Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20150221

Conference yesterday responding to Rudy Giuliani and a statement that he made questioning the presence love for the United States. Josh earnest says that quote the white house. Before Rudy Giuliani. We want to get your reactions. The white house responding to the former mayors questioning of president obamas love for the u. S. Heres how you can respond this morning. 202 7488001 four republicans. 202 7488000 four democrats. 202 7458002 for independents. If you want to post on our social media, you could do so http twitter. Com cspanwj for twitter. You can post on facebook, www. Facebook. Com cspan. You can also email us journal cspan. Org. The New York Times making a statement on their front page of their newspaper this morning. In remarks on obama, Rudy Giuliani to the core. He has be come a manifest, horrified at the views that a listless white house his remarks this week mostly through derision and outrage and seem to further distance is to giuliani from the heroic, above the fray image she carefully burnished after the september 11 attacks, aligning him or us warily with a hard right of the republicans. That is part of the times coverage this morning. Again, it was those statements into place earlier this week that led to the reaction from the white house on friday afternoon. That White House Press conference overseen by josh earnest. [video clip] many of you been in the room when the president has talked about his love for the country or how the United States is a force for good for the world. We can send you many of those examples, many of you been in the room when he is made those remarks, both here and around the world. More generally can tell you that it is sad to see when a person who has attained a level of public admiration tarnishes that legacy so thoroughly. The truth is, i think no joy or vindication or satisfaction from that. I think really the only thing i feel is i feel sorry for Rudy Giuliani. Host i get that is the reaction from the white house yesterday. The comments from former mayor Rudy Giuliani questioning the president s love for the United States. We will show you those comments of the former mayor from earlier this week. Again, as part of our conversation today, your reaction to the story. You can give us a call. Guest for 202 7488001 four republicans. 202 7488000 four democrats. 202 7458002 for independents. Again, if you want to make of the conversation on social media, http twitter. Com cspanwj is our twitter. And you can post on facebook, www. Facebook. Com cspan. Grace, you first up. Go ahead. Caller it seems like the republicans are crucifying the president , or actually anybody that does that. I really feel bad about the governor. You know, i have yet to see president obama stand up and crucify any living person in the United States. What makes these Republican People and i am a swing voter sometimes. What makes them i do not see him standing up in crucifying anybody that speaks out against him. Whats wrong with these Republican People . They just like hate everybody. I am really old. I hate to see the country come to this because the republicans just spent all her time up there. Mcconnell said, first thing right off, we will do everything he did not say our goal is to take care of the American People that pay us. He said, we will do everything we can to obstruct this president. Host grace, if i heard you correctly, did you say earlier that you feel sorry about the former mayor or his statement . Caller i feel sorry that he lowered himself to try to crucify the president. Obama does not crucify people. Host rebecca, from alabama republican line. You are next. Caller good morning. I do think our president loves america. I am a republican and i am old to. I think the republicans, when they listen to them talk, they take sometimes his words out of context. They say, he wants to transform america and that means that he does not love america. I do not see it that way. I just think he has a different vision for america. I think he would not have run for president if he did not love our country. Host does this story change your opinion of Rudy Giuliani at all . Caller i hated that he made that comment because i watched him on fox last night trying to explain himself and i understand what he feels, by do not think it is the way every american field. I think he is expressing something based on what he experienced during 9 11, and he cannot get past that. Host that is rebecca in alabama. I gay, our topic this mornings statements by former mayor Rudy Giuliani. Questioning the president of the United States about his love for the United States. We will get your opinion on that. From bronx, new york. This is mark. Caller good morning. Rudy giuliani attacks people that is what he does. He is attacked dickens when he was in office. He attacked me. I called in on his call in show to complain about problems and he attacked me. Thats what he does. He has no shades of gray. He was never in the military. He has no shades of gray. Everything to him as black and white. He did not go up the way other people grew up, i guess. I cannot answer for that. Thats what he does. I think president obama does love the United States. I do not like president obama personally. I do not know him personally. I do not like a lot of his the way he does things. Im sure he loves the United States. It is Rudy Giuliani that is the way he is. Host the previous call it has adjusted the idea that it was september 11 that affected him deeply, he could not shake that, that could be leading up to comments he is making today. What do you think about that statement . Caller no. A lot of that is behind us. He was very good during 9 11. He really rallied the city, i think you rally the nation. You called him americas man. He rally the nation and the city. He is past his prime. I think he is past his prime. I thought as america he was terrific. He brought the city back from the squeegees and the homeless and crime. He did a great job. Him and ray kelly. I think ray kelly did a great job as commissioner of the city. Host that was mark from bronx, new york. Gary lives in georgia. Go ahead. Caller good morning. I just want to comment on what Rudy Giuliani said. If, as a country as a whole at a time when we are try to defeat isis and deal with russia, they hear this stuff with the media and it weakens this country tremendously. How can we defeat those things when the republicans are still try to defeat barack obama . He is not running for office anymore. He is a lame duck. It is time now for the republicans to put down all their stuff and lets get patriotic. Can you imagine if some democrats which i cannot do it some democrats were tight but george bush after 9 11 like that, they would be called unpatriotic. Host off twitter one viewer says, Rudy Giuliani is the kind of person that people love. He made another viewer says that rudy is correct. Again, your thoughts on the former mayor Rudy Giuliani statement. You probably heard stories earlier this week about him questioning the present level of the United States. The white house responded to that. Youve heard that earlier on. If you want to make comments this morning, 202 7488001 for republicans. 202 7488000 fir democrats. 202 7458002 for independents. Jerry is up next. Caller good morning, pedro. We had Rupert Murdoch im sorry, Chris Matthews asked is Rupert Murdoch was of real american. Howard dean watley said that he questioned the patriotism of republicans. You had obama say that bush raising the National Debt it was unamerican. It seems to me that it is ok for liberals to question the patriotism of republicans, but dont you dare question obama. By the way, another question for your democratic caller is, if you love someone pedro, i dont know if youre married but if you find out the your deeply in love with your wife, why would you want to change her. Host jerry, did you agree with the former mayor . Caller i agree with him. Obama does not love the country. He will about the country once it reflects what he wants. For eight years, he has constantly talked about how america is not exceptional. Trying to excuse isis for the crusades. I just believe that one of the government agents came up there and said that the real threat to america is republican extremism. That means, if youd disagree with obama, youre the real threat, not terrorism. Host lets hear from sandra from greenville, North Carolina. Caller i just wanted to make a couple of comments about the mayor of new york. I see him as a really bitter old man. I see him as a guy that ran unsuccessfully for presidency two times. He is a better guy. He is a smart guy in that the rhetoric that he has, a key some relevant. This is just beyond me. I agree with the first caller. She talked about the president you never hear him i dont know what this guy is made of, but you never hear him coming at the folks the way they, hand. He always takes the high road. I do not agree with everything he has done, but at its core, it is rooted in the fact that you still have these Fringe Groups of republicans that cannot stomach the idea that this guy is not like them. Has beat them, and they cannot stand that. At the core, that is the reason. That is why you have these Fringe Groups, like Rudy Giuliani, they cannot accept that this guy each and every time they try and come after the president , even at the state of the union, and then he comes back with that wonderful quip, the he won twice. Host that was sandra. If youre in holds a comment please continue to hold just a little bit. We will tell you about a couple of other stories from the paper this morning. The starledger of new jersey has a story on those cite out for the affordable. A hundred thousand using health site got a faulty tax data. This is from kathleen obrien. Less than a week after the second open a roman. For obamacare had ended, federal officials disclose on friday that a hundred thousand taxpayers had received incorrect tax information. Many people will not get caught being uninsured, not realizing that information will be asked when a file taxes. Democratic line. Go ahead. Caller i am a history educator and was a disturbed at the mayors comments because i thought he used to be somewhat of a moderate. His comments reminded be, really of four different words disappointing, disgraceful, joe mccarthy, racist. I have two very quick questions. How can you alienate attire an entire race of people and call yourself a patriot . Secondly, as someone who works in teachers, i would like to know what civics and history teacher should tell their students about giulianis comments. Host what would you tell students . Caller what would i tell students . Frankly i would tell them that they were unpatriotic. You can disagree with policies, but you do not use an all minutes which basically polarizes. That is not what we need at this time in our country. This is our first black president. Im not arguing of course he should be criticized on policies if you disagree with it, but to label him as someone who does not love the country by a man who has in fact several times said that americas exceptional. In no other country could he have risen. He has said this over and over again. Yes, he criticizes the country for being imperfect, but so have a lot of president s. Go back well, we can go back beyond abraham lincoln. Whatever happened to Republican Party . Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt eisenhower. I keep looking for it. Host we will hear from a republican in pennsylvania. , go ahead. Caller eyesight i side with giuliani. This previous caller, i dont know in what planet they live in. Obama has been dominating his them enemies many times. Another thing, pedro, i wanted to say talking about racism like the previous educator calls in, they always label those who oppose obama racist. The most recent calls ive heard in my life come from blacks on cspan. They hate white people. What do you get, 90 of the black vote . If that is not racism, i dont know what is. These it cspan never calls it racism. He is the other thing, i watch you moderators on cspan. I dont knows this is a new marching orders, but every time, right out of the box, the first call you take to set the tone of the discussion topic is a democrat. Why do you do that . Greta does it, you do it, john does it. Host we do split the lines. We do start with either party. Again, we divide the lines and kind of keep them separated and revolve who is on top, so to speak. Again, back to calls laurie from North Carolina. Go ahead. Caller good morning, pedro. I wanted to talk about the topic that will be on our minds forever. We have religious extremism that were facing. Host lets start with the former mayors comments, if we can. That is what we are engaging in this morning. What do you think about what Rudy Giuliani had to say . Caller it all goes back to the point im trying to make. Of the four major religions in the United States, or across the world, there is a religious right that practices circumcision on boys which i think turns us to belligerence. Host arthur. Go ahead. Caller i think giuliani and dick cheney should be in the same boat. They criticize the president but they are the ones who started all this mess. George bush with iraq. All this stuff comes back on the United States. I think giuliani needs to put on a suit and go over there and fight. Host arthur, what do you think specifically about his questioning of president obamas love for the United States . Caller i think theres something wrong with him. He needs to check himself out. Host it was earlier on in this week that the former mayor was on the Fox News Program in which he made these comments would you have read about and probably seen. Here is a little bit of the exchange that took place. [video clip] first of all, im not questioning his pages of. Im sure he is a patriot. What im saying about his rhetoric is that i barely rarely hear things that reagan said or bill clinton would say. I do hear him cu criticize america more than other president s. It sounds like he is more of a critic then he is a supporter. You could be a patriotic american and be a critic. But, then you are not expressing that kind of love that we are used to from a president. Host those kind of comments made earlier in the week continuing on in other forms. The president and the white house responding yesterday. Our topic today about the statements that the former mayor questioning the love of president obama for the United States. 202 7488001 four republicans. 202 7488000 four democrats. 202 7458002 for independents. According to the wall street journal, Senate Negotiators are close to passing trade promotion authority. Legislation known as trade promotion authority, or faster comes as the Obama Administration is trying to close negotiations on a 12 country and trade deal. Orrin hatch and senator ron wyden and representative paul ryan has settled most disagreements over the legislation. One remaining issue is how congress could move a deal from fast track process. Complications from that could unravel any agreement. Rick. Caller hello, america. America, what you all do not understand or ce, look behind this gentleman. You see a capital that was no by slaves. A white house that was built by slaves. The president is staying in his place. It is the reality of this country. America, i love this country. Most black people 99. 99 of black people in this country love this country. By live in a state where Confederate Flag is flying. That was an antiterrorist group. You know what they used for the terrorist groups over there they use the Confederate Flag. You understand . This is ingrained in american society. The prison system. Corporate america. Host from cincinnati, ohio. Republican line. Caller speaking of the mayor, i love the man. He said exactly what a lot of people are thinking. I love what he said. I agree with them. I was just waiting for someone to come out and say it. My god he goes all over the world and puts the country down and knowing can see a . Are we all blind . I love the america, god bless america. He said exactly what i was thinking. Host so you agree with the mayor statement. You may have heard the mayor to talk about it saying he doesnt necessarily question the patriotism of the president just his love of the u. S. Caller obama question the patriotism of bush saying he ran up the debt, that is unpatriotic. Look at how much debt obama has run out. Talking about unpatriotic lets get real. Im sick of phony reporters and phony politicians. Host from washington dc. Caller i want to tell mayor giuliani that he is attacking a qualified lawyer from harvard. He himself was born in america. He could be from europe, or somewhere. Mussolini, franco, or hitler. I think he has a disrespect for our president who is in the category of john f. Kennedy Martin Luther king for bringing the country together and fighting racism, who killed bin laden. I think giuliani all americans who love america should tell giuliani to tone it down and perhaps find out what is this problem. Why is he using obama as a scapegoat . Host the british paper the guardian has statements on the top general in nato. Russian expansion as exhibit ambitions could quickly become an obvious existential threat to our whole being. The alliance needed fast capacity to counter russian efforts at coercion and propaganda, as seen in ukraine. Talking of an air of constant repetition with russia, bradshaw told an audience that nato had to maintain a cohesive system of deterrence on its eastern borders, something that would require help from the eu. Maria from new jersey. Caller good morning, pedro. Im sorry for my voice. I agree with them mayors remarks. I think this comes back to obamas leanings. He was brought up muslim. He went to grade school in indonesia. The saudis pay for part of his education. His family is tied to communist people. I think he prefers anyone to why christian why christian american males. I think congress is complicit by not going into his background. We need to elect the people they care about american citizens. I think this is an important discussion. I hope people realize that it is not about race, but whether or not someone is loyal to this country. I think, bring the troops home and with all gets get lets all get together and be americans. Host host from twitter, the issue is not the mayors comments, the question is what does. Again, you can give us thoughts on twitters and give us a call this morning. We are about your reaction to the mayors comments on the president. Numbers will be on your screen. Lena, youre next. Caller im still set with the country and the people who are calling in, these rhesus pate these racist people from maryland, pennsylvania, new jersey. This woman just called insane that rudy was correct. He always talks about how he loves america. You are racist. You all hate the country. I think you all need to be deported for saying things like that. Other countries are looking at us, america. What is wrong with you . You know that this man loves the country. Im so sick and tired of you racist people. They do. Host sylvia from albuquerque new mexico. Caller i agree with Rudy Giuliani. I do not think that this president cares for america. Another thing why did he not question Michelle Obama . Host why specifically do you agree with Rudy Giuliani . Caller because i think that the president does not seem to be focused on the country. Every time something is happening, if it is a black person he is in there defending them. If anything else happens to anyone else, it is forgotten about. He seems to be im wondering if the book that the man from venezuela gave him gave him some ideas. I made proud of my country. Everything that bush did criticizes him. I remember him saying host we will hear from don from vallejo, california. Caller good morning. Thanks for taking my call. You guys, man, im telling you all people calling and have the wrong idea about this whole america. Giuliani is geared, just like all the rest of these white folks in america. They have a perpetual hatred for blacks. How could black people be racist when the white man is willing this whole earth . Youve got to be in rulership before you could be a racist. Theres nothing that we can do. Host are you saying that the former mayor statement was totally based on race. Caller thats right. The white people hate the black people. Every which one. It is in the bible. The bible says that because of thy hatred against thy brother shameful come to your face. That is what is happening right now. Shame is coming to all these white peoples faces. Host gene on the independent line. Go ahead. Caller and makes me very sad the last caller. Im white and i do not hate black people. I do not think the entire world is ruled by white people. As i look around, theres seems to be quite a but a people color in power positions. As far as mayor giulianis comments, i think obama likes to use racism stir that pot to push his agenda. He says that he is a transformative president in the mold of ronald reagan. When i look at that, yes, he is transforming america domestically, but he is also transforming the world. He went over and what he did during his first campaign, he campaigned in germany, why . It was symbolic of what he was going to do. He went to cairo and said, now is the time. After that cairo speech, which he would not allow the president of egypt attend, everything started to fall apart. He went into libya to get gaddafi out, he knew t what would happen. Host george, go ahead. Caller i agree with giuliani and it is a sentiment that i know is widely accepted. Also, a lot of black people feel the same way. The racist thing just dont get it. Host when it comes to questioning the love of the United States, why do agree with the former mayor . Caller look of the things that he has done. Some things that have heard the general public. Wanting to legalize a lot of illegal aliens. You know, ultimately that has to hurt the economy. The Affordable Health care that was about idea. I thoroughly believe the he lied knowingly, see have to wonder this thing where he does not want to call the terrorist isis, islamic terrorists. The religious war. You have to wonder, was that something thrown in by the white house to cover for him . He blew his credibility when he lied to us about the health care thing. Then, the other act that he is pulling off as far as i can see, he doing more damage than good. Host just to show you little bit, the president of the United States spoke during the Democratic National committees winter meeting yesterday. Part of the statement was talking about his economic policy, specifically looking reaction to his economic policy. Heres some of what he had to say. [video clip] i just want everyone to remember that every step when we made these policies and progress, we were told by our good friends, the republicans, that our actions would crush us. And destroy the country. I want everyone to do a fact check. [laughter] go back to 2009 and 2010, 2011, 2012, go back and look at the statements that were made each year by these folks about these policies. Apparently, they do not remember. Host you can see that whole ascent, by the way, on our website at cspan. Org. Time magazine posted statements by louisiana governor bobby g g jindal saying that quote the merits comments were true. This is from bobby jindal. Gentle, likely gop president ial candidate, said if youre looking for condemning the merit, look elsewhere. Jeb bush, scott walker, rand paul, ted cruz, Mike Huckabee rick santorum, ben carson, they need to start leading pure go your thoughts, dallas, texas. Randy. Youre next. Caller i think giuliani is getting obamas constructive criticism and getting it misconstrued with a lack of love for america. Sometimes he is rebuilding us rebuilding us as a country, like he said he would. Sometimes we have to look at the ugly parts of us to get better. Host from massachusetts, michael on the republican line. Caller hi. Thank you for taking my call. Please do not hang up on me until after finish what had to say. I think when you talk about president obama and his love for the country, i agree with giuliani. There is a law that says you have to be born in the United States be president. The spirit of the law is that someone who is born in the United States, brought up in the United States and who loves the country will defend the country. Obama, was born to parents who obviously did not want to stay in america. His mother at was actually born in america moved to kenya and brought up her son in kenya and till she brought him to hawaii. He was brought up by disenfranchised parents who moved him out of the country brought him out in a muslim faith school, and then he came back to the United States. I think host are the specific ask that you would point to for his lack of love for the United States . Caller just look of the people he spends time with. Hes been a around reverend wright. He constantly pushes socialist policies that are against the foundation of our country which is capitalism. Other things. He always seems to point out the negatives of christianity. He seemed sympathetic to other countries that have grievances with our country. It does not seem as though he puts traditional American Values first. Host from oklahoma, michelle. Youre next. Caller good morning. I just think it is sad that you guys would even put this program on. Why would you give voice to people who want to call up and say that our president does not love this country. I think it is a sad state in america for us to even call in and question the love of the president of our country. America was built on racism. We have not progressed too far from that, according to giuliani. Im glad i was not raised like giuliani was. It sounds like he was raised in a household full of hatred of people of color. His family was immigrants. How do we know that he does not love america . It is evident because you can get on tv and say that our president does love this country. I think it is sad that sees cspan would even put this question on. Host how would you defend that his statement is based just on race . Caller because i see what he has done. He was the most racist merit in new york. He had People Killed left and right. You never heard about white folks being killed in new york under giuliani, it was always black folks, and he defended his police department. Its kind of like the gestapo. Host lets hear from tony. Caller how are you doing . Host fine, thank you. Caller pedro, dont cut me off either. I dont care if you are democrat. I dont care if you are republican. I dont care if you are an independent, liberal, what ever. Anybody in their right mind knows that this man loves the country. All over the world, everybody can see that this president is more accepted than any other president has come in the presidency in the last 20 years. He has opened up gates to other countries and be accepted by top leaders of the free world. Giuliani is another example of hatred. The guy who called in and said that 95 of black people is racist. Well, does he know that the president did not get the majority of the white vote . Is that racist to . Host tony, if there is something you could specifically say, demonstration or example of how the president loves the country, what would you point to . Caller what would i point to . He goes out to every country that he tried to show the love of americans. He tries to bring unity all over the world. This man tries to unify everybody. Anybody that says of this man does not love america is insane. Host canton, massachusetts. Here is larry. Caller good morning, that joe. Rudy, get a grip. Hello . You there . Host lets start with Rudy Giuliani. Why did you say get a grip . What is behind it . Caller this man is doing his best. If a white guy were in the white house right now, we would be at war. Hes doing all he can to make sure that again, he loves the country. Hes trying to make us safe. At the same time, he will not begun cold while people are getting murdered over there. For folks to not see that, its like, thats on you. As a republican, a black man, i support him. Im proud if the white man wearing charge, we would be at work, no doubt. Yes, im for him. He takes him time. We are not god. Thats all it got to say. Thank you very much. Host graham is up next from the lucky, wisconsin. Caller thanks for cspan. I just have a comment about the mayor giuliani thing. Hes not a man anymore. Hes out of public office. Hes an american. I believe he has every right to say what he wants to say. Ive heard worse. During the 2012 host do you agree with him . Caller i have my doubts. Thats just me. Host what do you base those doubts on . Caller they are just doubts. I dont have to base them on anything. You know . It is my opinion. Host greg from San Francisco california. Democratic line. Caller hey, buddy. I have a couple of things i want to say. Let me see, he is making sure thee workers are paid fair wages. He is getting us out of war is that was started with . Reasons. He is making sure that people have health care. Hes respecting the will of the voter and listening to the voter. Then, i want to say to these people like giuliani who claim that they love america, i just do not see it. This guy is having people first just walking down the neighborhood, stopped and pulled over. Then you had people like mitt romneys five sons who all say they love america and all the evil doers are on their way over here to come get as unless we get them first. But you know pedro not one of robbies five sons have stopped what they are doing to join the military to say to the soldiers, hey, you have done your job, let me be the patriot that i say i am. Let me take your place and fight the war. You go home, you have been tha two or three times. Host james from new york. You will be the last caller on this topic. Caller i truly disagree with giuliani. He has a history of what he did in new york city. He cant help but expresses hatred for the black president. I really believe that people have a problem with the broadband in charge of this country. If you look at what obama has done for the country and what he believes in, i think that i do not understand why people continue to talk about if he was born in this country, if he loves his country, if you pay g attic. You have not seen that in any years prior with the president and the way he is treated. Donald trump making the statements about obama. It is clearly racist. Ive never heard them talk about any president like that. Thats what i have to say. Host that was jeans in new york. The last comment that we will take on this topic. Be will change topics and take a look at the world of subprime loans. You remember probably from the financial problems weve had starting in 2008 that subprime loans were a leading factor. From there people stayed away from them, but a piece from the wall street journal says that they are coming back. Annamaria andriotis will join us. Then, Niraj Chokshi, from the Washington Post will join us. Washington journal continues next. . The cspan city story takes on tv and American History tv on the road. Traveling through u. S. Cities to learn about their history and literary life. This weekend, we partnered with Time Warner Cable for a visit to greensboro, North Carolina. Most of the seats were empty. Except for college students. Most everybody else was like, im not going down there because anything could happen. It was quiet. We go and sit down. And wait. To see what would happen. I wages came by i wages came by and a waitress came by that her tray was rattling. She was scared. We sat down with elbows, trying to study. I remember her saying, we cannot serve you, or we do not serve colored, we will have to ask you to leave. We had this instruction that we wouldnt say anything. Just keep sitting. Dont say anything. If they asked you what you would like, as per cup of coffee. They never asked the we wanted. They knew that they would not serve us. Watch all of our vince from greensboro. Washington journal continues. Host joining us from new york, Annamaria Andriotis from the wall street journal. Sheet to go look at the topic of subprime loans and their return. Thank you for joining us. Guest good morning. Host before we start, can you give us all a little bit of a history lesson. All of us remember the housing crisis, can you talk about the role that some private loans played in that. Guest they were pivotal to the financial crisis that happened just two years ago. Essentially what they are our loans that are given to people with low Credit Scores. The reason why they have low Credit Scores is because they have fallen behind on debt payments, have taken on too much debt, or had some other negative credit event that happened in their history. Low Credit Scores basically mean that people are more at risk of falling behind on future debt. Host part of the part of getting a subprime loan is the interest you have to pay. What are we talking about interest wise . Guest there are two problems that subprime borrowers encounter when you get a loan. First, after the crisis, it became very difficult for them to get loans. What we are seeing is becoming a hole at easier over the past year or so to get approval. The problem is now is that the Interest Rates that theyre are getting are very high. We see Interest Rates going up to 300 , if not higher on loans. Personal loans. High Interest Rates mean large monthly payments, meaning that they can become unmanageable for many people. Host part of the coverage that the wall street journal had was a chart that showed not only the categories of loans, but show that a lot of people stayed away from 2008, but now theyre making a comeback. Why are they making a comeback . Guest in the first 11 months of 2014, the latest data, from january to november last year nearly four out of every 10 credit card, car, and personal loans went out to peoples subprime credit. That is the highest level since 2007 which was the beginning of the financial crisis. They are making a comeback largely because lenders are feeling more confident in the u. S. Economy as more people go back to work. They feel that more people have the means to pay back loans. Host so these lenders, who are they . Are they are traditional types of banks . It seems to me that they were hesitant to grant these loans. Guest that is a great question. The types of lenders the pen on the types of loans. For instance, the majority of increase in subprime loans has a occurred with car loans. We are talking about a lot of large banks and other large Financial Institutions. Also, many Car Manufacturers have their own financing arm. Were seeing the those companies are getting back into subprime lending. What we look at other types of credit things like personal loans and credit cards, were seeing a growing number of new Financial Institutions that are fighting popping out. These are not banks. Esther clevelanders. They are focusing on giving out loans to people with low scores. Host again, for the next 35 minutes, we are fighting that subprime loans, their return. Our guest is joining us from new york. If you have questions about the rise of these types of loans maybe you have one of these loans yourself. In view of a question for our guests, here is the number that you can call. 202 7488001 for republicans. 202 7488000 for democrats. 202 7458002 for independents. Annamaria andriotis, paint the picture of the type of person that gets these loans . Guest the picture has been very bleak. Since 11 eight, it is been very difficult for them to get loans. A sickly, they went through a. From 2008 until 2012 or so when access to credit was limited. What has resulted from that is people who needed financing they went to lenders of a lowquality, for lack of a better description. They turned to payday lenders or title lenders. Lenders where there was very little regulation with high Interest Rates. Where, many times, they had to put some kind of asset as collateral. Now, what theyre facing is loans that have been very difficult to keep up with. They are now looking at increased access to credit as a way of getting out of that. Several people i spoke to for this story describe situations in which they are turning to these new types of subprime loans as a way of paying off those types of loans of a signed up for during the recession. It is trying to gain access to credit to pay off other debt. That of course can be a very difficult cycle to get out of. Host if i am that type of lender what am am i looking for . Guest these lenders are doing quite a bit of underwriting. They know that they have low Credit Scores, but theyre looking at other factors as well. One thing that they mention a lot was looking at their bank account and the history of how they had been managing their bank account. For example, as they see recent overdraft or bounced checks, any evidence that they made an attempt to make a payment and did not have enough in their Checking Account that is one way that they go about making a decision as to whether or not they declined those people for loans. They are also looking for income verification. That is something that we really do not hear much about before the last recession. There they are asking for paystubbs or other evidence of their making a decent salary. Host as far as the people asking for these loans, is it just low income folks asking for them . May be high income people that have bad credit from the recession . What is the snapshot . Guest yes, many of them have low incomes. Many of them do not. What they are having common is that they have low Credit Scores. Low Credit Scores affect many types of people. The common denominator there is that something happen in their past. Likely in the recent past that had to do with either a foreclosure, falling behind on credit card payments, some kind of debt that they did not manage well. As a result of that, their credit score decline. What we talk about low Credit Scores, essentially what we mean is people with subprime credit are generally people that have a credit score below 650. What we talk to a fight go scores, those are the scores used by most lenders when they decide whether or not to give you a loan. Five go scores range from 350 to 800. Once you fall below 600 or 650 that is when you are considered some prime subprime. Host Annamaria Andriotis from the wall street journal joining us from new york. Questions democrats, 202 7488000. And for independents 202 7488002. You are on with our guest. Caller president obama will no longer pay for Student Loans. He said unless speech he made to the nation. He said in the last speech he made the nation. Most of the students that are going to colleges are being educated and are being educated from anywhere in the 50 states, their families they will not compensate to give these children money to go to college and they depend on the president to do everything. He should not have to do that. Pedro do Student Loans fall into this category of subprime . Niraj annamaria the data we look that did not include Student Loans. Most of the loans being given out right now are being given out by the federal government. The federal government does not do anything in terms of underwriting. Theres very little underwriting. That would be with one loan, the loan given to parents, the parent plus loan. We do not have any numbers as to what is going on, whether these loans are subprime or not. We do know that subprime borrowers do not have a difficult time getting federal loans. Private Student Loans are a different story. Those loans that are given out by banks and other private lenders still do require high Credit Scores in order to get those loans. Pedro heres gilbert from alabama. Good morning. Caller good morning. I read a number of your articles in the wall street journal and i am interested. You made mention of the fact that about 3 loans. 300 loans. Im a Community Investment advocate in the city of birmingham. Credit is fairly new to mean. I have to buy things to keep myself going. There are people who have these high Credit Scores 750 two 850 they do not have to go out here what im saying is come until lately, lending tree, theyre competing to big banks. The competition is small banks. A lot of people are doing business with credit unions. Big eggs are catching a bad trip because big banks are catching a bad trip because of Smaller Banks and credit unions. That is causing big banks to have to deal with people with low Credit Scores. Im not saying that banks should go out and let people money pedro miss andriotis, go ahead. Annamaria he made a lot of interesting points. With regard to subprime lending it is not the banks that are doing much of this. What is happening is that you have credit unions, small lenders, nonbanks, that are pushing into the sub prime. They are seeing it as a way to potentially potentially compete with banks. They can increase loan originations by going to other types of borrowers who have been ignored. I think the guest mentioned something about lending tree. It is interesting because we spoke with lending tree for the story and they said that they have seen a surge in subprime personal loans that are being given out through lending trees network. Lending tree is not a lender that it connects people looking for loans with lenders to potentially make those loans. They have seen a surge in personal loans being given out over the past year or so to people with low Credit Scores. Pedro your colleague had a followup piece highlighting some of these companies. He highlights to opportune in california. There is about financial, a startup vouch financial, a startup. Theyre able to provide the lowest rates to customers who find friends or relatives to provide guarantees on personal loans. It seems a there is a home in strategy. A whole new strategy. Annamaria a whole new way of lending. These nonbanks are getting creative. They are trying to find ways where they cannot only increase the amount of loans they are giving out, but they can bring people in because, when you think about some of these Interest Rates, they can scare a lot of people away. One of the firms that has been large in this space that launched just last year is called elevate. It came out of a company that was previously a payday lender. You can see how red flags could go up. Their Interest Rates currently range from around 36 to 365 on loans. What the company is saying is that borrowers who do well with loans initially and pay their debts on time will be able to get Interest Rates toward the lower end of that range. 300 Interest Rates, those are very high. We are in an area that is not very regulated. This is something that remains to be seen as to whether Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other organizations will be looking at. Pedro crockett, texas. Joe, go ahead. Caller i am tired of these banks using my money for nothing. Im sick of it. I worked all my life and save my money to try to have put it on interest or something. My little retirement check i get. It is not even worth the drive to cash. Drawn your money out and that will stop all this mess. Annamaria the banks have pushed a lot into the world of subprime car loan lending. The banks are not the ones that are giving out much in credit card or personal loans to people with low Credit Scores. Because they have stayed away from these types of our worst. This is why we types of borrowers. This is why we are seeing a surge in other companies. These companies are vocal about it. There are a lot of people in the u. S. We need access to credit. They are being ignored by the banks, so they are stepping in and offering a product and forced these company in these companies do stand to benefit because we are talking about high interest charges that result in Revenue Opportunities for these new companies. Pedro miss andriotis on twitter, it reduces the risks of high Credit Scores. Is that a mentality that is out there . Annamaria this is risk aced pricing. This is why the lenders they are charging as high as they are. If you as a borrower show evidence that youve not been able to manager debt well in the past, you have a low score and you will be priced accordingly. What he says is accurate. Pedro from new castle pennsylvania. Here is frank. Caller good morning. I want to talk about the subprime loans from a professional point of view. In 2007, one week before the problem started, i was a Legal Services attorney in my community. For about five years prior to that time i was dealing with litigation involving the subprime loans. I retired one week prior to this when the crisis hit. At that time, a year later Lehman Brothers failed in all of that. I can mention from my perspective i hope this does not happen with the reinstitution of these loans. My experience has been representing people, low income people, who had been induced to sign mortgages on their properties for Home Improvement loans and at the same time they were induced to bump up to the amount they were borrowing as a consolidation of the debts they had. Sometimes, the subprime loan rate was higher than the individual loan rates that they had for the other debts that they consolidated. Pedro we will let our guest respond to what you said. Annamaria some very good points. We should talk about mortgages. The data right now showing the surge in some prime lending excludes mortgages. Mortgages are one of the few spaces with Consumer Lending where banks remain conservative when it comes to Credit Scores. There have been there has been about 4 billion of subprime mortgages given out annually since 2009. That is not a high number in the grand scheme of things. It peaked at around 600 billion in 2005 as well as in 2006. Subprime lending with mortgages right now only accounts for about. 3 of the total dollars being given out on an annual basis in new home loans. This is not occurring right now in the home lending space. People with low scores who are seeking mortgages will find a difficult time getting access to that. Pedro did these types of loans is that because of action done on capitol hill through legislation . Annamaria this is largely because banks suffered massive losses with subprime loa mortgage lending. It was rampant prior to the recession. It led to the housing bubble and subsequent bust. Banks are still trying to heal from those losses. That is largely the reason why they are not willing to return. Also, the fact that they are still dealing with a lot of buybacks from the federal government. Subprime lending in mortgages does not have much of an appetite among banks now. Pedro Cleveland Ohio your next. Evelyn. Caller my question was, how do they get the name to send people these bank cards preapproved when you have an actual one . Annamaria that is a very good question. Lenders are looking for potential customers. As you said, youd not need to go to them for them to find you. They have many tactics of doing this. One of which includes looking through Credit Report data. There are Credit Reporting firms in this country that hold on to massive amounts of data which include your Credit Report. Your Credit Report gives lenders indications of what kind of borrower you are. They include information such as whether you have fallen behind any of your debts, how much Credit Card Debt you have and so on. They look through this type of data and have their own algorithms to decide, here are the potential borrowers we could attract. They send out mailers and find other ways of getting in touch with you. Pedro miss andriotis, to state laws work to prohibit that or reduce that . Other federal laws that work in that space . Annamaria i am not aware of laws that can prevent lenders from sending people pitches for credit cards or other types of loans in the mail or in other ways. There are state laws which say that lenders cannot charge beyond a certain Interest Rate on certain types of loans. What we are seeing is that these new types of subprime lenders are working within these laws. They are basically offering subprime loans with these high, triple digit Interest Rates in states where they are able to do so. Many states allow for that. For example, texas and california, you can charge triple digit easily on these types of personal loans. Pedro amy is from texas. She is up next. Caller what you were just talking about with the banks lenders sending you unwanted information. I happened to stumble across the ftc website. I was amazed at the things you can stop. Places like aqua facts eqi facts. You can stop unwanted solicitation from banks. If people just go to that website, it is amazing the things you can stop. You have to do it yourself but you can. I recently got on the same day from discover, asking if i wanted to open a savings account with an interest of. 9. The next envelope asked if i wanted to take out a loan for 25,000 with an Interest Rate charged of up to 18. 99 . Pedro amy, thanks. Annamaria i am not sure what kind of malone that was. What kind of loan that was. We have seen a surge in personal loans being given out to borrowers of all stripes. That is happened over the past year. There is very little regulation with personal loans. Banks and nonbank lenders are looking for ways to increase those originations. They also present more of a revenue opportunity because personal loans tend to be unsecured. Unlike a car loan or mortgage which is pegged to an asset personal loans are not. Most of them are unsecured. Just by being unsecured, they do allow lenders to charge more in interest than they would be charging on those other types of loans, such as mortgages. Pedro a viewer on twitter asks, what is the perfect credit score . Who gets the perfect score these days . Annamaria the perfect credit score technically is the number 850. The fica will score ranges 3002850. 300 to 850. There are about 200 Million People in the u. S. With Credit Scores. About 1 of them have an 850 according to fico. If you want to be in a lender past good graces and what to get approval for the loans you apply for and to get the lowest possible Interest Rate, you need to have at least a 720 four 740 credit score. That will or 740 credit score. The higher up you move, the lower your Interest Rate could likely be. I do not have the exact number but we are talking about millions of people who fit into that range, between 720 and 850. The number of people is increasing. That is the good news. Pedro greg from texas. Go ahead. Caller good morning. My comment is, on those loans i went and got a loan, one of those payday loans and i did not read the fine print and i got duped. It cost me 2000 just to pay off that 500 loan. What they did to me with the Interest Rate on that thing, i was shocked by arty signed the paperwork. I already signed the paperwork. I thought it was a monthly pay off thing. Within 30 days, i did not understand that. It took me six months and cost me 2000 just to pay them back. When i paid it back, you go to the atm and you have to pay three dollars and . 50 3. 50 just to withdraw from the atm machine. The banks say, you have to go all the way to the next bank to go to your bank just to withdraw but they have these local atm machines in the stores that are charging you and they dropped the rate the withdraw fee. They know that you have to withdraw twice to get your 320 away. Pedro if you have to turn to alone in the future date, where do you go to if you would not go back to a payday lender . Caller i would go straight to the bank. I will not go to these Small Companies because it is too much. The Interest Rate is eating people alive and their praying on the poor. Annamaria so much to say to all of that. Here is the bottom line, payday loans are not the way to go even if you are dealing with a low credit score and refinance and need financing immediately. Payday loans have high interest charges. They require repayment very quickly and often times what happens is people get another payday loan to pay off the first and you get stuck in this horrible cycle. Payday lending is something the cs pb is looking at. There are a couple things people need to decide. Lenders are backed with regards to subprime lending. Loans are out there if you want them. Those loans come with a certain price. When you have to ask yourself as a consumer is, is it worth it to go out there and get this financing and pay these high interest charges . How badly do you need that financing . Is it something you can wait for . If you are able to improve your score over time to go to that bank and get a loan from them, you might be in a better situation than turning to these banks and getting these high interest loans these nonbanks and getting these high interest loans. If you have a low score, youre going to turn to these high interest loans and that is why we are seeing such a surge in Companies Offering these financing options. Pedro theres a story that came out this week, taking a look at information released from the Federal Reserve in new york saying the report was the study showed at the latency in student and auto loans. Delinquency in student and auto loans. Annamaria losses with car loans have begun to increase. They are now up. Many people argue there is a link a surge in subprime car lending the last couple of year. Now we are seeing an increase in losses. People who are signing up for car loans and a few months later do not have the means or for some reason are not able to pay back these loans. Student loans are a different animal. With Student Loans, much of the losses are not coming from the private sector. Instead, theyre coming from federal Student Loans. Federal Student Loans do not have a minimum score requirement. You can get federal Student Loans even if you have been through difficult financial situations. That is why we are seeing losses with federal Student Loans continue to rise. Pedro would you say those two areas are bubbles . Annamaria i dont know if i should be addressing that. There are people out there that are speculating that we are in some kind of double on the student loan front. Some kind of bubble on the student loan front. Losses are rising significantly in some cases. With car loans economists we have been trying to get an answer to that question and economists are mixed with most of them saying that we are not in a situation with a bubble yet. Pedro Annamaria Andriotis is with the wall street journal. Eddie, massachusetts, go ahead. Caller art we still bailing out fannie and freddie with this quantitative easing . Who is going to watch the hen house . Annamaria with regard to fannie and freddie, youre talking about mortgages. The one good thing happening right now at some pride as some prime subprime lending is rising, the appetite for mortgage lending is not. Most of the mortgages that fannie mae and freddie mac are currently buying from the banks are not subprime mortgages. Instead, they are mortgages that have been given to people with very good Credit Scores. The average credit score on mortgages given out currently is around 730. 730 is a strong score in the grand scheme of things. Pedro as far as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is concerned, what is there oversight in the world of subprime . Annamaria the cf pb can go after banks that are pursuing practices that are not right. That are in some type of way charging unfair rates or fees to consumers. They can go after many financial and the two shoes that are not banks as well. With personal loans, things get more compensated. Part of the reason things get more complicated. Part of the reason is the position provisions in. Flank doddfrank say there is not a cap that can be placed on the Interest Rates on personal loans. There was the credit card act that went into effect during the downturn that addressed how fees and Interest Rates can be charged on credit cards. With personal loans this is an area that can be largely unaddressed. Pedro next call is maryland, hillsville, virginia. Caller most of the questions i had have been answered. I am wondering, these people who go to these small, nonbank lenders and they feel like theyre getting a raw deal, what they did not understand. Can they go to the cpb and register any complaints that bring any kind of action against , what i think are predatory lenders . Annamaria the cfpb is busy is taking consumer complaints. There is a section where you can file a complaint on their website. You say what bank it is, what exactly occurred. That is one of the ways that the cfpb goes about filing actions against banks and other companies. They had this database of complaints they are receiving and once they see that the complaints they are getting start to add up for a particular institution, a particular product, that is one way they go after these banks and other lenders. Consumers who feel like they have gotten a raw deal should consider that. Consider going to the cfpbs website and filling out that information. Pedro how difficult is it to convert a subprime loan and refinancing into something more reasonable as far as Interest Rates . Annamaria refinancing is possible but if you want to get a better Interest Rate than what you got as a subprime borrower you will probably need to wait until your credit score has increased. At that point, you can go to regular banks, other institutions that are not charging triple digit rates to see if you can get a new loan to pay off that initial loan that you got and to hopefully get out of that cycle. One thing to consider is that it has become easier. This is happened over the past year, for consumers to check the credit score on their own. To know whether their financial situation, their credit score is improving. Fikeco has been partnering with banks and other lenders. Those banks are now showing customers their score for free. You have examples where you have discovered, and other lenders whoever recent who have begun showing existing cardholders their credit score. Pedro sam, up next from oklahoma city. Caller i have a comment in a question along with that. At the end of bushs term we were losing 800,000 jobs a month. A lot of hype a lot of hardworking people lost their jobs. Now, the cannot get credit. Because of the low Credit Rating. It seems to me, 1 of the money in this country is in the top 1 let me ask you this, these people that went through this crisis and normally it is the lowerclass people that got punished for most of this stuff pedro go ahead. Annamaria Credit Scores are very much linked to employment. That link generally goes like this. People lose their jobs, they no longer have the income to pay their debts. A fall behind on those payments and then their credit score declines. What he said is true. That link very much exists. Many of these people in this situation now who can only get access to subprime loans, are people who dealt with unemployment during the downturn. Pedro you brought up fico. We have a guest off twitter. She follows up asking is there any cross pollination on board with banks . Annamaria the company is called fair isaac corp. This is the score that has been used for decades by most banks. There are other competing scores out there but the fico score is the one used most often in Something Like 90 of Consumer Lending decisions. It not only determines whether you will get approval for that loan, but the Interest Rate you will be charged. In terms of the relationship between this company and banks the banks use pico scores. Fico scores. They are using the scores to determine whether or not to approve borrowers. Angst also have their own proprietary ash banks also have their own proprietary scores that consumers cannot gain access to. Banks will often use their own private scores. They will also take a look at the fico score to make a decision. There are other factors that come into play when they are deciding whether or not to approve you. Your income is another example. When it comes to the score, it is the fico score in most cases they are looking at. Pedro gregory, from pennsylvania. Hello. Caller good morning. I would like to base my question on a presumption, that being that the Internal Revenue code makes it practically impossible to deduct a bad debt. If the government is monetizing these bad debts we are talking about and accumulating them what recourse do they have two address this to address this . How are we going to sort this out . Thank you, madam. Annamaria if the federal government wants to address some prime debt in wants to try to subprime debt and wants to try to put some sort of cap on this, it is difficult to see how it would do that. There is the route of regulation, which is highly unlikely. Or, there is the route of the cfpb to take a look at the practices behind some of these lenders and how they are going about approving borrowers and looking at those Interest Rates. In the end, it comes down to a consumer decision. The lenders are offering these products. You as a consumer have to decide whether it is worth signing up for these or not. There is a train of thought. Economists are split whether the surge in some prime lending subprime lending is a good or bad thing for the economy. On the negative front there is the argument that if people do not have the means, if they have strong evidence in their past of an inability to pay loans, they should not begin access to more credit. They should not be digging a deeper hole. On the other hand, economists are saying access to credit is a good thing. It helps people get out of a bad situation and it helps them to boost their credit score. There is some truth to that. If you are not using credit for a long time, your credit score will suffer. In the end, it is not a government decision. It really comes down to the consumer to decide what is the right thing for he or she to do. Pedro heres carol. Caller hi. I want to remind viewers that subprime loan term is a euphemism for loans that are designed to be bad loans. Loans that are impossible to pay. As i understand it, that was the basis for the financial meltdown which eventually my daughter lost her business and her home and was left with nothing. As is my perception correct . Annamaria what you said is correct. Subprime loans were behind the financial meltdown. There was a surge in subprime lending during two dozen five and two dozen six 2005 in 2006. What was also happening another reason why it hit the economy so hard, was because you not only had people who were no longer able to pay their debts and who were losing assets, but you also had the fact that lenders were selling off these loans to the secondary market. There were investors who were buying these loans, these bad performing loans. That is not really happening now. There is a securitization market. That market is not accepting subprime debt at this point. Pedro one more call for our guest. This is julian from louisiana. Caller you may have covered it i came in halfway on the show. What you are saying who are the underwriters so that if a meltdown did occur again in these banks . Annamaria many of these lenders are nonbanks. Where does a nonbank get financing from to actually give out to borrowers . Where they are currently getting this money from his private equity. Hedge funds. Venture capitalists. These are private funders. They are wealthy people or institutions who have a lot of cash and want to make some kind of return off of it. They are turning to these nonbank lenders, giving them their cash and saying, lend it out at high Interest Rates and these companies are the ones that are pocketing a lot of those interest charges that people will be paying. Pedro you told us at the beginning that you saw a high amount of these loans in 2014. What is being charted out for the future . Annamaria it is expected that these numbers will only rise during the first 11 months of 2014, 189 billion of subprime debt with car loans, personal loans, or given out. Personal loans were given out. It was around 200 billion or so back in 2007. Again, the big exception here the space where this is not budging and were subprime lending is limited is in the mortgage front. That is a big difference from what was happening or to the downturn. Pedro our guest wrote the lead story on the topic of subprime loans our guest cowrote the lead story on the topic of subprime loans. Annamaria andriotis, thank you for your time. Annamaria thank you. Pedro how are the states doing . To talk about that, Niraj Chokshi will join us next as washington journal continues. Here are some of our featured programs for this weekend on the cspan network. This morning, starting at 10 00 a. M. Eastern, our nations governors get together to discuss issues affecting their states. Guests include any meyer, ceo of Union Square Hospitality group and maria barta romo a fox business news. Sunday morning at 11 00, we continue our coverage of the National Governors associat ion meeting. Guests include jeh johnson and gina mccarthy. On cspan two, booktv is on the road, experiencing the literary life of greensboro, North Carolina, part of the citys tour. Sunday, at 9 p. M. East 9 00 p. M. Eastern westmore retraces west more retraces his life. Just after 7 00, the 1963 interview of malcolm x. Discussing race relations. Sunday at six 30 p. M. Eastern jonna mendez tells the story of husband and wife kgb spy team who infiltrated the cia in the 1970s. Find out complete schedule at cspan. Org and let us know what you think about the programs youre watching. Call us at 2026263400. Email us or send us a tweet at cspan comments. Washington journal continues. Pedro joining us now, Niraj Chokshi. He is a political reporter and one of the reporters theyll be covering the National Governors association today. For those who will be watching later on, what do the governors talk about when dealing with the Large National issues . Niraj whenever a group of governors come to town, one purpose is to share ideas. I spoke with governor hickenlooper of colorado. That is something he said. He has a Big Initiative on how states can be more effective. He says, whether you believe in small or large government, everyone believes in good government. That is one of the aspects. The other big reason is this is where they get a lot of their money. A third of their state budget comes from the federal government. There are a lot of issues they want to talk to federal lawmakers about. On monday, they will be meeting with the white house and governor hickenlooper and governor who governor herbert of utah, both sat with a few of us reporters yesterday and they outlined some issues. Those include everything from the marketplace fairness act which would allow make it easier for states to tax online goods you buy. They are going to talk about immigration, trade deals. A lot on their plate. Pedro you said a third of state s budget comes from federal government . Niraj there are grants. A lot of it comes in the form of medicaid and those kinds of payments. Medicaid is one of the biggest at the state level. A huge expense at the federal level. It comes through congress, executive budgets, all kinds. Pedro we hear from the Obama Administration the economy is improving. How is that faring in the states . Niraj there are 50 answers to that question. States are doing well generally speaking. In the terminology of the Credit Rating Credit Rating agencies , things are stable. Theyre not bad, they are not great. It seems the worst is behind us. The really difficult years postrecession are behind us. The economy is still slow. Every governor is still concerned about jobs and employment and the economy. It is still it would still be better if things were moving faster. Pedro unemployment rates. The National Averages 5. 7. States like north dakota showing 2. 8 . South dakota, 3. 3 . What is factoring into those states with lower numbers . Niraj some of the strongest states right now by a lot of measures. That is because of an oil boom. Energy is really driving a lot of this, especially in the west and middle corridor of the country. That is largely because of energy. Pedro our guest is here to talk about conditions in the states, particularly at the national as the national governmentors association meets. 202 7488001, our line for republicans. 202 7488000, our line for republic our life for democrats. And 202 7488002. I suppose partisan issues go out of it when these governors meet. Niraj this is about partisan organization. As i governor hickenlooper and herbert have a great relationship. Ive seen them interact many times. They are jovial. They joke with one another. Obviously, they disagree on a lot of issues, but they do steal ideas from each other. Even yesterday, governor hickenlooper was talking about an idea he stole from utah. An initiative called 66 by 2020 in which they are shooting to get safety 6 of residents six the 6 of residents 66 of residents to hold a technical degree. It is about sharing ideas. Pedro a lot of the states were affected by the Affordable Care act. How are they faring . Niraj the big question is what happens with the Supreme Court. We just read about this this week. This case could devastate the law as it is being implemented. It is about subsidies. The issue at hand is 13 states have set up their own exchanges. The rest of the states are not on their own exchange, they are on the federal exchange or some variation. The administration argues that the law says the law was created with the intent that subsidies would be available to anyone on any exchange. The argument at hand is, a portion of the law says subsidies are available to those established by the state. The issue is what this congress intended when they drafted that law. If the Supreme Court rules against the subsidies in those states, millions of people, as many as 8 Million People are getting subsidies right now they would be affected. Pedro on another knowable on another level, talk about the states that expanded their programs. Niraj so far, states are doing well. Kentucky has been a standout. You might think of it as a red state. It is led by a democrat. The governor has said it has been effective. They are produced on uninsured rates from 20 to about 12 . They just had deloitte just did a study for the state and found that the state is expected to save Something Like 800 million in the next 10 years to the Medicaid Expansion. There are arguments that this will save money. The counterargument is that the expansion under the act though the federal government has promised to pay most of the cost in the long term, a lot of republican governors argue, you say that now but when things get tight in 10 years, you will shift those costs to us and our citizens will be so used to it we will not be a will to pull it back. Pedro Niraj Chokshi, covering the National Governors association plus what is going on at the state level. Our guest, to talk about financial issues. You can watch the National Governors association on cspan. The first call is from tom in new jersey. Good morning. Caller good morning. I have a couple things to say real fast. If you have a president who comes in office and the National Debt is 8. 5 trillion and he runs the debt up toward 19 trillion as we are today, you would think the economy was doing pretty good. Where did all of that money go . It like disappeared in the air. I run 15 shipping trucks out of new jersey. All the warehouses are down. He bore not getting paid. People are not getting paid. Everything in this administration has been a smokescreen of lies. To prove that, you have Bloomberg News saying every day about this fake unemployment number. Why dont they tell us how many people have been dropping out of the force of work . Niraj that is a good point. Longterm unemployment is a major problem and is a problem that is not captured in the unemployment number. Right now, unemployment is at 5. 7 . That does not include a lot of people who are dropped out of the labor market after months of searching. Lots of newspapers have reported on it. It is a difficult issue, to assess the size of the people affected. It is expected to be in the millions who have not been able to be employed. I think that is an important point about the debt. It is something states are grappling with too. Some of the biggest drivers of the debt are longterm entitlement programs. Tensions are big pensions are big. At the state and federal level they are making it hard to budget because they are growing and growing as states have less and less room to maneuver. Pedro catherine, up next from ohio. Regrets line. Caller democrats line. Caller my question is simple red versus blue states, what states pay the most federal taxes and which states go home with the most federal money . It has always been, we northern states a the most in the we do not get the most out. As an ohioan, i am sick and tired of supporting the people of the south. They cry the loudest but we always get the short end of the stick. Could you tell me why . Niraj that is a good point. It might be worth noting that a lot of those red states are not taking money that is available to them in the Medicaid Expansion. A lot of those governors are passing up on it. A few red state governors have taken up the expansion. Some of them have argued, this is money we are paying in, we want to take it back out. You bring out a good point. On the other hand, some republican governors are passing on what democrats argue is free money to pass on to citizens. Pedro 31 republican governors as it stands now after the november election. 68 republican state legislators on the books. 30 democrats. This is how it is playing out. What is it like with a rash of new governors that were reelected and republican governors coming in . How has landscape changed . Niraj the landscapes have consolidated for republicans. Of those 31 republican governors , 23 have also republican controlled their state legislat legislatures. Republicans are in a great spot to pass policies they believe in. In some cases, they are struggling to make their case. In kansas, governor brownback has cut taxes deeply. It has so far not boosted the economy. He argues, we just need some time. It has hardly been two years. I think he is an example of what governors are able to do. They are able to pass these strong, republican ideas and policies. Pedro there was a story about the wisconsin legislator. Niraj right to work has been big. Pedro from ohio, this is richard. Richard, are you there . Lets move on to joe in rochester, new york. Caller hi. My comment has to do with new york. That is where i live and being in new york, we have 140 billion budget here. We get a lot of money from the federal government. My concern is that we have a declining population in new york state. We have a governor that runs a bunch of smokescreens as far as budgetary process, who is against fracking and our utility rates are hollowly second highest in the country next to hawaii probably second highest in the country next to hawaii. Property taxes and sales taxes and basically everything we have to put up with, including bad weather. My concern is, the government as a whole does not seem to have a lot of answers on how the population is going to live. Niraj you bring up interesting issues. Your from the northeast and the northeast is not growing as fast as some of these other places. Some of that is because the northeast has older industry, manufacturing in a lot of places. You also mention the gas tax which i think is something i want to talk about because a lot of states are dealing with that. The federal government is about to take up the highway transportation bill in a few months. Theyre talking about it now. At the state level, gas taxes which fund roads, those gas taxes have not been keeping up with the needs of the states. A lot of states are talking about raising gas taxes. We have seen a lot of different versions of this in a lot of republican states. In South Carolina, the governor has said, we will raise that test but we must cut them in other places. They are suffering from the fact that cars get better fuel economy so you are able to travel farther unless gas so youre paying less taxes. That is a big problem for a lot of states. Pedro are other states capitalizing on energy . Niraj absolutely. Your pennsylvania, texas alaska. They are trying to build energybased economies. It can backfire. Alaska is a great example of how it can backfire. Right now, broadly speaking, the decline in oil prices is half of what used to be in june. It is good. That means Lower Oil Prices mean lower gas prices. For a handful of states where 90 of their general fund revenue comes gas taxes, it has put the squeeze on alaska. They were planning to spend 6. 5 billion this year. They are 3. 5 billion short of that. The state has many billion dollars in reserve funds if those oil prices are sustained it will be a big issue for them. Pedro kathy is up next from california. Caller i was wondering if you could give us information about the high speed rail in california. I am sure jerry brown is concerned about that. Niraj i am not familiar with exactly where it stands. I think the argument is an economic one he is making. He is hoping to connect los angeles to San Francisco in the central valley. And the central valley. I cannot give you more information, i am sorry. Pedro the president possible budget. The president s budget. From chicago rudolph. Caller good morning. It seems that the United States department of justice is doing such a great job in attacking these banks that have defrauded hundreds of homeowners across the country. I would like the reporter to make a comment on the lump sum settlements that have gone to the states and how theyve used that money. In illinois, the money has exclusively been used by the attorney general for those things which he feels are effective. This is one of the biggest contributions to state coffers and none of governors talk about that particularly those states with foreclosure rates. Niraj a lot of times in the settlements, states will get huge payouts and a lot of times the settlements do not your mark how those pay off our spent payoffs are spent. Settlement in the late 1990s, Tobacco Companies paid the federal government billions of dollars. That money is still being distributed to states and a lot of antismoking groups complain that states are just putting them in their general funds. They are not discrediting them to do d distributing them to combat smoking. On the foreclosure level, i am not sure how states are using it. I think it is a valid point that states do not always use them for those purposes. Pedro all those things factor in. Niraj it is not fast enough. In a lot of places, nevada is still struggling. Nevada has been a key place that was hit in the foreclosure crisis. Things are getting better, just not fast enough. Pedro kansas is up next. Here is sue from concordia kansas. Caller good morning. With governor brownback, the state of kansas is in hundreds of millions in debt. Next, he wants to raise a tax increase on alcohol and cigarettes. Massive. Next, you made the comment that governor brownback cut taxes across the board, but that is not true. The only cut taxes on the wealthy and corporations. He wants to decrease Education Funding. What you have to say about all that . Guest he cut income taxes for the top bracket. The schools issue is a big one. He is trying to ratchet back some of that funding and schools have complained. Schools have sued the state over the fact that its not covering its obligations and this event is unconstitutional. That is ongoing. He now proposing a lot of spending cuts, too. Host Arlington Heights illinois. Robert is up next. Go ahead. Caller im calling in regards to mr. Bentley in the great state of alabama. This whole issue with taxes in the state of alabama, he wants to raise taxes in order to provide more money to businesses. His own policy in regard to the war on drugs, he wants to put people in jail for Marijuana Possession and subsidize the prisons through the taxpayer. This is going on throughout the country. It is a failed policy. We owed china 17 trillion. The government wants to provide more contracts for Prison Services providers. Everything is contracts. The gentleman talking about road contracts, raising taxes on gas they want to tax, tax, tax to provide more contracts to contractors. Thats why politicians are lawyers. Bit. Ly needs to stay out of peoples bedrooms we are not all homophobic. Bentley needs to stay out of peoples bedrooms. Guest incarceration is a major expense for a lot of states. Marijuana legalization has been making the same argument. These are huge costs, ruining lives. There was one highprofile example of the man who on his third minor offense got 25 years for possession of pot. It is a big expense and you are right people are struggling to deal with it. There are lots of programs being implement it in a lot of states. People on minor offenses are being released early. Host scott walker made some statements about college and not going in his proposals to cut Education Funding in his estate. In his state. Guest states have done interesting things on education. States are shifting money away from grants and tuition aid. Tennessee, a republican state is doing something interesting. Something the white house has tried to emulate. The programs tennessee promise. The idea of the program is they will pay for committee college for everyone beginning this fall. They are paying for it with lottery proceeds. There are a lot of states doing a lot of Different Things on education. Host our guest, Niraj Chokshi from the Washington Post. If you want to asking questions about your state, give us a snapshot of whats going on economically 2027488001 for republicans. 2027488000 for democrats. 2027488002 for independents. Frank from new york. Hello. Caller good morning. Can you please make the argument for authenticating oilfields on federal land to pay down our National Debt . Guest you bring up an interesting point. A big concern to a lot of western governors. Many of those states, bunch of the land is federal land. As much as 80 in some states. There has been a push in utah to get that land back and out of the hands of the federal government. They argue we can put this land to use. They can manage the lands better. Others argue it is just to get it into the hands of industry and lay waste to our Natural Resources. It is a debate going on and you bring up a very good point. Host at the same time come off the midatlantic, we will see some oil drilling. Guest it is a tradeoff. At one necks areeveryone recognizes there are energy needs butters a strong case that we live in a beautiful country and we have a lot of beautiful Natural Resources but they dont want to ruin them. One of the five big sessions this weekend is on Natural Resources. Host timothy from michigan. Good morning. Caller top of the day. Thank you for cspan. My question is about reporting on unemployment. Since 2009, the democrats said unemployment was 800,000 month. Now, its 350,000 per week. That works over to 1. 2 million a month. Why did they change . Guest the headline on implement number has definitely fallen. We are at 5. 7 . We were 8 just a few years ago. What complicates the numbers often is the longterm unemployed issue. The number of people who are looking are slowly dropping out. Its a big problem for people who cant find jobs. People searching for six months. There are a lot of problems associated with being in a situation come including some Mental Health issues that have popped up. That may be complicating the numbers. Host you talked to the governor. Did he talk about how the states expanded with Recreational Marijuana is going . Guest i have been out there a few times and its something that is interesting. They were sued again this week over the issue. They were previously sued by oklahoma and nebraska. You are interfering with their ability to enforce our own laws because people are bringing in marijuana. Both suits claim the constitution supremacy clause should prevent colorado from enacting laws that conflict with the federal government. The lawyers dont think there is any ground there. The experiment is performing well. His answer is always consistently, i did not want this, voters approved it, but so far so good. The industry has been responsible. We have seen few major incidents in a negative way. Host are they meeting the revenue goals . Guest theyre doing very well in revenue. I dont believe they are at their goals but the state is doing so well that some of that money might go back to the residence. This is early. The markets are still developing. If we legalized nationally come a could bring 40 billion for states. Host the federal government was put on hold as far as the execution of president obamas immigration exec the border. The reaction from the states immigration executive order. Talk about what that order means for those states waiting to see what happens. Guest a lot of states are dealing with immigration on their own. Last year, there were more than 200 resolutions passed. That is down from 2013. States are enacting all kinds of things. The governor talked about this yesterday. You have a set of residents who feel uncomfortable driving uncomfortable taking jobs, they are being unproductive. By not having ids they feel they can bring these people out and help them to work. The New York Times had a great story on some of those people who have benefited from these programs. People hoping to benefit from the expansion. For states right now, its an issue of do we go it alone, do we try to offer things on our own. What can we do without federal involvement. Host fran from jacksonville, florida. Democrats line. Caller im glad that the governors are getting together today and i hope they have some discussions that will be beneficial for their constituents. To me, the Health Care Act is one that those that have it and havent should get together and talk about the outcomes of what theyve done. My being in florida, i had to get insurance and im glad i did. Now, my son doesnt have the income to buy insurance the way i did. And his income is too high to get into medicaid because they did not do the expansion. Its not that the Affordable Care act plans are too high for him. He is in that gap where he doesnt qualify to get in guest . Guest that is a good point. If they havent expanded medicaid, there are subsidies available up to a certain point. Plenty of people fall into that gap. You mentioned you are from florida. Florida has some of the highest the highest enrollment numbers of any state. You guys have had a pretty successful expansion of obamacare and that is the result of effective coordination among your nonprofits trying to get people signed up. It is probably because the older population that lives in florida who do need help services more than the younger population. Host rick scott putting this into place. What drove him to do that . Guest they are struggling with this decision. He has not chosen to expand medicaid. This is just simply nonprofits at the local level getting people signed up and educating them on the laws. Host jessica from South Carolina. Good morning. Caller i have a couple of things. The gentleman from new jersey called in this morning and was asking about the deficit ended going up. Nobody said the majority of the wars in afghanistan that bush started added to the budget. I wanted to touch on the Affordable Health care act, also known as obamacare. I hear people talking about their insane prices and everything. I have two employees a lady almost 50 years old and her son. It was 29 a month for their insurance. For another disabled gentleman that works come he paid 18 a month for his insurance. They could not afford insurance on any other plan or anywhere else. People talking about they are paying hundreds and hundreds of dollars a month on their obamacare, that cant be true from what ive personally seen. Host do you know if those people you talked about are getting subsidies . Caller South Carolina did not do any medicare expansion. They are not doing any subsidies. I dont fall into getting any subsidies or anything like that. Even though i am feeding a family of four and make 36,000 a year. Guest its important to point out that Medicaid Expansion and subsidies are different. Medicaid expansion is the option to opt out or in. With the subsidies, this is the issue right now before the Supreme Court. Subsidies are being offered universally. They are being offered on every exchange but they are not being offered in a way that people realize they are getting them. You put in your income and information about you and your family and those subsidies will come in the form they are paid to the Insurance Companies in the background. I suspect these people paying 18, 30 insurance rates are getting subsidies but maybe did not realize they were getting access to them. Host paul from indiana. Caller thanks for cspan. The transportation budget we paid 180 billion in the last seven years to states for highspeed rail. Not one track has been laid and not one train is running. I want to know where that money is going. I want to audit the transportation department. I worked as a democratic consultant in the southside of chicago. Illegal aliens have been voting or the last 35 years. I have a list of 300 names i get paid three dollars ahead for every illegal i bring to the polls. Axelrod stood next to me and cleared a check for 1500 in the next election. In the last election i want to know when this is going to stop. Guest transportation projects take a very long time. Sometimes 10 years, maybe even decades. This has been a complaint by states on federal transportation funding. The problem has been that they are receiving funds on a once every couple of years basis and that is not enough to plan. They have to know that they have those funds ready to take on big projects. They need to know that they will keep getting funds. They are calling on congress and the administration to work out a deal to pass a transportation bill that last for longer than a few years. Voter id is a big issue. A lot of states have been struggling to deal with it. There are all kinds of policies in place. There are strict versus nonstrict. Strict meaning you cannot vote and later prove that you are a valid citizen. Nonstrict meaning you can vote and then later offer that proof. There are photo id requirements. A lot of studies have looked into this and few have found that there is any sort of widespread fraud. It is usually small numbers of people voting who should not be. Host from kingsville, texas. Jose, good morning. Caller i would like to know what these folks are doing about children going hungry here. It is being mentioned briefly in the news. Guest that is a good point. Child hunger is pretty big. Food insecurity is a big issue. The rates are pretty high there. The rates of children who have had i cant remember the exact details, but its high. States are struggling to deal with it. This is an issue that will be coming up again, the Childrens Health Insurance Program aired states will be looking to the federal government to renew that. Host chris from kingston illinois. Caller i think who is going to when the president ial race next is whoever kenexa with the people on a level where they are worried about us, worried about america. Connects with the people. First on the list should be everybody i dont like that the gop is portraying marijuana as bad. It is here anyway and people smoke it anyway and nothing will change except for our states will have a lot more money to work on infrastructure. None of our infrastructure work gets done. We hear about other countries and war. Nothing raised about the American People. Our neighborhoods and everything else. We could use that marijuana money. The gang problems would go down because guest on marijuana funding its in colorado a good point. A lot of that money is earmarked for school construction. Some is also earmarked for Education Campaigns. Colorado launched its second Education Campaign to make sure that people understand what the drug can do in the negative impacts of it. A lot of people are making this argument that legalizing this drug will take it out of the black market and put it into the governments hands. It could mean a lot of revenue. Governor hickenlooper said look p drug dealers dont care who they sell it too. If we can regulate it, we can make it harder and trick the market down shrink the market down. Host does it change the landscape as far as red states and blue States Company 16 . , 2016 . Guest blue states are hoping it will bring up more people on their side. It might undo some of this republican we will see how energized the end of thing. Host this is al from ohio. Good morning. Caller i had a comment about Medicaid Expansion here in ohio. It looks like our governor announced that he will charge people on medicaid the figure he throughout was 20 a month. That would affect around 100,000 people, about 2 million a year. To nickel and dime people. I would like to hear your guest comment on that. Guest im not familiar with that charge. Governor kasich has been a strong proponent of expanding medicaid. He gave a speech to montana legislators. He sees it as the right thing to do. He thinks people need to get out of it, it is being too politicized. Host governor hickenlooper of colorado and the governor of utah cochairing the meeting. What are you looking from this gathering . Guest what i will be looking for is the policies that they bring up. What the governors are concerned about and what they want from the federal government. That will be interesting to see what their demands are from the white house. Host there is the room they will be in later today at 10 00. Talking about policy issues and other issues with Niraj Chokshi. For the last segment, with the Governors Association meeting coming up, for the last segment how about your governor . How is he or she doing . Here is how you can call and make your thoughts known. 2027488001 for republicans. 2027488000 for democrats. 2027488002 for independent. Your thoughts on how your governor is doing. You are looking at the room this will take place. We had on our newsmakers program, one of the cochairs republican governor of utah. He sat down for our program which you can see on sunday, talking about a variety of topics. He talked about utahs frustration with congress and the president in dealing with immigration. Http twitter. Com cspanwj[video clip] we have had a lot of frustration because of the lack of action on the congresss park. It is their response ability to resolve this issue and do something. Congresss part. Do something. We finally got so frustrated in utah that we try to develop our own policies and say we will enforce the laws you are not enforcing. Everything should be based on a rule of law. Seek we can find a better way to do things to solve the problem. We got challenged in court by the Obama Administration saying you can go around the congress. This is their responsibility not yours as a state. We won on some points and lost on the bigger points. This is a federal response believe your guess response ability. Guess what . Now he is going wrong congress and we say you challenged us its not fair. So, we are suing him now saying you overextended your executive authority. You can go around congress either. Its about who has the responsibility to put policy in place. We call upon the congress to immediately do some immigration reform, do something, even if its as minimal as securing the border. Much blame do Congressional Republicans deserve . Both sides have mud on their hands because it has gotten politicized . Or use of the Obama Administration and the way they approached the issue . There has been a lack of leadership. Leadership to bring people together and get things done. We will find a comfort mys. We have done it in times past. To find compromise. The buck stops at the white house. You have to bring people together. That is part of being the president. Host the conversation with governor gary herbert, you can see it in total tomorrow at 10 00. Part of our coverage of the National Governors associations winter meeting. A variety of events throw the day. Throughout the day. You can go to our website for more information. For the next 35 minutes, how was your governor doing . We want to get your thoughts on that. Tell us who your governor is and then you can go from there. 2027488001 for republicans. 2027488000 for democrats. 2027488003 for independents. We will start this morning with jeff in milwaukee. Democrats line. Caller good morning, pedro. My governor is scott walker. That should say a lot. Between iowa and california, london and d. C. I dont think he has been in wisconsin for the last two or three weeks. He did not accept the aca money for the obamacare so he has put me in a bad situation. Im basically a popper now. I give him and f. Host your state legislature caller the right to work . Hes calling an emergency session monday. Scott walker has said he will sign it if it hits his desk. Host what happens if the Legislature Approves it . Caller it is going to do to the Public Employee unions it Union Membership will continue to fall. Host you are breaking up. Caller unions are not going to be allowed to collect union fees from employers for employees. Or employees. Its another taccone and move back by the draconian move back by the koch brothers. Pennsylvania. Independent line. Caller my governor is wolf. I would like to put out a couple of comments out there. Even though you have heard the saying, some people make fun of president obama that he is mr. Teleprompter. I wish you would sell some of them to wolf because he cannot speak with or without one. He seems to come across he doesnt like democrats or republicans in rural areas or small towns. I have lived in pennsylvania most of my life. I have a background in sociology. Our whole area of leadership even our local mayor but we are coming down leadership. Even our local mayor, we are dumbing down leadership. Host texas is where george is. Republican line. Caller good morning. Basically, i think greg abbott is doing an excellent job. In the United States, we have exactly three problems. We need to stop the invasion of the United States by mexico. We need to arrest and prosecute all the communists that have completely infiltrated the United States government system from top to bottom and get rid of them. Get out of the middle east, stop intervening in the wars all over the dam place and let the world police itself. Host as part of our halfhour, you will hear from governors that participated at an event sponsored by politico, talking about their states and situations they are facing. First up is terry mcauliffe. How the potential shutdown of the department of home and security could affect virginia. [video clip] as governor of the commonwealth of virginia, it is the number one recipient of Department Defense dollars. We have somebody military assets, the Largest Naval base in the world, the cia, quantico. Anytime we have dysfunction appear in packs is greatly. In the last three years, virginia lost 920 billion in defense contracts. Sequestration is a real calamity. 9. 8 billion in defense contracts. I was at the council of governors. J johnson came in and gave his presentation. It woke every governor in the room. If the dhs shuts down, even if the dhs has a continuing resolution, you cannot fund the states. All of our funding, our sheriffs come all of our First Responders that we deal with, all gets shut off. Even with the continuing resolution. Folks dont realize the implication for every state. Secretary johnson said 2 billion went out to the states that all gets stopped. Host we are asking folks about how your governor is doing. Brad from new jersey, good morning. Caller good morning let me tell you about governor christie. The rest of the country thinks he is a nice guy. He went from 65 rating down to 35 and going down. He abandoned this estate. State. He is in this state half the year. Our lending power has dropped six times. People are leaving the state in droves. The potholes everybody is talking about potholes, the roads, the bridges. There is a commercial on the tv about the bridges, they are falling down and being shut down. Host why do you think he won a second term . Caller the person they put up against him was completely hated, even by the democrats. The democrats did not even vote for her. He had a big margin when he is a bum. He probably should be indicted for all the crummy things and deals he has made. Atlantic city, theres billions of dollars in casinos that are bankrupt. You talk about the republicans talk about think ozzie. Benghazi. We have benghazi in the new woark every week. Host canton, ohio. Republican line. Caller this is that sherry from canton. Governor john kasich on a 110 gets a 50. He doesnt give a damn about what goes on. You dont want this man for president. The dayton ward that operates his office he says tough luck. Host as in someone who was a republican, you did not vote for governor kasich . Caller no, i did not. Please dont let this man be president. Ohio is in a state of denial about whats going on. We have pharmaceutical problems in this governor is doing nothing. He is out campaigning around, doing nothing but putting his hand in the senate head in the sand. He will not return a call. There are state orders blocking me. If people call there if those are the people running his office, you dont want him for president. Host cindy from illinois. Independent line. Caller i would like to discuss our governor who had some great chances at the beginning of his administration. He blew it when he had his acceptance speech and lied about contacting the heads of the opposing parties and discussing with them how they would work together. It was reported that he did not do that. Ive been keeping track of his lies ever since. I would like to see more together with people on both sides and put in some of these changes he would like to make without hurting the poor people of illinois. I had hopes for him that so far all i can remember ares lies. Host what changes has he proposed making . Caller i would like to see term limits. One of the things hes learning to do that i dont agree with is working to take away the pensions that have been hardfought four with the teachers and illinois. Teachers and illinois are treated at two different scales. We have the chicago teachers and the downstate teachers. Downstate teachers do not make those humongous retirement pensions he is talking about. I would like to see some equity around the state for some teachers for the teachers. I would like to see putting in infrastructure help in roads and bridges. Host that is an cindy in illinois. Al in california. Democrats line. Caller what i would like to say is there is a 10 sales tax in california, a 10 or more income tax come all kinds of taxes. Some of the teachers are retiring 100,000 a year. The average person on Social Security makes 1200. The government has become a privileged class and the employees in california, the pensions are draining people so they dont get services and we dont get the proper maintenance of the highway, yet we are taxed more than you can believe and its the number one state as far as the middle class surviving. Host has governor jerry brown done anything to address those pensions . Caller he said he did, but its all a bunch of figures that they danced back and forth on. I dont see where he has. It has not been that great for several years. I dont think he has addressed enough. People were able to leave their job and be promoted for the last part of their public thing and they would get retired at more income than they made. Its been ridiculous. The average person in california gets 1200 for Social Security. People want to do away with Social Security and they dont see that the government is the one taking all the income. If you want capitalism government doesnt seem to be part of that. Host has there been predictions about those programs and their sustainability in the future . Caller as far as income taxing . Host hangout pensions and the ability to pay out these things the government has set up for state employees. Caller they are the biggest employers in the county im in. While they talk about it they had a guarantee rate of return by 8 of a percent. They get it from the taxpayer if they dont make it. They retire and then move out of california come into texas where they dont have to pay the taxes they do here. Like they do here. Host medicare the subject the closely watched figure amidst rapid growth Medicare Beneficiaries can choose to go with private alternatives known as medicare advantage. Don in memphis, tennessee. Good morning. Caller good morning. I would like to say that the governor here in tennessee is doing a bang up job. We dont have a state income tax. The cost of living is very reasonable. I would welcome people from the northeast and california to come onto tennessee because this is one great state to live in. Host how do you do all of that without a state income tax . Caller im sure it comes from our sales tax. It is not exorbitant or anything like that. They have other means of getting taxes to fund Different Things. Host as far as our last guest talk about the governors plan to offer Free Committee college come this fall, what is the expected cost to the state . Caller i dont think its a good idea. If people want to exceed in life and attain goals, they need to get off their butts and do it themselves. Im from the old school. If you want to succeed, get off your butt and go for it. All this stuff of helping people left and right, thats the democrats way of doing things and its ridiculous. Host you are still supportive of the governor. Caller you betcha. Host kathy. Democrats line. Caller the house and senate are both republican, along with the governor. My first job out of high school in flint was unionized at the dry cleaners. Government workers have huge Pension Plans here in the state and it will eventually break the state. It is already happening. Right to work happens here. You dont get the numbers. Our governor here just had a health scare and he was at university of michigan hospital. My insurance, i have a 10 copay. I paid just under four dollars a month for myself and my child. 400 a month. That would be a minimum for me of 2000. My cost, if i had that same procedure. I cant afford that. I can even begin to afford that on my wage. Medicaid is a good program. I wish i had medicaid. When we have people in good Health Physical and mental, we are a stronger nation for that. We need to look at that because when im shopping locally and i go and im standing at the deli and a woman waiting on me has almost no teeth in her mouth what kind of country with support that . We need to keep people healthy. Host republican line. Caller our governor is bruce rauner. He just recently had the state budget address and he talked about how they make decisions in cuts and reforms. Weve had problems with medicaid, with pensions. Our state is last in so many arenas. He is doing what he has to do shaking up the state. Hes going in there and shaking things up and hopefully getting people to think about things. I like that he has come out there and been bold. Host at 10 00, we will start airing sessions from the National Governors association. That is just one of the rooms where the action will take place. The governors will be addressing many things concerning their state, health, taxes, anything else. Governor hickenlooper of colorado and governor herbert of utah will be chairing the event as part of the total package. You can start watching that at 10 00. We are asking you about your governor, how he or she is doing. You can talk about who it is and go from there. 2027488001 for republicans. 2027488000 for democrats. 20274880032027488002 for independents. Chris christie talked about the importance of honesty, especially when governing estate. [video clip] when i ran for reelection against a female opponent come a state senator, i got 61 of the vote for reelection. One by 22 points. 22 of the africanamerican vote. Of from 9 up from 9 four years earlier. Honesty and straightforwardness plays no matter what neighborhood you are in in new jersey or what state you are in in america. Lets hear from dolores in georgia. Democrats line. Caller i wanted to Say Something about the governor ive been upset about him passing this gun law where people can walk around, they can go to church, go in a restaurant or bar or school openly and visibly carrying a gun. There have been so many killings by guns in georgia since the governor past that law. People have to do something about this gun control because every single day you can turn on your tv to channel five or 11 or whatever and you will hear several reports of people who have been shot and killed by guns. Over nonsensical things. The road rage thing that happened the other day was really outrageous. Something has to be done. The more they advertise guns the more killings there will be because people are Walking Around like its the wild west. Host when did that law go into effect . Are you saying gun deaths werent as high before the law . Caller gun deaths have always been high. But today, its the mindset that everybody can carry a gun openly anywhere they want to go. Why would you have to carry a gun to church or school . These things dont make sense. The more guns that are promoted the more debts you will have. Deaths you will have. Host you may have seen josh earnest talk about this yesterday. If federal judge put a hold to the executive action. They seek a stay of the order with paperwork expected to be filed no later than monday. Robert in illinois. You are next. Go ahead. Republican line. Caller i would like to echo the young lady from illinois. Hes doing an excellent job. I hope he considers we dont have jessicas law. I hope you get ts that passed. Its mandatory sentence against pedophiles. Host jerry from North Carolina. Independent line. Caller thank you for cspan. Our governor has a republican vetoproof legislature we dont have Medicaid Expansion here but we have to more people signed up for the Affordable Care act than anybody in the country. We are the only state that does not have extended Unemployment Benefits so all the taxes go to other states. We end up passing laws here that are overturned in the courts. We have people trying to get a state religion. Weve got people in our legislature that make jeff clampett and his family look like road scholars. Thank you again for cspan. We do a terrible job here in North Carolina. Host the former first lady of virginia being featured on the cover of newspapers today. Her husband receiving a sentence because of issues of corruption and association the wife of the former governor was found guilty was sentenced friday to a year and a day in prison. Angelo from new orleans, louisiana. Democrats line. Caller good morning. Thank you for cspan. Let me tell you what its like living in a state where your governor is running for president. More times around the country he has been to england with the price of oil down to 50 a barrel instead of over 100, the main money coming in for louisiana is oil. He decides to cut money he is cutting it off the two main universities, Louisiana State and southern. We had a beautiful hospital before katrina. It took care of everybody very well. It has been gone since katrina. It only would have taken 500 million to bring it back but hes building a billiondollar medical complex that they will probably never finish. Host from florida, joey, republican line. Caller this is considered a central state. The first caller from wisconsin hundreds of thousands are dying. He put the finger on immigration he could care less about immigration. We could have had 60,000 jobs here. It is ridiculous. He is worth 200 million. He can afford to take spanish classes cant afford to take spanish classes . I can afford a teacher or program or something. Host the headline says the u. S. Hacked cell phone sim cards from trost and, here is randy. Independent line. From charleston, South Carolina, here is randy. Caller anything in the Obamacare Administration office she dont accept it. Host what do you mean by that . Caller the health care, all the different programs that try to help the poor people, they dont seem to want to go along with it. They want to be their own country. Host randy from South Carolina. North carolina will be the future feature of our weekend profile. The literary and historical culture of greensboro, North Carolina. You will be exploring that meeting hearing people. We will be featuring the literary program, including the 1960 greensboro siddons. Sit ins. [video clip] i went there on the third day. The guys had gone down on the first and second and here is the third day and they are expecting us at this time. They know something is going to happen. Number one, its quiet. Number two, the lunch counter which was very long and lined up , it was quite intimidating. Once everybody else was like im not going down there because anything might happen, we go and sit down and wait. To see whats going to happen. A waitress came by with a tray she was so nervous that the knives were rattling. I did not know what she might be doing with those knives. She was as scared as i was. We sat there with our textbooks trying to study. I remember her saying we cant serve you well or we dont serve colored. I will have to ask you all to leave. I sat there for at least an hour. We had our long shifts. It was nerveracking, exciting. You had this sense that you are doing something very eight important insignificant very importantt and significant. Host greensboro, North Carolina on American History tv and book tv. How is your governor doing . As we wait for the start of the National Governors association from wisconsin, here is bill on the democrats line. Caller i would divide and conquer governor is dividing again by trying to pass no rights at work legislation. Our divide and conquer governor. He cuts the decent wage and everyone makes less. Thats what he has been doing since he got in. Last year, he bought the election by taking out a billiondollar loan and giving us a tax cut. Now, he is 2. 2 billion in the hole. Taking out another loan to bill gross. To build roads. We are bankrupt, basically. We dont have the money for schools and universities and Agricultural Extension offices that help the farmers, the research into these crops that cause wisconsin to be the dairy state, etc. They are being destroyed and he is putting these powers into his own hands. He is becoming the imperial governor. Host caller hi, how are you. He is the only governor i know that wanted to outsource the state jobs in ohio by [inaudible] prisons and i dont understand how you can have a Rainy Day Fund. In accounting i thought every penny was supposed to be accounted for so how can you have a Rainy Day Fund and after 30 years in office somebody makes a mistake and they have 8 million extra they didnt know they had in the budget. Who is accountable for the money and outsourcing of the jobs with state workers . That is all i have to say. Host the Financial Times looks at the cold snap that is in most places and topic of heating fuel saying the price jumped as the u. S. Battled the coldest february since the 1970s giving a temporary burst to energy markets. Temperatures were forecast from chicago to washington cold with longerterm outlook colder than normal and price moves show despite surging supplies that have knocked to oil and gas to multiyear