Monday night on the communicators, a look at the role of Economic Analysis at the deral communications commission. He is interviewed by a Telecommunications Reporter from bloomberg. You are saying that google should be regulated by the f. T. C. It sounds like . What i am saying is when Congress Starts thinking about what a future f. C. C. Would look like and we are thinking about discrimination by vertically integrated plass platforms, the conversation should not be limited to i. S. P. s. I think the threat google posed to innovation in the contents base is just as significant as what verizon could do. Monday night at 8 00 eastern on cspan2. Washington journal continues. Host we want to welcome David Wasserman, cook political report. Good sunday morning. Guest thanks for having me back. Host this is a headline from the washington post. Dont hit the panic button on trump. What is the challenge, what is the opportunity for the g. O. P. . Guest midterm elections are still 19 months away. So far the three months of the Trump Presidency has felt like three years. We dont know what the political environment will be like in 2018 but the first year, first couple months of a presidency are usually the biggest window for governing and legislating. Republicans have a majority in the house, a majority in the senate, and whether trump says so or not, the buck stops with the g. O. P. In the mind of voters. So right now you have a combination of an angry democratic base. We know theyre probably still going to be angry in 2018 but we also have a restless Republican Base thats very concerned about trumps ability to actually cut deals and get things done given the failure of health care and the likelihood of where tax reform is headed which is not looking much rosier. That combination of a disappointed base and an angry opposition is a potentially toxic combination. Host you wrote the following quote. The most striking house statistic in the last 20 years may be the decline of competitive districts, places where members have the greatest political incentives to work on a bipartisan basis. There are only 72 districts between d plus five and r plus five less than 1 6 of the house and a 56 decline since 1997. This also represents what you say is a 20 decline from just four years ago where there were 90 swing seats. Guest thats right. 2that 164 swing district to swing districts is a 56 decline. We have seen the bottom fall out in terms of competitive districts in the house. A lot of reformers are pointing to gerrymandering as the reason but what we found, we were able to isolate the changes, the calculations we made as a result f redistricting years from the p. D. I. We made after every election. We found that 83 of the decline in swing districts in the house was the result of natural sorting of the electorate. Areas of the country getting more homogenous rather than. Rtisan redistricters that has had an effect, a prorepublican effect. But really what we have is two americas with very little purple in between. Host lets talk about two elections. The republican elect from kansas getting a lot of attention. Some thinking democrats may pick this up in what was a heavily trump district. Guest that election was last week. The republican nominee there only won by seven points. That is a warning shot to republicans heading into the next specks election in georgia. A lot of republicans will be quick to point out that there are other factors in kansas that potentially mitigate that outcome. The fact that there is a very unpopular republican governor, sam brownback, whose Approval Rating is in the 20s. That costs republicans a few points in kansas to be sure. But keep in mind the 20 point underperformance is giving republicans heartburn going into another special election in a district in the atlanta suburbs that trump won. Host that is georgias sixth district. This is available online. The trump effect and a democratic candidate who is having to get above 50 is called a jungle primary. Guest this is a very unusual election process. I havent seen a house race become this much of a national fixation. The georgia sixth district is getting a lot of attention from donors on the left. Jon ossoff has raised 8 million, probably on his way towards raising more than 12 million for this election. Host let me stop you there. 12 million for a single house seat. Guest thats more than the five democrats who come from red states in the senate raised in this past three months combined. Host who is jon ossoff . Guest a former hill staffer, he worked for hank johnson who represents a more liberal district in atlanta. He is running in a district north of atlanta, traditionally republican suburbs, he doesnt live in the district. He was a documentary filmmaker and exposing covering humanitarian crises around the world, and republicans are quick to attack him for touting that as a National Security credential. Host let me show our audience some of the ads on air in atlanta. [video clip] is this what responsible leadership looks like . For those with pretisting conditions and low income seniors that could mean the difference between life and death. In Congress Jon Ossoff will work to improve access to health care, not deny it. Lets send a message to donald trump. Vote for jon ossoff. Liberal extremists will stop at nothing to push their radical agenda. Theyre demanding you vote for jon ossoff for congress. He is one of them. Ossoff will vote with nancy pelosi for more spending and a weaker military. Dont let them hijack our congressional seat. Stop ossoff now. Host the congressional leadership, that is paul ryans Political Action committee, two different efforts to try to stop jon ossoff. Guest there are 17 candidates. What we have you wouldnt know that by watching the coverage. Its a very unusual special election format. Everyone runs on the same primary ballot on tuesday and a lot of the vote will be early vote, people who cast ballots in advance. So expect ossoff to start out with a big lead on election night. The key is watching to see whether he gets 50 of the vote. If he is over 50 , there is no runoff. He wince the seat outright. But if he falls below 50 which we think he probably will, there will be a runoff between him and the leading republican candidate on june 20. Its a top two primary similar to what we see in a state like louisiana. Host our guest is David Wasserman. He is on this network frequently. We welcome our listeners on cspan radio. Road to the white house, 2020 will start later this month. Joe biden will be in New Hampshire campaigning for democrats. No indication whether he will run in 2020 but the democrats are gearing up for the midterm elections. Who are its spokespersons . Who is leading the Democratic Party . Guest great question. Is it nancy pelosi . Is there no leader . One of the great advantages i think for the out party is they have free reign to attack the leadership of the other side, the people in the white house for not getting the job done and they can benefit from anger from a number of different places. You are going to see democrats hammer President Trump over not only their standard attacks from the left but also the failure to deliver on its promises, which the sentiment shared by some on the right. We have a president whose Approval Rating is in the mid to high 30s. That typically generates a big seat gain in midterm elections. The out party has gained an average of 33 seats in the house and i think democrats are more hardpressed to pick up that number of seats. They need 24 to retake the chamber. We have fewer competitive seats than we used to in the house, but still you are going to have republicans who come to a cross road. Do they run with the president or run away from President Trump . Host does nancy pelosi run for reelection or make way for somebody to succeed her . Guest it always depends on whether democrats end up having a chance to pick up the house. In the past few elections, nancy pelosi has thought democrats do have a chance to make her speaker again. But look, if she fails for the fifth straight time to put democrats back in the majority, i think the pressure is going to ramp up on her fellow democrats to install new leadership. Host David Wasserman has served as an analyst and numbers cruncher for the bbc, nbc news election desk, the house editor for the cook political report. You can check it out online. Ted from North Carolina, good morning. Caller yes, how you doing . I am commenting about the Democratic Party. It seems like they need to get rid of the rule about the 400 superdelegates because they give the establishment democrats the advantage. Another thing about the democrats, theyre going to have to learn if you become like the republicans and you run as the party of not the republicans, you are not going to beat the republicans. In other words you cant take money from corporations, special interests, wall street banks, and run against the republicans and say you are better than them. I think thats why they lost the last election. I supported Bernie Sanders and now they have people like corey booker, taking money from big phrma. So its not giving them people are looking at them and saying wait a minute, democrats, you have people like nancy pelosi who are in charge of the party and theyre all millionaires. You are like the republicans, you know . Host thank you. We will get a response. Guest we talked about how divided the Republican Party was. There are a lot of divides in the Democratic Party. You will see in primaries for house and senate races in 2018 a number of democrats who come from the bernie wing of the pare and some who come from the more traditional clinton way of the party. I dont think one is a necessarily better route than the other for democrats in swing districts. You can make the case that a more moderate democrat could be a better fit for a slightly republican leaning seat. On the other hand midterm elections are about turning out your base. Crats, of these bernie theyre well suited for turning out the liberal base which has not come out in great numbers. Host talk about redistricting because i think iowa is one of the few states who does it through a nonpartisan commission. You had interesting insights. You wrote the following, redistricting is only responsible for a small portion of the swing seats decimation. In many districts the electorate has become much more homogenous. Guest thats right. We have essentially one red america, one blue america with very little purple in between. 61 of voters in the country live in landslide counties who voted for either trump or points. Y more than 20 when you have that geographic polar station of the electorate. A lot are looking to promote nonpartisan in many states. More or less in california. A tradition of making redistricting a simple bureaucratic function. Host how key is health care for republicans running in 2018 . Base cameot to of the out and voted for republicans in 2010 and 2014 on the promise of voting replacing obamacare. Could noticans deliver, at least not yet on that promise. So what will happen if you have republicans that do not have this big issue to sell to their lot on midterm, there are a of republicans who are fearful of the consequences. Host up next, oregon. Good morning. Can you turn the volume down to eliminate the echo . Ok. Er thank you. My question is simple for the guest. There are a number of moderate republicans like myself who support even eight democrats like senator ron wyden wondering what the guest thinks the chances are that ron wyden could be a viable candidate for the residency . Guest interesting. I had not seen his name raised before for a candidate for 2020 that there are a number of candidates that will likely try to join the race. One of the most prominent senators are talking about, Kiersten Gillibrand is getting a lot of mention. And others. Chuck todd saying he would not rule out another Hillary Clinton bid. That i am not sure democrats would dominate Hillary Clinton after 2016. Arguably, she was the most moderate democrat who could still win in todays Democratic Party. We will always wonder, would Bernie Sanders have beaten donald trump if we were able to see that matchup and 2016. I think the one democrat who would have beaten donald trump joe biden but how could joe biden make it through a democratic primary when todays party has moved as far left as the Republican Party has moved right . Host good morning, new jersey. Thank you for joining us. Caller i would like to make a statement and i have a question. I was listening to what was andg on in new york, syria, so on. I was born in spain during the civil war. I am sitting here wondering what is going on in this country between the republicans and the democrats. My way or the highway . Losing. We have fake news and so on. Long will its, how goings at the rate we are to reach what happened in turkey, what happened in need peninsula of korea . Host thank you. Guest we are looking at a couple of factors. The biggest one will be President Trumps Approval Rating and to the extent there is a rally around the flag affect after a Major International incident or a couldry operation potentially take away attention from some of the domestic issues that are giving republicans big problems right now and potentially boost President Trumps Approval Rating at least into the 40s. Right now he is in the midtohigh 30s. We will see what happens with the International Issues that have taken a bigger place on the stage. Host i asked you about 2020 because the individuals running will have a fairly visible role in 2018. Someone says, i hope the democrats dont make the Hillary Clinton mistake again. Another, even democrats are not dumb enough to put hillary up again. And another one says, Kiersten Gillibrand and cory booker are running. Guest now i think we will have a largest stem accredit field in 2020, particularly if President Trumps ratings are still mired where they are today . Will he get a high married challenge . A lot of republicans think he is not a real conservative and never has been. What weve seen in the last halfcentury is the last two president s who lost reelections also had to overcome a big primary challenge in the beginning phase of the campaign. Big factor inbe a how satisfied the publics with an incumbent and whether that incumbent is vulnerable. Host we are with david politicalof the cook report. Caller good morning and happy easter. I was getting ready to go out when i heard a gentleman caller and talk about how hillary lost. Beat her down into up so bad. Donald trump, and i dont care about russia or whatever, didnt it destroy hillary. It was Bernie Sanders and his coalition of cornell west and whatever. My thing is, i was not going to give to the democrats anymore when i saw the young man correct me on his name running today, i will contribute to his campaign because i am tired of these bombs bursting in air and the cities. I am more concerned with donald when and what he is doing he is talking about foreign affairs. We are in the biggest mess ive ever seen and i mean, it is huge. Sanders is not there because when he tells people about they take half of your paycheck on single payer. Thank you and good morning to everyone. Happy easter. Host thank you. We will let you get in the car and go to church. Some people are thinking, where was that energy level last year. Hillary clinton might have one if that hadates happened last year. We mightve been talking about a democratic president and set of all of this anger. Senate mind there are 10 democrats who are up for reelection in states that trump 2018 midterms. And you wonder, will those seven democrats, a lot of them tend to be more conservative democrats, generate the same enthusiasm that john off box in this one has. Is running in a race that many thought republicans should have one. And she is considering a house run. How serious is she . Republicans12, nominated a lot of very suave candidates. Voters were running away as if they had fleas or the plague. But now they are nominating much stronger candidates from red states. In wagner is one of them from missouri. In wagner is one in missouri. Also, montana. Up for reelection in a state donald trump one by 42 points. Democrats have their work cut out for them. When we talk about heading into 2018, the enthusiasm favors democrats but the map favors republicans. In the senate, it democrats have three quarters of the seats to defend. A candidateoe have running against him yet . Guest not yet. But one from west virginia, a top trending district in the country could be a strong contender if he chose to jump in. Host good morning. Caller good morning. I have an opinion on the Democratic Party. If they want to start winning elections, they need to start getting rid of some of their far out west ideals. And they should develop a conservative Democratic Party that would appeal to people in the them aquatic sector. Caller a lot of democrats on whycoast tend to forget democrats won elections in the last century. They were winning support from working class voters across the country for many years. President obama, when he won the election in 2012, he carried only 22 of americas counties but a lot of those rural midwestern counties in places like ohio, minnesota, wisconsin, he was winning 40 40 5 of the places. Those Hillary Clinton never went dairy lost result she won a lot of those by 4045 points. So they are in a difficult place in the Electoral College. They are on the upswing in places like texas and arizona but not white winning yet. Democrats have a choice to make in 2020. Did they try to win some states they not won in a long time or do they go back to those working class democrats to supported them. What do you think they will do. Guest democrats cannot easily pick one or the other. They have to be able to appeal in places like North Carolina and potentially places like arizona. They cant afford to lose a state like minnesota or maine, both of which they won in 2016 by less than three points. It will have to appeal to a lot of different corners of the country which wont be easy. Host mckinney, texas, republican line. Colors becausef there are a lot of people moving here to texas. I want to point out there are 1865 families a day moving to the state of texas. Isnt that interesting . My question for david, lets talk about the 800pound gorilla in the room. Ist people assume, david, and am assuming you and steve also innk that trumps when november was an outlier by winning the Electoral College vote. Sing the popular i would argue that perhaps for the rest of my life, we will win, that is the republicans, we winning the Electoral College in losing the popular vote. What say you . A for a long time there was blue wall that republicans just could not penetrate. Donald trump actually had an opportunity to win the white house while losing the popular vote. The reason was he was unusually popular with three demographic groups that work concentrated in safe states. Collegeeducated whites who had been against him from the start primaries. A lot of them live on the coast and new england and in places like texas and kansas. Vote by moreatino of a margin then anyone who has ever run for president and yet half of the countries latinos live in california, texas, and new york which is totally safe on the electoral votes. Voters. Inonly 146 of the vote utah, underperforming by 26 . But you can when the six Electoral College votes in utah with that. So it was a perfect storm for Hillary Clinton to win the popular vote by 2. 8 million and still lose the election. Democratic party has gotten so rotten and corrupt i do not think they will ever win again. Starting with fast and furious. The irs. Right onillary clinton down. I do not think there will ever win again. Thank you. Host george, thank you. Political fortunes turn pretty fast. Independent voters will be the arbiters of the next vote. Partisan democrats would argue this is the same under the inrent administration, but 2010 independent voters voted for a republican candidate by 90 points and gave republicans control of the house. Gave democrats stashed them across the house. How are they feeling right now. They are pretty skeptical of this administration. Host this one says, they must advance a woman who was black guy. Ot an old, white guest todays politics is about identity. We see this even in congress. A couple years ago, white men were still a majority of the Democratic Party. Today they are only 41 of democrats in the house. So there really is this drive in the Democratic Party that does not exist so much on the republican side to make on a sunday white house look more like the applet represents. That is a driving force in todays Democratic Party. It could be very difficult for someone who is not a woman or minority to make it through a Democratic Party for president in 2020. Host mary, good morning. Color it morning. My statement is i do not think the democrats are going to win if they keep going on the identity voters. They turned their backs on the working class. The same people that voted for Bernie Sanders drifted toward trump. For a democrat to get back into power they need to go back to class. Asic for working visit, talk about jobs, not talk about illegals coming in and just stick to their basic values and to stop turning their backs on the working class. Also, i would say for cory booker, to me he is just another Hillary Clinton. I had to hold my nose when i went into the voting booth because of what they did to Bernie Sanders and depth they continued their ways i will not continue to the Democratic Party. Host mary, do you think Bernie Sanders should run again in 2020 . Caller i hope he does. I think he represents the working class. They have been forgotten. Everything is about Corporate America and the democrats have lite. Unning democrat host what do you think of joe biden . Joe biden. Ove if he ran, i would vote for him. Either Bernie Sanders or joe biden. Guest what i hear from democrats on the coast and big cities, a lot of protests, a lot of anger. What i do not see a lot of introspection. Donald trump ran on all of these things. 63 mine people almost voted for him. He won the election fair and square. Host as many people voted for barack obama as Hillary Clinton and that shows you where the map change. Guest there were more that did not vote for either in 2016 as opposed to 2012. A far lower turnout. Democratsu look at standing in the interior of the country, what was fascinating for me when i analyze county by county the election votes was there was only one county out of 3000 in the country that voted for obama by 20 points in 2012 andvoted for donald trump 2016. It was howard county, iowa, along the border with i made some calls and it was interesting to talk to the democratic chair and republican there. And what i heard was there is one major employee in the town to that has been there for years. The donelson county which manufactures auto alters. A uaw plant. Macaw to had longstanding labor ties to the Democratic Party and had voted against republicans for years because was were where the party essentially shipping jobs overseas. What donald trump was able to do was mutate the genetic code of the Republican Party on training and emigration to appeal to those type of voters so you saw a huge swing. When democrats say this election was driven by james comey or russian interference or a lot of racists who came out of the woodwork and voted for the first time. What i see is not that. I see voters who voted twice for the first African American president who were persuaded by donald trump to vote for his brand of change. Host maria in california. Welcome. Caller david, what do you think are the chances we are very energized and california. Marching all over it the place. I think we are going to win quite a few, take away quite a few of republican seats. Even darrell issa barely scraped through. Duncan hunter is having problems. People are demonstrating. The chances of picking up quite a number of seats in california . Host lets talk about that. That is a transitional district becoming a little bit more competitive every year. Guest that is right. E one by the most narrow margin of any republican. Beforets need 24 seats republicans take control of the house. There are only 23 republican sitting and states were Hillary Clinton one. So there is no way back without toving into trump territory win some seats. However, there are four republicans in Orange County alone who said an district like ed royce, sitting in districts that Hillary Clinton carried. Democrats cant win back the house without making begins in california. Host happy easter to america and to you. I am calling because a few years ago on National Public television, i saw bill clinton candidate 500,000 grant to a. Ishop in kenya, africa and, this bishop was i dont know, he was one of the christian bishops of not catholic. But he was handing this bishop this grant from the Clinton Foundation in order to promote this bishop promoted gay rights, abortion rights, and that why he was getting this huge grant from the Clinton Foundation and personally i think the corruption of the Clinton Foundation calling itself a charity when it was really just promoting its own causes and its own purposes throughout the world is one big reason that hillary lost. Arete to use terms that derogatory, but i do believe donald trump was right. She is the queen of corruption. She has never been investigated properly. I think all of the agencies and the government were proliberal, proprogressive, and that is why the clintons got away with what they did for years. Host thank you for the call. How do the democrats turn the page on that . Factorbe one unifying for the party after that was Hillary Clinton. Republicans knew they disliked her intensely. A lot of republicans came out of the primaries not especially enamored with donald trump and a lot of traditional republicans, particularly those who care deeply about social issues who very worriedy about a twicedivorced casino owner, still voted for him. Caller good morning. Thank you for cspan. I just had one question regarding the democrats running. Why arent they running to be checked on the president . Because congress is not doing that. They are allowing him to do whatever he wants so why is that not there at theme when they are running. That there needs to be a check on the president . Guest it was a big driver in 2010 and 2014. The same can work against republicans and 2018. Look, a lot of voters in the middle of who were not particularly ideological or political but show up and photo, they say, i do not want either party going too far. I dont want to see obamacare prevail in its current form but i do not want to see it totally repealed. I want something in the middle. So they see a check on the power is a best avenue for achieving that. I will be curious whether republicans can motivate their own base but also appeal to the middle. Host a half minute left. Going back to the Time Magazine peas. What is the trump effect . Guest in some ways, trumps election was the best thing that happened to democrats after the election. It looked for a time they had no chance of taking back the house before the next census but i will put it this way, the pressure was on kansas to prove they could hold on to what they had as really deep trump country. The pressure is on democrats in this weeks special election in georgia because of they cannot win back districts that voted for trump by less than 4 , then they dont really have a chance to take back the house. Wasserman, host of the cook political report, thank you for your time. Host we will turn our attention tomorrow to Charter Schools. The general counsel of Charter Schools usa into the president of the National Consumer link to talk about fraud and the response by the federal government and George Bonita has ace the and jorge bonita. Melissa mccarthy back again last night playing sean spicer on saturday night live. In case you missed it, here is an excerpt. Theke syrian leader leader of it what is that name bazooka, felicia, ahmad mossad. Never used chemical weapons. Everybody freaked out. They were all like blue who boo hoo. Holocaustbout the centers. I know they are not really called holocaust centers. I really meant to say centers. Tion i wish they tried to see the big picture and not focus on every little slower and lie i say. That would be nice. I am sensitive on the fact they were sent there on trains but at least they did not have to fly united. A joke. I am particularly sorry this happened the same week as. K. A. Jewish easter. Way, Melissa Mccarthy was dressed as the easter bunny to play the part. We hope you have a nice weekend. Davidt, newsmakers with shall can. Then a look at the easter egg roles from the last four white house events. Then a tour of the africanamerican museum of history and culture. Post cspan2 guest this week on is david shall can. Ands a practicing physician