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Coming up on Washington Journal, we'll take your calls and comments live.
Then we'll talk about the week ahead in Congress, including leadership elections with reporters Emily Brooks of The Hill and Stephen Newcomb of Axios, and Philip Wegman, White House reporter for Real Clear Politics on the role of the Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 in the upcoming Trump administration.
Washington Journal starts now.
This is the Washington Journal for November 12th.
In the last few days, President-elect Trump has named his choices for key roles in his administration, including positions that will influence future policy and immigration, homeland security, national security, and foreign policy.
We'll show you the latest choices from the president-elect, and you can comment on these choices and what you think it says about the future Trump administration.
Here's how you can let us know so far how you want to grade President Trump's team so far: 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202748-8001 for Republicans, and 202748-8002 for independents.
If you want to post your grade and your thoughts on the president-elect's team choices and give us that in text, 202-748-8003 is how you do that.
You can post on facebook.com/slash C-SPAN.
And you can also post on X at C-SPANWJ.
Politico has a roundup this morning of these latest choices from President-elect Trump and future choices that will determine his team going forward.
They write that the incoming president on Monday tapped three of his staunchest current and former congressional allies for key roles, naming Representative Elise Stefanik, Republican of New York, as his next UN Ambassador, former Representative Lee Zeldin of New York to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, and Representative Michael Waltz, Republican of Florida, to be his national security advisor, with a fourth, Senator Marco Rubio, expected to be nominated as the Secretary of State.
He's also bringing immigration hardliners Stephen Miller and Thomas Holman back to the White House in key policy roles.
The story adding that the move signaled the extent to which the incoming president will both prioritize loyalty in his second administration and seek to leverage it across all the branches of government to carry out his most ambitious and controversial plans.
Again, that is Politico's take on that.
When it comes to the future head of the Homeland Security Department, CNN, reporting that it's South Dakota Governor Christy Noam, expected to be offered that role in the next Trump administration, they write this.
Noam, who was previously a South Dakota representative, will now be tasked with overseeing a sprawling policy, sprawling agency that oversees everything from U.S. customs and border protection and immigration and customs enforcement to the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Secret Service.
She had once been on the president-elect's shortlist for vice president, though her relationship with Mr. Trump shifted about after the negative rollout surrounding the publication of her book, No Going Back: The Truth of What's Wrong in Politics and How We Move Forward, America Forward.
In it, she revealed that she once killed her 14-month-old wire hair pointer cricket when she was not displaying the signs of an ideal hunting dog.
That's CNN talking about who will handle the homeland security issues.
When it comes to taking a look at immigration issues, Thomas Holman is the name that was first coming to the forefront in the last couple of days.
Wall Street Journal writes about it saying as the acting ICE director, he scrapped an Obama administration policy later readopted by the Biden administration that directed officers to focus on arresting immigrants in the country illegally with serious criminal histories.
Under his watch, ICE ramped up its raids on meatpacking plants and other places where Spanish-speaking immigrants were known to gather.
A former police officer, he joined what was then called the Immigration and Naturalization Service in the 1980s.
And he spent decades working as a career, as a government employee in various roles, including a Border Patrol agent.
Holman first championed the idea of separating migrant families as a deterrent measure during the Obama administration when in 2014 a surge of families from Central America started crossing the border illegally.
The idea was rejected out of him, but Holman revived it when Trump became president on a pilot program started in 2017 before it was an expanded borderwide.
Those are some of those names emerging in the last couple of days when it comes to the president-elect's team.
If you want to comment on these names and other names you've heard about the choices for the president's team, you can call us 202748-8000 for Democrats, 202748-8001 for Republicans, and 202748-8002 for Independents.
If you want to text us at 202748-8003, you can text us those thoughts and you can post on Facebook and on X as well.
Mr. Holman, after the news coming out of his future role in the administration, was on the Fox News Network talking about immigration policy, what he sees as his role in it.
Here's a portion of that interview.
Well, first of all, cost of deportation.
President Trump's plan is going to be a cost savings to the American people because this administration is paying for free airline tickets all over the country, free hotel rooms at $500 a night, a free education, free medical care.
And that's in perpetuity.
What President Trump's plan is going to do is over time is going to save the taxpayers' money and put an end to this foolishness.
They're paying $500 a night for hotel room in New York City.
Meanwhile, there's empty ice beds at $127 a night.
So President Trump's plan is going to save taxpayers' money over time.
And as far as the Remain in Mexico program, look, I worked for six presidents start with Ronald Reagan.
Every president I worked for took steps to try to secure the border.
No one did more than President Trump.
His success was unprecedented.
And when he came up with the Remain in Mexico program, that was an outstanding idea because that stopped people from coming.
People could still claim asylum, but they're going to wait in Mexico.
But once the word got out that they weren't going to be released, they stopped coming.
When they stopped coming, women aren't being raped by the cartels.
Children aren't drowning in the river.
The cartels aren't making money.
So President Trump's policy of Remain Mexico, not only a game changer, moved it to an historic low on illegal immigration, it saved thousands of lives.
Well, I mean, look, practically speaking, who's going to do it?
Are you envisioning military troops throughout the country rounding people up?
Tell me how it's going to be done in a practical sense.
First of all, I want to make one thing clear.
I read a media piece this morning, I think, Daily Call or somebody said, Tom Holman says the military is going to go out rounding up and arresting Illinois aliens.
Never said that, never said that in my entire life over my career.
So that was a ridiculous thing I just read in the paper this morning.
It's going to be a well-targeted planned operation conducted, leaded by the men of ICE.
The men and women of ICE do this daily.
They're good at it.
They're all at Fourth Amendment training.
They know what they can and cannot do illegally.
And it's a well-targeted, when we go out there, we're going to know who we're looking for.
We most likely know where they're going to be in this redundant, humane manner.
I keep reading these stories about concentration camps.
ICE has the highest detention standards in the industry.
And so these people will be well taken care of.
It'll be a humane operation, but it's a necessary mass deportation operation.
Thomas Holman's one of the name as far as the future Trump administration.
You can comment on him and other choices that have been made by the president in the last couple of days and forthcoming ones as well.
Again, the phone lines will be on the screen.
Just choose the one that best represents you.
If you've called in the last 30 days, hold off from doing so.
Again, your thoughts on the President-elect's team so far.
Lester in Alabama, Democrats line starts us off.
Lester, good morning.
Good morning, Petro.
How are you doing?
Fine, thank you.
Go ahead.
You know, Petro, as we looking at Trump as he's putting his cabinet together, every one of these people he's picking is nothing but racist white people.
You know, it's sad with this border.
He had the opportunity to seal that border.
He didn't do it.
Now he's coming in talking about he gonna treat these people fairly.
Trump have never treated anybody fairly.
And trust me, America gonna wish the day they never seen Trump.
Trump is a, he almost like Hitler.
And that's the game.
Okay, but specifically, what are your issues with the choices so far that he's made?
They're not qualified to even run, hold those positions.
That's it the ball.
We knew four years ago what she did with education.
America gonna wish the day they never seen Trump again.
Petro, have a good day.
That's Lester there in Alabama.
Again, your thoughts on the president's choices so far when it comes to his team.
This is Josephine in New Jersey, Independent Line.
You're next.
Hello.
Good morning.
My concern is for the children.
It's going to upset me to no end that there are a lot of children that were born here and their parents.
And the explanation Mr. Holman got when I was on 60 Minutes, as the reporter asked him, well, what happens to the children if their parents have to go back?
He said, even though they're American citizens now, oh, well, they'll all have to leave.
That's exactly what happened under Eisenhower.
60% of the people that were put out were actually American citizens.
And I don't want us to look like stormtroopers.
It's just upsetting to me.
What should be done?
And he would have the ability to do it.
Hire judges, judges, judges.
People will not come if they know they will be automatically brought in front of a judge within six months and they're out.
Do it the legal way, but why would you want to do that?
Let's act like the Nazis, stormtrooper action.
Thank you.
That's Josephine on our Independent Line, Mark from New Jersey, Democrats line on the president-elect's team choices so far.
Mark, go ahead.
Hi, thanks for C-SPAN.
I'm a climate change voter.
That's my main issue.
And we just elected a climate change denier.
So I am petrified of what's going to happen.
I'm here in New Jersey.
I smell smoke everywhere.
We haven't had but one rainfall in 42 days.
And Trump just put in Lee Zeldin for the EPA head.
I mean, the guy is into big oil.
I mean, there's, it's, I can't even express how bad it's going to be with climate change after Trump's gone.
So we all ought to just do our best we can, Americans.
That's Representative Lee's, former Representative Lee Zeldon, Republican of New York, tapped ahead, the Environmental Protection Agency.
Again, it's one of those announcements that have been forthcoming in the last couple of days.
Some of you posting on these choices when it comes to our Facebook page.
This is Tassos Perkis says that excellent choices all.
I particularly enjoy giant slayer Elise Stefanik becoming the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.
I wonder how many dictators and other clowns around the world will fall once she opens her mouth.
From Stephen Jellin saying Trump started his last term with good people who left him more and less disgusted.
My guess is that he will quickly lose interest in policy and focus instead on gaining absolute power for himself and for creating a submissive government.
From Frank Fraguda just saying this morning on our Facebook page, waiting for the Attorney General pick, which is still forthcoming.
And then Vimarie saying, same old things, nothing new to benefit normal Americans, no protection of individual rights, no ethics, no morals, just more sycophants for the three times impeached, multiple indicted, convicted felon.
Again, you can give your thoughts on our Facebook page at facebook.com/slash C-SPAN.
If you want to tell us what you think about these choices so far when it comes to key positions in the forthcoming Trump administration, you can also post on X as well.
That's at C-SPANWJ.
Let's hear from Dearborn Michigan, Independent Line.
This is John.
Hello.
Hello.
Good morning.
He's appointing terrible people.
Marco Rubio, are you kidding me?
Secretary of State.
They used to call him Little Marco.
And Trump, he called out Marco Rubio.
He said Sheldon Adelson was donating money so he can make Rubio his perfect puppet.
Well, now Trump is the puppet of Adelson money.
It's ridiculous.
But what is it about Mr. Rubio or Senator Rubio specifically that would make him a bad choice for Secretary of State if he's offered that?
Well, Secretary of State should do diplomacy.
Marco Rubio is a warmonger.
I thought Trump was a peace candidate.
Nope, he's just bringing in warmongers again.
John in Michigan there.
This is Demessia from Florida, Democrats line.
Go ahead.
Oh, hello.
You're on.
Go ahead, please.
Yes.
My name is DeMecca.
Mike the City.
You're on.
Go ahead.
You're probably listening to your television.
If you can not do that and just go ahead with your thoughts, please.
We appreciate it.
Okay.
So my thing is I'm just trying to figure out this guy's end goal.
I don't really think it doesn't even really matter who he's filling his cabinet with at this time because we already know what his agenda is.
Okay.
So and what do you mean by that?
Well, I mean, what was his agenda the last time he was here?
I don't remember anything positive that was actually, that actually got done.
And it only, I mean, in the end, when he's last year was when COVID, I mean, Obama stopped Ebola.
He couldn't stop COVID.
I don't remember anything.
Okay, DeMecca in Florida, again, giving her thoughts on these choices so far when it comes to the incoming president and his administration.
2027 88,000 for Democrats, 202748, 8001 for Republicans, and Independents 202-748-8002.
If you want to make your thoughts on the phone lines known when it comes to immigration policy, that's one of the ones if you go to the front page of the Washington Post.
If you go to the lead story, by the way, they reflect the story in the last 24 hours or so about the possibility of Senator Marco Rubio of Florida becoming the next Secretary of State.
Again, not officially offered the role according to positions, but at least that's being reported.
But if you also go to the main page under the photo which showed the President Joe Biden and the Vice President Kamala Harris laying a reef at the Tomb of the Unknowns as part of the Veterans Day ceremonies yesterday, a story about migration and immigration.
This is by Nick Miroff saying this time, strict migration rules already in place.
He says that when he returns to office in January, the president-elect stands to inherit enforcement tools from the Biden administration that are even more powerful than the policies at his disposal last time.
Biden administration officials, for example, have implemented emergency border controls this year that essentially ban asylum for migrants who enter unlawfully.
While Trump's Remain in Mexico policy provided asylum seekers with access to U.S. courts, President Joe Biden's asylum restriction offered no such process, allowing U.S. officials to summarily deport migrants and threaten them with criminal prosecution if they return.
The asylum restrictions have helped the administration slash the number of illegal crossings at the Mexico border by 78% since December to levels even lower than during the friend of the president's first term, President Trump's first term.
Let's hear from Mike, Mike in Houston, Republican line, on these choices by President-elect Trump so far when it comes to key positions in his administration.
Mike, go ahead.
Yes, I think that he'll do a fabulous job.
All of them will.
Why do you think that?
Well, they're all experienced people, and especially Borman, he was helping him last time on the same problem.
And I think Rubio will also.
Can I ask, you said you mentioned Tom Holman, you mentioned Marco Rubio specifically.
What do you think they bring to the party, so to speak, if they are named to these positions?
Well, I think Barman, he's had a lot of experience doing what he's been doing, and he's an ex-agent, and he's very well versed in what they need, and also Rubio at the same time.
Okay.
Mike there in Houston, Texas, talking about Thomas Holman, one of those choices when it comes to immigration matters and immigrations and customs enforcement, Marco Rubio, which was Senator Rubio, possibly becoming the next Secretary of State, according to reporting.
New York, this is White Plains Russ, Democrats line.
Hi.
Hi, Pedro.
You know, I know this guy, Tom Holman, is being portrayed as the bull Connor of the 21st century at the Borders Are.
But he seems like a tough talker that's more interested in deterrence.
And, you know, with Trump, he's appointed Elise Stefanik, a radical Zionist in the U.N., but this allows Trump to lay down the law to Israel.
He's not going to appoint Rashida Talib.
You know, it's like when Trump said, I had Pumpelin Bolton at the table and that work got the attention of Kim Jong-un and Iran's attention.
Trump rules by indirection, the weave.
I really think he's like the Walt Whitman of politics.
He contains multitudes.
Thanks very much, Pedro.
Well, can you expand on that?
What do you mean by that?
Oh, he hanged up.
Let's hear from Roger.
Roger in Kansas, Independent Line.
Hi.
Yeah, thank you for being on.
I just hope that Trump's team goes and fixes our older regulation in our country and really gets rid of the departments that have done a terrible job for our country.
Our education department just seems to go and is discrediting and preventing our teachers from teaching kids things they need to have a good work job.
Work ethics, they don't teach them how to read anymore.
They don't teach them how to write.
They don't teach them math.
They just are not doing what's in the best interest.
If they would just take that money and give it to the states and let the states do the education for our kids, our country would be so much better.
They just put too many strings and try to push through things that aren't what we want them to do in education.
And they have the same problem in the environment.
I mean, the things that they do for us in the environment are terrible.
I mean, I'm all for solar energy and wind stuff, but they have no way right now to make sure that those are all the most productive ways.
I don't think that anybody has done a test to see if our wind farms are actually making us money or if it's causing us more harm to our environment because the products that they have and what they're doing is hurting us.
I'm really looking forward to having the Kennedy's family help us out and improve our medical issues.
And personally, I would hope and pray that Trump fixes our Medicare because I and my wife are both retired on Medicare and we pay over $1,000 a month for medical coverage.
I have to, they take it out of my Social Security.
They make me pay deductible.
And on top of that, I got to pay for a copay coverage.
Why in the world do I have to pay for Medicare when in fact I should have had that?
I paid my entire life.
Now I still have to pay $12,000 a year.
Okay, Roger there in Kansas, a lot of things that he listed off, but one of the names that he listed off during his comments, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Washington Times reporting on that, saying the latest statements from Robert Kennedy Jr. talks about fluoride removal.
They write that Mr. Kennedy, a longtime activist and Trump ally who plans to serve in the new administration, outlined the plan when it comes to fluoride on X. Quote, on January 20th, the Trump White House will advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water, he wrote on X before the election.
Fluoride is an industrial waste associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders, and thyroid disease.
Mr. Kennedy pointed to a recent court ruling that ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to respond to a federal review that found a link between high levels of fluoride and lower IQ in children.
That's the Washington Times.
It was on Fox News last week asked about the role he may see in a future Trump administration.
Here are his thoughts from last week.
We are exploring a bunch of different structures.
The Trump administration, the Trump team has been very, very accommodating to give me what I want.
And what I want to do is what President Trump asked me to do, which is three things.
One, to end the corruption and the corporate capture of these agencies so that they're serving public health interests rather than the mercantile interests of the pharmaceutical companies.
Number two, to restore the tradition in these agencies of gold standard, empirically based, evidence-based science and medicine that they had when I was a kid, that they were world famous for and that they lost.
And then third, to end the chronic disease epidemic, which now disables 60% of our kids.
When my uncle was president, it was 6%.
And it's costing us $4.3 trillion a year.
And 77% of American kids cannot qualify for military service.
This is an existential threat.
It is five times our military budget.
And he's asked me, he's asked me to have measurable results within two years.
But my question is, why is Howard Luttnick saying that you wouldn't have a position?
Is that in the closing hours that they think that that might be a negative for some voters?
What's going on?
As I said, that is not true.
The campaign has walked back those statements by Howard Ludnick, and he himself is disavowed those statements.
So, does that mean that you think you might be the HHS secretary if former President Trump wins?
We don't know what I'm going to do.
I talked to the president about it yesterday, and he asked me what I wanted, and I said we're developing a proposal now.
So, I'm not sure whether that's going to be the most effective.
I want to be in the White House, and he's assured me that I'm going to have that.
I want to be in the position where I'm most effective in the chronic disease epidemic.
And I'm confident that if I wanted to do HHS secretary, the president would fight like hell to make that happen.
Again, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Fox News, one of those names being mentioned in the future Trump administration.
You can talk about the appointments that have already been announced that are expected.
Your thoughts and grade the President-elect's team so far.
202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, and Independents 202-748-8002.
You can text us at 202-748-8003.
Before we go back to calls, a little of an update when it comes to the Senate and the House, the last Senate race being called by the Associated Press.
This was out of Arizona.
Democratic Representative Ruben Gallego, yet now becoming Senator-elect Ruben Gallego in his contest and his victory over Kerry Lake.
That's being reported by the Zero Arizona Republic and the Associated Press as well.
If you look at the map that we have, and if you go to our website at c-span.org/slash results, we show you the current status of the race, according to the Associated Press, which provides the data that we show you when it comes to the various calls that have been made.
53 Republican seats in the next Senate, over 47 Democratic seats.
And that's the current stand of the Senate.
When it comes to the House, that is still yet to be determined about who will have power when it comes to the next House of Representatives.
But the current count by the Associated Press now currently stands Republicans with 214 seats, several Republicans seats yet to be called trending towards Republicans.
218 needed Democrats with 205 seats so far.
That's the current state of the House election.
We'll talk more about that in our next hour with two reporters taking a look at the House and the Senate and how they are preparing not only for the next term, but a new president as well.
The president-elect announcing several key members of his team.
Let's hear about it from Rick in Texas, Republican line.
Hi.
Rick in Texas.
Hello.
Go ahead, please.
Yes, sir.
How are you doing?
My name's Rick.
I've seen Brownsville, Texas.
I'm probably doing like about an A plus on his pick so far.
And he with the immigration problem, and he started over here in Brownsville because it's a mess down here.
That's all I got to say.
Why does it gain an A plus in your mind?
Yes, sir.
But why is that?
Why does it gain an A plus in your mind for these choices that he's made so far?
With the picks so far that he's made.
I think like Rubio, he's termed Rubio Kennedy and a bunch of others that are involved with the immigration deals.
You know, I've heard of those names, and it sounds good.
Okay.
Rick there in Brownsville, Texas.
Anderson joins us from New York.
Line for Democrats on the President-elect's picks so far.
Anderson, hello.
Yes, good morning, Pedro.
Good morning, America.
I am cautiously optimistic about the choices so far because I'm not looking forward to an event where you have Mr. Trump making choices on people that were loyal to him during the elections.
I am really concerned about Elon Musk's role in this administration.
Not just Elon Musk, but Robert Kennedy Jr.
I am concerned about that.
And I don't want a repeat of just Trump's loyalists going along with what Mr. Trump wants, because what Mr. Trump wants is not always good for America, and it's not always good for the world.
So I am cautiously optimistic that this time around, Mr. Trump has learned his lesson and to be a president of the United States of America.
We need unity in this country now because yes, Mr. Trump won overwhelmingly, but there are people that disagree with a lot of stuff that he's about to do.
And I'm cautiously optimistic that this time around, Mr. Trump has learned his lesson and do the right thing to do.
Caller and Americans.
You had mentioned concerns over two specific names, Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
What are your specific concerns about both those?
Mr. Musk, what he has stated is not for his employees.
I read something, there was a large article yesterday, I forget the publication, but they were mentioning about his stock option for his employees and so forth.
He is not a man that promotes unions, labor, employees' rights, and so forth and so on.
We all know the story about Mr. Musk.
So that's my concern.
And Robert F. Kennedy removing fluoride from the water we drink to preserve our mouth.
I mean, this is really crazy stuff I'm hearing already.
So I am hoping that somebody in the Republican ranks would be a guardrail for Mr. Trump and what he's about to do.
Thank you very much.
Ike is next.
Ike in New Hampshire, Independent Line.
Good morning.
Hi, good morning.
Morning, Yuron.
Go ahead.
Yes, so speaking of having control of the House and the Senate, I actually think it's a good thing that Trump gets all, you know, all his cabinet picks and the Senate.
So that when people vote, I mean, I supported Kamal Harris, but I think that if you're electing or if you're voting for a president, you should vote the House and you should vote the Senate to have control for that president so that we can actually judge on his policies that he enacts,
so that in four years or in two years, it could be a referendum on actually what the president does, you know.
And if you're picking him next time, you're picking him based on what he's actually done.
You know, so I think it's a good thing.
We can all see what Trump does and we could go from here.
So as far as the, you talked about the process, but what about the names that you've heard so far?
Any concerns or the people you like?
How does that shake out with you?
No, no.
Yeah, you're right.
That's a great question.
Like the previous caller said, I think somebody like John F., you know, R.F. Kennedy, he's a little iffy, you know, as far as my thinking.
I think he's a little too radical.
The John Holman as a border czar, I did not like him as an ICE, you know, when he led ICE.
But I think we should give them what they want.
This is what the people voted for.
Let's see what happens.
Okay.
Ike there in Ike there in New Hampshire, Nashville, New Hampshire, as it turns out to be, on our independent line, another independent.
This is Adele.
Adele in Maryland on President-elect Trump's pick so far when it comes to key positions of his administration.
Adele, hello.
Good morning, Mr. Pedro.
How are you doing?
I'm well, thank you.
Good morning, America.
Yeah, I have a few issues with deportation.
Deportation is existing even in Europe.
You know what I'm saying?
My problem here is going to be stereotypes.
They're going to attack, they're going to hunt just for Latinos and that's not right.
There's a lot, like there's thousands of ways Europeans here in America, they are undocumented.
And they burned the visa, the way they entered with this, and they never came back to Europe.
They're still here.
And definitely, they were not going to go for those kind of European guys.
My other thing is the choice of extremist Zionist Alexo Marco Rubio.
That guy is a pro-Israel, and Israel wants to take America for a war against Iran.
And we don't need the wars in this sign, you know.
And yeah, that's my issue.
Again, the position of Secretary of State reportedly expected to go to Marco Rubio.
No official confirmation as of yet.
Perhaps that comes today or in the next couple of days.
Again, you can talk about the current state of these choices.
202-748-8000 for Democrats, Republicans, 202-748-8001.
And Independents, 202-748-8002.
Are the numbers there?
Perhaps you want to text us.
You could do that at 202-748-8003.
Again, you can talk about these choices.
Let's hear from a Floridian.
This is Manny from our line for Republicans.
Hello.
Good morning, Pedro.
Thank you for having me.
I'm glad with some of these choices that he's picking.
I'm happy that he's got elected.
But in all honesty, I just did not know there were so many ignorant people in this country that think that the things that he's going to do are so outrageous.
There's so much fear-mongering going around.
But anyways.
Well, let's talk about the choices.
What are some standouts to you as far as your opinion?
I think that Kennedy is a good choice.
I think that Ruby is a great choice.
And I think the one that's going to be in charge of the border is another good choice.
I think he's picking good people.
And as far as Moscow is concerned, if we can bring him in, bring him in.
So as far as Marco Rubio there, Florida being a great choice, what makes him a standout?
What makes him great in your mind?
He's a good-hearted man.
He's a family man.
His parents came from immigrants.
He, you know, like I said, I know because he's right down the street from me.
And I never saw or heard anything negative about him.
He's well-hearted, and he's going to be good.
I think that he's going to do a good job.
Okay, all we can do is hope and pray in that this country goes forward in the direction that it needs to go.
That's Manny there in Florida talking about these choices.
When it comes to the president's team, you can continue to call in on the line, post on our socials.
202748-8003 is the text.
If you want to text us your thoughts from Charles, Charles in Ohio, Democrats line.
Hi.
Hi.
You're on.
Go ahead.
I'm old enough to remember when Ronald Reagan was in office.
And I don't know about Trump's picks, but when Ronald Reagan was in office, he decided to give all these corporations tax breaks to move overseas to stop the immigration.
Now, we're going to have tariffs to get the corporations back to the United States.
Thank you.
Well, we're talking about the picks so far.
What do you think of that since you called, assumingly, to talk about that?
The picks don't matter.
It's what he's going to do.
His picks, they're all, what do you want to call them, extreme.
So it's whatever he wants to do.
He's the president-elect.
He's going to do what he wants to do.
But why do you think they don't matter?
Okay, Jim is next.
Jim in Pennsylvania, Independent Line.
Hi there.
Yeah, I just wanted to indicate how much I like the pick of Tom Holman for Borders Art.
He's a no-nonsense guy.
Pardon me.
I didn't say anything, but just please keep going.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
I got the TV on mute and your lips were moving.
Gotcha.
There's probably a delay.
Well, at least you turned it down.
Thank you for that much.
I appreciate that.
But go ahead with your thought.
He's a no-nonsense individual.
And I hope the rest of them follow his lead.
He basically follows the law.
And he'll basically tell you if you don't like an aspect of what he's doing, talk to your legislator.
Don't talk to him.
He's just going to follow the law as written.
And that's the way it should be.
Thank you.
Jim there in Pennsylvania talking about Tom Holman, the next expected head of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.
Again, you can talk specifically about him.
Some of you talking about these other choices too.
One of the people talking about those choices, by the way, was on Capitol Hill yesterday.
It's Rashida Tlaib.
She is the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
They held a press conference outside on Capitol Hill.
One of the things that came up during the interaction with the press was about thoughts of these names that you've heard in the last couple of days and their reaction to it.
Here's a portion of that conference from yesterday.
Well, look, I think the election results made clear this is going to be a very challenging time.
Stephen Miller and Tom Holman were the architects of a lot of the first Trump administration horrific immigration policies.
And so family separation, mass detentions, those kinds of things is what was promised by the Trump administration.
And I think what we're going to have to fight.
So I think we're going to continue to see a number of people that have disturbing histories being appointed to many of these positions.
We're going to have to figure out how we fight that best.
This is not a first Trump term.
This is a second Trump term.
And I take some, there are both positives and negatives with that.
I think we have fought this before to the point where we elected a new president in 2020.
We did not elect Donald Trump.
At the same time, this is many fewer restrictions with the kind of electoral majority that he won.
And so I think we're in that discernment process.
We'll have to figure out exactly what this looks like.
And obviously, he's going to continue to name people to these positions who have been architects of Trump's Stop Trump's Project 2025 agenda.
Viewers, my apologies.
That was Representative Prabila Jayapal, Democrat from Washington, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus there.
Giving your thoughts yesterday on some of these choices, you can do the same on the phone lines.
We'll go next to Jim in Pennsylvania, Independent Line.
Jim in Pennsylvania.
Hello, go ahead.
I just talked recently.
Do you want me to talk again?
Nope, gotcha.
Let's go to Valerie, Florida, Republican line.
Yeah, I love all his picks so far, but what I'm waiting for him is to bring Tulsi Gabbard in.
I'm a little disappointed about Marco Rubio being slated for Secretary of State.
I think she would have been the greater pick.
But I like Marco Rubio.
Not for that position, though.
Why not as Secretary of State, if I may ask?
I don't think he's as qualified as Tulsi Gabbard.
He's a great guy.
I just don't think he has the makeup to do it.
But why Tulsi Gabbard, then?
Because she is such a calming person, very firm, yet very calming.
She has all the qualities that somebody would be very diplomatic in a Secretary of State.
I know she just recently joined the Republican Party, a former Democrat, turned independent and then Republican like myself.
But she also has, I don't know, I heard something a while ago about her being trying to start a family.
I don't know if that's the reason.
I also thought that it is Trump's first term that she did not accept a position that was offered to her.
But I'm hoping that something comes up with her.
And I think there's a lot of people that think like me.
Senator Rubio serving on the Foreign Relations Committee.
Again, that's part of the process of in these days following an election, seeing what names emerge when it comes to future positions in administration, on a cabinet.
Again, some of these names already being revealed.
You've heard and mentioned some of them.
You can keep on the phone lines if you wish and mention more of what you think about these choices.
Text us if you wish, post on our social media sites there as well.
Pete's up next in Massachusetts, Democrats line.
Yeah, hey there.
Yeah, I think the whole thing's a clown show, which you would expect nothing different from this, you know, from all this.
I think Stephen Miller is one of the most dangerous people to ever walk the face of this earth.
And him being Jewish in the way he acts is just reprehensible.
He reminds me of Joseph Goebbels in the 1940s.
I'm waiting for Rudy Giuliani to get up a position.
And maybe now that he's out of jail, they'll put Steve Bannon somewhere.
So, you know, the clown show is going to continue, but elections have consequences, unfortunately.
Wayne is in Pennsylvania, Independent Line.
Hi.
Hi, good morning.
Morning, go ahead.
I just want to say that I think JFKs do the best pick for the nutritional thing going on there.
I mean, these fruits and stuff, they're producing have a one-year shelf life.
My wife goes grocery shop, and I brought a granola bar and a pack of orange peanut butter crackers to work the other day.
Adrian Gernola Bar flipped the tab open and read that it was bioengineered.
So by lunchtime, I opened up the peanut butter crackers and they're bioengineered.
We can't produce enough food in this country to feed people.
I mean, why is everything bioengineered?
You're changing our DNA and everything else.
But I think it's a good thing that they're going with qualifications this time instead of, and I'm not saying this to be rude.
If you're black or gay or transgender, then you can be head of the Department of Transportation.
They're actually going with your qualifications, not your gender.
Why do you think then RFK Jr. is qualified?
Well, everything I've been listening to him say, he wants to fix the food problem.
In Europe, fruit loops, Pop-Tarts, Rich Crackers, there are so many different foods all over Europe that are banned.
But they're forced feeding these down our throats, our children.
It just can't be healthy.
Now, I'm no scientist, but from everything I've been reading and gathering, it can't be no good for you.
Anthony, up next.
Anthony's in New Jersey, Democrats line.
Yeah, you know, real quick on this JFK, I mean, this guy is a part of the clown car.
These people don't understand that we're not being forced to buy these foods.
We make decisions.
And, you know, that's what says it.
About Trump and all these pics and everything, I just think that people are, I don't know, the American people understand what happens after an election, which we're getting ready to find out now.
And how does the current president or anybody else let a man with all these convictions and everything he's done wrong that's been factually proven?
How is he just going to walk in Joe Biden?
I'm going to welcome him in.
But specifically, to go back to the pics, then what are wrong with the pics in your mind specifically?
Well, you know, like, like, like, well, for one, they're all extremists, it seems.
I hear all the people talking about the good things about Mark Rubio and the other guy that served well, you know.
But when Trump does this, he wants to take out the recess picks now.
I mean, it's just inevitable.
And I just can't understand how we're letting this man just walk in the White House and control this country when 80% of Americans go against the abortion rule.
80% of Americans and these couple of guys are telling us what to do.
And now our democracy is at risk.
I just sit here and I watch every day.
I'm heartbroken.
You know, yesterday.
Okay, that's Anthony there in New Jersey.
President Biden expected to welcome President-elect Trump at the White House tomorrow as part of the transition process.
Also, tomorrow on Capitol Hill on the Senate side, elections for Senate Majority Leader, the next Senate Majority Leader, expected to take place.
And you'll see the results of them.
Recess appointments being one of those things will be key at front and center when it comes to the next leader.
We'll talk about that in our next hour with reporters who cover the House and the Senate.
And you can ask some questions about that too.
You can also talk about the selection so far when it comes to the President's team and the next Trump administration.
Let's go to Patricia.
Patricia in Missouri, Independent Line.
You're next up.
Hello.
Hello.
I just want to say, you know, We don't have to like each other or get along with each other, but people live on hate.
They want to hate somebody.
Trump that majority of his work is up in Mexican.
He ain't going to do a play golf.
Make money for him and his family.
So, caller, specifically, how does that reflect on the president's choices so far as far as his administration?
He's on your fire.
Every other week, somebody he's on fire.
It's a joke.
It's just a joke.
He's a joke.
It's just sad, you know?
Sharon is up next in Delaware.
Republican line.
Hi.
Yeah, good morning.
I would just like to ask everybody that's listening to your show this morning.
Number one, do they have amnesia?
We just went through four years of total chaos, not only within this country, but outside the Middle East.
Everybody, there's wars everywhere, open borders.
Tom Homan is the guy to put in there, and I am darn happy that he did that.
He is going to go in there and he's going to clean house.
And the first thing that I hope Tom Homan does is get those border agents that were accused of whipping the migrants coming through, you know, coming over the border that were falsely accused of whipping them.
They never got an apology from the White House.
As far as I know, they're still on death duty.
So that, to me, is underhanded.
And everybody's like, oh, Trump's a convicted felon.
Everything was fairly good under Trump.
And as soon as the Biden administration came in, everything just started going downhill.
So if everybody was happy with that, then number one, the Democrats, number one this time, wouldn't have voted for Trump.
Neither would Independents.
So if I may ask, you living in Delaware, you mentioned Tom Holman.
Why immigration a top issue there as far as not only concerns for you, but as far as the president's election of Tom Holman?
Because I know a school teacher in Dover, Delaware, that said roughly a month ago, there were 70 Haitian kids dropped off in their school.
Don't speak English.
And she said that they just dropped them off and said, no, you deal with them.
So the schools here in Delaware, too, are also overrun.
I'm in Middletown, Delaware, and I notice a big change just in the people because I shop a lot.
I go downtown and shop a lot.
And I notice, you know, everything's starting to get locked up.
Everything's behind glass.
There's a lot of theft down in Middletown.
We never had this.
We never had this issue.
And this is where Biden's from.
Now, of course, Kamala won Delaware.
I don't know how that's possible, but she did.
But it's just, you know, he's going to make some major changes.
Trump was already in office for four years, and he did a lot of good things for this country that he never got credit for.
All right.
Josh, in Illinois, you are next Democrats line on the president's choices so far as part of his team.
Josh, hello.
Hi, Oria.
Thanks, Pedro.
Just wanted to say the last caller was talking about the pick for Bornazar, Tom.
I forgot his last name.
Tom Holman.
Tom Holman, thank you.
So how can people, there's a quote that can be attributed.
I'm not sure to who, but, you know, it's easier to fool someone than to convince someone they've been fooled.
Tom Holman, you know, previously, Republican callers had called, said that Trump has nothing to do with Project 2025, and he doesn't know anything about it.
And he lied straight to their faces.
And I think the first person he appoints is Tom Holman, the number one contributor to immigration policy, the writer of Project 2025.
So which one is it, folks?
Do you guys not believe the liar that just lies to your face and then installed the person who writes Project 2025?
The other caller that was talking about Rubio being a good person, look up Rubio's voting records.
He was the one that signed in asylum protection for Venezuelans prior to the Biden administration coming in.
So he's the one that allowed all these asylum seekers to stay in the country, get paid, receive checks.
That's your boy Rubio.
And then the last thing I want to say is for all these NAGA business owners that voted for Trump and Project 2025 policies, I'm going to be making sure that you all use E-Verify and that all your employees are U.S. citizens.
This is what you voted for.
If you don't use citizens, I believe the reason is great.
Okay.
And you're.
Okay.
Thank you.
Okay.
That's Josh there in Illinois.
USA Today follows up with a profile of Tom Holman saying he served 34 years with the Border Patrol before becoming acting director of ICE during the first two years of President Trump's first term.
He was the first rank and file agent to lead the agency that oversees the immigration enforcement.
As he told the Republican National Convention in July, he served under six presidents of both parties, starting with Ronald Reagan.
But while they all promised to improve border security, Holman said Trump was the only one who actually did it.
Quote, guess what?
He's going to do it again, he said.
The story from USA Today adding that deportations were higher during the Obama administration than during the Trump administration.
That's according to Department of Homeland Security figures.
That's Tom Holman, the future of Elon Musk.
The question as far as what role he'll serve in an administration, that was former President Trump, even as early as last month before the election, talking about the role Musk might play in a future Trump administration at the time.
Here's part of that conversation.
I'm going to have Elon Musk.
He is dying to do this.
You know, he's a great business guy, actually.
You think of him for science and rockets, and every time I think he's telling me about a new screw was developed, he's developed a new screw.
Screws are difficult, and it's made out of titanium, and it's so exciting.
But you know what?
He's a great business guy, and he's a great cost cutter.
You've seen that.
And he said, I could cut costs without affecting anybody.
So he will be in the cabinet.
Not in the cabinet.
He doesn't want to be in the cabin.
He just wants to be in charge of cost cutting.
We'll have a new position, secretary of cost cutting.
Okay.
Elon wants to do that.
And we have incredible people.
He's running a big business.
You know, he can't just say, oh, I think I'll go into the cabinet.
You know, other people can.
He can't.
But Elon's a little bit different in that sense.
And besides that, I want him to send the rocket up to Mars.
He said, he's made me a promise.
He'll get to Mars before the end of my administration, which will be long before, hopefully, China or Russia.
I created a Space Force.
First time that's been done since the Air Force.
Air Force was the last.
It was 81 years ago.
And I did Space Force.
And when Biden heard, oh, he laughed.
He thought it was so funny.
He didn't understand.
And he tried to end it.
And the military went down on him.
You wouldn't believe it.
It's now going to be one of our most important things.
We were getting killed in space by China and by Russia.
Let's hear from Stephanie.
Stephanie's in Staten Island, Independent Line.
Good morning.
I'm very happy about the pick of RFK, and I'm looking forward to him cleaning house in the FDA.
He's been one of the few who has consistently spoken up about the additives in our food.
And there's just so much corruption in the FDA.
We're only one of two countries in the world that allows pharmaceutical companies to advertise on TV, with New Zealand only being the other.
And there's so many things that are in our food.
I mean, flip over a box of Chips of Hoyer goldfish.
There's words that say that they're bioengineered and it's not real food.
If you go to Europe, there's warning labels on our food, on American imported food that say the effects of the food, which include artificial dyes and colors.
I hope he cleans house because the FDA doesn't have Americans' best interests at heart.
And the proof is when you go into a grocery store, flip over, read the ingredient list.
Even the food back in the 70s and 80s, if you look at the ingredients list, the ingredients were much more simplistic.
And over time, they've just been corrupted.
I mean, natural flavors are not natural.
And I'm really looking forward to RFK getting Americans healthy again.
Thank you.
Buffalo, New York, Republican line.
This is Joe.
Hi, just would like to talk about Michael Rubio, Elon Musk.
These are all people that disagreed with him and backstabbed him.
I'm not saying I agree with Trump, but how can you trust a politician that one day is for you or against you, and then the next day they're for you?
I just can't trust these politicians.
That's all I want to say.
Thank you.
James in Florida, Democrats line.
Hi.
Hi, good morning.
Thank you for having me.
Again, the last caller.
How can we trust these politicians?
This is the beginning of the end of this republic.
I am so upset on the outcome.
We have a felon that has been elected to office compared to a female.
That tells you the deviant behavior of our society.
Well, those are all things we've talked about over the last few days.
What about the selection so far, as far as the administration or the next administration is concerned?
The next administration is going to be a clown show.
And let me tell you, I am excited.
I am excited to see this unravel.
And all of those who voted for the felon, I am excited to see what's going to be the outcome.
Thank you.
Why do you think it's going to unravel?
Oh, the Republic is unraveling this.
Well, specifically, as far as these choices are concerned, why do you think it's going to unravel?
Okay, so the choices that he's making at the Good Old Boy Club, his friends, all of his foes and friends, and everybody.
Look, this country, we need to stay, stick together, the Republicans, the Republicans, and the Democrats.
That's the only way we can have sound, good things done for the average person in this country.
The division is bad.
Rome divided and fall.
Unfortunately, our Republican is going to be divided and it's going to fall.
Okay.
Okay, that's James there in Florida.
A couple events to tell you about to watch out for on the network today.
The House and the Senate both back.
You can watch them respectively on our main channels, C-SPAN 1 and C-SPAN 2, as they start up business again.
Later on today, Federal Reserve Chairboard Governor Christopher Waller will talk about monetary policy at the Clearinghouse 2024 annual conference.
Perhaps discussions of the election and what goes forward when it comes to the Federal Reserve will come up.
You can see that on C-SPAN 2, our app, our free video app, C-SPAN Now.
And then you can also follow along at C-SPAN.org if you wish.
Also, later on today, right after this program, the House Republican Leadership Press Conference featuring House Speaker Mike Johnson and others, again, talking not only about the business of government, but also the previous election, what it means for next year.
C-SPAN, the main channel, right after this program, if you want to stick around and watch it, always available on the app and the.org too, if you wish.
Let's go to John.
John's in Maryland, independent line on the picks of President-elect Trump so far and how you would grade those or rate those.
John, hello.
Good morning.
I think these selections are exciting.
They're all strong leaders.
And one commonality they have is they're not pushovers.
They will fight and they will protect President Trump's agenda, make our country stronger and safer.
Democrats, stop crying.
Okay, you had a week to change this election.
You did not vote.
Get out there and vote in Chicago.
Well, Caller, you said, well, back to the choices.
You said they weren't pushovers.
What exactly does that mean to you?
They're not, you know, at the first instance of something wrong goes wrong, they're not going to sit there and cry about it.
I think they're going to work around it.
They're going to work to accomplish the mission.
That's what I'm looking at.
With Tom Holman, I think Marco Rubio is going to be an excellent choice for Secretary of State.
He's going to bring something, a new dimension to our diplomacy internationally.
How so?
And I just think he's got the ability to do it.
I mean, Nikki Haley didn't have any experience, but she did well in foreign policy.
And I think so will Marco Rubio.
And also at the same time, President Trump is right about Elon Musk.
He's a cost cutter.
And he's going to lead the agency, the new agency of government efficiency.
And he's going to get rid of people who don't want to work who are in government jobs and promoted themselves during the last two administrations.
Okay.
Let's hear from Carolyn.
Carolyn's in the North Carolina Democrats line.
Good morning, America.
The choices that Trump is choosing in the White House, it really doesn't matter who he chooses because these people will have no voice.
They will have no power.
The only person that has power in the White House when he goes in there is Donald Trump.
And if they don't do exactly what he wants, then they won't be there.
So what Donald Trump has is unlimited power.
He doesn't even have a balance of power because there's nobody that's going to tell him that he can't do anything.
Well, don't you think that any cabinet choice of any president would instinctively want to do what the president wants, no matter what party?
No, you have to have a balance.
I don't think you should have yes people.
People should be individuals.
That's what this country was founded on.
That they should be able to voice their opinion and someone would listen.
Trump has proven that he does not listen.
He won the 2024.
He lost to 2020.
And he ran a whole thing on lies and they backed him.
So they have no voice.
If you're not a yes man for Trump, you will not be in there at all.
Okay.
So the picks don't matter.
Okay.
Alabama's next.
That's where Tim is.
Republican line.
Hi, Tim.
Yes.
Pedro, I just want to say, Louis, is that we've had the opportunity of voting, and there was an agenda that was voted on, and it happened along in the line.
Donald J. Trump.
These people that are taking, we have, you know, there has to be an agreement.
So people that are agreed with him are going to carry out his policies as essential for government.
So what I desire is that we're just government.
I don't think the American people at any given point has ever worked control.
So these people that are filling these offices are going to be in agreement with the president.
And that's what's necessary.
If you're not agreeing, you can't walk together.
So I'm so thankful that we've had the opportunity to devote.
Now then it's up to the American people to steal and let's just watch.
And I can tell you what you can do in four years from now if you don't know what takes place.
Okay.
Okay.
Tim, there in Alabama.
One more call.
This will be from Debbie in Pennsylvania, Independent Line.
Good morning.
Good morning, Pedro.
How are you?
Fine, thank you.
First thing I'd like to say is Senator Schumer is watching.
He needs to let McCormick in the orientation.
I mean, guys, we have got to put the past in the past.
It's ridiculous.
It is so ridiculous.
I understand people don't like Trump.
I don't like him sometimes, but his policies work.
His cabinet that he's picking, they are strong.
When they know they're right and they stand behind the Constitution, you're going to get that bullfight.
And that's what we need.
What convinces you of that, that the cabinet picks are strong and the things that you said?
They run constitutionally.
The problem I had with the Democratic Party from the last four years is they word it.
It's kind of like the Bible.
You know how you go to one church and it's interpreted one way.
And you go to another church, it's interpreted that way.
That's what they're doing with the Constitution, just like what they did with Biden.
Okay.
That's Debbie there.
And last call for this hour.
Thank you to all who participated, to the House and the Senate back this week.
Lots going on, not only when it comes to the day-to-day business, but preparing for a new administration.
Two guests joining us to talk about that.
We'll be joined by the Hills Emily Brooks and Stephen Newcomb of Axios for that conversation.
That'll be up next.
Later on in the program, we'll talk with White House reporter for Real Clear Politics Philip Wegman.
He'll talk about the Heritage Foundation, the potential influence of Project 2025 in the incoming Trump administration.
Those conversations coming up when Washington Journal continues.
sound from yesterday's for Veterans Day Memorial.
I've said it many times before.
I got in trouble for saying I was a young Senator.
I said, we have many obligations, but only one truly sacred obligation, sacred, to prepare those we send into harm's way and to care for them and their families when they return home and when they don't.
It's an obligation, not based on party or politics, but on a promise that unites us all.
And today, as we strive on to finish the work of our moment, to bind the nation's wounds once again, we commit and recommit to this sacred vow.
This is the last time I will stand here at Arlington as Commander-in-Chief.
It's been the greatest honor of my life to lead you, to serve you, to care for you, to defend you, just as you defended us, generation after generation after generation.
You are the greatest fighting force, and this is not hyperbole, the finest fighting force in the history of the world.
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Washington Journal continues.
The House and Senate back to work this week and joining us to talk about not only the day-to-day stuff, but also what to expect in a new administration is Emily Brooks of the Hill.
She reports on the House.
Here joining us in studio, we're expected to be joined by Stephen Newcomb of Axios, who covers the Senate in just a bit.
But Emily Brooks, welcome to the program.
Welcome back.
Thank you so much.
You wrote, or at least as of yesterday, the Hill said that when it comes to the House, at least in your mind, there's a determination of who controls it.
What's the latest?
Yes, so Decision Desk HQ is our race caller that the Hill partners with.
And last night they did call 219 races, which gives Republicans the majority in the House.
So the AP is a little bit behind.
Different race callers are a little bit different.
But the bottom line is Republicans are on track to have a very slim majority again in the House.
What this means is that Trump and Republicans will have a trifecta control of government.
That means that they can push through maybe some things that they are working on, hoping to get through and sign to his desk relatively quickly.
Speaker Johnson has been working for months on these priorities that he is hoping to push through Congress with total control of government.
And so that I think is going to be the major focus when the new year comes.
And one of those priorities, at least the things that you reported on recently, was the future of the Trump tax cuts from the previous Trump administration.
What faces the House now with this new majority as you see it?
Absolutely.
The Trump tax cuts, there are many provisions expiring at the end of 2025.
So Republicans would like to make this permanent or extend them.
That's a major priority.
Will it look exactly the same?
Maybe not quite.
There has been discussion about the state and local tax deduction, which Republicans from high-tax states don't really like how there's a cap on that, whether that is adjusted.
The biggest thing to know about that is that Republicans have been talking with Republicans in the Senate about using the reconciliation budget process to bypass the filibuster and get their economic agenda through without having to have that 60-vote threshold, which means they don't need to have Democrat support.
So they're going to try and pack as much as they can to address their policy priorities, not only on taxes, but they've also been talking about the border and border funding.
Speaker Johnson has said in one speech, addressing border through the tax code.
What that exactly looks like, we're not sure yet, but legislation is being drafted for that.
One of the couple other things that you highlight in a recent story, the future of some of those parts of the Inflation Reduction Act.
Yes, certainly there are many parts of the Inflation Reduction Act, which, of course, Democrats pushed through through the budget reconciliation process.
So the Republicans are sort of answering that move, but they would like to repeal some of that, namely a lot of the climate initiatives that were in that.
However, with Republicans having a slim majority, it is a question about how many of those climate initiatives and tax credits that do get criticism from Republicans that they will actually be able to repeal, because there are many Republicans in more competitive seats who look at those climate initiatives and tax credits and say that it's good for their districts.
And they even signed a letter to Speaker Johnson saying, please keep those in place.
So depending on which ones are targeted, how much they can repeal, there's also money that's already been distributed from those climate initiatives.
So it remains a question about how big those clawbacks would be.
And then finally, though, taking a look at education priorities to your story, school choice, the future of that, and also taking a look at higher education aspects there.
Yes, higher education was certainly a major focus of Republicans over the past year, especially in the aftermath of the war in Israel and Gaza, concerns about anti-Semitism on campus.
There was that very viral moment with Elise Stefanik challenging the university presidents on their speech codes.
So continuing to press university presidents on their speech codes, opening up to the conservative viewpoints, things like that that we've heard a lot from Republicans.
But also, you know, they've been talking about school choice.
And Speaker Johnson has also talked about using the tax code to influence school choice and kind of promote that idea.
There has been one bill that made it through the House Ways and Means Committee, which would essentially have, I think, tax credits for scholarships to fund K-12 education.
So that is probably a bill to look at in a way that how House Republicans would want to support school choice.
Let's weave in Stephen Newcomb from Axios in the conversation who covers on Congress.
Mr. Newcomb, good morning to you.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Thanks for having me.
The Senate takes a look at who its future leader will be.
Give us the latest.
Yeah, we're going to get an election tomorrow.
We should know who the next leader is going to be.
It's a three-man race.
It's Rick Scott.
It's John Cornyn, and it's John Thune.
Now, if you listen to the GOP Insiders, sort of the way that the race has played itself out over the last few months, John Thune, who is sort of a disciple of Mitch McConnell, somebody who has learned from him over the last few years, a lot of folks will say John Thune has the inside track to be the next leader.
But there's been a lot of at least public momentum, especially in the media.
You're talking about X, formerly Twitter.
A lot of Trump allies who have come out to endorse Rick Scott, who, for all intents and purposes, is to the right of John Thune on a number of issues.
And John Thune and Donald Trump have had a strained relationship in the past.
And I think the wild card here and the thing that viewers need to remember about this race and about this election is that it's a secret ballot.
So the public pressure only matters so much because at the end of the day, the people who are trying to pressure folks to vote one way or another will never really know how one of the senators voted.
Our guests joining us for a conversation of the future in the House and the Senate.
And if you want to ask them questions, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans.
And Independents, 202-748-8002.
If you want to text us your questions, 202-748-8003 is how you do that.
Mr. Newcomb, one of the things the future leader will have to deal with, at least in reporting of the last few days, is something called recess appointments and how the president wants to use them.
Can you tell our viewers what that is and how it works?
Yeah, so President-elect Trump has publicly called on the next Republican leader of the Senate to allow him to make recess appointments.
The way that works is essentially when Congress leaves to go on recess, the president wants the president-elect wants the ability to make cabinet appointments and appointments to his administration with Congress out of town, giving them hamstringing them from the ability to stop that nomination from happening.
Right now, the way that the Senate works, it specifically does pro forma sessions, pro forma meaning no business is conducted, but it is a floor day with the Senate open.
They specifically do that to prevent against recess appointments.
That's the way that the Senate is structured.
It will be an overall of the way the chamber has worked for the last few decades.
But that's the power that President-elect Trump wants.
Emily Brooks, one of the things that now Mike Johnson, not only with a new coalition, but as far as future speakership, how does he currently stand amongst the Republicans and how do you think that might change next year?
Yes, of course, Mike Johnson will have the same problems as he has now, where a slim majority means that only a handful of detractors can block his agenda, or if it's only Republican votes that are going to get on a piece of legislation, they can block that.
And also potentially threaten his speakership.
I mean, the speaker will be nominated in the internal House Republican leadership activities on Wednesday tomorrow.
But he actually has to get a majority on the House floor, which means almost unanimous support from Republicans.
And of course, we saw with Kevin McCarthy, that wasn't so easy.
So will he have trouble getting that?
That's why the exact final numbers of what the House majority is will matter.
Speaker Johnson has faced one attempt to oust him from the speakership, led by Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massey, and Paul Gosar of Arizona.
Unclear where they stand right now.
Massey has said in the past that there is no way he is voting for Speaker Johnson on the floor.
But there are also ways, as we saw previously with Democrats who did not vote for Speaker Pelosi to be Speaker, where they can vote present and not necessarily affect the outcome.
There is not a technical challenger to Mike Johnson yet.
Yet, if there will be, we'll see.
The deadline to challenge him on the internal House Republican election is noon today.
So we will know soon if that is something that's going to be serious or this will still, even if there's not, get dragged out through January 3rd.
Both of our guests joining us.
And again, if you want to ask some questions, you can call the phone lines.
Let's hear from Thomas, Thomas, and Maryland Democrats line for our guests.
Thomas, go ahead.
Yes, first single good morning.
And I'd like to Ask your guests, what is their background to be in this position?
Because I don't see any people of color working for Axios or for the Hill.
I mean, if you have them, you have them, but we don't see them on TV.
And this seems to be a problem for me in a way the votes are going to go down because we say that Trump got an X amount of people of color's votes that helped him get over the top, but we don't see anybody of color even getting to speak on anything.
Okay.
Okay, Thomas there.
We'll leave it to there.
And Joanne in Virginia, Republican line, good morning.
Joanne, Republican line, Virginia, hello.
Hi.
Hi there.
Thank you so much for taking my call.
So I would just like to ask the guests about the procedure in the Senate for selecting its leader.
Why is it secret?
Why can't we change that?
This is a democracy.
It should not be secret.
Okay, Joanne there with the Senate question.
So we'll go to Stephen Newcomb.
Hello.
Yeah, I think that the reasoning behind it being a secret ballot is to insulate lawmakers from these pressure campaigns.
You know, we have seen it pretty pretty significant campaign from right-wing media at this point.
I mean, we're talking about folks like Tucker Carlson and Elon Musk, who have come out in support of Rick Scott for majority leader.
And not to say that they can make endorsements all they want, and I'm sure that their endorsements do matter and will sway some lawmakers one way or another.
But at the end of the day, I think that they want the conference and lawmakers to be insulated from that outside pressure to be able to make a pretty sober and realistic choice about who they think is the best person to be the next majority leader.
And Emily Burks, you talked about the House process of how it chooses a leader.
With that slim majority, how many of the House Freedom Caucus members are still perhaps going to push back against the current slate of proposals, not only by the president-elect, but also by Mike Johnson himself?
And what does that mean for Mike Johnson as he leads, should he become the next state as Senate House Speaker?
That is to be determined.
I will say that the House Freedom Caucus has been a little bit eerily quiet.
They did have new member orientation last week, and lawmakers are returning to Congress today.
So I think we're going to hear a lot more from them.
But of course, members of the Freedom Caucus in general are overwhelmingly supportive of President-elect Trump and the Trump administration.
And so there might be some hesitation to necessarily show Republicans pushing back on him and his agenda in the new majority, especially when you have momentum for certain things.
However, on the point of the secret ballots, on the Republican side, at least in the House, the internal nominations are also a secret ballot.
And that is one reason why the speaker election is so interesting, because everybody is on record on the House floor saying who they voted for and why it also makes it difficult for Speaker Johnson.
Here's Linda in Ohio, Democrats line.
Linda in Ohio, hello.
Hello, yes.
Okay, so my opinion on whether on, okay, so we know that the Senate is going to be a majority.
It's Republican, and possibly the House is going to be all Republican also.
So It doesn't really matter because in my opinion, Trump is going to do whatever he wants to do anyway.
His agenda is going to be whatever his agenda wants to be.
He is not going to, in my opinion, because of the dictator that he wants to be from day one, in my opinion, it doesn't matter what if Congress leans Republican or it leans Democratic, because in my opinion, again, I'm sorry, but it is my opinion, Trump is just going to do whatever he's going to want to do.
And the people that he's going to have around him, they are the ones that are going to dictate to him, not Congress or not the American people.
Okay, that's Linda in Ohio.
Emily Brooks, is there a rubber stamp then should the House turn Republican for the president-elect?
Well, Linda has a good point.
There is a lot of stuff that Trump is going to do by executive order, bypassing Congress, not having to wait for consensus enough to get past the Senate filibuster.
There are certain things, though, that he will need Congress to do, especially if he wants to preserve things into the future, preserve his legacy, cement those in law, which is one reason why the tax cuts, making those permanent, are a top priority for Republicans and using that vehicle to bypass the Senate filibuster and not have to get agreement from Democrats on those things.
So that's another reason why.
But it will also be interesting to see how much Trump does bend Congress to his will if there are going to be people such as in his first term who are not necessarily rubber stamping what he wants to do.
If you recall in 2017, there was this agreement about repealing Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act.
So we'll have to keep an eye on that.
Stephen Newcomb, same question to you.
Yeah, I think what's interesting and what you need to keep an eye on, which Emily talked about, is how much Trump sort of bends Congress to his will because there are things that, for better or for worse, have to go through the legislative process to get done, like the tax cuts.
And over the next four years, there'll be a myriad of things, including government funding, a number of things that just absolutely have to go through Congress.
And we've already seen him with the recess appointments try to put pressure on whoever the next Republican leader in the Senate's going to be to allow him to sort of take that extraordinary step to sort of fast track his administration to being confirmed.
And then also in the Senate, it's a question of the filibuster, right?
Like, does President Trump put pressure on whoever the next Republican leader is to get rid of the filibuster?
Yes, we're tracking for probably a 53-47 split in the Senate, given what is going on in Pennsylvania right now.
We know that there's some moderate Republicans in the Senate Republican conference like Susan Collins or Lisa Murkowski who might not be on board with some Trump priorities and could stand in the way of those not getting through Congress.
So there are dynamics on Capitol Hill that could stop his agenda from getting done over the next two and four years.
Joe is on our line for Republicans.
He's in Missouri.
Joe, hello, thanks for calling.
Okay, thank you.
My thing is, are there still votes being counted in some state?
And this is what makes us suspicious of a fair election.
This is a week later and the votes are still not counted.
Stephen Newcomb, the Senate Arizona race now being determined as of yesterday, no more counts as far as the Senate, but as far as the speed, were there concerns that you heard about not only on the Hill, but the process?
I mean, I think people in general are frustrated with how long this process takes.
I think it's more egregious and takes longer in specific states.
But yes, they are still counting votes.
And the reason that some of these, a lot of these races are called, a majority of these races are called.
And it's different on the House side.
And Emily can talk about that, how there's still some races outstanding.
But the margins in a lot of these states are just so great that no matter how the outstanding vote breaks, it's exceedingly unlikely that the candidate who is losing will overtake the candidate who is winning.
And that's what makes the news organizations comfortable calling those races.
Like Stephen said, it's different in the House as far as the counting process is concerned.
Yeah, in the House, the bulk of the seats that we're still waiting for are in California.
And this is where these state-by-state rules and regulations really come into play because California, they accept mail-in ballots up until a week after Election Day.
So today is actually the last day.
If ballots still come in and they're mailed in, they're going to be counted.
Other states, your ballot has to arrive by Election Day.
So it depends.
And then there's the question of: are you allowed to open the ballots and process them before actually putting them in the machine on Election Day?
Or do you have to wait until polls close to open the ballots?
A lot of things like that really factor into it.
Some internal things on both bodies in the House side.
Now that Elise Stefanik is to have to go to the United Nations, what happens to her seat in Congress, but also the leadership positions that she holds?
Yes, I think the leadership position is a scramble is on.
Many Republicans already jumping into the race.
I mean, it is tomorrow that leadership elections are in the House.
So we have Lisa McClain of Michigan.
She's currently a lower-ranked leadership position as conference secretary.
We have people like Blake Moore of Utah.
He's also vice chair.
He is potentially looking at it.
There are already four people.
Kat Kamack in Florida is looking at it, and Aaron Houchin in Indiana, freshman Republican.
This is a position that is focused on communication for the conference.
So the chair is tasked with organizing communication at the press conferences every week when they happen for the press and also technically presiding over the conference internal meetings is what the conference chair does.
Traditionally, this role in the Republican side has usually been filled by a woman.
It's sort of one of the roles that traditionally has a woman for the last many years.
So there's a scramble for that.
But then, of course, with Elise Stefanik leaving Congress after she is confirmed, that could be difficult for Republicans with their margins in the House.
In New York State, the special elections, I think around two and a half months is when the special election would be.
So that's the amount of time that that seat would be vacant.
And Stephen Newcomb, on the Senate side, there were questions about whether the senator-elect from Pennsylvania should participate in events on Capitol Hill.
Can you tell our viewers about that?
Yeah, there was a question over the weekend, really, about whether Dave McCormick, who is the senator-elect from Pennsylvania, has defeated the incumbent Bob Casey.
I think AP has called the race.
Other news organizations haven't.
There's a lot of outstanding votes there, over 100,000 of them.
The race is sort of within 0.5%, which is an automatic recount in Pennsylvania.
So it's still a close race, but AP has called the race for Dave McCormick.
And Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, was not allowing McCormick or Ruben Gallego, who is the senator-elect in Arizona, at least over the weekend.
He had not invited them to the new member orientation, which is going to happen today in Washington.
He's changed his mind.
They've invited both Ruben Gallego and Dave McCormick to the orientation today.
Stephen Newcomb of Axios joining us for this conversation, as well as Emily Brooks of The Hill.
Let's hear from Richard, Richard in Illinois, Independent Line.
Hi.
Hello, my name is Richard.
My main concern is the educational issue.
I have three grandchildren.
Speaker of the House Johnson is known to be a young earth creationist.
And here we have Ken Hamm, who's a foreign national, an Australian, with his arc and his creation museum, which is a major educational effort in this country.
Now, the education, I have no problem.
I don't understand what the Department of Education, what the ramifications of eliminating it will be one way or the other.
But my idea for my local school district is they have this centralized school and all the buses are going.
I think they should condemn certain schools and decentralize the school system so that children in those areas can walk to school and then they can use the centralized facility for bigger events, you know, research or things like that.
So many of these ideas.
Yeah.
Okay, Richard there in Illinois.
Emily Brooks, you talked about education policy and what expected in the House.
But Stephen Newcomb, let me ask you, will education policy, you think, be a thing in the Senate by any means, depending on what the president-elect is expected to do when it comes to the Department of Education or policy overall?
I think a lot of that is going to be decided at the executive level, given the power of the president.
I think that they're not just at the Department of Education, but I think across all federal agencies, you're going to see obviously new faces come into power.
And I think you're going to see a drawback and a shake-up of sort of the power of the federal government and the way that those agencies are administering everything that they are responsible for.
And then I think on the legislative side, yeah, I mean, it might be on the list of things that are, you know, that need to get done or they want to get done over the next two years in this Congress.
But as Emily has alluded to, the first, second, and third thing is the tax fight that's going to come to Washington through this next year.
That is the biggest thing facing lawmakers, really the biggest thing facing the president.
This is a generational opportunity for Republicans to rewrite the tax code and change how the U.S. government spends its money and raises its money.
Thanks for the segue, because I want to ask you both about this term that we've heard, at least in reporting budget reconciliation and what it means to the future of these things you talked about, Stephen Newcomb.
What does it mean for the Senate?
Yeah, it just allows lawmakers to bypass the need to get to 60 votes.
I mean, it allows you to get past the filibuster, which is obviously the largest hurdle in the Senate.
And you need both majorities in both chambers.
So House Republicans are playing around with their majority at this point.
And I think Emily has talked about the need for a larger margin.
Yeah, like the fact that that could be a two to three seat majority could make reconciliation a really tough lift for both chambers at this point.
Emily Brooks, you take it from there.
Yeah, I think that this is something that Speaker Johnson has been working on for months.
He's been going to the Senate, talking to the Senate leaders, whoever is going to be the leader of the Senate Republican conference about this idea.
He's talked about it on the campaign trail.
He has spoken to Trump about it, to use this reconciliation opportunity.
And the thing is important to know about reconciliation is that you can't just do it all of the time.
It's like a once, maybe twice type of thing where you can do it.
There's questions about how much you can stuff in there.
Will the Senate parliamentarian accept that?
How much can they do on the border and include that with their tax policy package?
Can they only send money or can they, you know, do another other adjustments?
Is that going to get shot down?
There's a lot of questions about how much they can put in there.
They have very big ambitions.
But also, you know, you have the Republican Conference in the House, which is, as we've seen over the last two years, very, very dramatic, fractious, will hold up legislative activity when they don't get what they want.
Will they do that for something this important and this big that is supposed to be a big, major package in Trump's first 100 days?
We'll see.
Let's go to Sharon in New Jersey.
Democrats line, you're on with our guests.
Sharon, hello.
Thank you for taking my call.
My question is: I have 29 out of 40 people who voted and their votes are not showing.
What is the discrepancy in the non-votes that are being called?
My granddaughter voted for the first time.
She's away to college.
She wanted her vote to be counted in Pennsylvania.
She's sent in her ballot on time.
Yet she's showing as non-vote and several of other friends of mine and beyond.
Well, let's take that to see how both bodies, at least Democrats and both bodies, are dealing with this idea of accuracy of the election.
Any expression of concern from Democrats on the House side?
You know, we haven't really seen a lot of expressions of concern from Democrats on the House side.
And, you know, maybe it would be different if Trump was not winning the Electoral College vote.
That was something that we were on the lookout for, whether there would be Democrats who would raise concerns about him becoming president and then not having the Electoral College or not having the popular vote, but only having the Electoral College.
That is something that they raised concerns about when he was first elected in 2016.
But I think after January 6th, 2021, Republicans' whole stop the steal campaign and Trump's denying of election results.
Democrats campaigning on democracy and respecting election results are very reluctant to question the integrity of the election system this time around.
And frankly, just because across the country you have seen so much of a shift to the right in all different kinds of districts, Trump won every swing state.
It's not really as close and as much of a dynamic that would cause issue, really not much for them to raise issue about.
On the Senate side, Stephen Newcomb?
Yeah, same thing.
I think that Democrats, you know, especially given the fact that President-elect Trump won the popular vote, look, they got shellacked last week at the top of the ticket.
And I think that they are very conscious of, obviously, the stop the steal rhetoric that happened four years ago.
And I think that they are, at least the posture that I've gotten from the Democrats that I've talked to is that, yeah, they lost this election.
They lost it fair square.
And they have to go back to the drawing board to figure out how to win again in 2026 in the midterms.
Let me follow up on that.
Do you get a sense of soul searching within Democrats on the Senate, Stephen Newcomb?
I think that soul searching might be a bit exaggerated.
I mean, I think, obviously, look, the party is examining what happened, what went wrong, what they lost.
But also on the Senate side, there is an acknowledgement that, look, they outperformed Vice President Harris in every single swing state.
The Senate Democrats outperformed Vice President Harris.
Alyssa Slotkin is going to be the next Democratic senator from Michigan.
These are all states that Vice President Harris lost.
And I think there's a feeling within the Democratic Party, and we've seen it with the finger pointing that's already going on, there was a unique problem at the top of the ticket given Biden's unpopularity, given sort of the truncated campaign that Harris had to run.
It's a very unique dynamic at the top of the ticket.
So obviously, they need to figure out what went wrong, but I think Democrats are also weary of not throwing out what went right in some of those races.
Emily Brooks, then let me ask about Democrats in the House, and I'll use introspection instead of soul searching.
What's going on?
Yeah, certainly.
I think there's a lot of disappointment, of course.
But also, you know, Nancy Pelosi spoke to the New York Times last week, an interview that came out over the weekend, and she was talking about how there are also, as Stephen mentioned, a lot of Democrats in these swing districts who outperformed Harris at the top of the ticket.
Republicans are not significantly expanding their majority.
A lot of these races were in, for the House, a lot of the races that matter were in states that are not swing states.
And so perhaps Democrats were better positioned there.
So it's not necessarily a total, maybe not more a little bit looking at strategy.
There is certainly some soul searching.
There's always going to be when there's this big rebuke at the top of the ticket.
But certainly Democrats are not as depressed as you think they might be.
This is Ed.
Ed joins us from Maryland, Independent Line.
You're on with our guests.
Go ahead.
Yeah, thank you.
I'm wondering how much, how likely it is that the narrow possible majority of the GOP coming up in the House could affect renewing the 2017 tax cuts.
I think that cost $1.5 trillion or $1.8 trillion to the debt.
And then I think I read if they're going forward, if they renew that next year, it should add about $5.4 trillion to the debt.
And that doesn't count other cuts that they're planning on doing, which I think I'm reading CBO numbers that should add a total of about $10 trillion to the debt over the next 10 years, if the CBO is correct.
Thanks, Ed.
Well, certainly Republicans are looking at extending, making permanent those tax cuts from the 2017 bill.
And are they concerned about debt and deficits?
We hear all the time from Republicans that they are concerned about the debt and deficits, but history has shown us that when it comes to tax cuts, Republicans are not as concerned about that effect on the debt and deficit.
They said that it's a spending problem and that we should cut spending.
Republicans also argue that tax cuts will stimulate the economy, bring in new revenue.
Those details aside, there is a very big, going to be, I think, tension between Republicans in Washington about how much do you try and cut taxes and address a lot of these promises that Trump made on the campaign trail.
No taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime, Social Security tax questions.
Those all have significant impacts on revenue and on the debt.
On the other side, you have Republicans who all the time have held up government funding because there are not enough government, not enough programs being slashed to address spending in the way that they like.
So that tension is going to be something to keep an eye on.
Stephen Newcomb?
Yeah, and that the deepening of the deficits and the federal debt, when we're talking about how Democrats dig themselves out of sort of the hole that they found themselves in in Congress and at the presidential level, that's something that they will latch on to.
I mean, the idea that Republicans want to cut taxes, they'll argue that they want to cut taxes for the wealthy.
I think Trump has said publicly he wants to bring the corporate rate even further down.
That's a key messaging opportunity for Democrats.
And I think that that's what Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, over the next two years, they need to find opportunities like this.
You can't really stop the agenda from happening.
You can make it more painful.
You could slow it down.
You might be able to peel off a couple of Republican votes here and there.
But really, the challenge here is to message against this agenda and find a way to turn it on its head so that when November 2026 rolls around or when 2026 rolls around, you can reclaim your majority in both the House and the Senate.
And Milwaukee, we'll hear from Roger on our independent line.
Hi.
Hi, how are you this morning?
You bring up, I'd like to bring up two aspects, one on tariffs, one on resolving the tax problem in regards to our national debt.
The tax one for the tariffs, just quick.
Instead of having a 50 to 200% tariff that he's mentioned, whatever happened to the idea that America is the largest consumer market by far in the whole world?
And just like there's Costco and Sam's Club, why don't we have a membership for countries that want to do business in the United States and come up with a membership fee for those countries?
Now, that's putting that aside.
That's just out there for thought.
When it comes to the national debt, this would be what I consider a 10 to 15 year program.
And that is to go to a no-tax loophole tax system, of which you would have two exceptions.
One for medical.
The other one is if companies and rich individuals want to reduce their taxes, they can make a direct contribution to the national debt.
Okay.
So over time.
Roger there in Milwaukee.
Stephen Newcomb, let me take that and ask you this.
With the Senate turning over to Republican hands, who are going to be the people to watch when it comes to tax writing committees and the like?
Yeah, the tax committees.
You're looking at the finance committee.
Obviously, it starts at the top, right?
I mean, whoever is going to be the Republican leader in the Senate is going to have an enormous amount of sway and power over the direction of the conversation about tax policy and what that process looks like.
And then the top Republican on the finance committee, Mike Crapo, the top Democrat on that committee is Ron Wyden.
There were some things that went down at the end of this Congress before the election.
Sort of strained the relationship.
They had an agreement.
The House even passed this extension of the child tax credit and it included RD measures, research and development tax measures that overwhelmingly passed the House and then got sunk in the Senate and stood still.
And CRAPO essentially walked away from the table negotiating with Wyden on those measures.
So that relationship is a bit strained.
I think there's some bad blood left over.
There's going to be some bad blood that's left over from 2024 that carries over into the 2025 process.
And then there's other Republicans and Democrats in the Senate who are just, you know, folks who are sort of familiar with financial services and talking about Maggie Hassen on the Democratic side.
Obviously, there's some folks who are leaving, like Mitt Romney, who will no longer be in Congress.
But folks like that, we'll see who needs to take those places as Republicans who are influential in that conversation.
And Emily Brooks, on the House side, then, if all this is going forward with the tax cuts, the ones to watch when it comes to the Ways and Means Committee.
Yeah, Jason Smith is the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, relatively new chairman of this session.
And he has definitely been all over the place on tax issues, but he's going to be the main person to watch when writing this.
A big dynamic that he's had to deal with on the Republican side is the question of the state and local tax deduction.
Those Republicans from high-tax states like New York, California, who have been pushing him and Republican leaders to get rid of the cap or address it, adjust it so that their constituents can get some more tax relief.
How he handles that, especially with Trump coming out and saying perhaps we can do something on the salt deduction cap, which he signed into law.
Jason Smith has stayed relatively open to adjusting that a little bit.
Annie is next.
Annie in Florida, Democrats line.
Thanks for waving.
Go ahead.
Hello, good morning.
I just have a quick question, a couple quick questions about how they're picking the head for the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson.
I just feel as though I really don't feel very comfortable with him being the head of the House of Representatives.
Also, I just don't understand how I just wish the Democrats would have voted more.
But I don't see how any of these, the Senate, the Congress, or anything is going to work because there's too many chiefs and not enough Indians.
And there's too much ego.
And I really, really don't see much of anything getting done in the next two years.
Okay.
And I'm Annie in Florida.
Well, certainly no shortage of egos on Capitol Hill, that is for sure.
When it comes to the process for electing the Speaker of the House, how it works is tomorrow, Republicans will internally in their internal conference, this is returning members and incoming members, vote to nominate a speaker candidate.
That is only 50% threshold.
That is a secret ballot.
very likely going to be Mike Johnson, even if there is a last minute challenger from the Freedom Caucus or right wing or their allies.
The real thing to look at is January 3rd, the opening of the new Congress on the House floor.
The Speaker will have to get a majority, 50% of the people who vote for a candidate by surname, which means in a slim majority, all of the Democrats are almost certainly going to vote for Hakeem Jeffries for Speaker.
Democrats did save Mike Johnson earlier this year from an ouster threat that Marjorie Taylor Greene brought by tabling that measure.
Nobody really wanted to go through that chaos again.
But when it comes to the new Congress, I don't think there's any appetite to avoid making the Republicans look chaotic on the Democratic side.
So the question is, are there going to be a handful of people who vote for a different candidate?
There are, you know, the normal number that you want to look for is 218.
But if somebody is sick and can't be there that day, if somebody votes for president rather than for a candidate, that changes the numbers a little bit.
And so that adjusts, you know, maybe there can be a protest where somebody votes for president and it doesn't really affect the outcome, but they're able to log that.
We've seen that in the past with people who did not vote for Nancy Pelosi on the Democratic side.
But whether there is another speaker spite is something that we're keeping a close eye on.
Have not heard, don't have the whip count yet, but we also don't have the exact numbers for the House majority yet.
Stephen Newcomb, Vice President of Elect Vance, is still a senator.
Has he indicated his preference for the next speaker?
He hasn't.
I think that I think for Speaker, I mean, look, I don't think there's any other option than Mike Johnson at this point.
And then Vance hasn't really made an endorsement on the Senate majority leader side.
But I think when we're talking about egos, I mean, look, Washington is the wrong town if you don't like egos, but just the way that the Senate works, and I don't think this is an ego thing, but each individual senator is just individually more powerful than any individual House member.
I mean, when we go through the major legislative pushes that the Trump administration is going to want, there is going to be the opportunity for one or two lawmakers to say no and essentially stop the whole process.
And this really, you know, I think the spotlight falls on folks like Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, these more moderate Republicans who have voted with Democrats in the past.
Because of the way that the Senate works, they need, you know, at least you need 60 votes or unanimous consent to get most things done in the Senate.
If they say no, if they put their foot down, they could really cause a pretty significant disruption in the legislative plans of the Trump administration.
Stephen Newcomb, is there a sense that Senator Vance, when he becomes vice president, will be the ambassador to the Hill, so to speak, of the president in order to get his legislative priorities done?
I think that's certainly going to be part of his role, right?
But you also have to remember that JD Vance was not in the Senate for very long.
I think this is sort of the same dynamic that was facing Vice President Harris as well when we were talking about, you know, what were her Capitol Hill allies look like.
And the same thing for JD Vance.
Like he just hasn't been on Capitol Hill for a very long time.
His political career is still relatively new.
I mean, it's been a rocket ride to the top for Vance.
So I think also Trump has a lasting relationship with a lot of these folks in the Senate.
John Barroso, who's the number two, who's going to be the number two Republican in the Senate, is close to President-elect Trump.
So that relationship is going to be important.
And obviously, Mike Johnson and Trump have gotten acquainted over the last year.
Same sentiment, Emily Brooks, you think?
Yeah, I think that Speaker Johnson's relationship with Trump is key here.
He has talked often about how much he talks to him.
Trump has praised Speaker Johnson.
That is another key reason why he is very likely to remain as Speaker because of that relationship with Trump.
Of course, Trump has not officially endorsed Johnson to be Speaker.
But if there's anything that Congress is considering and trying to get a handle of where the administration stands, they're certainly going to go, I think, straight to Trump rather than Judy Bance.
From Texas, this is Carter, Republican line.
Yes.
Good morning.
Martin, you're on.
Yeah, so the question that I have, I've voted with the Republicans.
I've done it this time and I did it, you know, locally.
My thing is a lot of my friends are saying that Kamala Harris lost because of basically sexism was the driving force because it was a split as far as more men went to Trump more and about even as far as women is women went to Harris.
So I wanted to get your take on that.
Post-election analysis continues.
Emily Brooks, anything to offer?
Yeah, I think it's hard to quantify the impact of sexism right now.
Certainly it's something that is talked about.
When I was a campaign reporter in 2019 and 2020, I did even hear from Democratic voters that they were worried about choosing a woman to be the top of the ticket because of the impact of sexism.
And even some sexism from the voters themselves saying they're not sure if a woman would be best to lead the country at times.
That was a lot more rare.
But how you quantify that is pretty difficult when you're looking at the polling data, when you're looking at post-election data.
So I think we're still waiting for a bit of that to come in.
However, I think that there are a lot of other issues that Democrats would probably agree were more bigger, major factors, the unpopularity of President Biden and how long it took him to exit the race, the kind of assumption that a lot of Democrats had that he would not even seek a second term, and then he did.
And then there was not that opportunity for candidates to prove themselves in a primary.
I think those are all factors that Democrats are looking at, as well as sexism, but probably more.
Stephen Newcomb.
Yeah, I think that's right.
I think that the social issues, the misogyny that's sort of mixed in with, you know, I think any woman who would be a presidential candidate, whether it's on the Republican or Democratic side or an independent ticket, whoever it is, I think that that's certainly a concern and something we see when we have these elections.
But I also think Emily's right.
I mean, I talk to Democrats.
The number one thing, there's two things that they talk about mostly in the aftermath of the election.
It's yes, obviously Biden's unpopularity, but number two, inflation, the fact that they didn't find a message on inflation.
I mean, the message that they were sort of offering voters was a complete split from the reality that they see at the grocery store, right?
Or when they go to the gas pump.
And I think that that is one of the major things that the Democratic Party has to wrestle with and figure out what they did wrong on the economic messaging and how to get it right the next time around.
One more call.
This will be from West Virginia.
Patricia, Democrats line.
Hi.
Hi.
You're on with our guests.
Go ahead.
Okay.
I would like to ask either one or both of your guests this question.
Trump's pick for Secretary of State, Marco Rubio.
I would like to know how he plans to conduct business with China when he's been banned from traveling to China.
I mean, how is that going to be handled?
If he can't go to China, how can he, like Sullivan and Blanken, have traveled to China many times?
So how's Rubio going to conduct business with China when he's been banned from China?
Okay, that's Patricia in West Virginia.
Mr. Newcomb.
Yeah, I think that's a fair question.
And I don't really know the answer to it logistically how they're going to figure that out.
But I think in general, the posture toward China, I think, is going to be more aggressive.
I think it's going to be both economically and sort of diplomatically in the way that they sort of interact with each other.
I think it's going to be more just to have more edge to it.
This is one thing that Republicans have talked about throughout the entire Biden administration.
They thought that the Biden administration and Democrats were too soft on China.
So I would expect to see sort of a heating up of the way that we interact with sort of the country and their leaders.
But on the question of travel, I'm not sure how they'll work that out.
Maybe they'll figure something out now that he's going to be Secretary of State.
Mr. Newcomb, what should viewers be watching for over the next days and weeks when it comes to the Senate?
Well, we're going to see Senate Majority Leader election tomorrow.
We're going to figure out who is that that's the next big decision for Trump.
It's the next big domino to fall is who's going to be his top Republican in the Senate.
It's going to be a key partner for him.
And then on the Democratic side, until they relinquish power in early January, judges, judges, judges, Schumer and his leadership are in a sprint to confirm as many judicial confirmations as possible.
They have two this week.
They could get the process started on the third.
They are 21 short of the McConnell Trump number, 234.
They don't want to just match that number.
They want to go past it.
So if you're watching the Senate over the next few weeks, you're going to see a lot of judicial confirmations.
Emily Brooks, what's to watch for in the House?
Well, one thing that we have not talked about is the government funding deadline at the end of the year on December 20th, right before Christmas.
There has been long a push from the more hardline conservative wing in the House to extend that into next year, potentially March, when Republicans will now have control and Trump will be in office with the idea being, well, he can sign into law some lower spending levels, cut spending that way, get a better negotiated deal than they will able to get right now with Democrats in charge and Biden in the White House.
However, the other line of thinking on that is that you don't want to burden the new President Trump with a budget fight right when he's trying to enact his first 100 days agenda.
And will they end up extending that deadline?
We at the Hill did hear from one Republican leadership source that it's likely that they will kick that deadline ahead.
There's Republicans, and Speaker Johnson has said that they do not want an omnibus.
So exactly what that looks like to be determined, but there will be people upset in the Republican Party either way.
You can find Emily Brooks reporting at thehill.com.
You can find Stephen Newcomb's work at axios.com.
And to both of you, thanks for giving us your time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Coming up, we're going to talk with Real Clear Politics White House reporter Phil Wegman.
He's going to talk about the potential role that Project 2025 might have in the incoming Trump administration.
We'll have that when Washington Journal continues.
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Washington Journal continues.
Joining us now is Philip Wegman.
He's with Real Clear Politics.
He serves as a White House reporter here to talk about Project 2025, which we learned a lot about and heard a lot about during the campaign.
But does it have a presence even today now that we have a president-elect?
Yeah, that's the million-dollar question here because Heritage put together this project and they've been doing this since the Reagan administration.
What was different this time around though is that they invited the entire conservative constellation to get underneath their banner and prepare policy and then personnel lists for the incoming Republican administration.
And I got to tell you, no one cared about Project 2025 when it first started.
And I can tell you that with authority because I broke the story two years ago, it wasn't that interesting until that 900-page policy document got out there.
You had Democrats who are taking a closer look.
And with good reason, they were pointing out that a lot of these policies had been written by Trump alumni.
And so you had President Biden and Vice President Harris making the argument that this is the playbook for Donald Trump.
basically gave Democrats a lot of examples to hit Donald Trump over the head with.
What's the official stance of the Trump administration on Project 2025?
We've heard this a dozen times at this point, both from President-elect Trump and Vice President-elect Vance, which is no one speaks for the campaign except for us.
That's the argument that they made repeatedly.
There are some examples of cross-pollination, though.
Of course, you have alumni, for instance, folks like Tom Homan, Peter Navarro, writing this project.
And then also, the expectation is that just like in previous administrations, that Trump would pick from some of these Heritage staff lists.
So that was sort of the controversy.
What we can report for the first time is that when Trump and his campaign were basically heralding the demise of Project 2025, behind the scenes, the former president was on the phone with Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation, basically encouraging him to turn down the volume until after the election.
What was the point of that?
Because look, basically, you know, when Harris says, can you believe that they put all of this in writing, it's 900 pages of basically conservative orthodoxy.
For the most part, some of these things that conservatives were prescribing, like abolishing the Department of Education, it's a little pie in the sky, but it's something that they've wanted for a long time.
The issue was, particularly when it came to abortion policy, Heritage, because they're a think tank like all Beltwake think tanks do, they were describing their ideal.
And when that ideal was, you know, farther to the right of what the Trump campaign was describing, that created some confusion among, I think, reporters and the public.
And then it also gave Democrats an opportunity to go on the attack.
There was some elements to this, so I want to walk through it.
There was something called a mandate for leadership as part of this.
What was that?
So mandate for leadership is their blueprint for how they want any administration to govern.
And again, Heritage has been doing this since the Reagan administration.
Republicans often rely on some of their policy proposals in the way that any think tank puts together a white paper and hopes that they're able to put some of that into law.
Again, the difference this time is it was much more expansive.
And what Heritage was trying to do, the reason why they started this effort years ago in 2022, is they were solving for the problem of the first Trump administration, which is Donald Trump gets to town, he doesn't expect to win, and he's kind of shell-shocked.
He doesn't know which policies to necessarily pursue.
He has a general direction, certainly, but then he doesn't know who to rely on.
And so in 2016, 2017, the former president, he relies on a lot of rank-and-file Republicans.
And he begins with general Republican marching orders.
He feels he wasted some opportunity.
And certainly conservatives feel that too.
So with Project 2025, what these guys were trying to do is have a game plan ready to go on day one.
If you want to ask our guests questions about Project 2025, well, to what existence it might have in the next administration, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans.
And Independents, 202-748-8002.
You can text us at 202-748-8003.
Another element was what I just heard described, a LinkedIn of sorts for people interested in working for the administration.
And this is the important part.
This is why we are focused on this.
Because yes, you can prescribe policy, but personnel is the most significant thing in Washington, D.C.
We, you know, we all know this.
And there was concern after the back and forth between Heritage and the Trump campaign that Heritage and Project 2025, they were going to get locked out, that they were going to be blacklisted.
Howard Luttnick, the co-chair of the Trump transition team who focuses specifically on personnel, he told me, if you have anything to do with Project 2025, you're radioactive.
I'm almost quoting him, I think, when he said there's no lock and no key for Project 2025 into the Trump administration.
And his argument was: if you send me a resume that has Project 2025 on it, that's going out the window.
What we've seen, though, is this administration, they've got four or five thousand spots to fill.
These aren't just cabinet positions.
These are some of these lower-level bureaucratic positions that are going to be filled before there's a confirmation at the head of the agency.
And so, you know, transitions, they're frenetic, they're difficult things to do.
And what we've been able to report thus far is, you know, while there's still some bitterness from the campaign, you know, the Trump campaign was frustrated that Heritage didn't turn down the volume sooner.
It seems that a lot of the Trump alumni, excuse me, the Heritage alumni, and then also folks who were involved with Project 2025, they have not been given the cold shoulder to date.
In fact, some folks are already making news.
Tom Holman, for instance, he was a Heritage Fellow.
We just heard this week he's going to be President Trump's supporters are.
What's the history of the Heritage Foundation itself when having people placed into administrations, maybe not even the incoming one, but previous Republican administrations?
They see personnel as policy.
Their hope, and this is not distinct to them, but their hope is that if they get the right people in position, that they can move any administration in more of a conservative direction.
And, you know, don't just think about roles at the White House, but think about mid-level roles at the Environmental Protection Agency or the Office of Management and Budget.
You know, they have found the wonks and the eggheads who understand a lot of this policy, who live for this sort of stuff, and who are prepared to reshape the government.
So, Heritage, over the next 100 days or so, they are going to be laser focused on doing everything they can to make certain that their people and their conservatives are in the government.
And look, this is a helpful symbiosis here.
Trump is haunted by a lot of the apathetic Republicans who didn't necessarily share his vision when he was in office the first time with the Heritage Foundation and then also the assembled groups under the banner of 2025.
These are true believers.
You said that the president-elect had a conversation with the Heritage president to turn down the heat.
Could it go further than that as far as embracing some principles or at least embracing some people?
Yeah.
I know you mentioned Tom Holman, but at least others.
There are certainly others.
You know, I would be keeping an eye on Russ Vogt, who is no longer at Heritage, but he's with the Center for American Renewal, which is one of these organizations that's under the Project 2025 umbrella.
I'd be looking at Peter Navarro, who was an author for Project 2025 and also a Trump alum.
You could really go through the Project 2025 index, and this is why the Harris Foundation, the Harris campaign, was taking a closer look.
A lot of these guys are alumni.
So, you know, we also have the past as a bit of a guide here.
Trump loved Heritage during his first term.
He spoke at their gala and he heralded them for his work because they were giving him a lot of policy ammunition for what it is that he wanted to get done.
This is Philip Wegman joining us.
He's with Real Clear Politics, covers the White House, and here to take your questions about this.
Let's start with Stan.
Stan in Pennsylvania, Independent Line, you're on with our guests.
Go ahead.
Yes, a lot of people don't understand what Project 2025 is.
And I think that the Democrats are using this against Donald Trump.
And the other thing I wanted to say is, you know, we've got a lot of programs on TV right now that are doing nothing but teaching, hey, we need to unify our country and get together and do the best thing for our children and our grandchildren and the future.
And we've got these shows on TV like Jimmy Kimmel and The View and all these other shows.
And all they do is teach hate against Trump.
We need to unite together and start doing what's best for our country.
Okay, Stan, we'll leave it there.
I want to go to his first part.
A lot of people, excuse me, a lot of people don't understand Project 2025.
Yeah, and I actually thought that Stan's comment there was expansive but really interesting because what we saw over the summer is that Project 2025, this boring white paper, suddenly was in the cultural zeitgeist.
I don't know if Jimmy Campbell specifically made a joke about it, but there were plenty of folks on late night who were.
It was discussed on The View.
Suddenly, this got put into the mainstream and everyone was arguing about it.
Certainly, you know, it's not unusual for think tanks to do this sort of thing, but you could understand the Harris campaign's argument here and the reason why they wanted to make an issue.
To Stan's point, though, it was kind of confusing because there's not just the 900 pages of policy prescriptions, there's also this LinkedIn-style personnel database.
And so these two things taken together, they could have an oversized influence, but this is a bit of a mixed blessing for think tank wonks everywhere because suddenly their ideas are getting attention, but it's also controversial as well.
Let's go to Leonard.
Leonard in Brooklyn, New York, Independent Line.
Hi.
Hi, good morning.
Thank you for taking my call.
Can you hear me?
Yeah, you're on.
Go ahead.
Oh, okay.
Good.
Well, I just wanted to ask Mr. Wegman about, I guess, Project 2025's viewpoint of what they're exactly detailing about the Department of Education, I guess, changes or overhaul that they are thinking about doing, and what effects that would have on student loan borrowers and people who want to do like a secondary education.
Thank you.
So it's a 900-page document that's a lot to cover.
I would encourage anyone who has questions about the document to go read it because it's out there already.
In terms of Project 2025, they want massive changes to the Department of Education.
I think that the prescription has been to actually abolish it.
And certainly what we've seen from Republicans and conservatives is that they are no fans of the Biden administration's forgiveness for student loans.
So I would expect that any additional forgiveness to certainly end.
To what degree was there a sense that after people voted and you looked at exit polling and at the end of the day that it really made some type of impact of how people actually decided who they were going to vote for for president?
Not at all.
I've not seen that reflected in the numbers.
This seemed like an argument that was tailor-made for someone who was already in Harris's camp, someone who was not going to be persuaded by new conservative ideas, but instead someone who was all in.
And Project 2025, it played really well over the summer.
I'm thinking back to the Democratic Convention in Chicago.
You had Keenan Thompson walk on stage with this giant oversized copy of Project 2025.
And I think his joke was it was good for remaking the federal government and hurting small animals, right?
And it got a lot of laughs.
Why?
Because the Democratic faithful, they're already predisposed to dislike this sort of thing.
And if you're plugged into politics, you probably know about the Heritage Foundation.
But if you're a swing voter, if you don't have the luxury of reading the New York Times in the morning and then cross-referencing it with the Wall Street Journal, flipping between Fox and CNN, if you're a normal human being, maybe Project 2025, other than it floating around there in the cultural zeitgeist, didn't really land with you.
John, John, it's on our line for Democrats in Pennsylvania.
Hi there.
Good morning.
The Project 2025 reminds me of a line from the Great Gatsby.
They break things up and then hide in their money and let other people clean up their mess.
The Department of Education, Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, the governor, took $1.5 billion from the Department of Education in Pennsylvania.
Of course, he only was a one-term governor.
Thank God for that.
And by the way, Trump spent one-fourth of his term on a golf course in the last election.
I hope that people remember that.
You know, sometimes when he talks, he sounds like he has Tabes Dorsalis, the third stage of syphilis.
So, okay, we're going to go on to Gilbert then.
Gilbert in Ohio, Independent Line.
Hi there.
You're next up.
Okay.
Good morning.
First of all, I would like two questions answered.
I don't know if you know the answers.
First of all, six days ago, I heard the Speaker of the House state that he's going to get rid of Social Security.
I would like to know the date of that, if you happen to know.
And next, first, the Speaker said that six days ago he's going to get rid of health care in the first year.
The last question I want to ask, do you believe that the upcoming President Trump is going to give up his office after four years?
That's what I would like to know.
Thank you.
Bye.
That's Gilbert in Ohio.
Yeah.
So in terms of Social Security, Republicans have not had a very good track record of reforming that entitlement.
They've tried before and they've failed.
I don't think that Speaker Johnson, and I'm not a Capitol Hill reporter, so this is probably a question for Emily in the earlier segment, but I don't think he has plans to tackle Social Security and certainly not to end it.
There has been discussions about returning to Obamacare and Republicans taking a closer look at that.
Certainly we all know that they spent a lot of their political capital during the first four years of Trump trying to repeal and replace Obamacare, and they did not succeed, at least through the legislature.
Trump moved through executive actions.
To the last question there about whether or not Donald Trump will leave office, well, he's going to have to, right?
There's no second term.
He's constitutionally limited.
And I will say, while the fabric of the nation was really tested on January 6th, there was no scenario where these co-equal branches, the legislature and the judiciary, were going to let him stay longer.
And I think that this time around, at least the way that they are operating currently, what you see is they are trying to make the most of these next four years.
That's why the transition is moving quickly, hitting the ground running.
And I think that he knows this is his last stance.
The president and the president-elect will meet tomorrow at the White House, talk about this meeting, and it's part of the transition process.
Wouldn't you like to be a fly on the wall in that room?
I mean, I imagine that at some point they're going to bring the press pool in, that we'll get to shout a few questions at both the president and the president elect there in the Oval Office.
But this is a historic moment.
Trump has not been back in the Oval Office since, I believe, January 17th, 2021.
He left, and he did not participate in a lot of the transition ceremonies.
He certainly wasn't there for Inauguration Day.
And what I've been struck by in these last couple of weeks is the sudden era of good feeling.
You have Vice President Harris, who quickly concedes.
She gets on the phone to congratulate Donald Trump.
And certainly, you know, the president follows suit.
He invites Trump to the White House.
And there's a lot of talk about unity.
Let's not forget, though, this was an incredibly divisive campaign.
And while they want to talk about unity, Republicans and Democrats now, they spent the better part of a year and a half calling each other existential threats to democracy.
At some point, you had both Trump and Harris calling one another fascists.
Certainly, I think all of us want that divisive rhetoric to be set aside.
But let's not pretend that everybody's friends all of a sudden.
Philip Wegman of Real Kill Air Politics joining us.
He covers the White House.
Let's hear from Terry in Minnesota, Republican line.
Good morning.
Terry, I'd like to speak a little bit about the Department of Education.
Carter developed or, as president, ordered it in 1979.
We were first in the world in education.
Today we're 24th.
So really, what do we need it for?
Let's distribute the money to the states closer to the people with a caveat that if you decide that you want to be a social engineering education, you don't get the money.
As to the pipe dream that the last reporters had on stating, oh, there'll be all this sorts of infighting in the House and the Senate.
No, this was a mandate.
The reason there were fights in the House were because the laws that they tried to bring up were not conservative enough because they knew it wouldn't get through the Senate.
There's no longer a problem there.
And I'll tell you, too, the idea they're hoping, oh, well, you know, the senators will be able to hold up the bills there.
Not at 53, they won't.
And if they continue, if they use the filibuster too much, they'll get rid of it.
Because let's face it, if the Democrats won, it was gone.
Okay, a lot out there.
We'll have Mr. Wigman to give you what he thinks.
So let's take those in turn.
First, with regards to the infighting, I think that the caller raises a really interesting point.
These are my conversations with Senate Republicans.
They are of the opinion that whoever Donald Trump puts up for confirmation to some of these cabinet positions, he is going to get.
And that's an indication of just what these guys are expecting.
Vice President Harris was right in one regard.
She said, imagine Donald Trump with no guardrails.
And certainly there's not a lot of pushback from Republicans currently.
Can you think of an anti-Trump Republican in a position of prominence in Congress right now?
No.
You know, the guys like Jeff Flake, Mitt Romney, and others who were a burr in the saddle, who sort of threw a wrench in things last time around, they're not there anymore.
Donald Trump didn't retake control of the Republican Party so much as he tightened his grasp.
And with allies both in the Senate and then also in Congress, he does have a lot of political capital.
And we have already heard reporting that Susie Wiles, the incoming White House chief of staff, she knows that they have a very tight window, which is probably the year before the coming midterms to get as much done as possible.
And then to the point about the Department of Education, I think Elon Musk and others have made this argument about how the United States was once first in education and our standards have fallen.
Certainly, you know, test scores are down.
But, you know, this type of conversation, I think it shows the chalk on the floor nature of folks who aren't traditionally involved in government, someone like Elon Musk saying, wait a minute, we want things to change.
And there's a lot of frustration, at least among the conservative base, that there is policy, be it education or immigration or energy, that is enforced, but it doesn't seem to reflect the will of the average voter.
We've heard about the Heritage Foundation.
You've talked about there's something called the America First Policy Institute.
To what degree of influence we'll have in this administration, considering the name.
Yeah, absolutely.
So the America First Policy Institute, this is essentially a White House in waiting.
That was their nickname the years after the first Trump administration.
These guys didn't leave Washington, D.C.
They didn't leave the White House when Trump left.
They just moved down the street.
They're led by Brooke Rollins, who was domestic policy head in the previous administration.
And they were distinct from Project 2025.
They didn't join that endeavor, but they did something very similar, which was they got a lot of the former cabinet heads, they got a lot of former staffers, and they said, get to work.
We want you to focus on what a second Trump administration would look like.
And where Heritage was saying, look, we're ready to work with any Republican AFPI, which was staffed by Trump loyalists.
They were very much looking for a second Trump term.
This is Joyce.
Joyce joins us from Seattle, Democrats line.
Hi.
Joyce from Seattle.
Hello.
Try one more time for Joyce.
Go ahead.
Okay, can you hear me now?
Yes, go ahead.
I heard on the radio, and I'm surprised that it's not on TV or the news, and this gentleman is not mentioning it either yet, that Biden has the opportunity to nominate judges and the Senate has the well, we know the Senate has the approval to approve the judges that he nominates.
And since it's a controlled Democratic Senate, they can do it.
Well, Trump is trying to shut down the Senate, place them in, I've forgotten the terms that they use, I would just say, take them out of session until he becomes president so that he can appoint the judges.
And that Biden has that power as the current president, and the Senate has that power as the current Senate.
And I just am tired of seeing all the disruptions that are taking place.
And it's just awful.
Well, I think that Joyce raises a good question there.
She might be overstating the influence of Donald Trump in terms of the day-to-day function of the U.S. Senate, but she's absolutely correct.
You have Republicans who are saying, wait a minute, if there are federal judgeships that are open, if there are seats that have yet to be filled, we don't want Biden's nominees to be confirmed.
And so you see, you know, Senate Republicans trying to slow that down.
Of course, this is Majority Leader Schumer's prerogative.
And so he's going to be working overtime, I think, in these last 100 days or so to get as many confirmations as possible.
And you better believe that Republicans, either through blue slips or through other parliamentary wrangling, they're going to fight him.
They're going to try and keep as many of these judgeships open because one of the big opportunities for any president is to try and remake that judiciary in an either more conservative or liberal, more liberal direction.
One more call from Charlotte, North Carolina, Elisa, Independent Line.
Yes, good morning.
Thank you for taking my phone call.
And my question is on the line of the 2025 project as it relates to the Department of Education and they're removing the CRT, where the CRT is not taught on an elementary level, but on a collegiate level, and it's mainly there to teach the groundwork or the plight of African Americans through the passage.
Why is it that you fight so again?
And why do you want to remove, therefore, denying that our history?
Yeah, certainly no one's putting me in charge of education policy.
That would be a bad idea.
And certainly no one else pays me for my opinions.
But I think that the caller does raise an interesting point, which is we saw a lot of animation among conservatives when it came to questions of critical race theory.
Now, if you talk to a conservative, they will say, no, you know, a kindergartner is not actually reading Kimberly Crenshaw.
That's a collegiate level scholar.
But their argument is that, you know, critical theory is influencing U.S. education textbooks, and that certainly you can see the influence that maybe a student would see in middle school or high school.
And then they're going to want to de-emphasize that.
I'm not certain what specific policy the incoming administration would have on this, but whoever Trump puts as his education secretary, they likely are not going to privilege this sort of thing.
Again, I think a lot of the individual policy and the individual curriculum is going to be decided by the states.
But, you know, these controversies that pop up and that motivate the base, now the question is, all right, politicians were able to control the passions of voters.
They were able to fundraise off of this.
They were able to motivate people to get out there and vote.
Now, what are those politicians going to do?
How are they going to govern?
One more question.
Have you heard any rumblings about who might serve as the White House press secretary or the White House communications team?
That's a question that's directly going to impact my life every day.
We're going to take a closer look at some of the folks who were interacting with reporters on the campaign trail.
Stephen Chung, Caroline Levitt.
I'm not certain if those two press secretaries are going to want to be behind the podium.
We know that Trump, though, he wants someone who is dyed in the wool, MAGA warrior here, someone who can really be aggressive, like Kaylee McIntye was.
What was interesting about her is that Sean Spicer, he came on board.
He was an old hand, very professional guy.
But like many other folks, he was new to MAGA.
There's a similar dynamic with Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
But with Kaylee, she relished the fight.
And so she didn't walk into that room in a way that a Republican press secretary in the Bush or Reagan administrations might have.
She saw this as combat with an audience of one.
And so I would expect whoever the incoming president names as his press secretary to fit that mold.
The other question, though, is, you know, are we going to have these daily briefings?
Because we've had them with the Biden administration every single day.
And that's important in an administration that doesn't leak.
But with the Trump administration, what we saw is the importance of the daily briefing was kind of lessened.
And there were, you know, long stretches when those didn't happen.
It wasn't necessarily a problem because access was great to a lot of the key decision makers.
This is Philip Wegman of Real Clear Politics.
He serves as their White House reporter.
RealClearPolitics.com is the website if you want to see his work.
Thanks for your time.
Pedro, thank you so much.
We will finish off with Open Forum.
And if you want to participate in that, 202748-8000 for Democrats, Republicans 202-748-8001 and Independents 202-748-8002.
We'll take those calls and open forum when Washington Journal continues.
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Washington Journal continues.
In about a half hour, less than a half hour from now, the GOP leadership is expected to gather on the steps on Capitol Hill for a press conference, taking a look at the activities of what's left in this year and talking about the election and what happens should the House maintain Republican control.
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This is Open Forum again, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans.
And Independents, 202-748-8002.
On this open forum, caller, you are on.
Go ahead, please.
This is Open Forum again, 202-748-8000 for Democrats.
Caller, good morning.
Go ahead.
You're going to have to turn down that television now.
Oh, okay.
748-8000.
What I was wanting to discuss was everybody wanting to know what happened about the voting.
Everybody know what happened.
Clump had all the billionaires behind them having the lottery.
Going where people can pay their money to hit the lottery to win a million dollars.
That was for one thing.
And we quit trying to accuse President Biden and Vice President Kumler of doing anything wrong.
They done nothing wrong.
They done exactly what they supposed to do.
As far as the Social Security, I worked on my job 36 and more years.
I put money into Social Security.
Didn't nobody give that to me.
That's something I put in there.
And they say that Trump is going to run through the Social Security Saw to go broke.
Okay.
Again, this is Open Forum.
Viewer, you are on the air.
Go ahead with your comment on this open forum.
Hello.
Hello.
You're on.
Go ahead.
Hello.
Can you hear me?
I can.
Go ahead.
Okay.
I was saying that I noticed in the race, the Republicans and the Democrats were racing for pushing to win, pushing to win.
And I don't think we looked at the horses that were running.
And we lost, and the Democrats won.
I mean, the Republicans won, but still, the horses are not the best ones that should be in office.
Who were you?
As far as the choices you had and the choices you wanted, who were the choices you wanted?
Well, I didn't want Biden, and I didn't want Trump.
I thought they were just both too old.
And so Kamala Harris was the list of two evils, let's say, or three.
So I really thought that we both wanted to win.
Democrats wanted to win.
Republicans wanted to win, but they didn't care about the horses that they were running.
Okay.
In Indiana or on Independent Line, this is from Oklahoma.
This is Guy from Oklahoma.
Go ahead.
Hey, good morning, Pedro.
Thank you for taking my call.
And Ben, I mean, there is so much to digest over the results of the election.
Can you hear me, Pedro?
You're on.
Go ahead.
Yes, we can.
Well, okay.
The reason I'm an independent, the reason I voted down the ballot Republican is, of course, the economy, inflation, the border, all these things that are mainstream reasons why Trump took the office.
But for me, the biggest concern I have is all the gaslighting and just the way everything has become politically corrupt.
So, for example, over the weekend, I was listening to the BBC, and they had a liberal lady on there talking about what an outrage and a travesty it was that Trump won, and especially the way he handled the Afghanistan withdrawal was a total disgrace.
But that was Biden.
And I'm just, I'm so sick of the lies.
Trump's Putin's puppet.
The hunter Biden laptop is Russian information, and on and on and on.
It's just, so anyway, that was my reason for voting Republican is to get the line out of politics if it is ever possible.
Thank you.
We'll hear next from Dee in Wisconsin, Independent Line.
Hi there.
Yes, hi.
I just have one question.
I heard yesterday on the news that they are trying to make Biden step down so that Harris can take over presidency for a month and a half.
Can they do that?
Is that really what, you know, I mean, what this election's all about, just so she can step in for a month and a half and make him step down?
When you heard that story, why did you react in the way you did?
Because it makes me really mad.
This is a presidency is not a game.
And they're making it a game.
Like she, so that she, Posey said, so she can go ahead and have, so she could say she was president.
Dee, you're referencing a story that you heard the other day.
This is from the former communications director for Kamala Harris.
He made the unlikely suggestion that Joe Biden resign so she could become the first woman to serve as the president.
Jamal Simmons offered the thought during an appearance as a panelist on Sunday on CNN State of the Union when asked what should be the top priority for the United States before President-elect Trump begins his second presidency in January.
And though there's no indication that Mr. Biden, President Biden would consider it, Simmons said he quote, resigned the presidency in the next 30 days to briefly make Kamala Harris the president of the United States.
You can find more there, The Guardian, and other news outlets picking up that story from Sunday.
Georgia is next.
This is Mitchell, Republican line.
Hi.
Hi.
Hey, I would like to take a different tack to something I read this morning on the internet, and it was initially from Elon Musk.
But I like the idea that they're maybe going to take a look, a close look, at dismantling the Federal Reserve.
Anyone that's in the know that's read anything about the Federal Reserve knows that it's a quasi-government agency that's not really authorized under the Constitution.
The United States, as a matter of fact, really violates it, in my opinion.
The United States Congress, having sole power to mint and coin money and establish the value thereof, does not make provision for an international banking cartel that sort of installed the Federal Reserve in 1913.
And we look at the mistakes that it's made during COVID, money supply, interest rates, and everything else.
And I would also maybe include in that inflationary thing the stimulus packages that were passed.
But at any rate.
If it didn't exist, who should take over?
If it didn't exist, who should take over monetary policy then?
The Constitution says United States Congress.
Okay, that's Mitchell in Georgia.
The federal chair, Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
It was last week during a news conference, was asked if he would resign if President-elect asked him to.
Here's his response.
Hi, Victoria Aguita with Politico.
Some of the President-elect's advisors have suggested that you should resign.
If he asked you to leave, would you go?
No.
Can you follow up on it?
Do you think that legally you're not required to leave?
No.
To follow up on Victoria's question, do you believe the president has the power to fire or demote you, and has the Fed determined the legality of a president demoting at will any of the other governors with leadership positions?
Not permitted under the law.
Not what?
Not permitted under the law.
Thank you.
Courtney.
There was more there at that press conference.
If you want to check it out for yourself, you heard our guest in our first hour mention this, but when it comes to deadlines and monetary issues, fiscal issues, lawmakers are discussing a temporary measure that would fund the government into March, according to two people briefed under discussion who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
The time would give the Senate, it would give the Senate plenty of time to begin confirming the Trump, President-elect Trump's cabinet nominees and the House time to plot out maneuvers on tax legislation without the threat of an imminent government shutdown.
Without new legislation, financing for the federal agencies will expire on December 20th.
The proposed timeline also jibes with the timing of a plan originally put forth by the House Speaker, Mike Johnson.
Again, Mike Johnson set to go before cameras, the House Speaker, at 10 o'clock, about 15 minutes from now from the steps of the Capitol.
We will bring you that press conference when it takes place.
Let's go to Clyde in Oklahoma, Democrats line.
You're on, go ahead.
Well, you know, Leopard don't change his spots either, but it's still in there.
Six fields, six Trump, six bowl in Revelation's King James version.
Thank you.
Republican line, this is from Virginia.
We will hear from Jim.
Yes, good morning, sir, and thank you for taking my call.
I'd like to make several points, but there's not a lot of time, but I'd like to be very clear.
When President Trump was running the first time, we heard these words, fake news.
It kind of puzzled me what he was talking about, but I realized over the years exactly what he's talking about.
And now we know what fake news is.
I would like to know or see how the news media, and I'm talking about the fake news media, will change.
Will they move back so that they treat both candidates properly?
I mean, there was so much negativity towards Trump.
It was sickening.
And there's so much hate towards Trump.
We need to get it back where freedom of speech is exercised in a very responsible manner.
That's all I have to say.
Thank you.
From Missouri, Democrats Line.
This is John.
Hi.
Hi, how are you doing?
Thanks for taking my call.
Coming from the Administrative and the Sheriff's Association, I wanted to talk about immigration.
First of all, I want to know how we are going to pay for housing and transportation and everything of these illegals when we're taking them into custody.
We've got to the point where we refuse to take a lot of them because of the cost-effectiveness on the immigration policy.
So that's just my question.
Thank you.
202748-8000 for Democrats, 202748-8001 for Republicans.
202748-8002 for independents to participate in this open forum for the next 15 minutes or so.
Let's hear from Monique.
Monique in Georgia, Independent Line.
Good morning.
Hey, how are you doing, America?
I was calling, and like I was giving information and just a thought of, I am a citizen of the United States, and I can say I never voted, right?
A pummy never voted.
I have many around me that has voted, some that have felony charges that haven't been able to vote for whatever reasons.
But my only concerns is with this election, even when Trump was in from day one, right?
For number one, I think for our generations of all Americans, peoples, let's face it, it is a good thing, right?
And I say it is a good thing because here we have a man of, as they say, respect of all countries, okay?
With that being said, if the generation that's coming up now, they're way more advanced, they're business-minded children, and we can't keep our children, our youth, in a box.
They're way more advanced than we really are.
And if we as some of the elections can push our pride to the side and start dealing with more other youth, like back in the days, I heard one of the young ladies say on another podcast, some of her best days were when Bill Clinton was in office.
And at that time in Georgia, it was kind of tough for us because we had the red dogs.
They had to get rid of all of them, right?
So we're dealing with a corrupt system.
But as I hear my people speak, right, I have three concerns.
Okay, okay, okay, Caller, you put out a lot out there.
So I'm going to hear from Patricia in Oklahoma next.
Democrats line, hi.
Good morning.
Thank you for taking my call.
The tradition, the transition between President Biden and Trump is coming up very quickly.
It's been reported that Trump has not yet signed the ethics agreement due September 1st.
Will he do that?
And when will that happen?
Okay.
That's Patricia there in Oklahoma again, about 12 minutes left in this open forum to the caller's point, which she just made about the transition agreement.
This is reported in many outlets, but CNN as well, saying that ethics agreement that's required for the presidential transition is still not signed, at least as of this was on the 9th, saying that he's not yet, the president-elect's not yet submitted those series of transition agreements with the administration, in part because concerns over the mandatory ethics pledge, vowing to avoid conflicts of interest once sworn into office.
As president, Mr. Trump repeatedly came under fire from ethics groups for potential conflicts of interest relating to his business and brands.
Both of his and his family's foreign business ties have also come under intense scrutiny through his time as office and on the campaign trail.
More there.
We may see this addressed in the days ahead, particularly as the president-elect and President Biden set to meet at the White House tomorrow as part of the transition process.
Let's go to Robbie.
Robbie in Maryland, Republican line.
Hi, this is Robbie.
I just wanted to know why doesn't Trump do anything about the people that he's trying to go after?
I've seen it on YouTube and, you know, and he's trying to go after a bunch of mobs.
And I don't know what he was thinking because, you know, it's dangerous and he knows they're going to come after him.
I was wondering, what's his plans on with the terrorists and all that and then whatever they want?
I mean, because it's a mess right now.
And it's dangerous.
If you know this.
I know it's messed up.
And, you know, and I was wanting to know, is the president going to fix this?
Is he going to have peace?
Okay, Robbie there in Missouri, the Hill reporting this morning that California Governor Gavin Newsom, traveling to the nation's capital this week, made a push to protect California's policies from President-elect Trump following his victory.
The Democratic governor is seeking a $5.2 billion reimbursement for emergency funding, updates to California's Medicaid program and other priorities during the meeting with the Biden administration.
According to the Associated Press, he left the home state yesterday, expected to return Wednesday during a expected to turn Wednesday during a trip.
We'll meet with California's congressional representatives.
The trip to Washington comes less than a week after he issued a proclamation to convene a special session of the state legislature in December to safeguard his policies, particularly those regarding the climate, immigration, and reproductive freedoms.
Susan lives in San Diego, Independent Line.
You're on this open forum.
Go ahead.
Hi, good morning.
Thanks so much for taking my call.
I really appreciated that you guys brought on the Heritage Foundation conversation.
I feel like that has been so overlooked through this whole process, not just this year, 2016 as well.
Trump just took their money and their endorsements and their plan, and then he came out and said he never even heard of it.
Talk about lies.
He is the biggest liar.
For him to say he never heard of 2025 after he had been the speaker at the Heritage Foundation, talking about what a great mandate they made.
It's unbelievable that we are about to be a country that no longer has religious freedom, and that is ridiculous.
Heritage is an authoritarian, extreme, right-wing religious organization, and now we're stuck with it.
Why do you think we're not going to have religious freedom anymore?
Well, it's, I mean, first of all, to force it into schools.
That's already happening.
And I don't see how we could have religious freedom when the people who are running our government are all from the same authoritarian, extreme religion.
It's Christian nationalism.
That's Susan there in San Diego.
Let's hear from Tim.
Tim in Clearwater, Florida, Democrats line.
Hi.
Yeah, hello.
In our Constitution, we have supposedly three equal but same branches of government to put checks and balances in.
Does anybody truly believe that that didn't die the other day?
Do you really think that the Republicans in the House and Senate will do anything to check him?
Or the courts who the Supreme Court said he's got immunity?
Republican line.
This is Joanne in Missouri, Republican line.
Hi, I have a really quick question.
I'm just a little curious why everyone is moaning and groaning about all of the illegal aliens already in the country.
How did they get to where they went?
We paid for their planes.
We paid for their food.
We paid for their lodging.
Why is anybody saying anything about how they got here?
But nobody has a problem saying about how they're getting out.
Joanne.
Joanne there in Missouri giving us her thoughts this morning.
If you're interested in Federal Reserve policy, later on this morning, about 10 o'clock, actually, on our network, C-SPAN2, our companion network, it's a discussion with the Federal Reserve Board Governor Christopher Waller at the Cleaning House 2024 annual conference to talk about monetary policy, talk about possibly the election and the impact there.
You can see that on C-SPAN2, our C-SPANNOW app and c-span.org, as we've been telling you and showing you, House Republican leadership expecting to hold a press conference, 10 o'clock is the slated time on the steps of the Capitol.
And again, you can see it right after this program.
Follow along if you wish later on on the app and the .org.
As we look at the Capitol, show you a brief shot anyway.
Let's hear from Wade in Kentucky, Independent Line.
The left calling Trump a felon is a lot like OJ calling Nicole Scarface.
They caused it.
And I think one of the big factors is we will not allow America to become the Soviet Union.
You can indict political opponents.
You can convict them.
You can try to kill them, but we will not stand for it.
We will not allow it.
And there's a lot of reasons, you know, to vote for Trump.
And I'm ready for him to get to work and build a legacy.
But we just won't stand for it anymore.
In Michigan, this is Frank, Democrat's line.
Frank in Michigan, hello.
One more time for Frank.
Hello.
Okay, we'll go to Michael.
Michael in Nevada, Independent Line.
Go ahead.
Yes, thank you for taking my call.
And in the near future, when the convicted illegal aliens are going to be removed and returned to their origin of country, some of these countries will refuse to take them, especially murderers, the rapers, kidnappers, and all the fentanyl distributors, carriers.
And when the plane flies over, if the origin country refuses to let the plane land, then it's an act of kindness.
They should be given a parachute and asked to jump out of the airplane over their country.
And if they refuse, they should be taken and pushed out of the airplane.
Let's go to Tom in Baltimore, Democrats line.
Hi.
Good morning.
I just briefly can.
I have to just think of my mind.
I'm almost 80 years old, and I was hoping my country would do a little bit better than it has at this point.
I would like to say I've been a working class man all my life.
And both parties are supporting a slaughter of working class people in the Middle East, in Palestine and Lebanon.
And I look at those people as like people of my class.
They're working class people like me.
And I don't like to see either party supporting the slaughter of working class people.
And that's what I got to say.
Thank you.
This press conference from the House Republicans set to start shortly.
Joe in Long Island, Republican Line, go ahead.
Yes, Pedro, you guys got a phenomenal show.
I thank God for your show because people could voice their opinions and their feelings.
But the thing I want to say is that I don't understand it.
I mean, I voted many years ago for McGovern, which was a joke.
I don't understand how things happened in this election from when this man came down that escalator.
How people could see what happened to this country the last four years in this administration, what they did to this country, opened the borders.
And I could go on and on, go on.
And when you think about the talk on the media, it's all about the personality of President Trump.
All about his personality, what he does, not what he accomplished when he was in office.
But if there's a Democratic quora, could you please explain it to me of why you think that Joe Biden, Commer Harris, was the best state for this country, opposed to Donald Trump's personality?
Okay.
Thank you, Pedro, for taking my phone.
That's Joe there on our Republican line finishing off calls in this open forum.
Again, the House and the Senate both back to work this week with activity on both sides.
The way to keep close on what's happening, C-SPAN, our main channel, will cover the House.
C-SPAN 2 covers the Senate.
You can always follow along with the app and more information available at the website at c-span.org.
Our program ends today.
Another edition of Washington Journal comes your way at 7 o'clock tomorrow.
Just a few minutes from now, we'll hear from the House Republican Leadership.