CSPAN - Washington Journal 01/08/2025

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Jan. 8, 2025 07:00-10:00 - CSPAN

02:59:53

Washington Journal 01/08/2025

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Main

donald j trump

admin 06:20

mimi geerges

cspan 33:38

Appearances

kamala harris

d 02:06

mike johnson

rep/r 02:20

Clips

barack obama

d 00:05

bill clinton

d 00:05

david sanger

cnn 00:17

donald j trump [ai]

admin 00:10

george h w bush

r 00:16

george w bush

r 00:08

jimmy carter

d 00:07

martin caidin

00:01

ronald reagan

r 00:03

steve witkoff

00:17

ted gunderson

00:10

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Speaker	Time	Text
unidentified		Morning.
		Your calls and comments live then.
		Politico, Climate AND energy reporter Zach Coleman discusses president Biden's ban on new oil and gastrolink along parts of the U.s coast and president-elect Trump's pledge to reverse it.
		And George Mason University's Jameel Jaffer discusses the killing of 14 people on new year's day in New Orleans and what the attack reveals about ISIS and the state of global terrorism in 2025.
		Also, Vermont congresswoman Becca Ballot, a member of the Judiciary and Budget committees, discusses the incoming Trump administration, Lgbtq plus issues and congressional news of the day.
		Washington Journal is next.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
		It's wednesday, january 8th.
		Yesterday, president-elect Donald Trump held his first news conference since Congress certified his election and his second since winning in november.
		It was just over an hour long and we'll show you portions during the program.
		During this first hour we're getting your thoughts on the upcoming second Trump term.
		Are you feeling optimistic or pessimistic, and why?
		Here's how to call us, Democrats 202748 8000 Republicans, 202748 8001 and independents 202748 8002.
		You can send us a text to 2027488003.
		Include your first name in your city, state and you can post your comments on social media, facebook.com.
		Slash C-span and X at C-span WJ.
		Welcome to today's Washington Journal.
		We'll start with the WALL Street.
		UM, the WALL Street Journal, and it has this headline, it says that Trump ratchets up campaign to gain control of Greenland Panama Canal.
		It says the president-elect threatens to hit Denmark with high tariffs if officials there don't cooperate with his bid for Greenland.
		Says that the president-elect declined to rule out using military or economic coercion to gain control of Greenland and the Panama Canal, ratcheting up his campaign to expand America's global footprint quote.
		I'm not going to commit to that now.
		It might be that you'll have to do something.
		He said during the news conference.
		He was responding to a question about whether he could offer reassurances that he wouldn't leverage U.s military and economic might to get his way.
		Since winning the election, Trump has repeatedly raised the idea of taking over the Panama Canal from Panama and taking control of Greenland from Denmark.
		He has also said that Canada should become the 51st U.s state, in an apparent effort to troll Justin Trudeau, the country's departing prime minister.
		Well, here's what uh president-elect Trump said yesterday about that topic.
david sanger ▲ ● ▼		Let's start, if we could, with uh your references to Greenland and uh.
unidentified		So what?
david sanger ▲ ● ▼		Can you assure the world that, as you try to uh get control of these areas, you are not going to Use military or economic Coercion?
unidentified		Can you tell us a little bit about what your plan is?
		Are you going to negotiate a new treaty?
		Are you going to ask the Canadians to hold a vote?
		What is the strategy?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I can't assure you.
		You're talking about Panama and Greenland.
		No, I can't assure you on either of those two.
		But I can say this.
		We need them for economic security.
		The Panama Canal was built for a military.
		I'm not going to commit to that now.
		It might be that you'll have to do something.
		Look, the Panama Canal is vital to our country.
		It's being operated by China, China.
		And we gave the Panama Canal to Panama.
		We didn't give it to China.
		And they've abused it.
		They've abused that gift.
		It should have never been made, by the way.
		Giving the Panama Canal is why Jimmy Carter lost the election, in my opinion, more so maybe than the hostages.
		The hostages were a big deal.
		But if you remember, and nobody wants to talk about the Panama Canal now because it's inappropriate, I guess, but because it's a bad part of the Carter legacy.
		But he was a good man.
		Look, he was a good man.
		I knew him a little bit, and he was a very fine person, but that was a big mistake.
		Giving the Panama Canal to Panama was a very big mistake.
		We lost 38,000 people.
		It cost us the equivalent of a trillion dollars, maybe more than that.
		Probably the most expensive, they say it was the most expensive structure, if we call it a structure, which I guess you can, ever built.
		And giving that away was a horrible thing.
		And I believe that's why Jimmy Carter lost the election, even more so than the hostages.
		Those two things.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		That was yesterday, and you can watch the full event on our website, cspan.org.
		We're taking your calls.
		Before I get to your calls, I just want to update you on the wildfires in Southern California.
		The Washington Post reporting that firefighters struggle to contain wildfires in Los Angeles as thousands evacuate.
		It says several wildfires are ripping through Los Angeles County, forcing widespread evacuations as firefighters struggle to combat the blazes.
		Intensifying winds are expected to create increasingly dangerous conditions in the region.
		The Palisades fire, which broke out near the Pacific Palisades neighborhood, has burned at least 2,921 acres.
		The Eaton fire, which erupted to the northeast, has burned an estimated 1,000 acres.
		And the Hearst fire burning in the north has grown to 500 acres.
		California Governor Newsom declared a state of emergency.
		He said early today, more than 1,400 firefighting personnel had been deployed to combat these unprecedented fires in LA.
		And let's go to the phones now to Pat in Glenside, Pennsylvania, Democrat.
		Good morning, Pat.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I am very pessimistic about the outlook from this man that we've elected.
		And I'm very fearful of what he will do to the country, to everything.
		He campaigned on one, on many things, and now he's elected and saying quite the opposite.
		Using force to these people, to Greenland or Panama.
		What is he thinking, and what is the purpose of this rhetoric from him?
		I don't understand it.
		And I'm just shocked that the country went in this direction.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, Pat, what are you fearful of will happen specifically when you say that you're fearful?
unidentified		Well, I think he's going to cause much chaos within our country.
		I think that all of his, in his first term, I remember him consistently telling people, you better buy guns, you better get your guns, and hold on to those rights because, you know, if the Dems get in here, they're going to take your guns away.
		Now we have some very dangerous citizens in our country that seem to like violence with guns.
		I sometimes wonder if that's not the reason that our government has not been stronger toward him because maybe they're fearful of the people, of these lone killers that may come out on Trump's behalf.
		Maybe he doesn't know them, but they believe every word he says.
		And I think he's going to loot our treasury.
		I think he's going to capitulate to Vladimir Putin.
		And I think he's going to be just lining his pockets.
		By the time he leaves office, it's very possible that he and his entourage of a South African man and an Indian man, that's another thing.
		He's always talking about mass deportation.
		Ah, but now Musk and Ramaswamy have a whole different view with their H-1B visas.
		Everything is a lie that this man says.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		I've got to move on to John, a Republican in Portland, Connecticut.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, John.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I was just listening to a previous caller, and this is where your program has to change.
		Pat, give President Trump a chance to put his programs in place and his people.
		Stop bad-mouthing everything that the Republicans are trying to do.
		Four years ago, I gave President Biden the chance.
		And we need change in this country.
		Give everybody a chance.
		Give his cabinet a chance.
		And please, let's just stop all this rhetoric.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And John, what are you looking forward to specifically in the second Trump term?
unidentified		I'm looking for big change in this country.
		Economics, the God, the prices of everything are so high right now, especially in Connecticut.
		When I go to the grocery store, I come out with three bags and it's over $100, and there's no proteins in the bags.
		We just need big change in this country.
		Bring us together.
		Let's just stop bickering with each other on the left and on the right.
		We've got to bring our country together with peace, not hating each other and hating the people we've voted for need to just try to blend together.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, John.
		And this is the BBC says that Trump Jr., Donald Trump Jr., arrives in Greenland after dad says U.S. should own the territory.
		It says that he's arrived in Greenland weeks after his father said he wanted the U.S. to take control of the autonomous Danish territory.
		Ahead of his visit, Trump Jr. said he was embarking on a, quote, personal day trip and had no meetings planned with government officials.
		President-elect Donald Trump recently revived a controversy he ignited last month when he said, quote, ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity for the U.S.
		We are not for sale, the island's prime minister responded at the time.
		Asked on Tuesday whether he could rule out using military economic force on the matter, Trump said he could not.
		And he also talked about changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico.
		Here's that portion.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		To be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, which has a beautiful ring that covers a lot of territory.
		The Gulf of America, what a beautiful name.
		And it's appropriate.
		It's appropriate.
		And Mexico has to stop allowing millions of people to pour into our country.
		They can stop them.
		And we're going to put very serious tariffs on Mexico and Canada because Canada, they come through Canada too, and the drugs that are coming through are at record numbers.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		We're taking your calls this morning on your level of optimism or pessimism and tell us why on the Trump second term.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is Julius, Linwood, Illinois, Democrat.
unidentified		Good morning.
unidentified		How are you doing?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good.
unidentified		Listen, I'm going to tell you exactly why Trump is threatening those three countries in the Western Hemisphere.
		I think Greenland's in the Western Hemisphere.
		Well, Greenland, Canada, it's a threat, too.
		Greenland, Canada, and the Canal.
		You know, the reason he threatened those countries is because he promised day one he's going to end the war and with Russia and the name of that country slip me right now.
		I've got in Israel?
		Not Brazil.
		The country's Russia is taking over.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Oh, Ukraine.
unidentified		Yeah, he claimed he's going to end that.
		Well, see, the way he get out of that is to threaten some countries over here in this hemisphere.
		And so he threatened, and make no mistake about it, it's a threat.
		Anytime you talk about absorbing Canada and taking over Greenland, that's a military threat.
		This fool is doing.
		And that's why he's doing that.
		He's not going to do nothing to try to stop Russia from what they're doing and wherever that country is.
		I forget.
		I'm an older man, so it slips my mind right now.
		But that's what he's doing.
		That's why he's threatening those countries.
		He talked about he's going to stop Russia, and he's threatening it.
		He's talking about absorbing Canada, taking over Greenland.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, Julius, here's what he says about Canada.
		This is CTV News, which is Canadian.
		It says Trump is open to using economic force to acquire Canada.
		Trudeau responds.
		So here's what it says.
		Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, quote, there isn't a snowball's chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States.
		On the same day, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump declared that he's open to using economic force to acquire Canada.
		Trump, speaking at a press conference at Mar-a-Lago, refused to rule out the use of military force to seize control of the Panama Canal in Greenland.
		He was also asked if he was considering using military force to acquire Canada.
		Quote, no, economic force, he responded.
		Because Canada and the United States, that would really be something.
		And here is Gary in Lanoke, Arkansas, Republican.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I just listened to the last gentleman there online, and the thing he doesn't realize is this rhetoric is due specifically to make Canada lower their tariffs on us and give us more opportunity to the minerals and stuff in Canada to boost both companies, I mean, countries.
		And Greenland, Greenland is nothing more than an icy rock.
		And right now, they're under Denmark.
		But I think Denmark wants our protection as well as anyone else.
		And I think that this is very much a military necessary for us to be able to protect ourselves and the Western Hemisphere from both China and Russia.
		You know, if we don't have these things in place where we can observe and see what's going on, not just by satellite, then, you know, it's going to end up where one of those two countries are going to take over Greenland.
		And as you can see before, with them going into Ukraine, they definitely will be involved with a military operation on it.
		It wouldn't be economic like we're hoping to do.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, Gary, let me ask you this, because Denmark is a NATO ally.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, if Greenland were to be attacked, the United States would be under treaty obligation to defend it anyway.
unidentified		Well, I don't have a lot of faith in NATO anymore.
		I don't think those folks, the other countries, has been proven that they don't pay their percentage that they need to.
		And the United States has footed this bill forever.
		And I just don't have a lot of faith in some of these smaller NATO countries to carry on their obligations in that capacity either.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		And this is what Representative Dina Titus said.
		She's a Democrat on X. Trump is talking about Greenland and Canada like they are golf courses he wants to buy.
		This isn't a serious foreign policy strategy.
		It's whimsical imperialism.
		Instead of bullying our partners, let's work with them to address the substantial challenges facing our world.
		And oops, I lost that.
		Call Kevin is an independent in Omaha, Nebraska.
		Good morning, Kevin.
unidentified		Good morning.
unidentified		How are you today?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good.
unidentified		Good.
		Well, have a happy new year.
		Let me finish what I'm going to say.
		I don't know what Trump's going to do.
		He had so many crazy ideas.
		To me, it's ridiculous.
		All these things he's proposing, like the Gulf of America, Greenland, and the Panama come out.
		It just seems like he wants to reverse everything that every other president ever did.
		And that's all I really have to say.
		And I just want to thank Joe Biden for the good job he did in getting our country out of the COVID crisis where Trump let COVID go on, you know, he was so totally irresponsible with the COVID crisis.
		So thank you very much.
		And again, have a happy new year.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Happy New Year, Kevin.
		This is Jim, a Republican in Grand Forks, North Dakota.
		Hi, Jim.
unidentified		Hi, Mimi.
unidentified		Can you hear me okay?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes, go right ahead.
unidentified		Loud and clear.
unidentified		Hi, Happy New Year.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You too.
unidentified		And yeah, right.
		And I wanted to say that I think they're a little overly optimistic.
		All the partying going down at Mar-a-Lago.
		All the people on Fox News acting like it's the, I'm hearing things like MSNBC is gone.
		They have no more ratings.
		They'll bounce back.
		That happened to Fox News when we lost in 2020.
		I stopped watching too.
		Everybody gets very down, but the MSNBC's ratings will come back up.
		And nobody's going anywhere.
		But the thing that worries me most is I don't think the resistance to Trump and Inauguration Day will be as bad as it was in 2017.
		I have to remind the Democrats, sometimes we have a selective memory.
		You guys did not accept the outcome of the election.
		There was an organized resistance called hashtag disrupt January 20th, in which there was violence all over the country.
		There was cars on fire in Lafayette Square, police attacked, people in the inauguration were taunted and attacked.
		You might remember the thousands of women in the streets with those big pink hats and talking about storming the White House.
		That resistance went on all through the Russia gate and all through up to 2020 with that.
		And so I'm a little, I don't think it's going to be as bad.
		I hope the inauguration will be peaceful.
		Now, the second point I want to make is about illegal immigration.
		Trump is not going to be able to deport 11 million people.
		I don't know where they got 11 million.
		We probably have 30 million.
		This has been going on for 35 years.
		He can deport maybe some of the criminal people, 450,000 felons.
		He can do that, but we've slipped our leash.
		We have people who have been here so long and have had kids.
		It's not going to happen.
		And that's going to, I'm concerned about the Elian Gonzalez kind of a photo.
		You might remember when Jan Arino tried to remove that kid.
		There was that famous photo of a guy with black with a machine gun in his house, pulling him from his mother.
		If one image of a little Mexican kid being pulled from the arms of his mother is going to be the end of Trump because I think there'll be riots in this country.
		And so you can't do that.
		And also I want to say one important point about that, having been a guy who works in agriculture from the dairy farms of Pennsylvania to North Dakota.
		We keep hearing from cleanhand workers and politicians that you have to have these people here or the crops will rot in the ground.
		No, they won't.
		Most of our crops are taken from the ground using automation, machinery, technology.
		We don't need armies of people bent over picking cotton in the fields anymore.
		You know, we do have some, yes, some things that are picked with a lot of hand labor, but we don't need 10 million people to do it.
		That is a myth.
		And there's also, it's an insult to the many millions of black guys and white guys who are hardworking people who work with their hands like me, who never get any credit.
		And from the liberal Democrats don't seem to even recognize that we also work with our hands.
		And we work in, I worked in roofing for many years.
		I worked in agriculture for many years.
		And they don't seem to recognize that we even exist.
		And it's an insult to the American worker that we need these people to survive.
		So I just wanted to say I'm a little pessimistic about Trump with the immigration issue.
		And I don't think he's going to be able to deport 11 million people, nor should he, I don't think.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Jim.
		And CNN is reporting this.
		Trump warns, quote, all hell will break out if Gaza hostages aren't released before his inauguration.
		And here is, well, we will get that for you.
		Steve Witkoff, which is his Middle East envoy, talking about that.
		But here's what the article says, that the president-elect warned that if the hostages whom Hamas is still holding in Gaza are not released by his inauguration on January 20th, all hell will break out in the Middle East, offering one more stark indication of how much the incoming president would prefer to avoid inheriting the Israel-Hamas war as he prepares to take office in less than two weeks.
		And here is Steve Witkoff at the briefing, briefing the press about the ongoing hostage negotiations.
		Here it is.
unidentified		If there's a deal even at home, we've been hearing this now for the better part of the year.
		I would say they better be.
		Right.
steve witkoff ▲ ● ▼		I would say that the president is exasperated.
unidentified		I don't want to talk for him, but look, I don't know anyone who delegates better than President Trump.
steve witkoff ▲ ● ▼		He gives us a lot of authority to speak on his behalf, and he exhorts us to speak emphatically.
steve witkoff ▲ ● ▼		And emphatically means you better do this because the alternatives.
unidentified		Do you think they're waiting for President Trump to take office?
		No, I think they heard him loud and clear.
		Better get done by the inaugural.
		But when you say all hell must be paid off, all hell must be paid if they don't release the hostages, don't you?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Do I have to define it for you?
donald j trump [ai] ▲ ● ▼		All hell will break out.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		If those hostages aren't back, I don't want to hurt your negotiation.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		If they're not back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East.
donald j trump [ai] ▲ ● ▼		And it will not be good for Hamas, and it will not be good, frankly, for anyone.
donald j trump [ai] ▲ ● ▼		All hell will break out.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I don't have to say anymore, but that's what it is.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		We've got 35 minutes in this segment to take your calls on the question: Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the Trump second term and tell us why?
		And here is Jimmy in Pittsburgh, California, Democrat.
		Hi, Jimmy.
unidentified		Hey, you know, God bless you, young lady.
		Let me tell you something.
		When we had the 9-11, I called back to New York, to the precincts, said, I can't do nothing for you, but I wish I could.
		So I've been volunteering with a local law enforcement for 21 years.
		What next week we had at Trump when he talked about the Department of Justice is wicked and all this stuff, but they protect his family 24 hours a day.
		And this is what I'm saying.
		If they so bad as he says, knowing each other's secret service, I'm all in the gone.
		And he don't have no protection.
		That's a bad thing to say.
		But how is he going to keep talking about the Department of Justice being and I got dyslexia?
		We've seen the cases of all that stuff at his house in Florida.
		Then he says, I'm a Democrat, but I got Republican and Kicker Seeds.
		But he keeps saying the Democrats is against you.
		I ain't against the man.
		Do your job.
		Do your job for the whole country.
		Because when you take your hand and put it on that Bible, you're the president for the whole United States.
		You're not the president just for the Republicans.
		You're the president for everybody, whether they like you or not.
		You got to protect everybody, even people on Social Security living in Section 8.
		When they pay their rent, the property people pay their taxes.
		We pay in our taxes.
		I don't like when he picks on the FBI.
		I don't like that.
		And the agency, I'm not going to say what agencies I've been volunteering with for 21 years.
		They work together with all the police areas in my town.
		I cook food for them.
		That's what I do.
		That's my job.
		But we had one better ten huff of time.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Jimmy.
		And this is what Fox News says about that: that Trump blasts ongoing lawfare, in quotations, in first public remarks since Congress certified his election.
		It said that he railed against the ongoing lawfare against him during his first public remarks since Congress certified his decisive win over Vice President Kamala Harris.
		Quote, they're playing with the courts, as you know.
		They've been playing with the courts for four years, probably got me more votes because I got the highest number of votes ever gotten by a Republican by far, actually, by a lot.
		And you know, we had a great election, so I guess it didn't work.
		And here is President-elect Donald Trump reacting to news yesterday that Judge Eileen Cannon has temporarily blocked the special counsel Jack Smith's report from being released.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Cannon was thrown off the case.
		They dropped their appeal because he had no case.
		They dropped all of that, the lawsuits against us.
		They lost the lawsuit.
		So this is Derae Jacksmith.
		So he dropped the lawsuits.
		He was told to by the DOJ because they had no lawsuit.
		They lost in court in front of a very strong and a very brilliant judge.
		They lost in court.
		And that pertained to other cases in other courts.
		So he wanted to do a report just before I take office, probably.
		So he'll do like a 500-page report, and it'll be a fake report just like the investigation was a fake investigation.
		And I said, well, wait a minute.
		This guy was thrown off in disgrace, in disgrace.
		He's going back to The Hague or wherever they're going to send him in disgrace because he failed so badly, because it was a fake case against a political opponent.
donald j trump [ai] ▲ ● ▼		They thought they were going to use this to beat me.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		So what you're saying is, and I'm just hearing that, they're not allowed to issue the report.
		So if they're not allowed to issue the report, that's the way it should be, because he was thrown off the case in disgrace.
		Why should he be allowed to write a fake report?
		It'll only be a fake report.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And back to the phones to Marshall in Pineville, Louisiana, Independent Line.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Marshall.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I'm fairly neutral on President Trump.
		I vote an independent, et cetera, but I'm old enough to take remember Eisenhower in office.
		Mr. Trump, everybody seems to think they know exactly what he's going to do.
		Oh, he's going to be a dictator.
		Oh, he's going to tear the country apart.
		Oh, he's going to do this, that, and this other.
		And he does none of that, yet they look at Biden.
		Oh, he's such a great president.
		And then it's like the last time Trump got in.
		I saw where a lady and her husband, a doctor wife and her husband were flying the flag, the American flag upside down and half mast, just so they could take protest that Trump wasn't doing anything for the poor.
		And I thought, he hasn't been in office two weeks, and you won't take condemning?
		I mean, this is getting ridiculous.
		That's about all I've got to say of it.
		You know, I support Trump more than I do oppose him.
		I thank you for your time.
		You have a nice day.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is a post on X from Representative Steve Cohen, who says, Judge Cannon is acting more like Trump's conciliary, an acolyte rather than a federal judge.
		Blocking the release of Jack Smith's report denies the public the truth about Trump's actions.
		The public deserves to know what Smith found before it's buried forever by the new Trump administration.
		And Chairwoman Lisa McLean, a Republican, says, from the start, these have been baseless lawsuits led by faceless bureaucrats.
		Bureaucrats need to get over their Trump derangement syndrome and get back to serving the American people.
		We have to finally turn the page and focus on the issues Americans truly care about.
		And here is Ted in Wilmington, North Carolina, Republican.
		Good morning, Ted.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I'm very optimistic about the Trump administration because he knows how to get things done.
		People get upset about some of the things he says, but they just are not understanding he's the master of negotiation and using leverage.
		Now, we've suffered through the Carter administration, who was a total failure.
		I have no respect for Carter because of the way he stuck a knife in the back of the American nuclear industry by prohibiting reprocessing of fuel.
		And now we have spent fuel just backing up at power plants, and there's still no solution in sight.
		I think Carter was what used to be the worst president, but Biden worked hard to surpass that level and become our very worst president of all time.
		That's it.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		And Craig in Port Orange, Florida, is also optimistic with four exclamation marks.
		Finally, a president that will take care of Americans first.
		Our country will be turned around in the right direction.
		Here's Rich, New Jersey Democrat.
		Hi, Rich.
unidentified		How are you doing?
		I'm not sure that I'm optimistic or pessimistic.
		I've heard a lot of talk now about Canada with their unfair trade practices.
		I thought one of the major accomplishments of the Trump First administration was the revision of NAFTA.
		Now, if he's looking to take over Canada or at least renegotiate NAFTA, is he admitting that one of the prime accomplishments that he occurred in his first administration was a failure?
		And so that leads me to some confusion.
		You had a prior call that talked about we're not giving American workers enough credit for doing jobs in the roofing and foreign work and other things.
		But I think Americans would get those jobs.
		However, people don't really want to pay those type of wages, and that's why Americans really don't get those jobs, primarily because the immigrants will work cheaper than the American worker.
		So unless, and that's one of the reasons I don't think there's going to be a mass deportation, because I think the American businesses would be totally opposed to it.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Rich.
		And the U.S. Trade Representative, it's at USTR.gov, has information about trade with Canada.
		If you're interested in getting more specifics about that, it says that in 2022, U.S. Goods and Services trade with Canada totaled an estimated $908.9 billion.
		That's the trade between the two countries.
		And this is John in New Lano, Louisiana, Independent.
unidentified		Good morning, ma'am.
unidentified		How are you doing?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good.
unidentified		Yeah, I'm very pessimistic about what's going to happen in America.
		And I'm not just solely blaming Donald Trump, but I'm going to quote Maya Angelou for you.
		When people show you who they are, believe them.
		Okay.
		The oligarchs have taken over this country.
		And all I see is big money coming in.
		They took over the elections.
		They're taking over all aspects of government.
		And they are making the laws favor them now.
		In other words, they're just using their money to manipulate all the politicians in Congress.
		So I'm not solely blaming Trump, but America is in trouble because, you know, I do well for myself.
		I served 30 years in the military.
		I have no problems.
		I can make it easily.
		But I do care about the American people in general because I see a lot of people struggling out here.
		And To me, it's just that I always participate in the electoral process, and I vote for who I think the best person is.
		I don't care whether they're Democrat or Republican, because I do think both sides of the aisle are in on the take for themselves.
		And the poor, suffering people of America is the one who's going to be punished for all of this.
		I served 30 years with honor.
		Don't regret anything that I did, but I'll tell you, sometimes I really, really consider moving abroad.
		Thank you very much, ma'am.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, and we've got about 25 minutes left in this segment.
		We will take your calls.
		The numbers are by party.
		So if you're a Democrat, call us on 202-748-8000.
		Republicans can call 202-748-8001.
		And Independents, 202-748-8002.
		And we'll hear from Liz in Michigan, Line for Democrats.
		Hi, Liz.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I've been watching some of this as it's unfolding.
		My life has changed a lot in the last 90 days, about the same time the elections were going on.
		I started working actually in the grant area.
		And it's amazing how much Joe Biden did for this country.
		I know people feel that maybe it didn't help at the grocery line or the gas lines, but I'm telling you, the amount of money that he has put into law enforcement, homeland security, infrastructure, the people I'm working with had no idea.
		So he did make a good contribution trying to improve America.
		He inherited a mess with COVID.
		So I think people are very short-sighted in terms of what he's done.
		He had to deal with a lot of problems with the Republicans.
		But unfortunately, now we're going to see what's going to happen when they have complete control of the country along with their rich friends.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So Liz.
		What are you thinking about for the future?
		Are you feeling?
unidentified		I'm not optimistic because I just, well, I'll give you an example.
		One of the grants I was writing in, I had gotten a packet from a New York Republican senator that was talking about the changes that were coming in programs and that the previous administration had cut, the previous administration, this is local.
		The previous administration had cut back on these programs.
		So again, Biden had come in and made sure that people were able to get funding.
		I just spoke with somebody from the USDA this week that said in Michigan, they used to get about $24 million for different things in this state.
		It has now gone down to $1 million.
		They're cutting it.
		So when you're looking at all these negotiations and things that are happening, it's very scary because I think the people that are most vulnerable in our country are going to get kicked to the curb.
		All right.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, President-elect Trump was asked about the way forward with Congress on raising the debt ceiling.
		So here's that exchange.
		Looks like we don't have that.
		So we'll take another call and we will go to Stephen in Lexington, Kentucky, Independent.
unidentified		Yes, good morning.
		Thanks for having me, Mimi.
		I feel I'm on the verge of being pessimistic.
		Just the way he's not even in office yet and the way he's talking to the world, making America feel isolated, just trying to, you know, buy Greenland.
		Hassan went there, turned right back around 24 hours less, talking about Canada, Mexico, just already negative and so aggressive before even getting on the actual ability to do anything as a president.
		So I'm feeling pessimistic.
		If he does say what he's going to do, he's going to do it, regardless of what's in its way.
		So things are going to change.
		I don't know which way it's going to go.
		We just have to wait and see.
		But he's just so aggressive as a president-elect.
		And I don't like it.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You know, but there's people that do that like him for that reason, that that projects strength.
unidentified		It projects strength, but it also projects bullying.
		Essentially, he comes off as a bully, that he's stronger than everybody, smarter.
		So he rubs people the wrong way.
		And if you agree with that, then you might be a bully yourself.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		And here's that exchange about the raising of the debt ceiling.
		Here it is.
unidentified		Some Republicans say in trade for a massive bill that you and they shared that they interest in.
		They want to see big spending cuts.
		Do you agree with that?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Well, I'm okay with spending cuts.
		I like spending cuts.
		I'm on the record for spending cuts.
		And the debt ceiling was given to us.
		It shouldn't have been, but it was put in our lap.
		And what I want in terms of debt ceiling isn't the ceiling.
		I just don't want to see a default.
		That's all I want.
		I never talked about spending more money necessarily than all I want to see is no default because nobody knows what would happen if there was a default.
		It could be 1929 and it could be nothing.
		But that was put into our lap.
		And it shouldn't have been, but it was.
		And so we'll handle it.
		But debt ceiling is not about raising a lot of money.
		It's really just about extending it.
		I just want to see an extension.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		That was yesterday.
		If you'd like to see the whole event of that news conference from Mar-a-Lago, you can see that on our website at c-span.org.
		Robbie in Florida, Democrat.
		Hi, Robbie.
unidentified		How are you doing this morning?
		Happy New Year.
		Happy New Year.
		So am I optimistic or am I pessimist?
		I don't know.
		Because, you know, the talk is from the first administration when he was elected.
		Oh, he didn't do this.
		He didn't do that.
		President Trump was a great president because he didn't blow up the world.
		And I get that.
		I get that.
		Again, the argument on the other side is: hey, there were safeguards, right?
		We had upstanding, somewhat, Republicans that would stand in the way.
		And now we don't.
		Okay?
		That ship has failed.
		We're in a two-party or a two-sided America where we have those Americans and we have other Americans.
		And what I mean is, when Trump says, hey, the American people voted me in, all Americans want this, all Americans want that.
		No, he's talking about those MAGA Republicans.
		Okay?
		He's not talking about Democrats, Independents, progressives, whatever.
		He's talking, you know, when the Republicans, when these MAGA Republicans, ultra-mAGA, if you want to call them that, speak, they're only talking about their party, what their party wants.
		They're not talking about the general.
		So, you know, you started off the segment with Israel.
		Hey, I'm going to, you know, all hell is going to break loose.
		You know, well, all hell has already broken loose over there.
		Okay.
		There's nothing, there's no hell to break loose over there.
		It's destroyed.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What would you want the new administration to do about the war between Israel and Hamas?
unidentified		Well, he said 24 hours, I could stop everything, right?
		We're not even 15 days away, and he's talking about blowing everything up.
		What I, you know, again, it's a hard, it's a hardliner for Israel.
		We don't have a religious president.
		Biden was very religious.
		He was a Zionist, you know, all that jazz.
		Trump is nothing like that.
		He just wants power and control.
		He wants to be the guy to say, hey, I did it.
		You know, I made this one promise.
		I did it.
		Me personally, I want the 67 borders back.
		Let the Palestinians go.
		Israel, I mean, this is a civil war.
		This isn't a war between two countries.
		Let's get that part clear.
		And I know that gets a lot of people upset.
		It's a civil war between these people.
		And we should not be involved.
		And again, I thought Trump was an ISIList.
		Or, you know, all the UNAGA guys didn't want no involvement anywhere.
		Hey, let's just get out of there.
		Let's not deal with these guys.
		That's their country.
		That's their region.
		Let them be them, right?
		Is it going to make it better or worse?
		I don't know.
		I have nothing for Netanyahu.
		I mean, the guy, you know, again, this isn't against Jewish people or, you know, this is the Israeli government I have an issue with, and that is that, right?
		But again, 24 hours, he's supposed to stop everything.
		The only way he's going to do it in 24 hours is bombing.
		You know, I don't know.
		It's just going to create a bigger war.
		You have other regions out there that want to hurt us.
		Anyway.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Robbie.
		And this is Dave, a Republican in Valdosta, Georgia.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Hello, Mimi.
		Hello, Dave.
		One thing, just to address the fellow that just was talking, Palestine is Jordan.
		That's where the Palestinians are from originally.
		But Jordan was still part of it.
		The Queen of Jordan is Palestinian.
		They're ungovernable.
		Hello?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes, go right ahead.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		We're listening.
unidentified		Okay, I didn't hear anything.
		Okay, but that's the point with that.
		And as far as dealing with Israel, and I would let Bibi, you know, I'm sure President Trump knows Bibi very well.
		Get with him and take care of it.
		I think that's what needs to be done there.
		But also, this idea now with President Trump coming in now, becoming president again, is give him an opportunity and not start this.
		I'm glad the House at least has a little bit of Republican control to give him the opportunity to deal with our nation.
		And also with President Trump, he appears to be on our side, the people, the citizen of the United States, as opposed to with Biden.
		Everything Biden seems to do was we can pay for it, the citizen, but we can't deal with it because they are dealing with it.
		And it becomes something that's negative to the individual, to the citizenry.
		So one of these days, you know, that's what the people, a lot of the citizenry likes with Donald Trump, is that he's on our side.
		And so in this idea with all the some of the stuff coming out with, you know, buying Greenland or buying Canada or this or that, I think Donald Trump is telling, there's a little hidden message in there to Xi of China and to Putin of Russia that we are on the offense now, and this is still our war, our world.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Dave.
		And update from the New York Times.
		Fierce winds whip up devastating wildfires in Southern California.
		Thousands of people have fled their homes as multiple blazes engulfed parts of the Los Angeles area.
		Officials warn that wind gusts overnight could spread the flames to more densely populated areas.
		And that is what has been happening.
		This is a picture here in Pasadena, California.
		And we'll keep an eye on that and update you throughout this program.
		This is Alex in New York, Independent Line.
		Alex, are you optimistic or pessimistic?
unidentified		Very optimistic.
		Again, we have a few calls this morning talking about Greenland, Iceland, the Panama Canal.
		Don't forget Seward Spolly.
		It was considered a joke at the time that we actually tried to acquire Alaska.
		Look what happens now.
		We bought it for what is in U.S. dollars now, about $50 million.
		It's a multi-billion dollar yearly income source to the U.S., plus strategic materials.
		No, give the guy a chance.
		He's not even in yet.
		It's the first time he suffered from lawfare.
		This time he's got some great ideas.
		The majority of the people did vote for him and want what he's bringing in.
		Okay, as far as the millionaires and billionaires go in, the Democrats have this too.
		We're not the only ones that have wealthy donors behind us.
		Anyway, thanks for all you do.
		Hope all is well.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Alex.
		Let's talk to Tom, a Democrat in New Mexico.
		Hello, Tom.
unidentified		Yes, thank you.
		Yes, I'd like to talk about economic inequality.
		And it's been reported that 68% of the people worldwide believe that economic inequality at home is the greatest threat to democracy.
		It's also been reported that income inequality threatens democracy by mistrusting political institutions, global corporations, and big tech.
		Now, the incoming Republican administration on January 20th, 2025, will have a cabinet and advisors to the 47th president with an estimated collective wealth of $450 billion.
		This is probably the largest assembly of the richest set of advisors to a president who is also a billionaire.
		Now, the Federal Reserve, as of 2022, estimates that the wealthiest 10% of Americans hold more than 88% of all available equity in corporations and mutual fund shares, which is the top 1% controlling more than twice as much equity as the bottom 50% of all Americans combined.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, Tom, tell me what you think would happen.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What are you afraid will happen with all these billionaires and multimillionaires in the cabinet and in powerful positions in government?
unidentified		Well, I have a feeling there's going to be a situation where we're going to have them, all these individuals, directing the president and the government in the wrong direction.
unidentified		Now, we do have a set of checks and balances that are essential for preserving any democracy.
ted gunderson ▲ ● ▼		Now, I have a quote here by Franklin Roosevelt saying that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob.
unidentified		I also have another quote by Niccolo Machiavelli in a book that he wrote in 1513.
		The first method of evaluating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.
		I'm scared about all these individuals that are around him, and I have a feeling it's going to lead us into a very bad situation.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Tom.
		And this is Robin in Mercer Island, Washington, Independent.
		Hi, Robin.
unidentified		Good morning.
unidentified		I hope you're doing well this morning.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		I am.
unidentified		Go right ahead.
		Thank you.
		I am strangely optimistic.
		And I think strangely because the words of the phone come to mind.
		You may be right.
		I may be crazy, but it just might be a lunatic you're looking for.
		Seems like the American people that got Trump into office are looking for that.
		And I have faith in America.
		I don't think that everyone is as informed as maybe they should be.
		But we swing back and forth.
		And we have a democracy.
		And we have a Speaker of the House and Hakeem Jeffries, who seem to work really well together.
		That gives me a lot of faith in what we might be able to do and the things that we might be able to prevent.
		So it's not just about incumbent President Trump.
		It's also about the people that we individually elect into offices in our local areas and who represent us at the national level.
		And I live in a place where I have really good representation.
		And so my faith is in the people.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Who's your congressperson out there, Robin?
unidentified		Adam Smith.
unidentified		All right.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And we got a text from Yorf in Skippers, Virginia.
		I am optimistic that our president will be talking to the press daily and not being hidden to keep Americans from seeing dementia setting in.
		Trump has already had more press interviews in the past four days than Biden had in past four years.
		And this is Jim in Illinois.
		I am completely pessimistic about Trump 57.
		At this point, key Republicans in Congress and the Supreme Court are spineless Trump sycophants who will enable his hare-brained ideas.
		We as a country are completely screwed.
		Thanks for your show.
		And here's Nikki in Yemencee, South Carolina, Democrat.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I don't understand why people want to be delusional about Donald Trump.
		We already know what Donald Trump is about.
		He led an insurrection.
		He has 34 charges against them.
		He is a felon.
		He is unqualified to be the president of the United States.
		He cheated his way into winning the presidency.
		He paid off to win the election.
		He's in bid with Putin, who is against America.
		Stop being delusional that Trump is in the best interest of all American people.
		Trump is in the best interest of Trump.
		He is a fake billionaire.
		He probably lied his way into stealing money from other people to gain this so-called wealth that he has created for himself.
		He's only for the interest of the 1%, and that is his million-dollar criminal friends, just like himself.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, Nikki, I take it you're pessimistic.
		What do you think is going to happen?
		What are you afraid will happen?
unidentified		Well, first of all, Trump, you know what's going to happen.
		Let's be honest.
		If we're truly honest with ourselves, we know that he's going to kill democracy as we know it.
		Democracy is not going to be for all people.
		It's going to be for the wealthy white men who are in charge, not for the working-class white people, not for the working-class, uneducated white people who supported and voted for Trump.
		Not for black people.
		Black people, we already know that anybody that gets in power is not going to benefit us because they don't care about black people.
		They want to keep black people oppressed and keep them underneath the thumb of Jim Crow and all the segregated laws.
		He does not want the Hispanics here, but they're the ones that's doing the work.
		So he wants to kill democracy as we know it and have an oligarchy.
		And he wants to have a dictatorship.
		And he wants to be the all-powerful, the ultimate God of America.
		And he wants people to bow down to him just like Hitler did.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Nick.
		This is Clifton in Montgomery Village, Maryland, Independent Line.
		Good morning, Clifton.
unidentified		Good morning, Mimi.
		And I'd like to say, first of all, you are looking exceptionally well this morning.
		You're pleasant to the eyes.
		You always are, but something about it today is exceptional.
		I'm not pessimistic nor optimistic.
		I am in a wait and see mode.
		There's something about Trump this time around.
		I didn't vote for him.
		I thought he was kind of just a weird, off-the-shelf, deranged kind of person.
		But it's something about him this time around.
		Looks like that he's going to shake things up and make things happen.
		So I'm in a wait and see mode.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And when you say shake things up, make things happen.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What specifically do you want to see happen?
unidentified		I think that he's going to change the economy.
		I think something's going to happen with the wall.
		I hope he doesn't kick to the curb all the things dealing with the lower class.
		I mean, I'm one of them.
		We need the help.
		I think that he may turn his attention to it, not as thoroughly as I would like, but I think all the other things, infrastructure and all the other things in terms of foreign policy and stuff, because he has people around that he seems to be listening to, he might just surprise us all.
		So I'm in a wait and see mode, hopefully in an optimistic fashion.
		So there's nothing we can do about it anyway.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Let's talk to Rosemary on the Republican line in Rockwood, Pennsylvania.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Rosemary.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Thank you for taking my call.
		I just wanted to say first that we do not live in a democracy, as these Democrats keep repeating.
		We live in a republic.
		Just say the Pledge of Allegiance, Pledge of Allegiance properly.
		And it says, one nation, it says to the United States of America and to the Republic.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So Rosemary, explain the distinction between that when you say that this is not a democracy, it's a republic.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Explain specifically.
unidentified		A democracy is actually mob role.
		That would be if there were no political parties, there were just people, all everyone having a vote, and then you just take mob role.
		But a republic is we elect people to represent our interests.
		And those people go to Washington and express what the majority of their constituents believe.
		So that's what I believe.
		And I am optimistic because President Trump will do something about the fuel prices, which will in turn do something about all the grocery prices.
		And I'm tired of paying $5 for a dozen eggs and everything else that has gotten out of control with Biden.
		Thank you.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And Rosemary, you mentioned fuel prices.
		We are going to be talking about energy policy in about three minutes.
		So stay around for that.
		This is Aaron in New York, Democrat.
		Hi, Aaron.
unidentified		Hi, Amy.
		How are you?
		Good.
		I'm confused here.
		I'm really confused because on one hand, the people who voted for Mr. Trump said that they're voting because their money, they want some more money in their pocket.
		Now they're moving the goalposts and saying, oh, well, you know, maybe he's going to do something.
		What did he do the first time?
		This man inherited one of the best economy in our lifetime.
		Period.
		So as soon as Trump gets in there, this is the same bill that Biden, so-called dementia guy, could imagine if he didn't have dementia and he kept his head down and give us one of the best presidency in this country.
		The things that he passed, okay?
		Infrastructure, all this stuff that these Republicans did not want to vote for and then go back home and take credit for it.
		Ridiculous.
		And so now here we are back again, the same man.
		I am not optimistic.
		I'm not pessimistic.
		I want him to show me.
		Show me.
		Don't tell me and beat his chest and tell me how he's just don't beat.
		Show me what you're going to do.
		The same way Biden show us.
		He didn't have to appear in television and beat his chest and say this and say that.
		He put his head down and did the work as a leader and as a president of the free world.
		We are now importing our energy.
		We're importing stuff to other countries because our energy.
		So our economy, again, is one of the best in the world.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Aaron.
		Let's get one more call in.
		This is Lila in Des Moines, Iowa, Independent.
unidentified		Yes.
		Well, I'm perplexed that we have a treasonist going to be for president.
		How is it that when all the migrant workers are gone, what will fruits, vegetables, and eggs cost you?
		If you don't have people to grow, if you don't have them to pick it, then the prices will go very, very high.
		I'm, you know, a treasonist for president, a man who overtried to throw the government.
		I am disappointed in the stupidity of those who voted for the treasonist.
		How do you spell treasonist?
		T-R-U-M-P.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And that's the last call for this segment.
		More to come, because up next we've got a discussion on energy.
		President-elect Trump says he'll reverse President Biden's ban on offshore oil and gas drilling off large swaths of the U.S. coast.
		We'll dig into the politics and policy implications with Zach Coleman of Politico.
		And later, we'll be joined by Jameel Jaffer, founder and executive director of the National Security Institute at George Mason University, about the ISIS terrorism threat in the wake of the New Year's attack in New Orleans.
		We'll be right back.
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		Ahead of the presidential inauguration on January 20th, American History TV on C-SPAN 2 presents a four-week series, Historic Inaugural Speeches.
		Each weekend, listen to inaugural speeches from Franklin Roosevelt through Barack Obama.
		On Saturday, hear inaugural speeches by President Jimmy Carter in 1977.
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unidentified		Washington Journal continues.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back.
		We are joined now by Zach Coleman.
		He's climate and energy reporter for Politico talking about President Biden's oil and gas drilling ban.
		Zach, welcome to the program.
unidentified		Thanks for having me.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So tell us about this withdrawing of 625 million acres of U.S. coastline from future oil and gas drilling.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Explain what that means.
unidentified		Right.
		So President Biden used a section of what's known as the Outer Continental Land Shelf Act to withdraw future oil and gas drilling leases from ever being put onto the market.
		So in the U.S., for federal waters, that's pretty much all the coastline.
		There's a process of actually putting forward these plots of land, these plots of offshore land to bid on and then lease.
		And then once a company acquires the rights that lease, they can drill.
		So what the president did here is he withdrew those areas that have not already been leased from ever being considered.
		So we're talking about the coast off of Florida, the Carolinas, all the way up to New York and Maine.
		We're also talking about the West Coast, the Pacific Coast, and we're talking about the Eastern Gulf of Mexico where there has not been drilling in decades, but there is known to be massive reserves, but it abuts the coast of Florida, and a lot of Floridians don't like the idea of drilling in that water.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And what was the reason he gave for doing that?
unidentified		Well, the reason is for climate change and also for protecting the environment.
		I mean, there's a lot of wildlife and aquatic ecosystems and fisheries that depend on these areas being healthy.
		So the idea that you would drill in there and potentially have oil spills, which we know we've seen over the course of history in these waters, he wanted to make sure that there was no possibility of that happening in the future and disrupting those economies.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So in the press conference yesterday, President-elect Donald Trump did talk about that drilling ban.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		I'm going to play you a portion and then we'll talk about it.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		President Biden's actions yesterday on offshore drilling, banning offshore drilling, will not stand.
		I will reverse it immediately.
		It'll be done immediately.
		And we will drill, baby, drill.
		We're going to be drilling in a lot of other locations.
		And the energy costs are going to come way down.
		They'll be brought down to a very low level.
		And that's going to bring everything else down.
		That's what caused it to go up, along with the ridiculous spending on the Green News scam.
		All this money, trillions of dollars.
		It's like throwing it right out the window what they're doing.
		And they're trying to spend so much now.
		They're just taking money and giving it to anybody that wants it for any project at all if it's certified under the Green News scam.
		And they don't work and it's too expensive.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		That was yesterday.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So what power does President Biden have to enact this ban and what power does incoming President-elect Trump have to reverse it?
unidentified		So the power right now is, you know, this is an executive action that can be taken under an existing law.
		So President Biden has the ability to withdraw this.
		President Trump could try to unilaterally restore these lands for offshore leasing and offshore drilling.
		However, the last time this was tried, I mean, there was an Obama-era ban on new drilling in Alaska waters.
		And the Trump administration tried to put that back in play.
		And a federal court in Alaska actually shot down the Trump administration, and they never appealed.
		So the lasting precedent on this is that once it's withdrawn, it is withdrawn.
		So the Trump administration could try to do this unilaterally.
		It will definitely end up in the courts.
		And it could take some time for that to resolve itself through appeals, maybe even getting all the way up to the Supreme Court.
		So right now, the clearest way to reverse what President Biden just did is through Congress.
		But even that gets a little complicated because Florida Republicans have pretty much uniformly rejected any drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, which President Biden removed from consideration with this last order.
		And even President Trump, on his way out of office in 2020, decided to enact a moratorium on drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and all these waters that President Biden actually just withdrew from consideration.
		President Trump did the same thing.
		He did it for 10 years, not permanently like President Biden.
		So when you see President Trump saying we're going to reverse this, you have to ask, what are you reversing?
		Are you reversing the permanency of this?
		Are you trying to do this on a more temporary basis?
		And can you actually get Florida Republicans to agree with what you want to do?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And we will take your calls for Zach Coleman on energy policy, drilling, energy costs.
		You can give us a call by a party.
		So Democrats can call us on 202-748-8000.
		Republicans 202-748-8001.
		And Independents 202-748-8002.
		You say in one of your articles that this move by President Biden is largely symbolic.
unidentified		It is symbolic because there is a chance that it will be reversed.
		I mean, Republicans in Congress are certainly going to take an attempt through their reconciliation bill, which they can pass with all Republican votes, to actually reverse the permanency of this ban.
		But let's keep in mind here that it's symbolic also because there's not much drilling in these waters.
		I mean, there's none, really.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Why not?
unidentified		Well, it's just not an economically viable area.
		The Atlantic Ocean doesn't offer a whole lot of prospects here, and a lot of governors have resisted drilling off their coast.
		The people don't want it there.
		And that's the same with the Pacific.
		There are some attempts by some companies to restart some already existing offshore platforms in California, but that's encountering a lot of local opposition.
		There's just a political and social license hurdle for a lot of these companies.
		And again, in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, it's been decades of no drilling there just because it's so politically challenging to do that.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		In part of that clip that I played for you, President-elect Trump said we're going to drill baby drill and that energy prices will come down, bringing everything else down.
		Explain how that will work.
		How quickly will there be new drilling?
		And I guess part of the issue is getting petroleum companies to want to drill.
unidentified		Look, even Republican congressional staffers who I've talked to said, we're not going to go into these politically contentious areas and try to offer offshore leases like off the coast of South Carolina.
		They know that there's very limited industry interest there.
		So when President-elect Trump says we're going to drill baby drill and lower prices, this is a globally set price on oil, not on gas.
		But the amount that the U.S. is able to drill does have some effect on moderating price swings, but it cannot alone set the price for oil in the U.S.
		So there is some effect by producing more, but again, the economy on gas and oil is already so saturated.
		We already are producing a lot.
		In the U.S., we're the number one producer of oil and gas in the world.
		So any more that we produce is not likely to change the dynamics significantly on the price that people pay.
		And in the end, you have to be able to, you can't just tell drillers to drill.
		They have to find that it's within their own economic interest.
		And from all the people me and my colleagues have talked to, they're saying that there's just not enough of an incentive right now with their price where it is at, where it's set globally, for them to actually go and drill.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And what would that incentive be?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And is there something that the Trump administration could do to provide that incentive?
unidentified		There's not much that they could do.
		I mean, the price of the barrels just has to be so high that it would incentivize new economic activity.
		It costs a lot of money to actually go and do an offshore oil operation.
		I mean, this is one of the most expensive ways to drill for oil.
		So the price of the barrel has to be so high, and that would inflict more pain on Americans to have the price of oil so high.
		So that's not something that would actually lower the prices.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Explain the difference between Trump's first administration and what he's talking about now for the second administration.
unidentified		Well, in terms of his first administration, he certainly wanted to open up more federal oil and gas leasing.
		He wanted to drill more onshore.
		He wanted to drill more offshore.
		There's not much of a difference there.
		Through reconciliation, they opened up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling.
		They didn't actually get to drill that.
		That's a huge, politically contentious area in Alaska.
		And you see him wanting to do those same things.
		But again, on his way out the door, he was facing the prospects of another election.
		He did institute a moratorium on these same waters that President Biden has now taken off the table.
		So now with the President-elect Trump not having to face another election, will he reverse that?
		Will he continue to open up more land?
		I don't know.
		We don't know yet.
		So what we'll be telling is what message he sends to Congress about that.
		And him saying in this press conference that he wants to reverse this ban, that doesn't have a lot of specificity or detail.
		So we need to know what that is.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's talk to callers and we'll start on the line for Democrats in Richmond, Kentucky.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Cindy, good morning.
unidentified		Yes.
		I am a Florida native, and I moved to Kentucky this year.
		And I've been telling Kentuckians about this ban that Trump did.
		And actually, it started with Rubio, I believe, who reintroduced the Florida Shores Protection and Fairness Act, and that they did put a ban on drilling oil in Florida.
		The Republicans did.
		And I tell people this in Kentucky, and they don't even know that the Republicans and Trump did this in Florida.
		So I want people to know that not only did Biden just put this ban on, but Trump did it in 2020, as you explained.
		So I'm really upset about this that people don't know about this ban that Trump put on.
		What is going on with Fox News not announcing this?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Cindy, any reaction to that?
unidentified		I mean, again, this is like a universally opposed thing in Florida to drill in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.
		There's national security reasons, there's environmental reasons.
		And when you look at the broad sweep of climate forward-thinking Republicans, a lot of them are in Florida.
		The ones who really care about climate change, they understand that sea levels are rising and that oil and gas has some effect on that.
		Now, the world is still seeing an expansion of oil and gas demand.
		So there is a sense that this oil and gas is going to have to come from somewhere else if those other broader demand questions don't change.
		But it's also already not coming from the Eastern Gulf.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, let's talk to a Republican in Florida.
		This is Joe.
		Hi, Joe.
		Joe, are you there?
		In Florida?
unidentified		Can you hear me?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Oh, yes, go right ahead.
unidentified		Wonderful.
		Let me just ask you a question.
		It takes an act of Congress to declare war against another country.
		Now, what powers has a president got without the authority to initiate the prop that Samson's initiating right now?
martin caidin ▲ ● ▼		I don't understand.
unidentified		What is Congress for?
unidentified		Let's talk to a president in Florida.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Okay, go ahead.
unidentified		So, yeah, I mean, in fact, there is congressional authority to do this, at least to the extent that it's been tested in the courts.
		And this is from the Outer Continental Land Shelf Act, which has been around since the 50s.
		So there is statute.
		Congress has given the president the authority to do this.
		It's whether it stands the test of the courts is the next question, and we might see that over the next couple years.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What about drilling in federal lands in Alaska?
unidentified		Yeah, I mean, you know, that is likely going to be a political football in the next Congress.
		I mean, certainly the Republicans will look to open some of that up.
		You know, this executive action from President Biden does take more of Alaskan waters off the table.
		But even Alaska has not challenged that to a major degree.
		I mean, that is, again, a politically sensitive thing.
		When you get to actual governors and state lawmakers and representatives of those states having to take these actions, if you put it in their court, they've shown time and again that they're not willing to go that far.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And are there leases that have been given to companies to drill, but they haven't started drilling or for whatever reason?
unidentified		There have been leases in the Alaskan waters for some time, but there have been also some problems over the years.
		Shell encountered a number of problems in getting its offshore operations going in Alaska, but they've been there for some time as well.
		So, I mean, like, look, there has been drilling in Alaska.
		It's a major oil-producing state.
		But when you get to opening up some of these politically and environmentally sensitive areas, that's where it's a whole different ballgame.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's talk to Richard, a line for Democrats, Augusta, Georgia.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		The President Trump wants to drill, baby drill, but he doesn't realize how much effect that OPEC oil companies are going to have on the oil market.
		And if it's not above $80 a barrel, we won't see cheaper prices until oil drops below $75 a barrel.
		And also, we've been drilling, drilling, drilling since the Obama administration with plenty of permits.
		But oil companies, to me, I always say they rule the country on the energy prices.
		And if you don't have refineries that can process all of this oil or don't want to refine it, we're going to still have higher gas prices.
		And besides, they're having trouble with the batteries for electric cars in cold weather temperature.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Let's get a response, Richard.
unidentified		Yeah, I mean, the caller is exactly right.
		I mean, at a certain point, you need a high price of oil to incentivize more drilling.
		And OPEC, the organization, the cartel of oil-producing states, often working in concert with Russia, has an incentive to keep prices at a place where they can preserve market share and keep the U.S. out of drilling more.
		So they kind of are swing producers here.
		They can kind of decide whether to produce more or produce less to moderate the price of oil because they control that much of the market.
		And at this point, if prices are low, that will keep more U.S., which are higher-cost drillers, out of the market.
		I mean, the U.S. is getting more efficient at producing oil domestically, so that is starting to have less effect when you keep prices of oil low.
		You can still get U.S. drillers coming to the market, but the lowest cost producers are often in OPEC.
		So they actually have a huge control over this market.
		And again, about the refineries, that's also correct.
		I mean, the U.S. refineries are often produced, are built to handle crude varieties that are not as readily produced in the U.S.
		I mean, you were talking about producing, making gasoline off of heavy crudes that come from Canada and Venezuela.
		That's when a lot of these refineries were set up in the 70s.
		And we aren't building new refineries.
		They're huge capital-intensive operations.
		And the stuff that we produce in the U.S. is lighter varieties that those refineries are not equipped to handle.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Talk about energy independence.
		What does it mean for the United States to be energy independent?
		And have we ever been there?
unidentified		Well, we've never been truly energy independent.
		I think the idea that people have about energy independence is we will never import energy from somewhere else.
		And that is just not how this all works.
		It's a global market.
		It's a globally set price of oil.
		And it's just arbitrage.
		If you can get cheaper barrels of oil from overseas, that's what you're going to do.
		And again, with the refineries, a lot of them are not configured to just only handle what is produced in the U.S. You have to mix in stuff from other countries.
		We get 18% of what is refined in the U.S. from Canada.
		That's a heavier crude oil than we produce here.
		So when President-elect Trump talks about 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, you're talking about taking almost a fifth of what is refined in the U.S. off the market.
		Someone's going to pay for that.
		We're not going to get it from just domestic sources.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's talk to Sal in New Jersey, a Republican line.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Sal.
unidentified		Hi, Dylan.
		I've been listening, and there's a couple of points.
		I was just going to say, every time I hear, I watch H-SPAN, most of the time I hear these people with the negativity about President Trump's policies and to help the country.
		Now, this fella, he's drinking the Biden Kool-Aid, you could tell.
		When the Keystone Pipeline was open and we were in the reserves, Alaska, getting oil, and the Keystone Pipeline was open, how come gasoline, when I went to the gas to get in my car, was like $2.20, $10 a gallon.
		They're saying, he's saying all this stuff, get oil from other countries and refine it.
		It costs more money to get oil from Venezuela like we're doing.
		Refining it, all that money it costs to refine it when we have it here.
		And Biden, by the way, shut down all the leases and the things for people to open oil, to open drilling oil.
		I forgot the right word, but he wouldn't let them open up the drill on the oil.
		He shut it all down without Congress, that I remember.
		He just did what he wanted to do.
		So I just want to hear some people with positive things that Trump is saying he's going to do to get more people working if they start drilling and open oil refineries and start making money for the American people.
		That's what I like to hear people say.
		Thank you.
		Yeah, I mean, most energy production, oil and gas production in this country comes on private land.
		It's land that is not controlled by the federal government.
		But that being said, President-elect Trump wants to open more of that federal land to drilling.
		And there will be more drilling on federal land that will bring more jobs to those sites.
		But again, a majority of that oil and gas production cannot be shut down by a president because a majority of it is on private and state lands that the federal government does not have control over.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And he said that it's cheaper, the caller said it is cheaper to use our own oil rather than importing from Venezuela.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Explain that again, how the economics of that work.
unidentified		Right.
		So, I mean, this is a global market.
		There is no American price of oil versus Venezuelan price of oil.
		It is such a global commodity because we all depend on it that there's one price pretty much.
		I mean, there's a couple different points in which you can set the price, but it's basically one price.
		So if one place is producing it cheaper than another, it makes sense to import from that other place.
		It just bottlenecks.
		It's cost of doing business.
		There's traders who make a lot of money in between who end up making sure that these deals get done.
		And again, it is the actual engineering of the refineries.
		You cannot just feed American crude through a lot of these refineries.
		You need different varieties.
		And it's not just because it's not because they like Venezuela more than America.
		It's that there's literally different types of crude oil coming out of the ground that you need to make gasoline.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is Clyde in Oklahoma on the line for Democrats.
		Good morning.
		Clyde?
unidentified		In Oklahoma, are you there, Clyde?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Maybe not.
		I want to ask you about President-elect Trump's nominees in the energy sector.
		So we've got Energy Secretary dominee is Chris Wright.
		We've got Interior Secretary nominee is Doug Bergham.
		And EPA Administrator is Lee Zeldon.
		What are you expecting from those nominees?
unidentified		I mean, they're all going to sail through their confirmation process.
		I mean, these are three people.
		Lee Zeldon was in Congress.
		I mean, you know, when you're an animal of the Congress, you definitely get an easier path through the confirmation.
		But that being said, I mean, he's a Long Island Republican.
		He had taken some solid votes for environmental reasons on water protection.
		He's viewed as a strong legal mind.
		I mean, there's a lot of the EPA is regulations and legal matters.
		Chris Wright has said some controversial things about climate science.
		That being said, he is a technologist through and through.
		He is an MIT grad.
		He certainly seems to like energy, but he does not like the policy that supports subsidies for wind and solar technology.
		So to the extent that the Energy Department has any sort of say over the administration of a lot of these tax credits, the Inflation Reduction Act, which is a huge climate law that President Biden and Democrats passed, he would probably take a negative view on those subsidies.
		And then Doug Bergham, by all accounts, seems to be a moderate in a sense.
		And there have been good reports about people who have worked with him.
		You know, North Dakota set a carbon neutral goal.
		He believes in using technology to reduce the effect of oil and gas on climate change.
		A lot of that technology is nascent right now, but he is certainly expected to oversee this unleashing of American energy dominant, as President-elect Trump calls it, and that would mean more oil and gas drilling on federal lands.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is Robert, Washington, D.C., Independent Line.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Robert.
unidentified		Thank you.
		I got a couple of questions to ask, and I'd like to make a follow-up.
		When was the first time we paid $5 plus a gallon of gas?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Do you remember, Zach?
unidentified		You know, I don't actually remember that.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Do you know, Robert?
unidentified		Oh, wow.
		You should.
		You should.
		Now, it was 2004, 2005, under George W. Bush, when they added ethanol to the gasoline.
		I don't know why these Republicans have this selective amnesia while they don't remember when they was paying $5 plus.
		Now, the second question is, who amassed the greatest fortune in batteries?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Robert, go ahead and tell us.
unidentified		Thomas Edison.
		It was Thomas Edison 130 years ago.
		Question number three.
		Who is Nicola Tesla?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, that everybody knows.
		Everybody knows Nikolai Tesla.
		Yes.
		He invented alternating currents.
unidentified		He's greatest minds.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yep.
unidentified		Right.
		So now he was one of the greatest minds in the last 1,000 years.
		Now, he presented to us, to America, when he came here about what is called free energy.
		What was known as he devised various different inventions that could be able to produce energy to the wish that the U.S. government kicked him to the curb.
		Why?
		Because they say we cannot make no money off of these products.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, Robert, we are running out of time.
unidentified		Do you have a specific question for the guest?
		Well, I gave you the specific question.
		When was the first time we paid $5 a gallon?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You got it.
		And Zach Coleman is a climate and energy reporter for Politico.
		You can find his reporting at politico.com.
		Zach, thanks so much for joining us.
		Thank you for having me.
		And up next, we'll be joined by Jamil Jaffer.
		He's founder and executive director of the National Security Institute at George Mason University.
		We'll be talking about the ISIS terrorism threat in the wake of the New Year's attack in New Orleans.
		And later, Democratic Congresswoman Becca Ballant discusses her thoughts on the incoming Trump administration and Democrats' role in the 119th Congress.
		We'll be right back.
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		It's time to make your voice heard.
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		Whether you're passionate about politics, the environment, or community stories, StudentCam is your platform to share your message with the world.
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		Join C-SPAN for live coverage of the state funeral.
		Today, the public will have the opportunity to pay their respects as his body remains in state at the U.S. Capitol.
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		Watch C-SPAN's live coverage of the funeral services for former President Jimmy Carter on the C-SPAN Networks, C-SPAN now, our free mobile video app, or online at C-SPAN.org.
jimmy carter ▲ ● ▼		Democracy is always an unfinished creation.
ronald reagan ▲ ● ▼		Democracy is worth dying for.
george h w bush ▲ ● ▼		Democracy belongs to us all.
bill clinton ▲ ● ▼		We are here in the sanctuary of democracy.
george w bush ▲ ● ▼		Great responsibilities fall once again to the great democracies.
barack obama ▲ ● ▼		American democracy is bigger than any one person.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Freedom and democracy must be constantly guarded and protected.
unidentified		We are still at our core a democracy.
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mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back.
		We're joined now by Jamil Jaffer.
		He is National Security Institute founder and George Mason University at the George Mason University Law School.
		He's a former senior counsel to the House Intelligence Committee.
		Jamil, welcome to the program.
unidentified		Thanks for having me, Mimi.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, so in talking about this attack in New Orleans, the FBI had said that the attacker is 100% inspired by ISIS.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Tell us how they reached that conclusion.
unidentified		Well, you know, the most obvious piece of evidence that we have is that he put an ISIS flag on the back of his truck that he drove into that crowd there on Bourbon Street, killing 14 people.
		But beyond that, we know that over the course of the last year, and in particular, right in the lead up to his attack, he posted a number of things on social media indicating his allegiance to ISIS, indicating his concerns with music and Western culture and the like.
		And that's what's made clear to us.
		I mean, in particular, that he's involved ISIS.
		And in particular, he actually mentioned in one of his posts right before he conducted the attack that he actually was thinking about killing his own family, but decided that that wouldn't be splashy enough.
		It wouldn't get his cause enough attention.
		And that was part of his concern, which is why he conducted the particular horrific attack that he did there in New Orleans.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Now, the U.S., I believe, has largely defeated ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
		So, what's the current state of ISIS?
		Do they currently hold any territory?
		And how much influence and power do they actually have right now?
unidentified		Well, you're right that we've conducted a strong series of operations over the course of nearly a decade now against ISIS.
		But they do continue to hold small pockets of territory.
		Just in the last few days, U.S. forces, along with Iraqi forces, have conducted strikes in Syria and Iraq against ISIS targets.
		In addition, on December 20th, 2024, we killed a senior ISIS leader, Abu Yusuf, also known as Muhammad.
		And so we continue to conduct strikes against ISIS because they continue to pose a threat both in the region but internationally as well because they're trying to plot these longer-term attacks against the United States, against their allies in Europe.
		And they're also trying to continue to inspire people like Shumshuddin-Jabbar to conduct attacks in their homelands, either here in the United States or in Europe as well.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And how are they inspiring those attacks?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Through what medium?
unidentified		Well, you know, it's unfortunate, but it's actually online.
		They're posting videos that talk about the jihad.
		They talk about training terrorists.
		They talk about what might motivate you to conduct an attack.
		They talk about extreme versions that are not the actual version of Islam that most of the world's billion Muslims practice.
		And so they are working in effort to actively take people who have other issues.
		Shamshuddin-Jabbar had issues in his family life.
		He had issues financially.
		He had issues acculturating to life after the military.
		And they want to take those vulnerable people and convert them into killers by giving them something to believe in, by giving them something to motivate them, something that explains why they're having problems that aren't the actual reason for their problems.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		I'm going to play you just a short portion of Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh talking to reporters last Friday about the level of threat that ISIS represents today, and then I'll get your reaction to it.
unidentified		ISIS retains capabilities as we've seen in Iraq and Syria, and that's why we have our forces in both of those countries to ensure that ISIS can never reconstitute or resurge or surge back to what it was just a decade ago.
		I mean, the entire mission of our force presence there is to ensure the enduring defeat of ISIS.
		And that's why we've partnered with the Syrian Democratic Forces over the past few years.
		And that's why we continue to conduct strikes against ISIS positions, whether it be as recently as in the Badia Desert or elsewhere.
		Because of course, ISIS remains a threat, but they certainly are not the same threat that they were a decade ago.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What do you think?
		What do you make of that, Jamil Jaffer?
		And the concept of military defeat of ISIS, given that this is more of an ideology that inspires other people to make attacks on their fellow citizens.
unidentified		Yeah, look, Bibi, there's no doubt that it's hard to combat an ideology, but ISIS isn't just an ideology.
		It's also a group of fighters and planners who are conducting attacks and plotting attacks overseas, who are looking to recruit people online, making these videos that we're talking about, trying to radicalize people, communicating over encrypted apps with Americans in the United States, with Europeans in Europe as well, trying to get these attacks conducted.
		So there are people, there are facilities, there are training camps, there are capabilities that they're obtaining.
		Just look in Syria with the fall of Bashar Assad, which is a victory for the world, that brutal dictator who used chemical weapons against his own people.
		At the same time, the very people coming into power, Hayatur al-Sham, HGS, Jalani, the new leader of Syria, purportedly, he's a former member of al-Qaeda, former member of the Nusra Front, a key terrorist group in the region.
		Now, he claims he's reformed himself, but they now control real territory with real weaponry.
		The Israelis have taken a significant effort to take out a lot of that Syrian military equipment.
		But the truth is, that's a real challenge, and these terrorists are not going away.
		They also believe that they continue to remain at war with the United States, whether we think they're defeated or not.
		They continue to conduct these attacks, continue to identify opportunities.
		And if we take our eye off the ball, unfortunately, Mimi, they will achieve success, not just in ways like they did here in New Orleans, but in bigger and even more spectacular attacks, which is ultimately their goal.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And we will take your calls for Jamil Jaffer of George Mason University.
		And we're talking about the threat that ISIS poses to the United States.
		We are taking your calls by party.
		So it's Democrats 202748-8000.
		It's 202748-8001 for Republicans and 202748-8002 for independents.
		Well, President-elect Trump has said that he wants to scale back the U.S. presence in the Middle East.
		And just as a reminder, the U.S. has about 2,000 troops in Iraq, about 900 in Syria.
		They're there to counter ISIS.
		What do you think that the impact of that will have the more isolationist or America-first agenda?
unidentified		Well, look, you know, Mimi, we've had three presidents in a row, President Obama, President Trump, and President Biden, all of whom have wanted to reduce our force posture overseas, remove ourselves from a lot of these overseas conflicts, focus here at home.
		And at times when we've done that, we saw the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
		We saw President Trump's successful efforts against ISIS, but then the challenge where he allowed the Turkish government to go after ISIS, go after our allies, the Kurds as well.
		And so there are challenges in our relationship with our allies and our adversaries overseas.
		And the real fact of the matter is, at the end of the day, Mimi, it is better for the United States and for Americans and for allies in Europe to fight these adversaries where they are, whether it's in the Middle East or elsewhere, rather than allowing them to plan and plot attacks against our homeland here in the United States or against Europeans in Europe or against Americans and Europeans anywhere around the globe.
		So the real truth is if we're going to win this effort or even be successful at staving off attacks on the homeland, we've got to conduct and continue to conduct operations overseas, not just in Syria, not just in Iraq, but in Afghanistan, in northern Pakistan, where the government doesn't control that territory, and parts of Africa as well.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Well, President-elect Trump was asked about it at the news conference yesterday, and I'll play you a portion of what he said specifically about Turkey.
unidentified		About Syria, the Pentagon disclosed last month the U.S. has some 2,000 troops in Syria.
		That's almost double the number initially, we were told, of 900.
		Will you keep that troop capacity the same upon taking over?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Well, I won't tell you that because that's part of a military strategy, but I will say it was Turkey.
		Turkey's been after that country in different names and different forms and shapes for 2,000 years.
		Those people that went in are from Turkey.
		And President Erdogan is a friend of mine.
		He's a guy I like, respect.
		I think he respects me also.
		He's the one that didn't go after certain people after I requested that he not.
		You know who I'm talking about?
		The Kurds.
		I don't know how long that's going because they're natural enemies.
		They hate each other.
		But he didn't do that yet.
		And he didn't do it in the past also.
		He started, and I said, please don't do that.
		And he didn't do it.
		But if you look at what happened with Syria, Russia was weakened.
		Iran was weakened.
		And he's a very smart guy.
		And he sent his people in there through different forms and different names.
		And they went in and they took over.
unidentified		And that's the way it is.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of that, Jamil Jaffer, on ceding the fight of ISIS to Erdogan, to the Turkish president?
unidentified		Well, look, certainly President Erdogan has interests in the region, as do Russia, as do Iran, as President Trump correctly laid out.
		And he's right that in a lot of ways the Turkish effort was successful at harming Russia and harming Iran and its interests in Syria and by replacing that government and getting the brutal dictator Bashar Assad out.
		Now the problem is though, the people that have now taken over that country have long-term ties back to al-Qaeda, back to terrorist groups that have attacked the United States.
		And President Trump rightly lays out that there is this challenge between the Kurdish forces and the Turkish forces.
		Turkey, of course, is a member of NATO.
		We have key bases there.
		We have an important relationship there as an ally.
		At the same time, we have a very strong relationship with the Kurds who actually won under President Trump are fight against ISIS, or at least took back a lot of that territory.
		As you point out rightly, we haven't yet won that war.
		We haven't defeated them.
		But the Kurds were hugely helpful, and we've got to maintain that relationship as well.
		Now, President Trump, I think, tells a little bit more of a charitable story than actually took place with President Erdogan and the Kurds at the same time.
		Getting the Turkish government and President Erdogan in the right place to the United States is a good thing for the NATO alliance.
		It's a good thing for the United States.
		They recently, a while back, bought Russian S-400 missiles.
		That's a huge problem.
		We need to have them stop doing that.
		We need to get them back into the F-35 program if that's appropriate.
		But, you know, Turkey has different interests in the region as well.
		We've got to figure out how to work together with them, but also not allow them to go after key allies of ours that have fought for us and fought for themselves to protect those lands in Iraq and Syria from the very real threat of ISIS and groups like al-Qaeda.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		We're going to take calls, but one more question for you before we do, which is this attack in New Orleans was carried out by a U.S. Army vet born in Texas.
		He had pledged allegiance to ISIS just before the attack.
		Legally, when it comes to an American citizen, what can the FBI do as far as tracking people, surveilling people here in the United States that have either ISIS leanings or have actually pledged allegiance?
unidentified		Well, Sabrina, Mimi, it's a great question, a really important question.
		The challenge I think that we face today is that we have an authority that used to be in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
		It's called the Lone Wolf Authority.
		It allows us to surveil Americans with a court order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which is made up of district judges from around the country, to surveil lone wolf terrorists like Shamshin-Jabbar.
		Unfortunately, Congress allowed that lone wolf authority, along with other critically important authorities, roving wiretaps for terrorism suspects that we have today on drug suspects as well, as well as the 215 program, which allows us to access metadata to identify potential connections between terrorist groups and individuals in the United States.
		All of those authorities were allowed to expire four years ago.
		So it's no surprise that the authorities that are critical to identifying people like Shamshin-Jabbar, now they've gone away, that we're missing some of these things.
		So one, we've got to get those authorities back.
		Second, Section 702, which is our ability to surveil terrorists and spies overseas, foreigners, not Americans, is also set to expire in the upcoming year.
		It was reauthorized by Congress last year, but only for a short period.
		We've got to reauthorize that as well.
		And so Congress has a lot of important decisions to make and frankly has dropped the ball in a big way when it comes to lone wolf surveillance over four years ago.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Let's go to calls now to Greg is a Democrat in Willington, Connecticut.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Greg.
unidentified		Good morning, Mimi.
		Good morning, guest.
		I'm a lifelong Democrat.
		I'm a big anti-war guy.
		I think the guest here is being a little bit disingenuous when he describes the situation in Syria.
		Julani is a terrorist, and he has a $10 million bounty on reward on his head.
		And And in large part, he is there because of U.S. support of his terrorist group to take down the legitimate government of Syria.
		And this all started back in 2011.
		So the guests, you know, the history of this situation is completely missing here as I talk.
		But short of that, it makes it really difficult if we're supporting this guy who's a terrorist in the overthrow of this government.
		Why on earth should I believe anything the FBI says about what is happening in New Orleans or Las Vegas?
		I have no faith in my government because of the deception that they constantly do with misleading information about what's going on in the world.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Let's get a response, Greg.
		Go ahead.
		Jamil Jaffir.
unidentified		Well, Mimi, I think Greg raises some really important points.
		To the extent that I suggested that Al-Jalani, I don't think, is a terrorist or wasn't a terrorist for a long time or associated with al-Qaeda, I agree with him 100%.
		He's exactly right.
		Al-Jalani was part of the Al-Nusra Front, which is a terrorist organization that was part of al-Qaeda.
		But to be clear, in my view, we don't support al-Jalani.
		We supported the Syrian Democratic Forces.
		They, to be fair, have worked with groups like HTS to push against the Syrian government.
		That is true in the Syrian civil war.
		People of different factions have fought against one another, but they've also fought together against Bashar Assad.
		As far as I'm aware, we have not supported al-Jalani, and I don't think we ought to support Al-Jalani.
		At the same time, I'm glad that Bashar Assad is gone.
		I'm very worried about what happens when a guy like Al-Jalani takes over a country like Syria.
		It's true, he's taking office fatigues.
		He's putting on a tie now and looking good for TV.
		But the reality is that Al-Jalani has these very deep ties to terrorist organizations.
		We should not support him.
		And we should ensure that Syria is a country that embraces all of its people.
		There are significant minority populations there, Shia Muslims, Christians, the Jewish community as well.
		And so we should ensure that's a country that is stable and secure.
		If Al-Jalani has really reformed, great.
		We have a lot of things to be skeptical about that.
		I'm not buying it right now, but let's see what happens going forward.
		But I agree with the caller.
		That's exactly a problem.
		Now, with respect to his concerns about the FBI, there's no doubt that our intelligence and law enforcement community needs some work, that we need some reforms.
		At the same time, I think fundamentally they're rowing in the right direction, which is protecting our country from the threat of terrorism, protecting our country from other threats as well.
		I think we ought to support our military intelligence communities and give them the tools and capabilities they need while also ensuring they're doing the right thing, protecting Americans' privacy and civil liberties as well.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Jamil, do you think that the threat of ISIS has grown since the October 7th attack by Hamas on Israel?
unidentified		I think there's no doubt that our terrorist adversaries, whether it's terrorist groups supported by Iran, like the Houthis in Yemen, right, or the terrorist groups that are in the al-Qaeda-associated terrorist groups and al-Qaeda birth terrorist groups like ISIS, they're all looking at the United States and our allies and saying, look, these guys are people we need to go after.
		They've long believed that.
		And October 7th only gives them the opportunity to say, we need to do more.
		And they've seen, frankly, a lot of indecision by the United States in terms of our support for Israel, which is fighting essentially against an attack that caused the equivalent on a population-adjusted basis of a dozen 9-11 attacks.
		And we've asked Israel to hold back and slow down.
		And look, there are important things to do to protect civilians in Gaza as well.
		At the same time, we can't give any quarter to terrorists who conducted the kind of attacks like Hamas did in Israel.
		The kind of depravity with which they acted, the things they did to young women and girls in that attack were horrific.
		And I just, I want the American people to think, I want our callers and listeners to think about how we would feel and what we would do with the terrorist group that conducted an attack that is the size of a dozen 9-11s in a country the size of Israel.
		We spent over two decades going around the world chasing al-Qaeda.
		Israel's barely a year into this conflict against Hamas, and they've got to do the thing and destroy Hamas and take it down and remove all its operational capability.
		At the same time, we've got to ensure that the Gazan population is safe and secure and that they get the food and medical supplies they need as well.
		Because at the end of the day, they're not the adversary, and Israel knows this.
		At the end of the day, it makes it harder for Israel to operate against Hamas if the Gazan people are suffering and they're viewed as causing suffering as well.
		So there's a balance there, I think, Mimi.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's talk to Ali in Lorton, Virginia, Independent.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Well, first, I was calling to suppress my view about a couple of things, but I would like to thank the first caller, Jeff, I think.
		I thought not many Americans understand this, but what I want to say is the similarities with what happened in Iraq.
		In 2003, the United States came, removed the Saddam Hussein regime, criminal dictatorship.
		Probably everyone agree on that.
		And then handed over the government in Iraq to extremist Islamic parties that they have been, a couple of them actually accuse of terrorism, and they are well known to the United States.
		They handed over the government to them, providing them with IDs, legitimacy, armored vehicles, and left Iraq to the fate of those people.
		I just, it's really striking that see the same thing happen again.
		Just terrorists who's wanted to the United States, probably, probably he's wanted because he killed innocent people.
		Just a few days after he take over, I believe the assistant undersecretary, Barbara Alif, go and visit him, give him the legitimacy, and then foreign minister of Rome all around the world start to fly to him and make him the ruler of Syria.
		In Iraq, it took a couple of months to the terrorist organization, international, the neighboring country intelligence to form up and to start operating and start the civil war there, as they called it.
		It was a proxy war, not civil war.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So that's what I want to say.
		Yep, let's get a response.
		Go ahead, Jamil Jaffer.
unidentified		Look, I think Ali raises an important question about what happens when dictators leave power, right?
		Who fills that power vacuum?
		In Iraq, we were able to put in place a government that we thought would be more allied to the United States and not oppress its people the way that Saddam Hussein did.
		And the truth is the Iraqi government over the last decade and a half, or two decades even, has actually done a lot for the Iraqi people to benefit them in a lot better ways than Saddam Hussein would have.
		At the same time, it's certainly not gotten the U.S. the result it's wanted.
		With the elections in Iraq taking place, they've elected more and more problematic governments to the United States.
		And that's been a challenge for us, no doubt.
		And that problem may also replicate itself in Syria.
		There's no question that Ali raises an important point that sometimes dictatorships, even the most brutal ones, might benefit, the stability might benefit the United States.
		But the truth is, the Syrian regime was never interested in working with the United States.
		Bashar Assad was a brutal dictator.
		Ever since President Obama set the red line and it was crossed, where he used chemical weapons, sarin and chlorine gas against his own people, that made clear, and it had been clear for years, frankly, that Bashar Assad was an Iranian puppet, a Russian puppet, and somebody that was not in our interest to have been power.
		It doesn't mean, as Ali rightly points out, that Al-Jalani is in our interest or that we're not going to have a huge problem with a nation state controlled by a potentially radicalized organization.
		So we've always supported the Syrian Democratic Forces.
		We believe that they're the right people to come into power and help get Syria to a good place.
		That hasn't happened.
		That is not the way this has played out.
		And that's going to be a challenge to the United States and for our allies going forward.
		So I think Ali is right to raise these questions and to write to raise the example of Iraq.
		And it is a cautionary tale.
		And we need to think about that going forward.
		At the end of the day, though, in Syria in particular, while we have 2,000 soldiers there, again, we thought it was 900, but again, it turns out that the government actually had 2,000 there.
		You know, while we have a lot of forces in the region, right, the most important people in this dynamic are the Turks.
		They're a NATO ally.
		We've got to get them in the right place, work with them, and make sure they're one that they're not going after our allies, the Kurds, at the same time that we're getting the right people into power.
		It's not always going to work, but Bashar Assad being gone is a good thing, I think, for the Syrian people.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Ed is an independent in New York, Maine.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Ed.
unidentified		Yes.
		Hey, thanks.
		Thank goodness for C-SPAN.
		I just had a quick question.
		How long was it from the time that Mr. Dad in New Orleans?
		How long was it from the time that he left the military until he supposedly did this attack?
		So he was in the military for about 13 years.
		And I believe, I need to double check this, but I think he left the military around 2021.
		So it's been a few years, three, four years since he left the military.
		He did indicate he had some struggles with his departure from the military, acculturating back to civilian life.
		So that was one of his challenges.
		He also had financial troubles, had troubles with his family, you know, two children, two daughters, and a son, two marriages that ended in divorce.
		So we knew he was going through some trouble.
		There's some suggestion that he also had some mental health issues as well.
		You know, this, I think, demonstrates how important it is that we support and care for our veterans and address mental health issues that they have.
		PTSD after being in wars for a long time is a very real thing, and it really is important that we take care of veterans.
		At the same time, it is kind of shocking, I think, to the American people that somebody who was born here in the United States in Beaumont, Texas, raised here, lived in Houston, served with what appears to be honor in the military for over a decade, could so quickly turn against this country and go and kill 14 innocent civilians in Bourbon Street through a car rhyming attack and then engage in a gun battle with police officers where he was ultimately killed.
		I think that's a disturbing thing for Americans to think about, and it ought to disturb us.
		It demonstrates, I think, a real challenge that we have about ensuring that people with mental health are taken care of, that those issues are addressed, but also that terrorists are actively looking for people like that with vulnerabilities, looking to recruit them, looking to turn to the radical ideologies, and then cause them to act out, whether here in the United States or in Europe or in other parts of the world where we have allies as well.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And Jamil, we're almost out of time, but I wanted to ask you about a January 2nd Truth Social post by President-elect Trump who linked Islamic terrorism to open borders.
		And I want to know what your reaction is to prioritizing border security over traditional counterterrorism in the United States.
		What do you think of that?
unidentified		Well, look, I don't think we have to choose between those two, Mimi.
		I think we can do both.
		I think we can continue to conduct effective counterterrorism operations overseas while also doing a much better job to secure our border.
		Look, we know that a number of ISIS terrorists have crossed into the United States in the last few years because of our challenges at the border and the southern border.
		And we know that the Homeland Security Department has encountered record numbers of terrorism suspects at border crossings.
		They're seeing what we're all seeing on the news, which is our southern border is open.
		We don't want terrorists to come into the United States.
		At the same time, the New Orleans attack highlights that whether terrorists come in from overseas or radicalize Americans here in the United States, terrorism is an ever-present threat that we've got to fight overseas.
		We've got to be able to identify it and have the right authorities here in the United States to identify those threats, like the Lone Wolf Authority we talked about.
		And there's no question, Mimi, we've got to secure the southern border.
		You don't have to pick between the two.
		You can do both.
		We're the United States of America.
		We oftentimes forget.
		I think the American people oftentimes forget, in part because our own leaders say, we're a country that's that's that's that's, you know that's failing.
		We're not a country that's failing.
		We're the most successful country the world's ever seen.
		We are a global superpower.
		We can walk and chew gum at the same time.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		That's Jimuel Jaffer, National Security Institute founder at the George Mason University LAW School there at Nationalsecurity.gmu.edu.
		Thanks so much for joining us.
unidentified		Thanks, Mimi.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Up next, Democratic congresswoman Becca Ballant of Vermont discusses her thoughts on the incoming Trump administration and Democrats role in the 119th congress.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Stay with us.
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mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back to the program.
		We're joined now by Representative Becca Ballant.
		She's a Democrat of Vermont and a member of the Judiciary Committee.
		Congresswoman, welcome to the program.
unidentified		Thank you so much.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And I know this is your first time on the program, so a special welcome to you.
		You just started your second term in Congress.
		First woman, first openly LGBTQ person to represent Vermont.
		Tell us about what you learned during your first term in Congress and what your priorities are for this one.
unidentified		Absolutely.
		I'll start with my priorities.
		They are the same priorities that I had when I came in.
		The overarching priority is shoring up and protecting the democracy.
		That is something that's incredibly important to my constituents in Vermont.
		We have a terrible housing crisis in Vermont, one of the worst in the nation.
		So getting investments in housing.
		We also have a terrible mental health crisis that's impacting small towns and bigger cities in Vermont.
		That's also important to me.
		And I would add those are two things that I think we can get bipartisan work on.
		Things that I've learned is that the members on the other side seem to have, many of them, a different value around protecting the Constitution and the rule of law.
		And what has been surprising to me is the number of my colleagues in the Republican conference who will talk disparagingly about President Trump, who will talk disparagingly about the way that he conducts himself, and then in the end, they fall in line.
		That's disturbing to me.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		When you say that your Republican colleagues are maybe not protecting the Constitution and the rule of law, spell that out.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What specifically do you think could happen?
unidentified		Look, it's very deeply disturbing to me that I was sitting on the floor of the House of Representatives the other day with over 100 people that did not certify the last election.
		You cannot just support the winner when your guy wins.
		And the fact that we have a Speaker of the House right now who still will not admit that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, that isn't just a sign of a lack of character.
		It's an indication that they're willing to be loyalists to one man above the country.
		And so that is deeply disturbing to me.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What's the strategy going to be for Democrats?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You do not hold the House, the Senate, or the White House.
unidentified		So the one thing that I've been thinking about in earnest is that there are places that we do need to partner because we were sent here to do work on behalf of our constituents.
		So as I spoke about before, housing, mental health, certainly the opioid crisis, the economic disparity in this country.
		Those are things that we do need to do work across the aisle.
		But we cannot compromise on our values when it comes to believing in the rule of law and shoring up the democracy.
		So we have a very fine, tightrope that we need to walk here.
		And as Hakeem Jeffries has said, we need to partner wherever and whenever we can.
		But we need to know who it is that we're negotiating with.
		Because when you look at what happened in December, we had a deal.
		And Speaker Johnson walked away from that deal.
		So who are we negotiating with?
		Are we negotiating with Hakeem?
		Is Hakeem negotiating with Speaker Johnson?
		Is he negotiating with the incoming president?
		Or is he negotiating with Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy?
		Who is on the other side of the table?
		Makes it very difficult to figure out how to work together.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		If you'd like to speak to our guest, Becca Ballant of Vermont, you can give us a call on our lines.
		The numbers are 202748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8,001 for Republicans, and 202748-8002 for Independents.
		You can start calling in now.
		You serve on the Judiciary Committee.
		What's your view of President-elect Trump's nominees, Pam Bondi, as Attorney General, Kash Patel as FBI Director, and Tulsi Gabbard for DNI?
unidentified		So, Kash Patel, as a nominee for FBI director, has literally said, I'm going to go after the press.
		I'm going to go after journalists.
		This doesn't happen in a healthy democracy.
		This is what happens when we are sliding towards authoritarianism.
		So I believe he is wholly unqualified.
		In this situation with Pam Bondi, she is somebody who has served as Attorney General in her home state.
		That is not somebody that I agree with politically, but certainly she is competent.
		And the last nominee that you mentioned, Tulsi Gabbard, the intelligence community has said, this is not somebody that we should be trusting with our national secrets.
		And I agree with them.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So what's your expectation then for the process in the Senate for those confirmation hearings?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Are you confident about the vetting and the investigative process?
unidentified		I believe some of the nominees will get through, certainly if they are qualified, even if they hold differing views from folks in the Senate.
		But, you know, I thought it was really interesting what John Thune said the other day, the incoming leader of the Republicans in the Senate.
		He said, look, I don't know if they're all going to get through, that there are some indications that there are Republican members in the Senate who are not thrilled with some of these picks.
		And so I think the fact that he went on, I believe it was Meet the Press, the other day saying, I have concerns, that's an indication that there are some concerns behind the scenes.
		So I hope that they will do their due diligence.
		That is what we as Americans expect them to do.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		I want to ask you about what's on the front page of USA Today this morning, and it's this.
		Biden says, yes, he could have won re-election.
		What's your opinion on that?
unidentified		I did see that headline, and every indication that we had as Democrats in the caucus was that the president was on a trajectory to lose, and most specifically, that we were going to lose many, many House seats because of that, meaning the Democrats would lose House seats.
		And so we have a very, we have a situation where the Republicans have a very narrow margin of victory.
		It's just one or two seats now when we look at who's being appointed to the administration.
		And it is incredibly sad and discouraging that when you look at all of the work that the president has done on behalf of the American people and all the investments that were made, that that message did not get through.
		But it did not get through.
		And it was not getting through.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Why do you think it didn't get through?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Why did Vice President Harris lose the election?
unidentified		Well, I think it's multifold.
		I really do.
		And I think that is the work that we all have to do is look into the details.
		But the ways in which we were all communicating with constituents about their most immediate needs was not effective.
		And you can't discount the amount of not just misinformation or disinformation that was being spread on social media.
		There has been a wholesale rewriting of what happened on January 6th.
		And that absolutely played into what happened in the election.
		No question.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Let's talk to callers.
		And we'll start with Jeannie in Austin, Texas, Independent.
		Hi, Jeannie.
unidentified		Hi.
		Ms. Belen, I just feel like even hearing you right now, I'm a registered Democrat, and I didn't vote at all this presidential election.
		The first time I didn't vote, I didn't feel connected to what the Democratic Party was saying, and they didn't represent me.
		I'm a Latina, live in Texas, Austin, Texas.
		And what I was seeing with the economy, not one word of compassion came out from Biden all those years he was in power.
		And then even Kamala really making me feel like they understood our financial worries and how we've been living and nothing, none of that.
		And just now, it seems like I just feel like you're in denial about really what we, as the people, have been saying what we need and what has affected us.
		And so, yes, I didn't vote at all, but I'm worried about what Trump's going to do.
		It's sickening to me that it's like a process happening at this point.
		You know what?
		I really don't know what we can do, to be honest with you.
		We have Elon Musk in there, who, you know, has nobody's talking about this, but he bought up a bunch of land over there where his SpaceX is and lowballed people and people who had bought land over there, their houses to retire.
		And no one talked about how he did that to all those people there.
		And also, you know, there's many, many things about him that people can agree, disagree with, but it's very worrisome.
		But I'm more disappointed that Democrats, they're not going to win again either in four years if they continue to deny what is going on with us, the people.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Jeannie, let's get a response.
unidentified		Genie, thank you so much for the call.
		This is something actually that I think about a lot.
		I was a teacher for years before I ran for office, and the through line of my career has always been, how do you alleviate suffering?
		And it starts with seeing everyone's basic dignity and humanity.
		And I agree with you that there were times in which we needed to see a more empathetic and compassionate message coming through.
		But I will push back a little bit because you saw on the part of Donald Trump and JD Vance within their campaign, there was very little compassion or empathy shown for many, many sectors of the electorate.
		But I agree, we have to get back to those basic, you know, bread and butter concerns.
		I represent an overwhelmingly rural state.
		People are having a hard time affording housing, affording groceries.
		And yes, you are right.
		Those are the things that we need to be talking about, which is why it's concerning to me that in the press conference yesterday that President-elect Trump had, he was not talking about the price of eggs.
		He was not talking about building more housing.
		He was not talking about the price of prescription drugs.
		He was talking about taking over Greenland and these outrageous ideas that do nothing to speak to your concerns, which are legitimate.
		Absolutely.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is William in North Carolina, Independent Line.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Hi, William.
unidentified		Hey, good morning.
		Thank you for taking my call.
		You know, you talk about the upcoming administration and the threat to the Constitution, yet you guys appointed a replacement for the president that was the presidential candidate without a primary, which I believe is probably unconstitutional.
		And you talk about not having empathy or sympathy for the causes of the American people, yet you have a leader of your party still in place who doesn't seem to really care what goes on in our country.
		He's disappeared.
		He doesn't come out and tell people what's going on.
		He told us it's not what you believe that's really happening.
		It's just it's not happening the way you think it is.
		So he's come out many times and there's no way that as intelligent people you didn't know this man had cognitive decline at the beginning.
		So you've lied to us over and over again and at the same time you want us to say, well now we've got to believe everything you say about the incoming administration.
		It's sort of a hypocrisy that needs to end in Washington and it's why people lose such faith in Congress.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right William.
unidentified		William, thank you for the call.
		You don't need to believe what we say about the incoming administration.
		All you have to do is look at what happened for the four years when Trump was in office when you look what happened on January 6th and the fact that he still will not take responsibility for that.
		That being said, you brought up some really important issues.
		And I just want to push back a little on what you said that it's not constitutional for Kamala Harris to be on the ticket.
		She was already on the ticket.
		She had already been through the primary process.
		So it's absolutely constitutional.
		I understand you may not have liked the process.
		You may not have liked the candidate.
		But in terms of that being unconstitutional, that just is not the case.
		Now, the crux of your argument, I think, is a good one, which is there is a disconnection in the way that folks within the Beltway here in Washington communicate with our constituents back home.
		And it's something that I try to do every day to my constituents back home in Vermont.
		How is this impacting them directly?
		And that should always be the guiding principle.
		And I cannot speak for all of my colleagues and I cannot speak for all of my party.
		I am showing up to try to do my level best work on behalf of the people who sent me here.
		And that is what should be guiding all of us, regardless of party.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Jim Bo in Bakersfield, California sent us this by text.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Can the Congresswoman describe her relationship with Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson and other fundamentalist Christians in the House?
unidentified		Jim, many of us within the House who are members of the LGBTQ community do not have a relationship with incoming Speaker.
		Part of that is because of the way that he has shown up, most specifically in the way that he has allowed his party to treat Sarah McBride, who will be the first trans member of Congress.
		She won handily her state of Delaware.
		This is a woman that is being harassed and intimidated by other members of Congress.
		And he has done nothing to quell that.
		That being said, I do have friends on the other side of the aisle.
		I play on the bipartisan women's softball team.
		I have friends who I serve with on various bipartisan caucuses.
		I have, since the reelection of Trump, made a concerted effort to make coffee dates with friends on the other side of the aisle because I know many of them did not want Trump to be reelected.
		And they will tell you that, that he is not a man who has seriousness of purpose or character.
		And so my goal is always to find those partners that I can work with.
		In my home state of Vermont, I was elected the first woman to lead my Senate, and I was elected unanimously.
		And that was by Republicans and Democrats.
		And I take that work, of bipartisan work, very seriously.
		But no, it's very difficult to have a real relationship with someone who is trying to reinvent the nation as one that is beholden to Christian nationalists.
		But we will try to work with him wherever and whenever we can.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And last question for you from X. What do you say to the Trump voters in your district?
unidentified		Oh, I really love this question because I know that in at least 12 towns in Vermont, people split their ticket between me and Trump.
		So, and I actually received a card yesterday from someone who is a Republican in Vermont who said to me, what I know about you is even if I don't agree with you on all policies, I know that you are showing up for me.
		And so what I say to my constituents is my number one priority is making sure that I am able to deliver for you, whether it's housing investments, whether it's making sure we deal with our issues of gross, gross economic disparity.
		And knowing that I have to show up in listening mode.
		I always say that, you know, having been a teacher for so long, the most important thing that you can do is give attention to people, to stop talking and listening and have folks tell you what they are experiencing directly.
		And then my job is to try to translate that into policy that I can push through within the committee and on the floor.
		It's not easy work, but it's something I take incredibly seriously.
		And so to Trump voters of my district, I am not going to ignore your needs by any means, but I'm going to do whatever I can to protect the state of the democracy.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Representative Becca Ballant, a Democrat of Vermont.
		Thanks so much for joining us.
		It's really my pleasure.
unidentified		Thank you so much.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Up next, more of your phone calls on Open Forum.
		You can give us a call, start calling in now.
		The numbers on your screen.
		202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202748-8001 for Republicans, and 202-748-8002 for Independents.
		We'll be right back.
jimmy carter ▲ ● ▼		Democracy is always an unfinished creation.
ronald reagan ▲ ● ▼		Democracy is worth dying for.
george h w bush ▲ ● ▼		Democracy belongs to us all.
bill clinton ▲ ● ▼		We are here in the sanctuary of democracy.
george w bush ▲ ● ▼		Great responsibilities fall once again to the great democracies.
barack obama ▲ ● ▼		American democracy is bigger than any one person.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Freedom and democracy must be constantly guarded and protected.
unidentified		We are still at our core, a democracy.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		This is also a massive victory for democracy and for freedom.
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		Washington Journal continues.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back to the program.
		We are in open forum until the end of the program at 10 a.m. Eastern Time and looking forward to taking your calls.
		Right now at the Capitol Rotunda, former President Jimmy Carter is lying in state.
		Members of the public are coming in.
		You can see that now on your screen to pay their respects.
		And yesterday at the Capitol Rotunda, Vice President Kamala Harris gave a tribute to former President Jimmy Carter.
		Here's a portion of that.
kamala harris ▲ ● ▼		It is an honor to be with you this afternoon.
		And to Jack, Chip, Jeff, Amy, and Jason, and all the other members of the Carter family.
		On behalf of the American people, Doug and I offer our deepest condolences.
		Being with you today, I'm reminded of the enduring words of a favorite hymn: May the works I have done speak for me.
		Today we gather to celebrate the life of a man whose works will echo for generations to come.
		A man from Plains, Georgia, who grew up without electricity or running water and served as the 39th President of the United States of America and lived every day of his long life in service to the people.
		President James Earl Carter Jr.
		So I was in middle school when Jimmy Carter was elected president and I vividly recall how my mother admired him, how much she admired his strength of character, his honesty, his integrity, his work ethic and determination, his intelligence,
		and his generosity of spirit.
		We have heard much today and in recent days about President Carter's impact in the four decades after he left the White House.
		Rightly so.
		Jimmy Carter established a new model for what it means to be a former president and leaves an extraordinary post-presidential legacy.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		That was yesterday.
		We have the full event on our website at c-span.org.
		We will be covering the funeral of former President Jimmy Carter tomorrow.
		So definitely stay tuned for that.
		And we'll go to your calls now to Thelma in Bronx, New York, line for Democrats.
		You're on Open Forum, Thelma.
unidentified		Hi, Mimi.
		Good morning.
		I'm just calling in to let the guy that call in and was saying about Joe Biden.
		What about Donald Trump?
		Donald Trump has a mental problem.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Is that all you wanted to say, Thelma?
unidentified		No, no, no, no.
		I thought I was, no.
		Donald Trump has a mental problem also.
		What about Donald Trump?
		Republicans need to stop talking about people's mental problem because Donald Trump has a mental problem.
		Everybody could see that.
		And also, Miss Mini, I want to say that.
		I want to say that Joe Biden could have win this election.
		Why is it all the Democrats' senatorium win the election and Candela at the top of the ticket did not win?
		All the Democrats senators, they win the election and Canela at the top of the ticket, she did not win.
		Joe Biden could have win this election.
		I spoke to people in Pennsylvania.
		I have family and friends in Pennsylvania.
		And they told me a lot of Democrats stay home.
		They did not come out to vote for Camela.
		That is the reason why Canela lost.
		They did not like the fact that they removed Joe Biden from the ticket the way they did.
		And they told me that a lot of Democrats stay home and they did not vote for Canela.
		Joe Biden would have win the election.
		He is the only Democrat who could have beat Donald Trump.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Thelma.
		And we mentioned this before.
		This is the front page of USA Today exclusive exit interview that President Biden did.
		He said, when asked, he says, yes, he could have won re-election.
		You can read that whole article at USA Today.
		And this is Ronald in Georgia, Republican line.
		Good morning, Ronald.
unidentified		Good morning.
		How are you doing?
		Good.
		I just want to know, at the beginning of your segment this morning, right before I called, that lady that you chat on, Rebecca there, the Republican Rebecca, she said that she was a teacher.
		But Lake and Riley was a student.
		And yet they blocked everything.
		That policy that they had going on, they tried to block it.
		Thank God there was enough Republicans to vote for it.
		On the first part of that segment you had on there, you were talking about y'all had Trump up there wanting to have that block with that girl he was with.
		Y'all shouldn't put stuff like that up there.
		He's our future president.
		And I really don't have much faith in the way y'all talk about it.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So Ronald, you mentioned the Lake and Riley Act.
		So this is NBC News.
		It says that the House passes Lake and Riley Act to amp up border enforcement and put pressure on Democrats.
		The bill named for a nursing school student who was murdered by a man in the country illegally passed the House last year.
		The new Republican-controlled Senate is expected to take it up Friday.
		So we will let you know if that happens.
		The vote, by the way, was 264 to 159 to pass that act in the House.
		And this is, Let's see.
		Don in Rhode Island, Independent Line.
		Don, you're next.
unidentified		Hello.
		Hi.
		Hi.
		Great haircut, Mimi.
		I've been watching you guys for a very long time, and this is the first time call, first time I got through, actually.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Great.
		Go right ahead, Don.
		We're listening.
unidentified		Well, I meant to comment on some earlier things, and then it jumped me over to open forum, so there's a lot that could be said.
		But I think the, you know, I watch a lot of C-SPAN.
		You get the range of callers and people that you interview as well.
		And I'd also like to apologize for America on your to you on behalf of America for sometimes the way people, I'm sure you guys get a kick out of it when you're offline, how people call in.
		It's pretty crazy.
		But my point today would be that all Americans and everybody in the world should really strongly consider looking into roasting their own sacred cows.
		This country and people in general are just really, really into their own propaganda, right, left, center.
		And whatever emotionally supports their narrative is what you're going to go with, it seems to be more so than where the facts would dictate.
		And I would like to share a quote with America.
		John Maynard Keynes, and I am not a hardcore leftist or a righty.
		I'm a very independent thinking person here, but he tends to be on the left of the spectrum.
		And he had very vigorous debates with someone who was a right-wing economist.
		And I can't remember the gentleman's name, but in the 1800s, people used to write letters back and forth to each other and have respectful debates.
		And they were in such and have lunches together and whatnot.
		And this gentleman who had a very kind of what would be considered more of a right-wing economic theory had a portion of that theory which accounted for bubbles and that kind of thing.
		And John Maynard Keynes' theory had no such architecture built into the theory.
		So he simply absorbed his friend's idea and brought it onto his own.
		His friend said to him quizotically, you know, what are you flip-flopping basically in today's parlance?
		You know, you're stealing some money.
		I thought we were arguing here.
		And John Maynard Keynes responded with a quote that all of America should pay attention to, and it was, I don't know what you do, but when I get new facts, I change my opinion.
		That is something we all need to do better.
		Joe Biden, 51 agents.
		Come on, guys.
		Whether you're a Democrat, Trump obviously lost the election.
		I mean, come on, let's get it together, people.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Don.
		And here is Carol in Red Hook, New York, Democrat.
		Hi, Carol.
		Carol, are you there?
		In Red Hook, New York.
		No.
		Well, let us go to Speaker Mike Johnson, who also was at the Capitol Rotunda yesterday giving a tribute to former President Jimmy Carter.
mike johnson ▲ ● ▼		President Carter's life, his selfless service, his fight against cancer, and his lasting contributions to his fellow man are all truly remarkable.
		Whether he was in the White House or in his post-presidential years, as was discussed, President Carter was willing to roll up his own sleeves to serve and get the job done.
		We all know about his work with Habitat for Humanity, and that was mentioned.
		And the origin story goes that it was in 1984, sorry, when he first became aware of the work.
unidentified		He was in New York for a friend's anniversary.
mike johnson ▲ ● ▼		Millard Fuller, the founder of the fledgling charity at the time, called President Carter and asked if he wanted to visit a site in Brooklyn during his trip.
		President Carter agreed, and he found his way down to the Lower East Side.
		Standing on the roof of a dilapidated building, he looked out on the wealth of Wall Street to the south and to the power of Midtown Manhattan to the north.
		And then he looked down and he saw an image he'd never forget.
		An elderly woman cooking breakfast over an open fire in the rubble of the building, there in the heart of the richest city in the world.
		The Habitat for Humanity worker that was there with him turned to President Carter and said, if there's anything that you can do, we would take it.
unidentified		He said, if there's anything I can do, let me know.
mike johnson ▲ ● ▼		The worker said, well, maybe you can send some volunteer carpenters from your church.
		It was the very next day that President Carter called Habitat for Humanity and told them he was going to send some carpenters, all right, and that he himself would be one of them.
		And thus began his famous tradition of donating one week every year to build and restore homes for his fellow Americans.
		It's remarkable to think that one of the 45 men who has served as president and one of the only 13 who held the role in the nuclear age would humble himself to such service.
unidentified		We all know that his care for humanity didn't stop at building homes.
mike johnson ▲ ● ▼		In the face of illness, President Jimmy Carter brought life-saving medicine.
unidentified		In the face of conflict, he brokered peace.
unidentified		In the face of discrimination, he reminded us that we are all made in the image of God.
mike johnson ▲ ● ▼		And if you were to ask him why he did it all, he would likely point to his faith.
		I'm reminded of his admonition to, quote, live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon, and of his amazing personal reflection.
		Quote, if I have one life and one chance to make it count for something.
unidentified		We all agree that he certainly did.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		That was yesterday.
		We will be covering the funeral of former President Jimmy Carter on this network.
		It is scheduled to kick off at the National Cathedral at 10 a.m. Eastern time, so be sure to join us for that.
		Some programming notes for you today, right after this program here on C-SPAN, is a discussion about the new Congress and lessons learned after the contentious speaker elections, the impeachment of a cabinet secretary, and other historic events during the previous session.
		That's from the American Enterprise Institute, and you can watch that live starting at 10 a.m. Eastern here on C-SPAN right after this program.
		It's also on our app and online at c-span.org.
		Also at the same time at 10 a.m. Eastern but on C-SPAN 2, we've got outgoing Commodity Futures Trading Commission chair Rosten Benham discussing his leadership of the CFTC and potential policy changes in the new administration, including cryptocurrency.
		That's at the Brookings Institution.
		That's live at 10 a.m. on C-SPAN 2 on the app called C-SPANNOW and online at c-SPAN.org.
		And we are in open forum for about 20 minutes.
		Cindy is in McKenna, Illinois.
		Republican.
		Good morning, Cindy.
unidentified		Hi, good morning, Mimi.
		I'd just like to say that the Democrats, they seem to like to talk about misinformation.
		Well, your previous guest, she's spreading misinformation herself.
		She said that Trump did not talk about the price of groceries yesterday in his speech, but I watched it, and he did.
		So obviously, she did not listen to the whole speech.
		He brought up the bacon and the apples, and because I remember I thought, uh-oh, he's going to talk about that apple story, whatever.
		But he didn't.
		But anyway, so that's all I just wanted to say.
		Like, do they only hear what they want to hear?
		So that's all I wanted to say.
		Thank you.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Great, Cindy, and that's why we've got C-SPAN with our extensive video library so you can go back and listen to events in their entirety.
		And this is James in Independent in Collins, Mississippi.
		James, you're next.
unidentified		Yes, good morning.
		Yes, ma'am.
		Just give me a time and let me know when you're going to cut me off.
		First President Jimmy Carter is not a funeral.
		It is a homegoing celebration, a homegoing celebration.
		No one is in no grave.
		Your body is in a grave, but you yourself is not in no grave.
		As a Christian, as a Christian in Christ Jesus of Nazareth, these lies and things that people are saying, I don't care.
		The top of the list is no liar shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.
		Listen to what I'm saying.
		All these other idioms they put out about this and that and that and this.
		No liar, no matter what race, color, creed, whatever it is, if you are a liar and you are a murderer or you are a liar or a murderer, there is no life in you.
		So all these politicians, all these people that are talking about lies on the Democratic side, lies on the Republican side, who's lying and who, this, who, that.
		Remember this one thing.
		You are going to give an account of what you're saying, whether it's truth or lies.
		So, hello?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes, go ahead, James.
unidentified		So I hope and pray that the women that supported President Trump, the women made their choice, because that's the only way President Trump won the election because of the majority of the women.
		Women, this was women's power.
		All the things that President Trump did and said about women, about lying, about stealing, women chose him.
		I supported the women.
		I said, whoever the women go for, I'm going to go for.
		I never thought that they would go for President Trump, but they did, and I accept it.
		But women put him over the line, and I want to see just how much he's going to do for women.
		President Biden, he said that he was going to look into the restitution for black Americans and slavery and segregation and racism.
		He did not do it.
		He said he was going to spine a committee, and he was going to look into this.
		So I'm asking President Trump to look into the African Americans of slavery descent, this restitution for black people, because you keep talking about the communities that black folks live in, their neighborhoods, and all these things.
		Let's go back.
		And nil enough, one more thing, ma'am.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yep, go ahead, James.
unidentified		One more thing is this here.
		They keep talking about a woke, awoke, awoke.
		It's all about making white children sad and bad.
		There was white people died trying to free black people.
		White folks lost their lives.
		Last white folks lost their lives, their families, to free black people.
		And you don't want to tell a history about that.
		It was just a lot of white folks died.
		So how is that going to make you feel bad if you tell a little white child, well, you know what?
		Yes, this country was like this, like this, but that was also Caucasian people lost their lives to free African Americans.
		Yes.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		James, I got to move on.
		This is Earl in Nashville, Georgia, Democrat.
		Good morning, Earl.
unidentified		Good morning.
unidentified		How are you doing?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Good.
unidentified		Yes, ma'am.
		I hope that you let me share a couple of things with you for the peoples.
		As a ministry, I'm sitting there.
		I'm looking at 2 Chronicles chapter 7 and down to 14.
		God is telling us, He says, my people who are called by my name to humble themselves and pray and seek my faith.
		Let me stop there.
		See God's faith, not the president's faith, not Joe Biden's faith, not Donald Trump's faith, but God's faith.
		He told her, he told us what he would do for us.
		The peoples have to put their faith in our in the Lord Jesus Christ and not into man's.
		That's a problem.
		We have put our faith into man and forgot about the first law is which is the Lord Jesus Christ, and now we're trusting in man to do what he said he's gonna do, but man don't have that authority.
		God, the one has authority.
		The people need to understand what they're doing here.
		Yes, the people have been fooled on both sides.
		I would ask them to seek, to seek God for answer.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Earl.
		And the Washington Post updating on the fires in Southern California.
		This is, it says here, there's, quote, there's nothing left.
		Eaton fires burn Pasadena homes to skeletal structures.
		That is a picture there from those fires.
		And thousands of people have been evacuated.
		Firefighters, over 1,400 firefighters, are battling those flames there in Southern California.
		Michael in Austin, Texas, Republican Line.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		How are you doing?
		So I have called before.
		I talked to you in the past.
		It was about tariffs.
		And then also I had touched on fluoride.
		But today, I want to kind of touch on the idea of Greenland.
		I know Trump is catching a lot of flack for even considering something like that, but I do ask people to kind of just think critically.
		At one point, it would have seemed crazy for us to purchase Alaska.
		In 1867, we purchased a gigantic piece of land that was very far away from what we knew to be the United States at that time.
		But when you hear Trump, who is an opportunist and a dealmaker, proven, talk about this, he doesn't seem to convey it properly.
		Maybe he's hiding his hand, but the reasons that we would purchase Greenland would ultimately be for the same reasons that we purchased Alaska because it creates U.S. expansion as well as access to valuable resources.
		Geopolitically, it's in a great area as well, as it intersects many trade routes.
		And I'm sure there's billions of dollars worth of trade in terms of natural gas, oil, and a lot of investment is being made to AI.
		These servers need to go somewhere, and Greenland is pretty cold.
		I think that would be an optimal place to hold these servers as we invest in AI in the future.
		So I would just ask people, again, I'm a Republican that leans moderate.
		You know, I don't wear the red hat, but I think we should give Trump the chance to make these deals.
		I think ultimately they would be beneficial for America.
		And that's really all I wanted to say today.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Michael.
		And this is a map just to give people an idea of where Greenland is with relation to the United States.
		So here is Greenland, currently under the authority of Denmark.
		Here is Iceland.
		This is Canada down here.
		And then this is the United States.
		So United States, Canada, Greenland, and then here is Northern Europe.
		Here is Alaska, part of the United States, obviously, one of the states.
		And this is Russia up here.
		And let's talk to Nestor next in Washington, D.C., Independent Line.
unidentified		Oh, yeah, Nestor Cuff.
		Hey, this is my first time a first-time caller.
		Thank you.
		Appreciate it.
		Can you hear me?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes, go right ahead.
unidentified		Okay, first of all, I want to say something about Jimmy Carter.
		And it's already been stated.
		It's biblical.
		You annoy a person by their deeds, by their deeds, by their actions.
		Match that with Donald Trump.
		Jimmy Carter was a very humble man and a humanitarian.
		And so I want to give praises to Jimmy and his family, number one.
		Also, two, talk about the Democrats.
		This has been talked about already, but the Democrats, in my estimation, lost to the 2024 election for four reasons.
		One, white supremacy.
		And this was noted by a few of your guests.
		There's a book out there.
		The name of the book is called Cast.
		And there was a recent census, I think, around 2020 that asserted to the browning of America.
		Okay?
		And that had to do with the Hispanic vote, the Latino vote in America.
		That's one reason.
		Second, the Democrats also failed to communicate a very strong immigration policy.
		It was noted over and over from some instances about how the Democrats and the Republicans, how they try to formulate a cogent immigration policy.
		But what was lacking was that it was rare to mention about how the Republicans played the card and not in an effort to prevent such a cogent immigration policy for a long, long time.
		Third, you know, the politics, as they say, as they call it, the woke politics or the politics of identity politics that intersect between gender and race and trying to be politically correct.
		I think a lot of folks, and woke is still being defined, number one, it's constantly being defined.
		That has to do a lot with the LGBT community and how sex and how race intersect.
		Well, that created a lot of confusion.
		I mean, as a black male, it creates division within our community.
		Okay, so that's, and the Republicans were able, and a few black men that supported Trump.
		They were able to benefit from that confusion, from that, that, as they call it, woke identity politics.
		And third, the Democrats also, I'm going to say this last, third, the Democrats also failed to understand the power of social media.
		They failed to seem to understand the impact of social media as it relates to podcasts and a few other social media outlets.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right, Nestor.
		We got your points.
		Let's go to James in Sterling Heights, Michigan, Republican.
		James, you there?
unidentified		And some previous callers, there was a gentleman that called up that said gasoline during George W. Bush went up to $5 a gallon.
		I looked it up, and there's an NPR article online that says the last time, or the first time gas was $5 a gallon was on June 10th, 2022, which was underneath Biden.
		Second of all, the last lady that called in on the previous segment talking about them deporting all the people that work agriculture, they're not going to do that.
		They think they're going to deport everybody.
		Number three, the Democrat representative you had on, what you need to do every time you get one of these people on is say, ask them what their definition of democracy is.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		What's your definition, James, of democracy?
unidentified		I want to know what theirs is.
		And I bet you if you ask a group of them, everybody's going to have a different idea of what they think democracy is.
		My opinion really doesn't matter because I'm not running the country.
		And that's another thing.
		You need to ask these people, too, who is running the country now.
		And it's not Joe Biden.
		Thanks.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		All right.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And Doris in Houston, Texas.
unidentified		Yes.
unidentified		Can you hear me?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Democrats.
unidentified		Can you hear me?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead, Doris.
unidentified		Okay.
		The gentleman just said who's running the country.
		He said Joe Biden wasn't.
		Well, neither is Donald Trump.
		Because under Donald Trump, I believe Elon Musk and his minions will be running the country.
		I also want to say that there's a problem when we elect a man as president of the United States that stood on the stage in Helsinki and made himself to be a treasonous person.
		Are you still there?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yes, we are, Doris.
		We're listening.
		You're talking about Helsinki.
unidentified		Yes, when he was in Helsinki, also, he made himself to be such a liar that it's one thing he said that I believe, and it's very few things he says that I believe.
		He said that the system was rigged.
		Well, if the system was rigged against him, the system was rigged against Joe Biden also, because I do not believe that that many American people are misinformed enough to put Donald Trump back in office.
		I think the whole thing was you would not put a smart, well-qualified white woman in office, and you definitely was not going to put a smart, really qualified black woman in office.
		Thank you.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		And this is Michael in West Wego, Louisiana, Independent Line.
unidentified		Hey, how are you doing?
		Good.
		Just want to point out a couple of things.
		One, when Donald Trump was president the first time, this country was driving.
		It was on the verge of being independent for fuel and energy.
		When Biden stepped in, we are buying energy from countries that hate America right now.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You're talking about Venezuela?
unidentified		Yeah.
		Well, as well as other countries.
		I mean, when they said that we're starting to have a gas issue and we need more crude oil, we started going to other countries that are literally enemies of the United States that have a very, very poor opinion about the United States.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		So, Michael, here's the question that I had asked our previous guest.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		When you say that we were independent, what does that mean to you when it comes to energy?
unidentified		Being independent means we're not buying oil from anybody.
		We're supplying our own oil, our own fossil fuels.
		You know, we are, we don't need outside help.
		And that's what being independent is.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Even if it's cheaper to buy it from outside?
unidentified		Well, who are we buying it from?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		You tell me.
unidentified		A lot of the time.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
unidentified		All the countries that's out there that we are buying oil from right now.
		You know, they don't like us.
		And it's not really cheaper to buy oil from them.
		When Donald Trump was in office, we were getting ready to start selling oil because we had enough.
		We had more than enough that we needed.
		We were getting ready to start selling oil.
		Now we're buying oil.
		You know, when the judge looked at Biden and said, you know, Biden, there's no way he would be able to stand trial, you know, because of his mental capacity, he's still being president.
		If you can't, if you're not able to stand trial because you're not mentally competent, how can you stand to run a nation?
		That's what a lot of people don't look at.
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Michael, just going back to what you were saying about oil, so this is what I found about where the United States imports oil from.
		And here's the top five countries where the United States imports petroleum.
		First is Canada, then Mexico, then Saudi Arabia, then Iraq, and then Brazil.
		So that's the top five oil where we import oil from.
		And then the top five destinations where U.S. petroleum is exported to is Mexico, China, the Netherlands, Canada, and Japan.
		So that is at eia.gov, if you'd like to take a look at that.
		Mary in Palm Desert, California, Republican.
		Hi, Mary.
unidentified		Hi, Mimi.
		Good morning.
		Yes, I just wanted to address the you happy about President Trump or unhappy?
		Your first open forum?
mimi geerges ▲ ● ▼		Optimistic or pessimistic?
unidentified		Well, I'm on the fence, to be honest with you, and I voted three times for Mr. Trump.
		And I want to go into why.
		After eight years of Obama Biden, I raised children in Washington State.
		I was a nurse there for 30 years.
		And I saw the community I worked in go downhill under those eight years.
		And when I heard he was running, I didn't watch his TV show or anything.
		I didn't know much about him.
		I said, what the hell?
		We got to get things better because I was walking into homes where people lost their health care.
		They lost a provider.
		The community I worked in as a nurse went downhill.
		Houses were being boarded up and vacant.
		And I said, what the hell?
		Let's give them a try.
		Well, things got better in that community I worked in as a nurse.
		People bought homes.
		They painted them up.
		Churches opened back up.
		Less crime.
		And so I thought that he did a good job.
		And also, unpopular belief that people didn't do well under him.
		People who made that $60,000, they did better under Trump.
		They really did.
		They had more money in their pocket.
		And that's what it boiled down to for me.
		And it's not about my economy.
		It's more about the people who are making under $60,000.
		They are the people that voted for him again and again.

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