Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20161205

Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah when the saints go marching in i want to be in that number when the saints go marching in oh when the saints go marching in when the saints go marching in yes, i want to be in that number inn the saints go marching when the sun begins to shine yes i want to be in the number when the sun begins to shine when the saints go marching on in when the saints go marching on in yes, i want to be in that number when the saints go marching in when the sun begins to shine when the sun begins to shine numberwant to be in that when the sun begins to shine when the saints go marching on in yes, yes, when the saints go marching in i want to be in the number in the saints go marching washington journal continues. Joining us, mike lillis, a Senior Reporter for the hill that covers congress extensively. What does it mean to be a House Democratic these days . Guest it means you are in a position that you do not think you would be in a month ago. There has been some turmoil. They have been in disarray since the election. They came in. They thought that was going to be a bone to them down ballot. They thought they were going to pick up a significant number of seats. They thought they were going to take the senate. None of those things happened. They are in this position of what went wrong . They are going to do an autopsy. Set of the commission and say what went wrong and how did we miss these voters . How can we energize our base . We did not do it this time around. To be a democrat is to be questioning the future of the party. Host there is a lot of talk of unity. Is that the case . Guest we saw a lot of this unity in the wake of this election. There was enormous call for the leadership to be overthrown. Nancy pelosi has been there for 14 years. There is a younger crop of people who are frustrated that they have not been able to move up the ladder. Frustrated that this is the fourth election cycle that they have not been able to take the majority saying we have to go back to square one. We have got to go back to winning. Antipelosi raises a lot of money and yes she has experience. Nancy pelosi raises a lot of money and yes, she has experience. After fourying cycles where to do something to win. Tim ryan came in and challenged her. He lost. Pelosi will be there. Her authority is unquestioned. Going forward, there is this movement that is growing as the years go by, these people are getting younger and younger. You are seeing this happen in real time. Host he talked about tim ryan and his loss. Talk about how many votes he got. Is that significant that he got the number he did . Asked. Depends on who he if you ask nancy pelosi, she got two thirds of the vote. It was 134 to 63. She is saying yes, i still command this enormous amount of the very liberal leading caucus. Question. Is not in tim ryan comes in and says wait a minute, the last time you were challenged, that was after they got wiped out. They lost 63 seats and they have not rebounded since. Heath shuler was a blue dog democrat from north carolina, not very senior. He challenged her. It was more of a symbolic challenge. It is a secret ballot. He got 43 votes. It was a little more than people thought he was going to get. There was that since that with the secret ballot, i can cast this protest vote and say, because we get wiped out, we snap with the same person in. It was that kind of message. He got 43 and line comes in and gets 63. Again, you see this growing. The wave is growing. Younger people coming in. Host the role of the House Democrats postelection. If you want to ask him questions about that, what it means for policymaking you can post on twitter and our facebook page. Lets hear from nancy pelosi just after her reelection, how she talks about Going Forward and mike lillis will get you to comment. , workinggo forward very closely together as the opposition which is a different role. Our unity is very important. Will be strategic, unifying and unwavering in our support. That is what joins us together. Everything else is part of who we are. What unifies us is our values and those values said mike lillis, she americas working families twice. What goes on from here . Unity. She is calling for they have been unified all along. They are scratching their head this month. Pushing,s theyre been economics did not pull very well. They support gun reform. All of these polled in the 80 to 90 percentiles. Figure out why they whenosing based on this she is saying unity, she is stressing that they are on the same page. Tim ryan believes in all of those issues. When she says unity, she is talking about issues and the need to figure out how to convince voters they are on the same page. I think what you are going to see them do long into the future is hone that message, helped convince people that we are for them and how do we translate wage,olls minimum Social Security how do we translate that into sibling which they can go on a Bumper Sticker . Here tim ryan will be wednesday to share his thoughts on the Democratic Party and its future. Mike lillis, our current guest to talk about these things. You can go to the hill. Com to see his writing. Nicholas from pikesville, maryland. Republican line. Go ahead caller . Just go ahead. Caller i have a question in a comment. The implication was with schuyler, there was a secret ballot but with a, there wasnt . Guest the secret ballot was for both of those elections. Because of the secret ballot, someone can vote in or against policy without suffering any political repercussions. Inosi has done very good uniting the party. She can keep she can kick people off committees. She can demote them. She raises tons of money. She cannot give that to certain campaigns. She has ways of keeping democrats in line. The secret ballot just allows somebody, maybe a freshman member, to go in there and vote for the other candidate without nancy pelosi ever knowing. It gives you anonymity and there is no repercussions. I am sorry for the confusion. Wisconsin, independent line. Pedro. Yes, great show, i was going to say, the reason i am independent is because i think the republicans and democrats, neither one of them follow the constitution. The democrats have basically been the same for the last 45 44 years. The mcgovern i took over the party. Media covering them now not exposing their radical agenda. The public is catching on, pretty much so in the midwest where i live. I see theo say media keeps on beating up on trump. I was not a big trump fan at all. I was wondering, do you think the democrats in the future here are going to bring more people in, like heath shuler or tim ryan. Or do you think it is good to stay like a Coastal Party . Host great question. That is the composition theyre having. At the top, it is going to stay a Coastal Party. They try to topple policy. Try to topple pelosi. California after that. What they have done is to carve out new leadership positions that are not going to go to does that are going to go to more junior members that are going to go to more junior members. This was tim ryans argument all along. Out he is the youngstown, ohio, bluecollar manufacturing district. Trump won the district. He says i am the guy who can go to fish fries. I can talk to these voters. We can get these voters back to the democratic fold. Pelosi recognizing this and realizing she has to do something, which she did not do in 2010. The challenge was not strong enough. This year is very different. She has carved out a number of new leadership posts. If you ask the critics, they say they are cosmetic things to cover her for her to save face. If you ask of those who are being placed in those positions, they are appreciative that they are going to have a spot at the table. They will be in those weekly leadership meetings as they steer message and policy. That is the type of thing you are going to see pete we had some elections on friday. We are going to have some elections this afternoon when congress returns. Those names will be unrolled. Host what happens this afternoon . Guest they are going to vote on the campaign arm. Pelosi used to appoint the head of the test the head of the democratic he was appointed two years ago. People have said that is getting too much power to one person. Part of this conversation in revolt postelection is need to spread that power around. Now that role is going to be elected. Here was a thought that would be challenged. Sean Patrick Maloney suggested that he might challenge him. Not going to happen. Lujan will run unchallenged. He will be the chair for the next two years. There is a committee called the democratic policy and taken into effect aas couple of years ago. Nancy pelosi carved a position out. It was appointed, but now it will be elected. It will be divided among three different vicechairman. So, they are trying to spread power and make it more to microsoft democracized. So, spreading the power around regionally and generationally. Allowing these people to vote. Host a democrat from springfield, virginia, erica, you are on. Caller good morning. What i see on the democratic side of the party it seems that they have walked away from the grassroots. Vocation, but we do not need charity. We want a 15 minimum wage raise. Debt reduction to be much more aggressive, so students can go back and invest in the economy. We do not need little things. We need to walk away from corporations. That is very, very important. Say, some people respect nancy pelosi, and i understand. The new generation means new Democratic Leaders coming along. Progressive, and it really want to make change. They want to move away from corporate influence. That is what we need to fight against. Host erica, we will let our guest response. You have put a lot out there. Guest a great comment. Part of the discussion they are having right now is how are we going to defend president obamas legacy from donald trump and congressional majorities in both chambers. There is a lot of disagreement on what to do on that front. A lot of people agree with you that the reason the democrats lost was that the message did not resonate. That they did not get there liberal base out because they went to soft. They did not fight hard enough for court, liberal values. Values. Liberal i should mention, they have strong checking in congress in Bernie Sanders and senator elizabeth moran. Nancy pelosi is in a different spot because she is a leader, and she has to negotiate with the other republican leaders. Think shef policy, i is 100 on the same page as Bernie Sanders and elizabeth warren. Policy wise, you have that sector. It is a very liberal heavy democratic caucus. So a lot of people agree with exec or what you have said. Shifting gears, there is also recognition that they will have to compromise if they want to get anything done. When obamanell was elected, Mitch Mcconnell was the Senate Minority leader at the time. He said that his primary goal was not going to be to allow obama to do anything at all. He wanted him to be a one term president , so they blocked everything. He was criticized soundly for that. Eight years later, politically, it seemed to have worked out for republicans. So, some democrats are saying we need to make donald trump a one term president. That was set in no Uncertain Terms last week. So, theres kind of a mixed message on whether or not we should work with donald trump. Democrats have always been a party that wants to govern and believe in government. They are at this crossroads where they do not they cannot burn the house down just to defeat donald trump and block everything he wants to do. There is a sense they have to work with him. A the same time, there is group of liberals that feel they need to fight for their values and block everything that would undo them. Host from pennsylvania for our llis, this isi john. Go ahead. Caller pelosi is 76 years old. Democrats are in the upper 70s. They are part of the new the neoliberal switch that can be attached to the clintons. Clinton in 1996 when neoliberal which is a corporate stance. That has not worked. It split the Democratic Party between the black caucus in the neoliberals. And the neoliberals. Bernie sanders was popular because he was a democrat. He was not taken in by all the money. The neoliberals work. Liberals were. Eo that is one of the problems. They need to learn from republicans. They are really the organization that runs the republican party. Guest i think this goes back to the previous question. As the democrats try to locate a strategy to get them back on the winning track, do they stick with their liberal values or compromise . You mentioned alex, but the alec, but the democrats have id of support, t plenty of support, too. With the demise of labor unions over the years, a lot of their support base has eroded. So, the trick is to appeal to a lot of those workers left behind by the great recession. Everything is economics these days. That is what this election said. That is almost what all of these elections said. 2010 was a little different, because obamacare made a difference. However, economics is the way. Democrats need to find a weird appeal in this way, otherwise it will not work. Have a twitter message sent in. Going into 2018 and 2020, what do democrats face as far as elections . Aret midterm elections always difficult for the incumbent party. Nancy pelosis argument was that she has done this before, and she knows what it takes. In 2004, we wiped out the republicans in the midterm elections. Her or is it right now is she experienced and she can do it again. Thats her argument. 2018 will be a very different cycle for republicans. A lot of people that were thought to be wiped out this year were not, but they will be very vulnerable in two years. Historically, it is a tough cycle for the incumbent party. So, nancy pelosi is saying that with all of those actors combined we could make enormous those factors combined, we can make an enormous difference. Give me a chance, and i will make it happen. That is her message. Nancy pelosi thinks she can do it, and we will not know until two years from now. That is her argument. Host sun city, california. On the democrats line should write, go ahead on the democrats line, roy, go ahead. Caller can you hear me . Guest host yes, you are on. Caller first, i wish the democrats would be more obstructionist like the republicans were. We as democrats always want to govern and look out for the people. We need to be ruthless just like republicans. I want to make one quick statement about your last issue. I wonder how many of the people would accept the pipeline running under Arlington National cemetery or the pearl harbor memorial. Host thank you, roy. Guest there are a lot of people that agree with you. A lot the democrats and they should be ruthless. Mcconnell was ruthless. He did not want obama to do anything. He filibustered everything, even things that republicans were going to support. That was just as a delay tactic to keep other things off the floor. There are a lot of delay tactic there are a lot of things lot of there are a democrats that think nancy pelosi should do the same thing. For years, democrats have said they are the party of government. They believe in government, and they believe in governing to help people in their everyday lives. If they block everything and we have shut down threats and all the things we have seen over the past couple of years, if democrats are being blamed for those things, then they are not the party of Good Government anymore. It would be very sharp political tactic on their part. They would have to somehow walk the tightrope by saying we are knocking down government in order to save it. I do not know how successful they would be descending would be sending that message. That is what is happening right now the disagreement in the party about how they should proceed. Host taking a look at potential leaders that could have risen up to replace what is currently in place, they highlighted how the bacerra. Javier would you view as the shining thes who do you view as shining stars . Figuresou mentioned the just the latest one. Have to start looking deeper into the bench. They have to start rubbing rooting for these younger guys to come up. We do not know who these figures will be. You mentioned one man in texas that is a rising star. Another one in massachusetts. I think people believe he will jump back to the state. If he remains in the house, he is certainly a rising star. If you look at the nominees that nancy pelosi just made for some ,f the new leadership positions we have a hawaii democrat that will now be in leadership. They are going to have to elect someone five terms or less today. There will be so when a house at the table, and we do not yet know who that will be. Certainly, there are three choices who have made her name this month by opposing nancy pelosi. They came out very publicly at the end to endorse tim ryan which is a Political Risk for them in the near term. They have only been here they are all sophomores just elected into their second term. They are playing a long day. Those are some rising stars you will see. There are a couple of other names to mention. She is a relatively young illinois democrat. In queens alsos nominated someone for the position. Right from pennsylvania Matt Cartwright from pennsylvania also a choice. These are the types of people that want to move up, and maybe moving up. We will wait to see how successful they are. Lillis of the hill joining us. We are talking about how House Democrats will play following the recent election. Next caller, go ahead. Caller three points. Number one, democrats, no matter what, they have to be caught to get out the vote. Taught to get out the vote. It is not a matter of how many people you can register, or how much money you can raise. The main point is that come election day you have to vote. They are not inspired. Republicans are very organized. Democrats are a mess. It is tragic. The other thing is that you have to get rid of the old guard. Nancy pelosi the other oldtimers have to go. A changing of the guard has to come about. When democrats do get in, they always promise to the unions. However, they do nothing for the unions. When obama got in, it was the same old stuff. Houses. All three these people were talking about minimum wage. Thank you, caller. Guest you are exactly right. It is back to the original point of how you get voters to the polls. I think everybody is talking about how to energize the vote. About why thisly cycle was such a dismal turnout for the democrats. People are looking back to the past two cycles when you had obama at the top of the ticket. In 2012 alone, i think there were many democratic voters that came out for obama. This time, for Hillary Clinton, it was much less. It was not like there was this huge groundswell of support for donald trump, who did not get any more voters out then mitt romney. It was more Hillary Clinton not energizing the base. You are right that the democrats failed to do so, and they need to improve on that if they want to win elections and congressional seats. To say they are not talking about it, i do not think that is right. I think that is probably their key focus. This autopsy they are going to do will examine why the money advantage they had on capitol hill and all of these Different Things did not exactly work. I will say, if you ask nancy pelosi in her supporters, they will say that i think she brought in 141 million in this cycle. That is enormous. No one else comes close on the hill. She would say, maybe it did not get us into the majority, but it would have been much worse if we do not have it. So, part of the argument we are having is the effectiveness of money. How important is it . How can we make it go forward to be more effective . Host what talk is there now about the democratic response to the changing of the Affordable Care act . What about this idea of an preceptor Infrastructure Spending . What role will democrats play in those two, big topics . Guest two very important topics. St, the other repealing the repealing of obamacare that is something to do not want. That is part of the obama legacy they want to keep in place. Republicans are going to vote 100 for repeal. They have done that over and over again in the house. So, democrats are the firewall. Humor can filibuster everything he wants. He knows very well that he is the last line of defense. All eyes will be on Chuck Schumer in the Obamacare Repeal fight. Infrastructure, that will be fascinating. That is a very different than it. Dynamic. Everyones to build roads and bring money back to the district. The question is how to pay for it. Democrats is making a lot of promises. Democrats and republicans donald trump is making a lot of promises. Democrats and republicans have been agreeing with him, but when it comes to paying for it he is not said where or when or how he wants to spend it. They have to come up with 1 trillion that you cannot find that on capitol hill. You cannot find that on capitol hill. These are the budget fights we see every year. So, certainly that is an area where they can come together and agree on a bipartisan basis. We talk about how it is going to be funded, that is going to get messy. Host congress is about to go out on their break. What needs to be done as far as budget issues . Two things, one they could get it done this week. Spending for the government expires this friday on the ninth. They have to pass something by then. The question is if they will push it next week to get something longerterm, or can they pass a continuing resolution shortterm a longer shortterm budget bill by the end of the week. The thought is maybe they can do that. But the house introduces the bill, they could vote on it by wednesday, and everything could be done by friday. We still have not seen the bill. Initially, there was talk they could find the government through march. Now that donald trump is humming cinubg is is in, and he needs to a point his cabinet it allows the republicans to have more say in the spending fight. Inack obama will be gone january. They want donald trump to make more of these decisions when they have a republican in office. Passes a Defense Authorization bill last week, and have to pass this week. Obama has not yet said what he is going to do with it. Defense bills tend to be rather bipartisan. That is expect it to move. The final piece is a Water Resources and development bill. Water the deal with the crisis in flint, michigan. Democrats have been pushing for hundreds of millions of dollars to help with that. It has been pushed for years since the crisis started. Speaker ryan said that he would do it in december on this water bill. So, this is expected to pass. , and a very short calendar then they are gone. We do not expect any kind of major fight. Host up next, mark on the independent line from naube maine. Caller good morning. I am listening to the show this man, the the hill writer. It reminded me of what president johnson said back in the 60s. He said democrats legislate and republicans investigate. You cannot win on the issues, then the only thing you can do is character assassination. I think we have more of that going on today than we did back then. A lot of colors that have spoken about democrats i think they have been too soft with their team plan. They need to get tougher. That is my only quote. It is a great quote. I will shoot one back at you. There is another quote that says, democracy ensures that we get no better than we deserve. I think a lot of democrats are wondering what will happen with this donald Trump Administration. That quote from George Bernard shaw. We have had a stalemate on capitol hill for at least the past six years since republicans came in on that Tea Party Wave as a response to obamacare and some of the things that are the obama did when he first arrived. That president obama did you first arrived. It was also a response to the democrats controlling all three houses. One party has control like that, there tends to be a pendulum swing in the other way. On that Tea Party Wave, the democrats lost 63 seats, and they have not fully rebounded yet. A lot of those tea party guys came in come a they go back to their districts come in, and cheered at their districts. Did exactly what they that block president obama and his agenda. It is all criticism, but when they go back home to their districts they hear nothing but praise. So, this is how democracy is. It is messy, and there is a lot of Different Reasons for. The gerrymandering that made all of these liberal districts every liberal and all these conservative districts very conservative. The number of purple districts is very minimal at this point. That is why it is difficult for democrats to get back in power in the house. For all of these reasons, democracy is messy. That is we see every day on the hill. A caller on the democrat line from new jersey. Go ahead. Caller go ahead. Morning. Rning good he just mentioned gerrymandering. First of all, we are talking politics and conflating it with policy. The cheering that these representatives are getting when they go back to their districts are because they got to select who voted for them based on gerrymandering. Pelosi andout nancy the Democratic Leadership in the house when you have gerrymandering, 90 of your district is white, older whatever why would you possibly want to compromise . Why would you possibly want to govern . It is safe. There is all this false equivalency. Democrats did it, too. If democrats were in total control of california, the whole government from the governor on down some and date gerrymandered what on down, if they gerrymandered what do they have . Not. Did guest i think both parties are guilty of gerrymandering. There is no question of that. What happened in 2010 was that republicans controlled more statehouses, and they were very indepth at taking advantage of that to carve out more conservatives tricks then liberal districts. Thannservative districts liberal districts. We are living the latest example of it. That is what it is such an issue right now. You say voters do not go out and vote their own members, i think that is inaccurate. It is those voters that are empowered. On the state level, every 10 years after the census, they will redraw the map. If they do not like the map, the voters can go to the state elections and vote in someone who will drop a different map. That is how democracy works on that level. Anddistrict maps are drawn, we get the results of that through the house election. Is therenot think it to say that republicans are the only ones that gerrymandered. There are plenty of liberal districts that are perfectly safe. The same member has been in their for decades as a result. Host there is a story this morning on harry reid who will get a sendoff before he leaves congress could talk of the about his legacy before he leaves congress. Talk a little bit about his legacy before he leaves. Guest he is one of those powerbrokers. Is a very innate manic enigmatic guy. Hes very softspoken, but he was so good at what he did. There are numerous stories of him twisting arms to get what he wants. He is so good behind the scenes. You put him in front of a microphone, and you wonder how he is able to do it. Both in his home state in nevada and on capitol hill, i think obamacare will be one of his major legacy items. At least, in most recent years. Just his ability to unite the party there is a lot of moderate conservative leaning senators, and he has to come into the room to take to convince them to take a tough vote on Something Like obamacare. He was able to do Something Like that through very good legislation legislative maneuvering. Tweaking the line which to get a little carve out for you and you. Also, just convincing them politically it was the right thing to do for the party and the country. Democrats will miss that ability to do that sort of thing. Host do we now know what kind of work or career he will pursue . Guest i do not have an answer to that. He is in his late 70s. I think he will be happy just to go back to nevada. I dont have the answer to that. Ost one last caller tom on the line for republicans. Go ahead. Caller thank you. Nonpartisan, and i do not vote in the primaries. I am one of the people that ran away from the Democratic Party. You mentioned obamas legacy. Left a legacy because he knew how to tweak. If you want to get people back into the democrat party, you have to care about the middle class. The working people are getting clobbered by obamacare. You have a Lieutenant Governor on cspan talk it week ago, and she presented sides of it. Million get benefits and 20 people georgia million get clobbered. Million people are getting clobbered. Middleclass people cannot cover it. It is coercion. Obama was told it was unconstitutional. It is a money grab. Workingclass people work hard, and they should be rewarded for saving a few dollars. You are depleting their bank accounts. 1800 is a mortgage for some people they could not afford to pay. The government is putting a gun to their heads saying that you need to pay it or we will keep decreasing the tax penalties. Obama care that obamacare is his legacy, but it is also one of the most controversial items i have seen on capitol hill. It has divided an awful lot of people. It has divided those that have either benefited from it, or had seen their premiums rise. If you do not have insurance before, but have it now because of this law you are likely happy with it. If you had coverage, and now you are seen premiums rise higher than you expected, then you are not happy. That is just part of the split. It is congresss job to recognize these deficiencies and fix them. We will see what they do with it. Republicans want to repeal the whole thing. The question is what do they do with these people that now have insurance. Do you drop their Insurance Coverage . The you try Something Else do you try Something Else . Donald trump made this a central issue of his campaign, and republicans have been wanting to repeal it for years. They want to do it quickly once donald trump its into office. They can leave the tough decisions for later. They can say they were killed it, the repeal will not go into , but they repealed it the repeal will not go into place for two years so it gives them time to find a replacement. It will be interesting to see what they came up with come up with. Host with all the changes being made with House Democrats and leadership, when do democrats get a sense that it is working or not . Guest immediately, you will know if it is working if the insurgents those that were unhappy after the election if they were satisfied with it. That is the nearterm effect. Even that is unclear. Once nancy pelosi one, it sounded like they are ok with it. They had their shot to make a protest vote. Longer term, it will be in 2018. It will depend on how many people came out to vote and how many seat democrats one. Of the hill. Is thank you for your time. Guest thank you. Host coming up, we would hear from former ambassador marc ginsberg. Us isisdiscuss with inspired attacks within the United States. Later on, we will be having our typical your money segment. We will talk about the Incoming Administration pulling some of the funds for harboring Illegal Immigrants. Journalas washington continues. Abigail fillmore was the first first lady to work outside the home teaching in a private school. Eisenhowers hairstyle and love of pink was a fashion style. Jacqueline kennedy was responsible for the creation of the White House Historical association. A youngeagan, as actress, found her name on the blacklist of suspected communist sympathizers. She appealed to Ronald Reagan for his help, and she later became his wife. The book makes a great gift for the holidays. It gives readers a look into the personal lives of every first lady in american history. Stories of fascinating women and how their legacies resume today. Share the stories of americas first ladies the holidays. It is now available at your favorite bookseller and as an ebook. Atwe have a special webpage www. Cspan. Org to help you follow the Supreme Court. Go to www. Cspan. Org and select Supreme Court you the right hand side at the top of the page. You can see all of the oral arguments being covered by cspan. You can find recent appearances by many of the Supreme Court justices, or watch justices in their own words including oneonone interviews. There is also a calendar for this term. A list of all current justices with links to see all of their asearances on cspan as well other Supreme Court videos available on demand. You can follow the Supreme Court on www. Cspan. Org. Washington journal continues. Host the former ambassador to joins usmarc ginsberg now. Aboutnt peace talks taking the fight to isis from the homeland. What inspired this . Guest i spent a great amount of time in the middle east trying to deal with the influence of social media and how isis uses it to recruit. We came back to the United States and started seeing how isis is able to use social media to radicalize lone wolves online. I started devoting a great deal of time on this. An article i just wrote in the Huffington Post, i explained that out of the 15 lone wolf to the in recent years recent one we saw at ohio state what has happened is that social media has become the iygen by which lawson would isis is able to radicalize lone wolf, american young men to instigate these attacks. Social media companies, whether orbe facebook or twitter google or youtube, they know there is content online the has been found in computers by the thatf lone wolf terrorists directly call for the killing of americans. Pleas andte all of my everything i am writing, google and youtube refused to actively take down the most egregious content that calls for the killing of americans. Host that is the direct conversation you are happening having with these companies themselves . Guest im currently talking with youtube. They have the software to police allwebsite to take down not but if yous with online right now, you would see there are 64,000 hits on tube alone for our lucky four his sermons on the killing of americans. Those are what i want google to take him. Fromclaim under an act 1996 that they are shielded from content liability. Anyone can put anything there and regardless of the content, they are not held responsible for it . Guest there are lawsuits that have been filed in federal court. My colleagues and i have studied the lawsuits. Studied within and the lawsuits are alleging. The lawsuits were able, in effect, to claim that google, in particular, is not only aware of the content but is also making money off of it. Placing ads onre the content that is being seen by lone wolves that are committing these attacks. Host is it possible they can find the content other ways . Are trying to make it as hard as possible for people to be radicalize online. You can never completely solve the problem 100 , the why can we not get Silicon Valley more actively willing to take action. They themselves have acknowledged this content calls for the killing of americans. Unfettered First Amendment rights to yell fire in a credit movie theater. The Supreme Court has ruled on that. There are people that want to see the internet completely unregulated. Watch we put up with more killing of americans fight lone wolves who are able to use the internet that has been weaponize isis. Weaponized by isis. 2027488001 for republicans. Did7488000 for democrats democrats. 2027488002 for independents. Boston plans there are concerns about civil rights when it comes to Civil Liberties groups and what comes onto the internet and the freedom to do that. Is there any concern to you as far as the intersection of enforcing these things and keeping civil rights and freespeech . Guest there is always a balance in our country. We live in a society of loss. If you want to be a complete libertarian and say that there should be no restrictions on freespeech, then you are living in the wrong country. There are freespeech advocates the have not lost emily members or have seen the ramifications have not lost family members or have seen the ramifications of the content online that is radicalizing. I have seen recruiting material to fight americans abroad and in the United States. No one is suggesting here that there should be unfettered discretion to take down content, but we are suggesting there should be at least reasonable efforts by these social media companies. I will give you a perfect example. I wrote to youtube. Five specifichem websites with the content killed for the killing of americans. Five days later, they took it down. Is that censorship . They themselves are taking down the content that i pointed out. The issue is not to me they are taking the content down, but tot it is requiring Citizens Police the websites when there is already Software Available to do it themselves. Is the software specifically tailored enough . Guest absolutely. Group hasr extremist worked with a professor at dartmouth to develop Software Technology remember how you would watch the daily show and they would only show specific clips of specific words . That Software Content now exists to police any website. They can take down content that says things like kill amer icans. You can identify this content by those words. Incoming congress has to make the decisions . Guest i would encourage become administration to seek in amended to the Communications Decency act that would incomings has to require Silicon Valley content providers, that are shielded from content liability, to use the best efforts to take down the content that is most egregious and calls for the killing of americans. Host have you had a chance to talk with the administration itself . Guest not yet. I hope to do so. Whether you are democrat or republican, the idea that we cannot do better to police the content and prevent online radicalization and avoid having more lone wolf attacks the United States is beyond my comprehension. This is something that any democrat, republican, independent should want to see happen. , 2027488001 four republicans. For democrats. 2027488002 for independents. Again, our guest is marc ginsberg. When it comes to fighting isis overall, what do you think has been the record of the Current Administration on this effort . The administration arrived far too late to the story, so to speak. They originally claimed that isis was a jv squad. If they had not engaged in the most egregious attacks in iraq, i doubt we would have seen any rampup from the obama administration. For all the months and years i have spent in the middle east, what i have come to understand is that whether it is al qaeda or isis, the threat of sunni radical islam is a threat to the United States. Administration began ramping up militarily, the soft power effort to fight isis online has been a disaster. The state department has failed. They failed to recently set up what is called a Global Engagement center under richard engel. Even with that leadership, they have not been able to effectively work these lone wolf attacks in the United States or direct messaging abroad to stop the enlistment of young arabs to join isis. Friendly, it is not only our job. We also failed to adequately engage arab states in this effort, as well. The one thing everyone keeps waiting for is for the United States to solve every problem in the united in the middle east. Fight between the sunni and shiite branches of heir tod the rightful the prophet mohammed, but we are never going to solve that problem. What are some guest lets talk about the battle for mosul. Who is going to govern mosul after the Coalition Defeat isis . I do not think we need to engage once again in nationbuilding him up there has to be a way of vacuum e nationbuilding, that there has to be a way of solving the vacuum that will appear. Defeatedm of isis the military leader is not solve the fact that isis is still a presence ideologically in the region. We need to have a much more multipronged approach to defeating isis and defending the homeland. Postece in the washington Huffington Post is not just about fighting isis, but it is about also defending the homeland. Host christina on the republican line. Your head. Caller host go ahead. Caller there is a recent we do not have restrictions on speech. While these people are doing noushings, doing hei things, we can find out about these things and fight it. We can become ignorant, and we need to know how to defend ourselves. All the people that we call for help, they had trained in this. They listen to this, and they see these horrible things happening to people. We need freespeech without restrictions so that we know how to defend ourselves. When they are saying these things, we need to know what they are doing. Suspicious if we see something. We are not going to know if they get blotted out from our vocabulary. Guest i appreciate the comment. You make some good points. Let me explain. What we are talking about here is for us to act in little more responsibly on how to remove content that has radicalized young muslims in the United States to commit terrorist attacks against americans. Arehe same time, there unencrypted websites that the fbi is continuing to monitor without any restrictions on content. We are trying to do is come up with reasonable approaches that protect americans from online radicalization sermons. Content even reaches and radicalized Young Americans when the speaker is dead. Taking down the videos is not going to make it harder for police to understand what exactly is going on online. Host mike on the democrat line. Caller good morning. About theomething google and the you tubes of the world are resisting taking if theybility, because have to monitor the content from isis and they would have to copyright. They can be held liable in that regard. Guest many conversations i had with googles Senior Management the issue is not that they are not policing. They already had important statements of content control that they themselves already the pond. They themselves act upon. They themselves already act as sensors. If i point out malicious content in this instance, where i have pointed out content to them that already falls within the violations of their own statement of policy and they are taking the content down, that suggests that they themselves recognize it violates their own statement of policy. Are actinghemselves, as sensors on the very content censors of the content i am pointing out to them on their own that one. Platform. I think what we are doing with here is a oversimplification. It is just not going to work. If you allow me an example. If i were to take this exact conversation and put it on youtube, copyright issues aside, according to what your guest wants to do, this could be bad because a Computer Program heard andsay kill americans therefore it needs to be back. Banned. So, you can have some easy calls on actual isis videos, or you could have some wrong calls like this video. What you do with the ones in the middle . Someone has to make that call. I do not think that by that you will have the ability to control it. Child pornography is a different thing could you know it is wrong when you see it. With free speech, a line is going to get drawn and someone will not like were you draw the line. Guest time and again, there freebeen talks about speech. Im not suggesting that anyone censora sensor that c , but google and youtube already thats censors on content they view as violating their statements of policy. I am not suggesting that there will be a Citizen Police squad that will police this content. I am already serving as a citizen that is bringing content to their attention. If i am bringing content to their attention, and if it falls into the gray area, they may not take it down. In the instances i have pointed out content to them, they had taken it down. So, they themselves are doing exactly what you say he should not be doing. From spokane on the them republican line. Theer i feel unsure about media reports i think they should be more honest with the American People regarding this issue. Feel dering, what you i would just like to know how you feel the immediate the median could be improved to give us the honest truth of what is going on . Of tryingmy instance to protect the homeland and americans from the harm of radical islam, might issue goes far more apprehensively than the one i in dealing with which is the role of content providers. By problem of radicalization lone wolves that have resulted in the tax over the last 15 years in the United States in the attacks over the last 15 years in the United States. What can we do more . I think the media can better educate americans on the middle east. Educate americans on the role of islam. That it should not be used as an tolanation or justification engage in the killing of innocent arabs, muslims, americans, what have you. I grew up in the middle east. I was the first jewish ambassador to an air of state from the United States. World veryd the arab well. There have been money is of errors that have been there are millions of arabs that have been victimized by isis. This is a challenge we face in the United States and throughout the middle east. And need better tools better leaders that are willing to take on the threat of radical islam online. The message of radical islam used by isis attracted almost 20,000 recruits from around the arab world to travel to iraq and syria to fight for isis on behalf of the islamic state. It is one of the most egregious and are very examples that and barbaric and other examples examples thatc islam can offer. Host why have you not going to nsa directly . Had this debate with them on what should be the proper role of content providers and encouraging americans to act as more responsible corporate citizens of the United States. Host lets go to our next caller. Marc, number one, you are from the Carter Administration which we all know how that went down. Anyway, i do not think you are telling the truth. It is probably why we do not believe any of you anymore. If you just look back on study g, watch, and most everyone watches cspan. We do not get the correct information. You did not give us the correct information. You did not tell the truth most of the time on the tv. Host caller, in this case, can you give an example . Be specific. Caller most of what is happening in foreign countries, when it started way back with the first bush administration. You mentioned the words nationbuilding. We all know it that means. Guest i am not sure what point you are trying to make about whether or not i am telling the truth. What exactly are you saying im not telling the truth on like a on so i can explain myself . One, donald trump said that he is going to stop most of the immigrants from foreign countries. Lets do it right this time. Guest what does that have to do with telling the truth . Host she is gone. Lets go to our next caller. Sheila from washington, d. C. Caller i have heard your guest speak about radical islamic websites, but most of the things we have seen in this country appears to be homegrown. T do we do with websites what we do their there . Guest there are lots of websites that provide content platforms for radical islam. Essentially, we rely they rely on unencrypted platforms and also decrypted encry pp. H as whats a what we are trying to do is focus not so much on the problem of content providers such as youtube, google, and twitter alone, but the threat of radical islamic content that is used to radicalize americans in the United States, where the content directly calls for the murder of americans that is what we are talking about. Speech h being free there are all sorts of interpretations of islam that are online, some more radical, some from britain, some from the arab world. It is impossible it would be impossible to find, police, and even suggest any of that content could be removed from a lie. Social media has gotten more out of control, whether you use twitter or just go and type radical islam. What i am suggesting is we can decrease further lone wolf attacks by having internet content providers act more responsibly. Host twitter, and our facebook page. Diplomacy days, diplomacy work, i want to ask about current names being floated to be secretary of state. Abc news says the list includes jon huntsman, john bolton, the former u. S. Ambassador there are others. What you think of the current crop who stands out, what you like, what do you not like . Guest the crop is an interesting crop. They all bring things to the table. Jon huntsman is fantastic. I know john bolton. We have worked together. I do not know mitt romney i do not know how he would work visavis the relationship with the president elect. General petraeus is a fantastic person. Rudy giuliani himself, who i have also worked with, brings an enormous amount of experience and talent internationally. Three worked for secretaries of state served in the clinton and Carter Administrations, and works with president reagans secretary of state and president bushs secretary of state. The one thing that is clear to me, no matter who the president designates, he will want to have someone that has the respect and admiration of his National Security team, and who will be the first among equals in helping to provide the president guidance, as well as provide the best messaging possible for the president abroad, and also be a great leader of the foreign service. Have not one thing we heard a lot so far is Homeland Security or at least who should head Homeland Security. Guest i know the president elect, from the papers, has been interviewing frances townsend, president bushs former homeland former advisor for Homeland Security. She is fantastic. She is highly respected in the Homeland Security area. She is extraordinarily fair. Extraordinarily reasonable. I think the world of her. Host one more thing, from a diplomacy aspect the call the president received from taiwan. How much of an issue is this for you, being from that world . Guest clearly, it has rattled the chinese. In terms of an administrative dish and mission, i used to be an admission, i used to be lobbyist. I think the president knew what he was doing when he took the call. When you look at president obamas tibbett to asia the guidance to get out of the middle east and focus on asia. Unfortunate, the problems this administration is leaving behind for the president elect are significant. China is engaging in cyber warfare with the United States. It has not done enough, in effect, to constrain north Koreas Nuclear program. China is building islands military islands in the south china sea. It has engaged in currency manipulation, and its face it, the trade deficit with china is astronomical. I think what is important is to understand here i suspect the president elect new exactly what he was doing. He wanted to send a message to china. This suggests that the same time he will need a very good ambassador in beijing, and i understand one of the persons he is thinking about is the Current Governor of iowa, terry branstad. Guest why is he a good choice host why is he a good choice . Ji lived indent iowa. Manage that could help this relationship because lets face it, this will go into a challenging time u. S. China relations. Host mark. Republican. Caller hello there, young fella. Thank you for your service. Guest thank you. Caller i want to say this do we not have enough muslims in the United States to fight for their own country . Why arent we doing something to get them to be interested in their own country . Countrye lived in this for so long, and we have taken care of them. Lets go fight their own people. They know how to fight them. Guest lets may spend let me spend some time. This is a sensitive topic that gets americans riled up. There are incredibly patriotic muslims that serve in the military, continue to serve in the military, who have lost their lives serving in the military Second Generation, thirdgeneration immigrants from around the arab world, the muslim world. I have had the privilege of getting to know so many of them because of my diplomatic, as well as my own Public Relations career and legal career in the United States. Many of them work quietly for the National Security agency. Their linguistic abilities are essential to the fbi. Many of them are providing the very type of monitoring support that we need intelligence to identify potential attacks and terrorist conspiracies in the United States. So, i think it is very important to set the record straight that we do not have what we have here is whether they are somali firstgeneration, or iraqi firstgeneration, there are bad apples among many of these immigrants who have gone online and have been radicalized, and then turn against the United States. They need to be called out and pointed out by the muslim leadership, arab leadership in the United States, to the maximum extent possible. Any detection that comes about from knowing there is an area errant young member of the committees committees to get in a fight. Host arvada, illinois. Caller i have concerned about this movement. It is censorship. It is censorship. Just like in china, they cannot tiananmening about square. The senses to me about flagburning initiative. It keeps you go from protesting because some white someone might without a flag and verdant and brand you as being unpatriotic. I think to get rid of these people, the best thing would be less censorship. We have so much censorship of our news because it is in so few hands. This is why some people call you and say thank you cspan. That is my only comment. Guest i think it is very important to understand what we are not talking about is censorship. If you are a 100 believer in the First Amendment, as i am, there are certainly restrictions by law against the First Amendment right in the United States. As a lawyer, i am wellversed with the constitutional law this. What we are talking about is not censoring. We are talking about removing content that Internet Service providers themselves acknowledge violent their own standards, and they are taking down. If there was no censorship in the United States, then twitter, youtube, and google, and facebook, would not be taking down taking down the sites of individuals who are violating all sorts of standards because of their own speech, whether it is radical islam, or Something Else. So, with all due respect, maam, we have fellowship. The United States have company such as twitter, google, facebook, that are censoring the content of individuals, and they are already taking content down that they themselves team violates their own principle. Host washington, d. C. Republican line. Caller good morning. Inside the United States and outside the United States. Ide the United States [indiscernible] ,he system of the United States especially the security system, Intelligence Security system, cia lying to the American People. [indiscernible] thede and outside of problem. And outside of the United States human middle east, the United States in the middle east, the United States made the problems over there for the future of americans, the business of americans, and they have to remove immediately from the middle east all of the problem. They cannot do it. Thanke thing that i you very much for the call. One thing i have come to understand from my decades of working for the middle east, they noticed a test to verify what is our core, strategic interest in the reason region . We have time tended to stumble into wars in iraq. I do not think most americans realize the americans have been drawn into a proxy war in your mind in yemen where there is a battle for supremacy and hegemony over the broader islamic world. Is that a word americans should be engaged in . War againstect, the isis is important to us because of the threat to the homeland, but if i were to advise the next administration, i would want to start from a concept of core principals. Have the American People appreciate what the core objectives are, and without lying to the American People, the American People deserve the truth of knowing what we are trying to accomplish in the middle east, without having our young men and women sacrifice themselves and their lives for interests that are not consistent with our core objectives. Guest is the former and asked her to morocco and mideast advisor to president carter. Marc ginsberg, our guess. North carolina. Bert, go ahead. Caller thank you. One of the things you deflected pretty well is a previous callers message that the alt right is getting their message through, and you seem to be harping on what you call radical islamic messages. What about the alt right how do you deal with that issue . First of all, i do not even like to call at the altar right i call it the not see right. Nazi right. Cleansing it by calling it the alt right is unacceptable. The fact that this right wake group right wing group comes to washington and does the nazi salute is something all americans should find abhorrent. I think the media has a responsibility to policing these organizations, calling them out, and not cleansing them by giving them a label where most americans would not even understand what that meant. Host stephen. Pennsylvania. Independent line. Caller good morning. I have been following this since i was a very young man, and i have been putting two and two together the last couple of years since they have had computers where i can cross check when it comes to terrorist attacks and lone wolf attacks, and they correspond with historical dates and battles throughout historys. History. The latest big things that have happened in the last 10 or 15 years have coincided with major events from world war ii whether it is on the u. S. Side, as a victory or defeat by the axis. I do not see anybody putting two and two together. It is almost like a crossword puzzle through intelligence. There are certain words used on the television screen, and certain things said. When i have done my research at home here on a piece of paper, my wife calls me nuts, but she has seen a pattern. She says my god, youre right. Of course, it happens within certain times. It is even around the world. It is like a coded message that on this day i want three different attacks in the United States by three different individuals, and then overseas, somewhere, on someone elses continent, i want a massive attack the following day when the battle actually occurred. I find it a funny coincidence. Host caller, thank you. Guest that is an interesting point. Let me explain in the lawsuit that was brought by the one 800 law firm in detroit, the only american killed in the nice anacks in paris, they have expert that is able to decipher the online chat that was taken down by twitter so, they are hesoring this content and pops up again, and they are able to extrapolate the data bits of this individual and followers, coincided, and attacked the patterns around dates of the islamic calendar to determine when there the possibility of additional tax in the middle east, additional attacks in the middle east, or the United States, identify content that is being pushed through, to medications. Indeed, you are right there are certain days, particularly in the muslim candle, by which you are able to see, in effect, increased chatter, coordination for attacks, physically around the beginnings of ramadan, and the commemoration of battles fought by the Prophet Muhammad particularly in northern syria. Host one more call. Patty. Connecticut. Independent line. Patty, from north brantford. You are on. Caller ok. I am calling because i noticed that all of these lone wolves ofm to be Second Generation islamics. In other words, i believe anchor babies. Another thing, obama is going to take a group of refugees from australia, and they are not vetted. Its good to be a big group. Australia does not want them. I am wondering why we are getting them. Guest quickly, i think it is very important for any refugee coming from any battleground in the middle east, or from a muslim state where there is a significant amount of terrorism, to be properly vetted to the satisfaction of the American People. Host so, if you, in this effort of yours from hearing in hearing from google, youtube do you plan to continue to lobby them, will you have a discussion, continuing discussions . Guest i am engage in a dialogue with google right now. It is a cordial dialogue, but they insist it is not the responsibility to do what im doing for them. I disagree with that. I think Congress Needs to review the Communications Decency act, and view whether or not it needs to be amendment to, in effect, amended to come in effect, tullys websites to react possibly on behalf of the American People. Host marc ginsberg, thank you. Guest thank you. Host coming up, your money segment federal funds that go to cities and what donald trump might do to the funds if those states harbor Illegal Immigrants. Liz farmer will be our guest for those topics. We will be right back. Tonight on the communicators it is a great measure of how fast things change that the law is just figuring out those examples, cell phones and email it might be thinking it out figuring it out at the time those things will not be as important in our daily lives. There is a built in delay the philosophers of from and it is hard to keep up with the latest shifts. Paul ohm. He is interviewed by a cyber and surveillance policy reporter at reuters. A lot of computer scientists love science, and i wonder if they can appeal to people to do their duty to spend time in bc and help the government out. D. C. And help the government out. Toabigail was the first lady work outside of the home. Sold clip on banks to twon eager to sell a 5 copy her style. And nancy reagan, as a young actress, saw her name on the blacklist of suspected communist sympathizers. She appeal to Ronald Reagan for help. She later became his wife. The stories and more are featured in the book first ladies. The book makes a first great gift for the holidays, giving readers a look at every first lady and their personal lives. Share the stories of americas first ladies for the holidays. Ladies is available at your favorite bookseller and also as an ebook. Washington journal continues. Host it is time for our your money segment to look at programs and initiatives by the federal government to look at how they are funded and what they do. Our guest is liz farmer, with governing magazine, a Staff Reporter for the publication, and were talking about the topic of federal funds that support cities across the state. Approximately, if you are an average large city, how much of your federal budget is based off of federal dollars . 10 . T i would say 8 to it is no small amount. Unfortunately are no consistent statistics, but anywhere from 5 10 for most midsize to large cities is fairly average. We are talking about 1 billion in large cities and several hundred Million Dollars in smaller cities. Host does that go directly to them is it passed on through the states how does it work . Guest if it works differently for different kinds of funding. Most of the funding is passed through a significant amount of passthrough states. In some of the research that i have done, it is difficult to parse out which of the funding comes directly from states, and which is coming directly from the federal government. It is both. Host i would imagine a city like los angeles or new york would get larger shares of pies that smaller cities is there a consistent format, or is it based on size . Guest it is based on the citys ability to attract federal funding the larger the city, so typicallynt the larger the city, the more money they get. Host how does that usually work . Guest the city does make requests for certain types of funds. Some of it comes to the state. A major example is medicaid funding. Then the grants administration, some of it is targeted toward certain projects the city wants to do. Some of it goes through different types of services the city wants to provide. To click, there is a longstanding agreement. Sometimes it is an annual reapplication process. It varies. Host the topic of federal funds came into vogue because of statements made by the Trump Administration when it came to policy on immigration. Can you counter is what is at in discussion . Guest the concern is they harbor Illegal Immigrants, and do not cost them to the fence. Trump has threatened to withdraw federal funding. There are huge legal issues, and some say trump cannot do this to begin with. Cities are starting to stand up and say we will make contingency plans, not change our stance. It is becoming very divisive. Host contingency plans involve asking the question what happens if we do not get these dollars . Guest that is the issue, yes. So far, no city has actually published specific contingency plans, but they say they are working on the. My suspicion is behind closed doors they are working on ways to rejigger money, but for some of these cities, especially the larger ones, we are talking about a huge pot of money, and there is no contingency plan if you lose several hundred Million Dollars in federal funding. Host liz farmer is here to talk about federal funds that go to cities. If you want to learn more on these topics, here is your chance to do so. We have divided the lines to do this way. If you are in urban resident actually, the lines will be host you can tweet request or questions or comments and post on our facebook page. You provided for us generously the city of new yorks analysis for its budget and how much federal funds are part of it. We will not go through the specifics, but for a city like new york, if that money is gone or is taken, who is directly impacted . Typically, and this is true for most cities as well, but in new york city, who is infected, the homeless, battered women, social Services Like that , Public Safety Law Enforcement relies on federal grants to you are looking at a wide swath of services. Grants. You are looking at a wide smile wide swath of services. Child care services, section eight vouchers is a huge one. Host that is the money they depend on, and if it were taken away, what is immediately affected . Does that mean losses of services, or does it go further than that . Host guest it could mean suspension of a program, particularly with guest it could mean suspension of a program. It could appeal to the state for funds to cover that. Either way, the money vanishes, and it has to come from somewhere, or it does not come from anywhere. Host the larger question is why do cities get money from the federal government in the first place, and not from the state or the city itself . Host guest a lot of this goes back to 200 block grant funding, this was in the 1970s. Community block grant funding. This was in the 1970s. Cities want a direct access and do not want to rely on the state. They do not want to be the parent doling out what they think is correct. This is a way for cities to have a direct connection to the white house, congress, and to be able to make their own appeal to capitol hill in terms of what their direct needs are rather than only rely on the state. Again host bill is in wisconsin, democrats line for our guest, liz farmer, of governing magazine. Bill, you are on. Go ahead. Caller i would just like to interject the funding for states is very unequal. Forst read an article that . 61 back jersey gets for every dollar of federal tax they pay, whereas wyoming, one of the least dense states, gets 1. 11 back from the federal government for every one dollar citizens pay to the federal government. It is important to keep that in mind while you are talking about city budgets. As you said, cities do not want to depend just on their state. There is such a great variation in state funding. Thank you. Guest that is right. There really is a great variation in state funding, and typically, the lower the states that have lower income population more poverty, rely more on federal grant funding. This is largely connected to medicaid, things like that. There is certainly a disparity in terms of what the taxpayers in each state get back from what federal money is coming to their state. ,ypically, the new jersey wyoming example wyoming is a sparsely populated state, and new jersey is densely populated and has a significant amount of wealth. Those are two factors. Wyoming has less wealthy people, unless you are in the oil industry. Those are two factors that work into the math. Host we hear next from a caller that is in new jersey independent line. Mike, good morning. Guest good morning. How are you guys today caller good morning, how are you guys today . Guest good, thank you. Is with theomment sanctuary cities, the lifeboat theory nobody seems to be bringing up again. I feel that if i were in an underdeveloped country, i would run to the United States, but here we go with the lifeboat theory again. Should the working american be able to pay for anyone coming in . Thank you. Yeah, you know, i was speaking with somebody about this earlier this morning that when you have great services, which cities do a lot of cities have four of the lot into homeless services, social services and they tend to be more liberal than rural populations. That attracts people that do not have as much to offer. That is why you see a lot of city populations that do have immigrants, legal or not, and they are an attractive place to live. With these sanctuary cities, there is no hard estimate. Estimaten franciscos is Something Like 14,000 Illegal Immigrants, possibly. There are no hard numbers, but legal or not, cities are an attractive place for anyone coming to the country to start a new life for themselves. Host next, brad from maryland shadyside, maryland, republican line. Go ahead. Caller my comment or question is this government funding has just gotten out of control for everything. You cannot even speak out against the much money is being spent anymore. Who you talk to. You do not talk to the president to get funding. You talk to congress. That is what we have forgot. We do not talk to congress for worse, for anything. The executive branch has gotten out of control. That is my question or comment. Answer how you will. Guest the executive Branch Funding has gotten out of control, or congress has gotten out of control . Host brad, you want to respond . Caller everything has gotten out of control the only wars authorized by congress was the invasion of afghanistan and iraq. Since then, we have a countless battles. Libya. The middle east is exploding. Where are the control with spending. It has gotten ridiculous. Guest ok, and certainly a lot of people feel the same way. That goes back to one of the reasons Community Block programs started in the 1970s. Cities want to have a voice on capitol hill. Rather than rely on whatever congress decides to give to states, and then rely on whoever is in the state legislature, and whoever is running the state to figure out how much do we want to give two cities cities are where most of the people in this country live now. That was not quite true in the 1970s. They are still the centers of population in states, so they want to have a voice in the spending they are talking about. That is one of the reasons why funding directly to cities grew starting in the 1970s. Community Block Development programs generally, what are their services that purposes . They are block grants, as the name suggests, and a city can apply to help reduce homelessness they do not have to be super specific. They do or do not get awarded however much they ask from the federal government. There is a pot every year. There is several billion dollars every year, and typically, capitol hill and the white house duel that out directly to cities, and the rest of the federal funding comes through various other federal agencies. The other kind of funding is called category grants, and that is more specified. A city has a transportation project it will apply for that. There are certain stipulations on how it can spend that money. The next question if a federal government sends money to a city, what is the oversight . Guest it is eventually question, and it goes back to the inequality issue with larger cities having a large Grant Administration staff, so they tend to get more funding because they are more wellversed in the process. Smaller cities tend to get less funding. I have a smaller staff. When it comes to administering them, and making sure the money goes where it is supposed to go, that is where it can get tricky. The city as opposed to the monitoring that the money gets spent correctly. The federal government can audit them. Couple of years ago, there was a gao report on how cities manage grant funding, and it basically found that even large cities like detroit, for example, that because they had cut back so much on city staffing in general, and really hacked into the Grant Administration staff, money was supposed to to be was being spent that wasnt supposed to be spent on certain things, so detroit would have to return the money or the money was just languishing in a fund waiting for matching funds from the city that never arrived. We are talking millions of dollars every year being wasted in one form or the other. Granted ministration with the city is a huge deal. Host liz farmer, Staff Reporter for governing magazine on your money segment. Heat. Raleigh, north carolina. Keith, you are on it good morning. Caller thank you very much, sir. It is a very nice show. I love the show. A topicnt was i think like this the reason why people are very interested in it is a lot of people feel well, if you send trillions of dollars to other countries i do not understand the whole system. A lot of people wonder why is there such a problem helping out the american system not trying to interject politics with donald trump, but that is why people understand and agree with what they say. For a person to live in america and become a billionaire, a 50 50 billion dollars men are why isrk zuckerberg there a problem if you have the need of human beings, black, white, indian, chinese, try to help them out in the city. I love you all, love your show. Thank you very much. Guest i think you touched on, as you mentioned, a nerve that explains what has been happening over the last year in this country with the election suspicion on how the federal government is operating is obviously very much a concern. So, what we have here with this discussion is we have a president elect saying he is going to withdraw funds from cities that do not operate in a way they believe he believes they should. Parallel ineresting terms of what the federal government is telling states and cities to do when you look at has been handled, and the Supreme Court decision. I read an article a week or so ago that later this out legally. Earlier i mentioned there were legal problems. The legality of this is the way was handled, the result was congress and the federal government could not tell the states exactly how to manage medicaid expansion. They could not even tell states to expand medicaid. That is why we have all these different roles in different ways it is handled per state. It is the same thing for this the suspicion from the cities and population in general cities, states, on up to the federal government, not one of the federal government tell of how to spend money, or federal budgets it is the same issue with immigration. Sit they want to be able to run the way they want to appear mark on a huge question whether trump can withdraw cities based on this. Host cliff. Florida. Independent line. Caller good morning. Great topic. I know the guest mentioned that disbursement in different states depends on budgets, and a large city might get more money, such as new york versus wyoming, but going back to the beginning who decides how much money gets disbursed by the federal government . Are there actuaries . There are 50 states hawaii, alaska all the others like puerto rico who decides how much is the amount . That is number one question either actuaries, a Public Private partnership on the information. And two do we consider a state influx . I live in florida. We are a growing state. Does that make a difference in the formula . I love the topic, i love cspan. I will take the answer offline. Guest that is a great question, a technical question, and it is, sort of, a technical answer, in that there are so many different kinds of federal grants that the way each one is doled out, it is not all uniform. You mentioned a formula. Some grants are formula funded medicaid is an example of that medicaid is based on need, funding, population, although sorts of things. Other website transportation related grants, those are more singular, standalone items by themselves. The city or the state has to apply for it and lay out what its needs are. It may or may not get everything it needs from the federal government. The federal government has a lot of grants directly to cities and states that are designed to generate economic retirement economic requirements. You might have heard of a tiger grant. There is no simple answer typically, the budget starts the white house has its own budget it lays out, and people in the white house staff lays out how much should go in certain grant funding, but what happens is typically agencies solid, the department of housing and urban development manages this end doles out the ones were cities and states apply. Hud determines how much they get. It depends on the agencies. Some things are directly in the budget. There is no specific answer. Host can a City Employee lobbyist to make its case here on capitol hill . Guest yes, in the sense that cities and every level of Government Association has an association there is the National League of cities, the association of counties, the National Governors association, and a zillion more. [laughter] guest there are a lot of organizations. Those groups lobby on behalf of cities and counties. Particular ones that i mentioned they are the big forces. They have offices, some of them located right here in this building. On capitolffices hill. They typically lobby on behalf of cities and states. Cities often can send their own elected officials, and they do meet with representatives on a regular basis. Hear from kathy, south carolina. Independent line. Caller yes, i would like to ask ms. Farmer a question. Conversation, it sounds like the sanctuary city governments would prefer to make the vulnerable American Cities suffer rather than comply with orders for removal of Illegal Immigrants. I will take my answer offline. Thank you. Certainly one way of putting it. That is probably the way that trump sees it as well. The other alternative to the argument is legally speaking, if cities comply with this federal order, what precedent does that set for any other policies they would like to have as a standalone city . I certainly agree with you cities are putting on the line the funding for needy services, and the greater question that i think most lawmakers are talking about is, again, it is an issue of federalism, and it is an issue of sovereignty. Our country has been founded on the idea we have a central government, but the government cannot tell the states precisely what to do, and that filters down to cities as well. Host by that thinking here is a guest [laughter] you know, there used to be something i love stuff like that. There used to be Something Like revenue sharing. It died out in the 1980s. The nflort of, like how owners have revenue sharing. It was whatever revenue the federal government collected after spending it on its own needs, it would disperse it back to the states, and it does that now, but not in as free a form as handing over a check. It died out in the 1980s, as i mentioned. States do that in sales tax revenue they dispersed that back out to the cities based on population. It is another one of those formula things. This idea that states and cities should be selfcontained bubbles, not share the revenue it is, sort of, a nice idea, but it does not play out when you consider things like someonete commerce, or in washington, d. C. , for example, someone might be West Virginia on a marylandoperated train to washington, d. C. , so youre talking about three dish three districts in one day. Host republican line. Good morning. Should i think this all should it be done in the reason im saying this is you the cities that if president of the United States does something wrong, no matter what his reason is, he is held responsible to the law. You have a person that is here illegally and does something wrong, the city says we are not going to turn them over. That is not the only problem that is in this. Most people would agree, and not disagree with the system that they have set up. If they only would turn in or hold the people that have done something, and the government wants to take them and either do themhing with them send back home, or put them in prison. This whole situation does not make sense to me. It seems to be all political. Guest it is definitely political. You are right about that. I am not sure that cities harbor Illegal Immigrants if they have committed a crime other than being here illegally. I am not totally wellversed on all the examples to be able to address that, but, again, you are getting into the sentiment that has been such a polarizing issue in the country. A lot of it is connected to the divide. Ban cities are, kind of, the Industrial Centers of states, but they are attracting a lot of federal funding, as they have been talking about as we have been talking about, and meanwhile the smaller, rural areas are losing population as a whole, seen less and less commerce, industry, and it leads to resentment. People look at cities as these great beacons of the state. Independent line. This is earl. Caller what i am noticing is due to information from cspan, you have donor states that contribute the majority to the federal government, and then you have these southern states, or these middle states that contribute less. You mentioned earlier that donor states receive maybe . 60 on the dollar, whereas recipient states you did not say how much they contribute totally, and the of the southern states, and those that are not contributing they are the ones that have a problem with the federal government, and then they want to tell the donor states what they should and shouldnt do. Can you look at it from that perspective rather than to say the perspective percentage they contribute or receive on a dollar . How much do they contribute in real dollars and cents to see the actual reality . Guest a lot of this is something i encounter with my reporting i cover Public Financing on a regular basis, and an mass of things tend to gum appearance in politics, and people use that to politicize what their agenda is. The whole donor state idea is basically the notion that states with more population, richer people, more industries, faced , gross statedp product, i suppose, they naturally produce more revenue. Some of that goes to the federal government. They do not get all of that back because they do not need it all back and a lot of the government funding most of the inequality we are talking about with this issue has to do with medicaid. So, states that have less poverty with them do not need as much in medicaid funding. States that have more poverty a lot of them are in the south mississippi, alabama are two huge ones. They get a ton of money from the federal government for medicaid because they have more poverty. It makes this funny math equation, it shouldnt, but it doesnt have anything to do with politics, and it gets to this tends to get thrown in there. Host the Washington Times has a mayor, wee l. A. Things he said about donald trump before the election and after the question is is donald trump a city president as opposed to president obama, who had a Good Relationship with metropolitan areas . Guest it remains to be seen it i hesitate to predict anything with child because he has been so unpredictable. Trump becausewith he has been so unbreakable. I would be surprised if he was a obamaresident as much as has been. He has bypassed governors, thickly in red states particularly in red states with governors that do not want to work with him, and gone to houston,hat are blue, austin, for example, and worked with citizens to eliminate veteran homelessness. Cities got on board with that, and it became a collaboration with the white house. I wrote them down because i knew i would forget all of them. For example, prepare it for Climate Change is another one. Obama, while he is not directed cities to increase them and which, he has supported all of them that have. You have these liberal issues that cities are taking on because theyre states have been reticent to work with the white house on it. Host lets hear from bill. Patriot, ohio. Caller good morning. Se illegals coming in here they go to cities like california in california, and york,o to cities in new and they do take the jobs lowpaying jobs, where if they were there, and the welfare recipients in those states, who work for what the government was giving you now youre not even have to work. You just have to say you are looking to find work. If the illegals were not here, and those people were made to go to work for their benefits, we raise in the industries where the illegals are not there anymore, like the farming industry, things like that you would see them raise the rate on how much they pay. Host thanks, bill. Guest i dont disagree with that. To get reallyard good numbers on that with a lot of what we are talking about because it is, by nature, on documented. It certainly is a common belief that without the support of immigrants and many people believe Illegal Immigrants not just in agriculture, but the Restaurant Industry as well. Without that support, and being able to pay them lower wages, things here will cost a lot more. It is a simple economic issue. Host a tangential question two host can you shed some light on the . Guest the Unfunded Mandate 1 states get up in arms about that. It is true. The federal government can change policy, and but not have a way for states to pay for it, and that is a to them. That is something states will get on their high horse and complain about over and over again. The problem is what states typically tend to do they will pay for what they can, then pass on the cost to cities, particularly major cities. You have it rolling downhill. Can you read the other question . Host the other question related to enforcement cost to miss appellate is in counties that are not reimbursed by in his appellate is in counties that are not reimbursed by feds. Maybe that is in question. Guest again, it goes into the unfunded issue, and that is what cities and states are going to have to figure out. We have been talking about federal funding and the fact doesfederal government buoy cities quite a bit, but it has been going down the last decade. That is probably because of the recession. We have limited dollars now. States and cities, to some extent have been relying less on lesson whatever government has said them. You might see more cities and states reaching out to private Sector Companies to pay help pay for the cost. You have those issues. Overall, the trend has been they have been relying less and less on those big dollars anyway. Host liz farmer is with governing magazine a staff reporting reporter. What is governing magazine . Guest we published monthly, cover state and government policy. As relates to federal government i write a lot about tax reform on capitol hill, how that might affect state and local governments. We cover all 50 states and puerto rico. [laughter] guest and, then, you know, as many cities as we can get our hands on. The idea is we write about things that are both good ideas and bad ideas so people in the private and Public Sector know what works and what does not. Host michael, you are next. Caller good morning. Thank you for cspan. My comment, and you can look at it as a question a lot of educatednt quite as some of your guests may be, and you keep batting around the term sovereign state. The state of california is not a sovereign state. They are not entitled to the same things that we would give a country like canada, mexico, saudi arabia. They are sovereign states. A lot of the money that the government doles out every year to the states is in the form of grants. And i think what mr. Trump has every right to do is if you have a city who is in a specific complyhat wishes not to with the federal laws and the laws that are in the constitution, which the Current Administration chooses to ignore, then they get no grants. Host thanks, caller. Guest you mention a couple of things there. I will start with the sovereignty issue. Yes, states are subject to federal government overall. It is in the constitution, however i think it is the 10th amendment. The federal Government Law trumps state law, however state laws however states can create their own laws however they see fit, as long as it is not negate whatever happened at the federal does not negate what happened at the federal level. That is issue were talking about here. When it comes to immigration, the legal question is that immigration is enforced this is in the law immigration is enforced by the federal government to cities have been government. Cities have been standing on this leg of were not going to help you enforce your law. The other part of this is states cooperation with the federal government if they have sanctuary cities they do not agree with, they can pull their own statefunded. That is at the state level. That could happen. Then the other part of this are a few aspects to this. The last thing i will say is that legally looking at the legality again the guy mentioned earlier, when the federal government i think i mentioned it when the federal government change the drinking age it was age 21. It was different in other states. States that did not comply saw federal government withhold highway dollars because of the driving thinking and driving issue. Withhold lawcould enforcement dollars because it is a related topic, but there are so many Different Things happening. I am not a lawyer. There is no hard precedent for this. Therefore, you could argue both sides very easily. Host one more call. Jerry. Florida. Republican line. Caller i will jump in. High walked on my morning walk and i walked by the Border Patrol in florida, setting up patrolling i would think Border Patrol would know on their first arrested a person was illegal or legal and have a criminal record, and i would think in their data base, a second or third, i have no idea how they see this work in cap are handing an capturing and apprehending an an alien. Thanks for the 10th amendment anyway. Host thanks, caller. Guest you are welcome. I hope you are enjoying the weather. Another issue Law Enforcement cooperation between states and cities that is something following 9 11 all aspects of government have been working on doing better. That is another show. Host a discussion on federal funds to support City Projects and other matters with liz farmer of governing magazine. Thanks for your time. Guest thank you for having me. Host that is it for our program. Another [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] and a look at some of the live programs we will be having today. Coming up at 11 45, the group no labels will host a discussion on what the first 100 days of the Trump Administration might look like. Later, more of the upcoming howp presidency, a look at the media might cover the Trump Administration. Tonight, a panel with two of this years president ial debate moderators. They will be talking about their experiences with the cochairs of the commission that sets up the debates