfather. So when you look at there was no way that he ever thought his portrait would be in the rotunda of the most powerful place on the face of the globe because he was coming to the wilderness, this was not the United States. He was just escaping because he believed in the unbelievable, and yet, he also didnt know that in that same rotunda where his portrait is, his 11th greatgrandson would have the honor of serving the people of North Carolina in the most powerful place. So believe the unbelievable, and my message to you and other conservatives is when they tell you it can be done just remind them of the miraculous thing that have been done because people have dared to believe. Great question. Thank you. Okay, i think we have time for one last question if youve got one last question, and its not yes, maam i like your sweater by the way. Thank you. This is about immigration. How much money is the United States losing because they havent paid any money to us so the question is how much money are we losing from illegals who are here who havent paid into the system. I dont know that anyone actually knows, there have been a number of great figures. Here at heritage you can find the number of people who can put together a very plausible financial argument for that in terms of where they are, but heres the cost. One is dollars and cents, but the others is in a number of other areas. We are sitting here debating about immigration, and it will be the topic over the next two weeks like youve never seen. It will be the topic of whether we will have a shutdown or whether were to get in here or there, but were really not talking about immigration. We are talking about people. Ultimately, when we are talking about people, what we have to understand is the hidden cost of the actual cost of not dealing with the situation. Some of those costs are unbelievably high. When we look at the diversity lottery like we have, which basically said regardless of the country of origin, we will allow people to come in and they end up conducting terrorist activities in new york city, the cost of that is not measured in dollars and cents. It is measured in blood and tears. And so, to get this right, what we have to do is perhaps take very tough stands that ive been negotiating on the immigration side of it from a conservatives point of view for many, many weeks and trying to find that sweet spot. One is a cost. Certainly its in the billions of dollars. We know that. The exact and amount, you dont ever know what you dont know but so in that we only have estimates that people make in terms of where we havent in the number of people that are here. The other part of that is, we do know better for going to have a country, you have to have a secure border, you also have to understand when you have a secure border, you have rules and ours are really the constitution and the rule of law so the more that you go with sanctuary cities and all these other things, its dealing with situations that we should deal with appropriately in a real way. And so, i can tell you that on some of the programs that we are looking at that have been very difficult to actually hone in on, we will try to address some of those costs as it relates to the tax reform bill. One of those is with the additional earned income tax credit to make sure that there is a Social Security number for those that actually pay that reimbursement. I am hopeful, getting back to the common i just made, the unachievable is achievable if you are willing to put your reputation online and get out there. I will close with this. You have to hold this job, the job im in, very loosely because the minute you want to hold onto it, and i give that, if youre a lord of the rings fan, you get that precious and youre just holding onto precious, the minute you try to hold on to this members pin that tightly come you dont make decisions in the best interest of your constituents so you have to hold that loosely saying we are willing to try to achieve the unachievable. What happens or sometimes the decisions we make [inaudible] being a member of congress should not be a career. It should be a calling. And if its a calling, we will make it work. God bless you. Thank you so much. [applause] thank you congressman meadows. On behalf of the policy institute, i know you have a dirty no good deed goes unpunished mud but wed love to give you your own. Thank you. Also, a sack with the logo on it thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you i can use the time. I love it. Thank you merry christmas. [applause] thank you all very much. We will see you back here in 2018. Thank you. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] the hill reports President Trump signed a shortterm spending bill to avoid a government shutdown. He find it a day after congress and that funds the government until december 22 giving congressional leaders two more weeks to negotiate a broader spending agreement. You carry more about the details at the hill. Com. Also to let you know, we will be hearing from the outgoing director of the National Counterterrorism center. He is expected to discuss his tenure and growing Terror Threat and thats hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for international peace. We will have a live at 1 30 p. M. Eastern. Itll be right here on cspan2. Live later tonight, President Trump holding a rally in pensacola florida. He is expected to talk about republican tax reform. We will take you live to the Pensacola Bay Center starting at 8 00 p. M. Eastern and thats also here on cspan2. You can watch online at cspan. Org or download the free cspan radio app to listen live sunday at 7 00 p. M. Eastern. To be on cspan2. Former Senior Advisor to secretary of state Rex Tillerson discusses his book Digital World war. Islamist, extremist and the fight for cybersex premises content is key. Distribution is clean and she wears the pants in the family. If you think about that, the way i like to think about isis and others is that we are in a content war at 8 00 p. M. , former ms nbc news anchor with her book everything you need to know about social media without having to call the kids in social media, everybody can get together and everybody can join together and do incredible things that there are stories in the book about what others have done with social media. Social media, its not really new. All thats new are these delivery platforms. Think about it. We have smoke signals. That was social media. The party line, the telephone line, that was social media. Everybody on the block and get on the phone. Whats so different is that everything is amplified in terms of how far you reach and of course the speed of the communication. For the full schedule good book to. Org. This weekend on American History tv from, Yale University historian Joann Freeman on Alexander Hamilton when washington become president in 1789, he made hamilton the first secretary of the treasury. A structured International Financial system and pushed to strengthen and empower the national government. Sunday at 4 00 p. M. On real america, the 19 80s training film on welcome affection about behavior in the workplace. I make a lot of decisions. I pick up the evaluation report, i signed passes and just a word of advice, if youre working alone, it will be beneficial to you [inaudible] at 8 00 p. M. On the presidency on resident Andrew Jacksons effort to challenge and cripple the bank of the United States during the 1830s. No president before had said anything like this. Other president s have warned americans against entangling foreign alliances, they warned against sectionalism and excessive partisanship at home , jackson warned them against control of their own government by, in his words, the rich and powerful. American history tv, all weekend, every weekend, only on cspan three. We will take a closer look at negotiations for a longterm funding of the government with the congressional reporter who covers the issue. At our table