Question. Sean you guys in the Democratic Caucus have narrowed the republican advantage in the senate this week. It looks like there are some other interesting senate races. Some retirements. We are less than a year for the midterms. Will democrats win the majority back in the senate this november . Sen. Van hollen so this was a great week for the senate. For alabama and for the country with the swearing in of doug jones, who ran a Campaign Based on Kitchen Table issues. I am not your negro am not going to make any predictions about global happen i will not make any predictions about what will happen. All i can say is the signs out there that she have an energized Democratic Base and a lot of independent voters who are crossing over to support democrats as they did with doug jones. And a lot of disaffected republicans. And i believe that the steps that the republicans and in congress have taken are going to make things a lot harder for those republicans, including the passage of this tax bill which is a total giveaway to corporations while millions of middle class taxpayers will see their taxes go up. A lot to focus on in these campaigns. Things are heading in the right direction. Senator, when you are making priorities. Is your priority going to be defending these 10 democratic senator who is are up for reelection in these trump states . Or are you going to go on offense and win races like nevada, arizona, texas and tennessee, where you have opportunities to pick up seats . Sen. Van hollen we think we can do both. If you look at our incumbents youve good lot of battletested , incumbents and the reason theyve been successful, sometimes in politically difficult states is they always focus the people in their states. That has been their north star. We are going to work hard to p them come up most of all knowing what to do in their states. And well look for every pickup opportunity that are out there. There are a number of pickup opportunities. This is also a cycle where we have seen, as in the case of alabama, where no state is safe for a republican senator. Kevin so following up on that, where do you think you can expand the map beyond the races that have already started emerging and establishing . Sen. Van hollen weve obviously got to work hard make sure they continue to succeed. Then there are eight republican seats. Alabama, of course, was a seat that we recently picked up. And all of those eight are going to be in play. We have candidates today in every one of those eight seats with the exception of mississippi where were talking to some very strong candidates. All of them are strong potential states. Having said that, obviously, state of nevada is a big pickup opportunity for the democrats. Arizona very much in play. But i wouldnt discount any other states. We have really good candidates. Bill brandis and, former twotime governor of tennessee running. Always governed based on a pragmatic governing approach. Trying to address issues that were important to people regardless of party. Kevin you said you have these 10 states where you are defending that trump won and 2016. Whats the one state that youre most concerned about . Sen. Van hollen im not going to get into ranking the states here today. We take nothing for granted. More importantedly, our senators take nothing for granted. That is what they have been elected. They are very focused on trying to make sure they serve the interest of the constituents and their states. Sometimes that means fighting President Trump. For example when it is a big tax giveaway to corporations paid for by people in their states. Sometimes it will be working with President Trump. Again, their goal is to make sure that they have as their top priority the people in their state. Look there are lots of , competitive states out there right now. But we also have incumbents who are really strong positioned. Sean in some of these state, were seeing democratic primaries unfolding. The biggest one is california. Could also be general election with two democrats. There are some other states that were seeing incumbents get primary challenges. How complicated does it make your task this year as you look at some of these emerging democratic primaries . Sen. Van hollen one of the stories of this election is how few democratic primaries we have, at least on the senate side. I expect senator Dianne Feinstein will do very well in california. But in other states we have really very few primaries whereas on the republican side, you have lots of very bitter primaries in a whole range of states. Partly caused by the fact republicans were unable to recruit their top contenders and so you have very tough fights among the republican primary contestants. Kevin focusing a bit on california in recent years, weve seen some case where is where Republican Campaign committee has had to spend money in the republican primaries to protect their incumbent. Do you anticipate this an area where they need to go into california which is a very , expensive state and help out senator feinstein . Sen. Chris van hollen we strongly support senator feinstein but we also believe shes in a really strong position both in terms of her record and fighting for the people of california. And the campaign that she will run. So, i dont anticipate having to invest any funds in the state of california. Sean zooming out a bit, talking about the messaging, a lot of democratic activists and some democratic lawmakers have expressed some serious concerns about the president to the point where they have said there should be a move to impeach President Trump. Two questions. One, do you think President Trump to be impeached, do you think congress should move in that direction . And what sort of messaging mean on the campaign trail, especially in some of these red state where is President Trump is very popular . Sen. Chris van hollen so i think the focus for people who want to make sure that we hold donald trump accountable is to win the 2018 election in the house and in the senate. That should be our focus. And that means fighting on these issues that are important to people in all these states. So we saw the country rally in opposition in the effort to eliminate the Affordable Care act, which meant millions of americans losing access to the Affordable Care act. You some republicans, independents and democrats rallying to fight that. Rural hospitals were very longly were strongly opposed to that effort. That was the first signal that donald trump and republicans werent really out there for the forgotten americans. In fact, they were targeting forgotten americans. And this tax bill, you tell me the big corporations are the real forgotten americans. They do very well in the United States congress and now they have a big tax windfall. At the same time millions of folks in the middle will see their taxes go up. Foreign stock holders in 2019 are going to see a 48 billion windfall. Foreign stock holders. How is that America First . So theres a whole lot here to talk about on the issues that people care about and that should be our focus. Sean does it make it harder than some of your democratic colleagues and activists when theyre talking about impeachment . Sen. Chris van hollen i dont think any of our senators or Senate Candidates are focused on impeachment. I think theyre focused on the Kitchen Table issues. Thats what doug jones did in alabama. He really focused on issues that people care about when it comes to income security, job opportunities, pay, pensions. Those were the issues in his campaign and on election night, he talked about protection the Childrens Health insurance program. Those are the kinds of priorities that folks will be focused on. Kevin this week it was report that a psychiatrist that traveled down from connecticut to d. C. , she worked at yale to talk to members of the senate and members of congress about President Trumps mental health. I think some more questions about that came out after his tweet regarding the button in comparing his button to kim jonguns in north korea. Is that something where you have any concerns about and something that you think that is the type of thing that could potentially lead to impeachment . Sen. Chris van hollen i have concerns about the fitness of donald trump to be president. I have said he is unfit in my view to be president , which is why its important people hold him accountable. What i find is people in red state, blue state, purple states want members of the senate who are going to hold the president accountable. And again, that means fighting the president where the policies that he proposed are bad for their states. Where he proposes policies that are good for their states, our members have been willing to work. Weve been willing to work on a bipartisan basis. We laid out early on this tax debate a number of principles. Number one was if youre going to have a middle class tax cut, everybody in the middle class should have a tax cut. Nobody should see their taxes go up. They raised taxes on folks in the middle. We said that folks at the very top should not get a big tax break. In fact, steve mnuchin, the secretary of treasury said that folks at the top, were not going to get a tax break. Well, at the end of the day, folks to make 1 billion a year get an annual tax break of 70,000 a year while corporations get a permanent tax cut. So were going to be very focused on those kind of issues and our members have been always willing to work on a bipartisan basis when its in the interest of people in their state. Sean some of your republican colleagues were over at the white house today to talk to the president about immigration which is at the center of the policy debate going on in congress right now. Would you be willing to vote for another spending bill if it comes up later this month for around january 19 if a daca solution is either not included in that bill or has not been resolved before that time . Sen. Van hollen so there are a whole lot of items that we need to resolve before january 19. We need first of all, to make the adequate investments in our country, in our national defense, yes. But also in our kids education. Right now, weve got republicans proposing to dramatically increase defend spending and cut that portion of the budget that we invest in our kids education, in innovative research. If we want a strong country, we need a Strong Economy and we need those investments. Second, Childrens Health insurance programs. I mentioned doug jones talked about this on his election night. We need to resolve that. We need to make sure Community Health centers have funding. We need to deal with pensions. There are some folks who put their money into pension plans. We need to make sure theyre strong. And before january 19, one way or another, we have to deal with the daca issue. I mean, these are kids who were brought here through no fault of their own. Theyve grown up in our schools. Theyve always pledged allegiance to the american flag. We need to resolve these issues. And frankly, Mitch Mcconnell promised senator jeff flake that we would address the daca issue when he voted for this tax plan. So we hope to be able to resolve all of these issues. We cant be kicking the can down the road. Greta specifically on this daca legislation, the dreamers, if it has not been dealt with in one way or another before the spending bill is brought to the floor, how do you vote . Sen. Van hollen so i want to make something really clear, which is that donald trump is the only person whos tweeted about a government shutdown. Republicans now have majorities in the house and in the senate and they control the white house. So they need to work with everybody to make sure that we dont have a government shutdown. And the extent that theyre unwilling to work with everybody else to resolve these issues which have been around for a long time, then theyre going to have to shoulder the responsibility for any kind of government shutdown. The funds in the budget that we will be voted on are some of the money that donald trump wants to use to report the Daca Recipients in march. We need funds to make sure we educate our kids and invest in our schools. So this has got to be a negotiation and its got to make sure that we deal with these priorities. So weve got to address all these issues by january 19. Whatever form its in. Maybe theres a freestanding vote on the daca legislation. Maybe its part of the budget. But all of these issues that were talking about need to be addressed and resolved by january 19. We cant keep kicking the can down the road. Kevin do you think its good politics for some of these trump state senators that are facing reelection to draw a line in the sand on daca . Some of these people, senator tester for one, voted against the dream act, i believe, in his first term. Do you think its good politics for them to now draw a line on the sand saying were not going to continue to fund the government unless we get a solution . Sen. Van hollen so, first of all, i make it a point never to advise my colleagues as to whats best in their individual states because they have obviously a much better sense of doing that. Right now, our entire caucus is in support of the dream act. How we resolve those issues and how each member resolves those issues is something that, you know, theyre going to have to decide in the context of whats in the budget, whats in other legislation and, again, always focus as they have been on whats best for their state. Sean this week, we saw the department of justice take a step to reverse a Marijuana Policy that had been put in place under the obama administration. First off what is your reaction , that move . And secondly, is this a decision that you think could affect some of these campaigns across the country that were seeing unfolding . Some of these senate races that could decide the majority . Sen. Van hollen it could. Let me first say with respect to the decision. I think it takes us in an absolute wrong decision. We should be focusing our federal Law Enforcement resources on going after violent criminals, not locking up people in federal prison for marijuana use, especially in states where the people of those states have decided to either decriminalize marijuana or to legalize marijuana. In my view, we shouldnt be locking people up for marijuana use in any event. So that is a bad use of federal Law Enforcement resources when we have so many other challenges here. I would point out that corey gardner, republican senator from colorado sent out a tweet this week indicating that the sessions decision was a total contradiction of what sessions had told him. Senator cory gardner, prior to the confirmation. Area where you have common cause between republicans and democrats in certain states. Again, that is always a decision to be made by the senator representing the particular state. Kevin a twopart question here. Do you support the full federal legalization of marijuana . And considering that Marijuana Legalization is now extremely popular in Public Opinion polling more popular than its , ever been, pretty overwhelming majority of americans support it now, why havent democrats fully embraced that issue as part of their political platform . A lot of people suggested its a good way to increase youth turnout. Sen. Van hollen these decisions have to be based on the policy merits. Not the politics. And my view is we should decriminalize marijuana and leave the states to make decisions with respect to legalization of marijuana. Youve seen that in certain states like colorado, washington state, now california. I really think that in this case, we need to make sure that the states have an opportunity to sort of weigh in on that. We should at the federal level watch closely. I dont think we should preempt decisions made by states. One way or another. But i do believe we should decriminalize it across the country marijuana laws to the extent that we can. I do not think people should be locked up the United States of america for possession of marijuana. Thats not right. And its certainly a bad use of federal resources to go after that kind of activity. Sean in previous cycles weve seen some Democratic Campaigns, im thinking of senator mccaskill when she ran, meddling in republican primaries in a way thats advantageous to democrats. You mentioned mississippi which is a state where there could be a pretty intense republican primary. Maybe some other places. Are you open to perhaps spending money to try to dictate the outcome of a republican primary thats here in a way that would help the democrats . Sen. Van hollen in this cycle republicans are doing a very good job themselves of beating each other up in these republican primaries. So i dont anticipate us getting involved in those republican primaries. Obviously, thats a decision for people in the states going forward. But, there is clearly a situation on the republican side, a very antiestablishment mood which is complicating things for the senate races. Kevin do you think that presents any opportunity that antiestablishment mood in republican primaries . Do you think there are case where democrats are going to be facing weaker candidates than they might otherwise . Sen. Van hollen all i know is as of right now, you have a whole pile of republican primaries in a lot of these states. How they will resolve themselves, i dont know. But i do make it a point never to get in the middle of a republican civil war. But it clear is a factor. Weve heard republicans talk about this battle between mcconnell forces and the trump forces and the bannon forces. So youve got all of this going on. But i think at the end of the day, the big issues in this campaign are going to come down to questions of are you standing up for peoples Economic Opportunities . Are you there for people on these big issues . If you look at the republican budget, which included the green light and the structure for passing