CSPAN - Washington Journal 04/15/2025

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April 15, 2025 07:00-10:00 - CSPAN

02:59:41

Washington Journal 04/15/2025

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pedro echevarria

cspan 44:34

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donald j trump

admin 01:50

hakeem jeffries

rep/d 02:13

jodey arrington

rep/r 01:53

stephen miller

admin 00:34

steve scalise

rep/r 00:45

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dr joel wallach

00:09

nayib bukele

00:09

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charles in louisiana

callers 00:05

john in wisconsin

callers 00:30

josh in arkadia

callers 00:02

robert in tennesee

callers 00:11

william in arkansas

callers 00:10

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Speaker	Time	Text
unidentified		seat to democracy.
		Coming up this morning on Washington Journal, your calls and comments live.
		Then we'll talk with Axios senior political reporter Alex Eisenstadt about his book Revenge, the inside story of Trump's return to power.
		And Ling Ling Wei, chief China correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, discusses the brewing trade war between the U.S. and China and the impact of retaliatory tariffs.
		Washington Journal is next.
		Join the conversation.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		This is the Washington Journal for April 15th, or as most Americans know, the deadline for filing federal income taxes.
		A recent survey by Gallup asked public opinion about paying taxes, including if they thought the amount of taxes they paid was a fair amount, with most split evenly on if that amount was fair or unfair.
		We'll show you the results.
		And to start the program today, tell us if you think the amount you pay in income taxes is fair.
		And yes, fair is in quotes.
		It's subjective.
		You can tell us what you think fair is.
		202-748-8001 for Republicans.
		202-748-8000 for Democrats.
		And Independents, 202-748-8002.
		If you want to give us your thoughts on the fairness of taxes, you can do that by text to at 202-748-8003.
		You can also post on Facebook and on X.
		The Gallup poll came out recently and they asked about people about fairness when it comes to federal income taxes and almost even split from this Gallup poll.
		It showed that when it was asked the question, do you regard the income tax in which you have to pay this year as fair?
		It was 50% of those saying that it was not fair.
		And 46% of those responding saying that when it comes to the taxes paid of federal income taxes, they thought it was a fair amount.
		Some other data from this poll too from Gallup to show you.
		When it comes to the idea of if taxes are fair and it breaks down by political party, it was 62% of Democrats saying that, yes, the amount of taxes, federal income taxes specifically paid was fair.
		45% for independents.
		And for Republicans weighing in, it was 35%.
		Some other data there when it comes to the view of the income taxes.
		59% overall said the amount of income taxes they pay was too high.
		38% saying that it was just about a right amount.
		And 2% saying that when asked, the amount of taxes they pay were too low from this Gallup poll.
		And then one more data set to show you, specifically coming to the idea of whether taxes were too high or not.
		Those weighing in, Republicans saying that it was 71% of those Republicans saying that the federal income tax they pay was too high.
		Independents, 63%, 39% for Democrats.
		So as you paying your taxes, or maybe you're finishing them up today, if you want to give us your thoughts on the amount of income taxes that you pay, if you think that amount is fair, again, if you want to call and let us know, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, and Independents, 202-748-8002.
		And you can text us too at 202-748-8003.
		The Wall Street Journal this morning takes a look at the brackets and the tax code for those filing federal taxes this year and what those brackets consist of.
		It says that this is Alicia Ebling writing this morning saying that the tax code currently has seven income tax brackets for individuals with accompanying tax rates that range from 10% to 37%.
		The 10% rate takes effect at the first dollar of taxable income after benefits such as the standard deduction are applied.
		And as your taxable income moves up the ladder of brackets, each layer gets taxed at progressively higher rates.
		The margin rate or the top rate is the highest rate that applies to you.
		It aligns with the highest bracket you will fall into.
		And it goes on to say what you pay on your last dollar of income.
		So for 2024, that taxable bracket income for those married filing jointly, if you fall into that category between that $1,000 and $200,000 mark, you'll pay a 22%.
		That's a rate.
		It goes to 24% for $300,000 and higher, and it goes from there.
		Of course, separate tax brackets for those filing single.
		So that's some income information from the Wall Street Journal when it comes to taxes.
		Some of you giving us your thoughts off Facebook.
		Arthur Peterson saying that when it comes to fairness of taxes, if you think it's fair, Arthur Peterson saying, yes, it's tough when your kids grow up and you lose your child tax credits.
		However, this is Dan Gutbridge, low, small type, but he says he's on Social Security Disability Insurance, owed $1,400, had to give this month's check back to the government, adding he's visually impaired, relied on that money to survive in a car-dependent area.
		Then he says, I did find out a fun fact when I e-filed this year.
		When government owes you a refund, they could take two to three weeks to approve your form.
		But when you owe them, it's instant, saying that his Social Security check dropped at 4:30 in the morning, e-filed at 4:45.
		The IRS accepted, took back the money at 5 o'clock.
		Bob Ceelow adds this thought when it comes to taxes.
		It's time for a flat tax, he says, so everyone pays their fair share.
		And then Warren Proctor, also off of Facebook, saying that it's fair.
		He said, yes, but it's not fair that millionaires and billionaires use loopholes to pay nothing.
		So you can make your thoughts off Facebook if you wish.
		You can post on our other social media sites.
		Again, the phone line's available to you as well if you want to call in and give us your thoughts.
		Susan in Virginia, Republican line on this idea of fairness and taxes, federal income taxes.
		Hi, Susan.
		You're first up.
unidentified		Hi, good morning.
		Well, millionaires and billionaires aren't the only ones who don't pay taxes.
		I'm calling about my mother's situation.
		She's 92, and she has some small savings.
		And so by law, I think when you reach 72 or 75, you have to take, you have to start withdrawing from your savings.
		Well, you're taxed on those withdrawings.
		So at the end of the year, whatever federal tax she paid on those drawings, she gets back.
		So it's a wash.
		So I just think the whole system needs to be revamped.
		It just takes too much time to reclaim her money.
		She gets it back anyway.
		And why does the government make her take her savings out?
		I don't understand that either.
		But that's my comment.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is the revamping only necessary in how you pay taxes, or do you think the idea of paying taxes and who pays what, do you think that needs to be revamped as well?
unidentified		I think, sir, the whole system needs to be revamped.
		I mean, let's pay taxes on what we buy.
		That makes sense.
		But your income, to me, should not be taxed or your savings.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Susan there in Virginia.
		One of the ideas underneath all of the today's being Federal Income Tax Day is the idea of a future tax extension of taxes that were passed in the first Trump administration and other taxes as well.
		This is a debate that's going on in Congress.
		It was House Majority Leader Steve Scalise last week talking about tax provisions in the current GOP budget bill, saying why he thinks they're important.
		Here's some of Majority Leader Scalise's comments from last week.
steve scalise ▲ ● ▼		You can talk to people in any walk of life in the private sector, in any industry.
steve scalise ▲ ● ▼		They will tell you there's trillions, four, five trillion dollars of money sitting on the sideline, not being invested in America now until they see what the tax code looks like.
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		Everybody's talking about tariffs right now.
unidentified		Most businesses are waiting to see what the tax code will look like before they make major investments.
steve scalise ▲ ● ▼		And they will tell you, if we just prevent a tax hike, which, by the way, every Democrat voted today to raise taxes.
unidentified		And they've said they wanted the tax rates to go up.
unidentified		We do not.
steve scalise ▲ ● ▼		And if we flatline and say no tax increases on American families, that alone will spur trillions of dollars more investment in our economy.
steve scalise ▲ ● ▼		And you could see 3% GDP growth, which would be not only great for the economy, more money in your pockets when you go to the grocery store, when you go to the gas station, but it also gives us the federal treasury more money coming in to lower the deficit.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Again, that was last week.
		Today is the deadline for filing income taxes, the fairness of those taxes, the amount you pay is what we're starting off with this morning.
		202748-8001 for Republicans.
		Democrats, 202-748-8,000.
		Independents, 202748, 8002.
		In Florida, Democrats line, we will hear from Otis.
		Otis, go ahead.
		Otis in Florida.
		Hello.
unidentified		Yes.
		Hello.
		How are you there?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Fine, thank you.
unidentified		Well, what I say is this.
		The tax break is fair, but like the guy said on the table, but it's unfair toward me and it's fair toward the richest.
		That's backwards.
		It's unfair toward me, but it's unfair to everybody else.
		Here's what I mean.
		We all have to pay, obligated to pay $171,000 a year to the government, everybody, regardless of how much money you make.
		Most people are not going to come close to that.
		Billionaires and millionaires, they get a check every month, and most of them can pay that $171 in one paycheck.
		Increase that, you'll have a lot of money coming into the government that can make Social Security solvent.
		We know that.
		And I just don't like how people want to say, you got a fair tax.
		Everybody pay their fair share.
		It's not going to work.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So, Otis, you pay taxes year after year.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is that what you're saying?
unidentified		Yes.
		Pay taxes on every paycheck you get.
		That's what I'm saying.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Well, when it comes to federal income taxes at this time of year, do you have to pay and do you get things back or do you owe?
unidentified		I owe.
		I've been on since for the last 15 years.
		I have to pay back.
		And I don't make as much money as these big people that are saying that don't want to pay taxes.
		I don't mind paying taxes.
		That's what keep America strong.
		Our share.
		Do our part.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What do you think you get back from paying taxes if you don't mind paying them?
unidentified		Okay.
		I get back up.
		I get back the security nation, a secure nation.
		I get to see a lot of elderly people taken care of.
		I get to see them if they're in the nursing home.
		I get to see that taken care of.
		We just get tranquility around the country.
		Is not the best, but it'd be better than nothing.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Otis there in Florida doesn't mind paying taxes.
		Tells us why.
		You can roll that into the mix as well.
		Norfolk, Virginia, David, Independent Line, you're next.
		Good morning on this idea of fairness in the amount of taxes you pay.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I just wanted to say I'd like to see us go back to something more resembling closer to what we had in the 60s where corporate entities paid more, and I'd like to see us remove the cap off Social Security.
		And hopefully that would help extend the life of Social Security.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Well, when you say corporate taxes, pay more, what do you think the ultimate benefit would be for, say, the average person or overall?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What do you think the benefit would be?
unidentified		I think it would take the burden off the middle class and help pay for everything that we need as a nation, police and so forth, military, that type of thing.
unidentified		It would just take the burden off the middle class.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		David, there in Virginia, talking about that.
		One of the Gallup features when it comes to the view of these federal income taxes, they asked people to give their opinion when it comes to income group.
		And this is the results.
		They said 58% of those saying lower-income people pay too much in taxes.
		54% saying middle-income people pay too much in taxes.
		And it's 58% saying that's upper-income people pay too little in taxes.
		This is from that poll.
		You can weave that in, but when it comes to overall fairness, that's what we're asking you this morning.
		Again, 202-748-8,000, one for Republicans.
		Democrats, 202-748, 8,000.
		And Independents, 2027, 8,000, 2.
		From Michigan, we will hear next from Mary Ann, Republican line.
		Hi, Mary Ann.
		You're next up.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I'm just, I think with Trump saying that he would take taxes off seniors, most of us seniors are already disabled, but to hire a lawyer, because that's a big business, it just takes too much time, you know, to prove how sick you are.
		I mean, we are mostly disabled, at least by 75.
		I am, and my husband is 100% disabled.
		But, you know, I don't think it's fair that they're not allowing seniors to not pay taxes on the little they do get in Social Security.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What's your tax, if I may ask, what's your tax situation, given the way you describe yourselves, what's your tax situation usually yearly?
		Do you end up paying?
		Do you end up getting something back?
		What's that look like?
unidentified		We get a little bit, a little bit back, maybe $800 or $900.
		But it's like, you know, just like the big families that are on welfare, they're getting $3,500 or so for each kid they have.
		And, you know, it's unbelievable.
		I mean, every kid has a cell phone.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Mary Ann there in Michigan, again, giving us her thoughts.
		Some of you texting in.
		Larry from New Jersey texting us his thoughts this morning saying that my wife and I paid over $2,500 in taxes this year based on withdrawals from 401ks.
		He felt like it was a little steep, but like the Beatles, he said he's the tax man.
		Felix Perez on this idea of fairness when it comes to taxes.
		Emphatically, he says no and starts it off there.
		Then he goes on to say, I thought after retiring, my retirement was going to be tax less, but it has to get my butt to work after receiving a bill from Uncle Sam.
		So no taxes is unfair, especially the way the government spends it.
		Again, those are the thoughts on Facebook this morning.
		Facebook.com/slash C-SPAN is how you reach us that way.
		The phone lines as well.
		Matt in North Carolina, Democrats line.
		Hi, thanks for calling.
		You're next up.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Thank you, sir.
		I appreciate it.
		And I really do appreciate C-SPAN.
		The reason for the call is, and I call it periodically and let you guys know, as long as rich people are writing the tax code, it's never going to change.
		They're not going to pay taxes.
		And us, the middle class, do pay taxes, not only in income tax, but also highway use tax and all the other taxes that we do pay.
		But I just want to also echo the other gentleman that said, I think we should go back to higher taxes for the richer people.
		And as far as I'm concerned, we could tax Elon Musk 99%, and he'd still be sitting on $2 billion.
		And $2 billion, in case anybody doesn't know, is 2,000 million.
		So I say tax those guys as much as possible.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Do you think that a rewrite of the tax code would resolve a lot of issues for the United States?
unidentified		Absolutely.
		But let me tell you what, rich people are going to be writing the tax code.
		It's never going to be fair.
		And people have to get that through their silly heads.
		Trump never released his taxes.
		And all the guys that do that, they don't want to pay taxes.
		We pick up the load.
		And then we have $37 trillion worth of debt.
		Everybody's talking about tax breaks right now.
		Tax breaks.
		We don't need tax breaks.
		If you love America, you pay your damn taxes and you pay as much as you can afford to do and still live the lifestyle that you're trying to live.
		But I can't afford a high-power accountant to do my taxes to figure out every single loophole.
		I'm a W-2 employee.
		I don't really have many choices.
		I've got a house to write off and that's it.
		And that's it.
		But I pay my taxes.
		And the effective tax rate, I think I'm mine and make $100,000 a year.
		It's like 26 or 27%.
		I guarantee you, nobody in that upper billionaire class, millionaire class, they're not paying 26% taxes.
		I promise you that.
		And Trump's looking for more tax cuts.
		I mean, it's terrible.
		I mean, I can't believe that we're even talking about that with $36 trillion of debt and $1 trillion just maintaining that debt a year.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You guys, it's silly.
		It's crazy.
		Matt in North Carolina, he talked about those income taxes.
		Here's the 2024 again.
		If you fall between that over $200,000, $300,000 to almost $600,000, 35% rate for single payers, that goes to 37% after you go up into over $600,000.
		Mary, filing jointly, that same, you're still about 24%.
		If you make $300,000, that comes up to about $600,000.
		You're a 35% racket, and then on to 37% when you reach those figures there.
		Again, that's in the Wall Street Journal.
		You can find that chart online, too, if you want to take a look at it.
		Maybe you want to kind of use that as a gauge to what you think is fair when it comes to federal taxes.
		Bruce joins us next.
		Bruce in Florida, independent lines, this idea of fairness.
		And yes, it's in quotes.
		It's subjective.
		You can fill in the blanks that way.
		But Bruce, go ahead in Florida.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I think the biggest deal is when people have worked and saved all their lives.
		My wife still works and it's silly that we turn around and pull money out of a 401k because obviously our money that we're getting back from Social Security isn't enough.
		And so we're still paying taxes.
		No matter what you do, you're paying taxes except for the wealthy people or the really unfortunate group of people that really doesn't make enough money to have to pay taxes.
		So we're getting double hit in the middle.
		And it's ridiculous.
		You save a little, you spend a little, and then when you get older, you're still paying.
		And that money then stings.
		And you really come to realize how unfair the tax code is.
		That's about it.
		Bruce.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Thank you in Florida giving us a call.
		He's on our line for independence.
		Let's hear from Robin.
		Robin in Maryland, Republican line.
		Hi there.
		You're next up.
unidentified		Well, thank you.
		So I think, number one, we have to take off the cap on Social Security.
		To me, that's the stupidest thing in the world.
		The richest people, people making over $170,000 a year, don't have to pay Social Security.
		And everyone knows Social Security and Medicare are going broke.
		So number one, that cap has to be taken off.
		I also love the idea of no tax on Social Security.
		I'm 74 years old.
		Two years ago, I had to go back to work because I was taking too much money out of my 401k to live on, and I had to go back to work.
		And now, today, we're writing a check for $15,000 because we've got to pay taxes on Social Security that we get that's untaxed, and now I've got to pay taxes on it.
		And I think paying taxes is reasonable, and I think the richest people should pay the most.
		But at the same time, I think that the tax laws do need to be reformed, and they do need to look at ways to help us old people.
		I've been paying into taxes for 60 years, and I would love to get the benefits from it.
		And I also don't want to see special interest groups like kids get tax breaks on loans and things like that.
		So I think taxes are reasonable, but there should be some ways to take care of us old people.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Robin there in Maryland, giving us her thoughts.
		More of you giving us your thoughts on text.
		This is Kevin in Connecticut saying, no, it's not fair.
		For decades, middle class has been paying for the rich.
		It's time for the rich to pay their fair share.
		And then off of X, this is a viewer saying, I feel like our rate while high is fair.
		However, it's clear the corporations and the very wealthy do not pay a fair rate at all.
		If they did, many of our budgetary problems would be reduced.
		Again, X available to you, too, if you want to make your thoughts there.
		At C-SPAN WJ is how you do that.
		This is from the debate over tax cuts.
		It's the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that was passed, subject to a possible extension before the end of the year.
		If Congress acts some of those details of the provision, it would lower most individual income tax rates and it updated those thresholds from the TCGAA, as it's known.
		It doubled standard deductions and it also capped deductions for state and local taxes, so-called SALT taxes, at $10,000.
		Homer in Louisiana, Democrats line on this idea of the amount you pay in income taxes is fair.
		Hi, Homer.
		You're next up.
unidentified		How are you doing?
		I'm not going to left the Social Security money separate.
		I was Social Security.
		I'm an 82-year-old bit.
		And then back when they put the Social Security money in the general fund, that's where they messed up.
		And Ray Charles has seen that.
		And then Trump bragged about how he didn't pay taxes.
		We were stupid.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Well, what do you mean?
		As far as your own situation, would you say it's fair or unfair?
		How would you describe that?
unidentified		Okay, basically, we got to have taxation.
		That's what's going to keep the government running.
		But as it is, the rich needs to put a little bit more in the pocket.
		If they got enough money to go around playing around with rockets and stuff like that, they need to put the money down to where they got it from.
		Appreciate you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Homer there.
		Tom is next.
		Tom in Pennsylvania, Independent Line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Good morning.
		Well, I guess one thing you can always count on, you'll never run out of problems.
		And, you know, to a lot of people, and the majority of people, taxes are a problem.
		I have to say I do respect a fellow like Mark Cuban, who's a billionaire and is actually proud to pay his taxes.
		And it's unfortunate that we don't have more people like that, especially at the head of our government.
		You know, when I look back and I see why the tax, why Trump did not release his taxes and finally came out later over a four-year period, two out of those four years he paid no taxes.
		One year he got a million-dollar refund, and the other year he paid $740.
		It was something like $700.
		I mean, that's absolutely ridiculous.
		I mean, I paid last year, this past year, it'll probably be about $30,000 in taxes.
		And, you know, it is what it is.
		I mean, that's what keeps the government running.
		But I do agree with callers that feel that it's unfair that these guys with all these exceptions are able to reduce their tax rate.
		And, you know, now we have a guy running the country that's a perfect example of that.
		So it is what it is.
		I know my son, you know, he had to pay a fair amount of tax himself this year.
		And I hate to see him do it at his age, but it is what it is.
		And that's, you know, they're the rules, and we go by that.
		So anyway, that's all I got.
		Thank you so much for taking my call.
		Have a great day.
		Thanks.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Republican line in Ohio.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Dan is next.
unidentified		Hi.
		Okay, so I don't mind paying my fair share.
		But on the other end, it's the government wastes a lot of money.
		And I think that it's about time somebody takes a look at where this money is being spent.
		You don't mind paying your fair share, but the government should take the tax money, respect the taxpayer, spend this money responsibly.
		The money that they waste is absolutely ridiculous.
		Also, isn't it true that the bottom 50% don't pay any federal taxes?
		The vast majority of the taxes, you should be telling people this.
		The vast majority of the taxes is paid by the rich people.
		You have 50% of the people at the bottom end don't pay any federal tax at all.
		And then these people have kids.
		They get $3,500 per kid from the federal government in a refund, a refund that they never paid any taxes to begin with.
		They never paid one penny, but they're getting these huge refunds.
		So the government needs to spend the money more responsibly.
		And then people wouldn't mind paying their fair share.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Dan there in Youngstown, Ohio, Bob adding something else to the mix when it comes to this, saying he posted this on Facebook, Bob Glenn, saying, since we retired, our tax is minimal, if any.
		But he goes on to say local property tax is slowly draining our bank account.
		So about the time I'm 80, I'll be looking for a job, even though I'm disabled.
		Again, Facebook is one way you can reach us.
		You can reach us on X. You can text us if you want.
		You can call the phone lines if you wish about this idea of taxation and if you think it's fair.
		D is in Maryland.
		Dee in Maryland Democrats line.
		Hi.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I just want to say, first of all, all the people who are on here saying that taxes are too high and the rich are getting richer with taxes know the tax code is not fair because when Trump came in office the first time, he is the one who changed the tax codes to make it for the rich.
		But no one has ever said that this was a problem.
		We should not be paying taxes on no Social Security and pension money.
		But this is what the rich wants us to do because just like now, they're trying to pay us a trillion-dollar tax cut, and we're not doing anything to stop it.
		And the Republicans in office are allowing it.
		Hello?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You're on.
		Go ahead.
		Keep going.
unidentified		Yes.
		I say the Republicans are not trying to vote this down.
		They are cutting all these federal jobs so that the rich people can get these tax cuts.
		And that's what the problem is.
		All these people calling up are agreeing with the tax, well, you know, the tax code for the rich, the rich.
		But they're the same ones who voted this name back in here, who cut the tax code the first time.
		We need to really use some common sense and start paying attention when we elect these officials.
		We are in a world of trouble with this, with these taxes that's coming down the pipe.
		Look at this bill.
		Do not watch that bill coming through the Senate and the House this week that it's going to be passed.
		The rich do not pay their fair share in taxes, and it's not fair.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Dee there in Maryland, she brings up the efforts in the House and the Senate, the passage of a bill that would include the extension of tax cuts and other tax cuts.
		You saw some of that action being with the first step with the passage of those bills last week.
		It was then that the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, talked about that budget bill from the Republicans, talked about the aspect of tax breaks and who benefits most from it.
		Here's Hakeem Jeffries from last week.
hakeem jeffries ▲ ● ▼		Here in the Capitol, the battle lines with respect to Democratic values and Republican values have once again been clearly drawn.
		House and Senate Democrats are standing on the side of the American people, and we continue to be committed to building an economy that's affordable and that works for everyday Americans and drives down the high cost of living while protecting health care, nutritional assistance, and the social security of the American people.
		Donald Trump and extreme MAGA Republicans are doing everything they can to tank our economy, drive us toward a recession, and gut the health care of the American people by visiting upon them the largest Medicaid cut in history,
		along with the largest cut to nutritional assistance in American history, all in service of enacting massive tax breaks for their billionaire donors like Elon Musk.
		It's a toxic scheme that they cannot hide from because it continues to be on full display on the House floor and on the Senate floor for the American people.
		The budget resolution that passed the House today will set in motion some of the most extreme cuts to health care, nutritional assistance, and the things that matter to everyday Americans in our nation's nearly 250-year history.
		It's a disgrace.
		This is just the beginning.
		And House Democrats are going to aggressively push back every day, every week, every month, until we bury this reckless Republican budget resolution in the ground, never to rise again.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is the amount of taxes that you pay and income taxes?
		Do you think that's fair?
		That's what we're getting your opinion on this morning.
		Republicans, Democrats, Independents, 202-748-8,001 for Republicans, 202-748-8,000 for Democrats and Independents, 202-748-8,002.
		Let's continue on with calls.
		Terry in North Carolina, Republican line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Good morning, CeasePan.
		Pedro, number one, if I'm not mistaken, I think Elon Musk just paid the largest tax bill in history.
		Number two, to listen to these people out here, it's just sickening.
		I would soon have tax cuts for our job creators, who the Democrats call the rich, instead of tax increases to pad the pockets of crooked, thieving politicians like Hook Ham Jeffries.
robert in tennesee ▲ ● ▼		I think you need to be doing a segment on how Washington, how our politicians are so wealthy off our taxpayer money.
unidentified		We fund them.
		We pay them.
		How's Nancy Pelosi worth $200 million?
		How has AOC come in as a broke bartender and worth $30 million now?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So back to the original question.
		It's the idea of fairness.
		What do you think about that?
unidentified		As fairness, it's not fair.
		It's not fair to the rich.
		In my opinion, they pay more taxes than anybody.
		The one Republican earlier is right.
		The lower end of the class of this country, our inner city people, pay no taxes at all.
		They might pay a tax when they walk into Senum 11 in Buy Some, but they don't pay no federal taxes.
		All they do is contribute to the problem.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Would you describe what you pay in income taxes as fair?
unidentified		What I pay in income taxes?
unidentified		I've had to pay my whole life for the last 45 years.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Sure, but is it fair, though?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Would you describe it as fair?
unidentified		Would I describe it as fair?
		Yeah, I describe it as fair.
		Maybe I think maybe they take a little too much from me and the working people of this country, Social Security recipients.
		Do you think that we should those people should be paying taxes?
		Oh, do the, what is it, 150 million people over 125 years old that are collecting Social Security benefits?
		Is it fair to them?
		How much taxes do they pay?
		Pedro, I think maybe you ought to look into the mirror a little bit.
		And that town right behind you, Washington, D.C., the richest place in this country that produces nothing but crooked politicians.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Guy is next.
		He's in Oklahoma, independent line.
		For what you pay in income taxes, is it fair?
		Hello, Guy.
unidentified		Hey, good morning, Pedro.
		You look sharp as usual.
		And the gentleman from Ohio a few minutes ago, and the gentleman that just spoke from North Carolina finally are some intelligent, educated, informed people calling in.
		The rich people carry the burden of the taxes in this country.
		The top 1% of the rich people pay 34% of the tax burden.
		If you take the top 10% of all income earners, they pay 72% of all the federal taxes collected.
		Yeah, the rich pay their fair share, and half the people in the country, the bottom half, don't pay any taxes at all.
		It's time to go to a flat tax or a consumption tax and to debolish the IRS.
		Take all those 87,000 new hires that Biden wanted to put in, send them down to the border.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So, Guy, though, when it comes to your personal situation when paying taxes, would you describe it as fair?
unidentified		Pedro, I'm the founder of Guy Phil Financial Services.
		I called in a little while ago, and I'm one of these billionaires that don't pay their fair share, according to the legacy news.
		I pay massive amounts of money in taxes, and I always have.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, we'll go on to Randy.
		Randy also joining us from Oklahoma.
		Democrats' line, a reminder viewers, if you call in every 30 days, we appreciate it.
		But here's Randy in Oklahoma Democrats' line.
		Hi, Randy.
		Go ahead.
		You're next.
unidentified		Good morning, Pedro.
unidentified		Wow.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Randy, you're coming in low on my end.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you put a little closer to your handset there or your device?
unidentified		Yep.
unidentified		Okay, go ahead.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		A little better.
unidentified		Go ahead.
		Yep.
		Great.
		The last few callers have done something that I don't normally hear on C-SPAN, and that's that they all agree our government's corrupt.
		And do I pay my fair share?
		No, I don't.
		I pay way too much.
		I make about $80,000 a year.
		I work constantly.
		And I see my tax dollars going to enrich crooked politicians and their families.
		I want to pay a fair share.
		I want to make sure that I pay exactly enough to sustain our great nation militarily, traffic, you know, the interstate, everything that our government's supposed to do, I want to make sure they're fully funded.
		But what's happening is just, for an example, we were taking in $3.5 trillion a year, and the government was spending $4.5 trillion a year.
		So they demanded they raise our taxes to $4.5 trillion a year.
		Only thing is, they started spending $5.5 trillion.
		COVID hit, and they raised it another couple of trillion dollars a year.
		So now we're paying almost $7 trillion in debt.
		We're spending $7 trillion, and we're only taking in, you know, six or five.
		The problem is, no matter how much we pay in, in fair taxes, if you want to call it, no matter how much we pay in, they're going to spend more than what they take in.
		And that's because they're all corrupt.
		And Donald Trump and Elon Musk and his Doge team are rooting that out.
		And I tell you what, Democrat, Republican, Independent, non-binary, affiliated people need to look and see that our government is corrupt.
		And we need to get behind Doge and President Trump to clean up the corruption.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		As a Democrat, why do you support the Doge efforts?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And largely, would you support the extension?
unidentified		Well, we need to clean up our government.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Would you support the extension of the tax cuts then as well as a Democrat?
unidentified		You mean the tax cuts on no-tips and the tux cuts on the middle class?
		See, this is the thing.
		They passed that tax cut, okay?
		And the corporate tax was a permanent tax cut.
		And the personal income tax tax cut was temporary.
		See how they play that?
		And now they're saying, well, the corporate income tax is going to get a tax cut.
josh in arkadia ▲ ● ▼		They already got it, and it's permanent.
unidentified		The increase will be on people like me that work constantly.
unidentified		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Randy, they're in Oklahoma again, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, Democrats, 202748, 8,000.
		And Independents, 202-748-8002.
		An opinion piece by Dean Baker takes a look at the money that's or the prospective tax cuts that the Congress is trying to pass, part of President Trump's objective.
		He writes this, incredibly, we are making the situation even more unfair with the massive taxes or imports that the president's imposing when it comes to those tariffs.
		We don't know all items that will be covered.
		A tax increase of close to a trillion is annually.
		He says that on average, this would come to about more than $7,000 per household, and the burden would fall disproportionately on middle-income families.
		This is because the rich typically don't spend all their income, and they spend more on services such as restaurants and travel, which will be less affected by the president's tax hikes on imported goods, saying that this is the most anti-worker tax policy the United States has ever seen.
		In effect, the government is penalizing the people left behind in the last century.
		He adds that it doesn't need to be this way.
		Congress has plenty of room to raise taxes on the big winners in this economy.
		The United States saw rapid wage and income growth in the quarter century after World War II when the top tax rate for the rich was between 70 and 90 percent.
		Growth also surged in the 1990s when President Bill Clinton raised the top tax rate from 31 to 39 percent.
		Higher taxes on the wealthy have not kept the economy from growing.
		The thoughts of Dean Baker on a piece called Wealthy Americans Must Pay Their Fair Share.
		Tony is in Philadelphia, Independent Line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Hi, how are you?
		Yeah, I agree with everything you just said there.
		The average American pays about 23%, between 23 and 25%.
		The average billionaire pays about 8% because of the unrealized gains when they don't sell off their property that has increased in value.
		But they're making bank and they're not paying taxes on that.
		This is why Warren Buffett said, why do I pay less taxes than my secretary?
		The founding fathers of the United States loved wealth taxes and they told us from day one, only tax property to prevent monopoly.
		That was the British system.
		And never, ever tax income.
		They thought that taxing people's sweat and labor was insane.
		People who, like the other coalition, said, oh, the rich pay all the taxes.
		That is nonsense.
		People who work for a living should not be paying any taxes.
		The United States became an industrial giant by 1870 with zero income taxes.
		In 1913, we stabbed their backs.
		We returned to the British class system where eventually 2% will own everything and everyone else will become a renter serf.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Tony, but in this case, for your own personal situation, how would you describe your tax situation and would you describe it as fair?
unidentified		Of course, it's unfair.
		It's ridiculously unfair.
		The average, the rich in this country have been gutting America since 1913.
		Sure, but why is it unfair for you?
		Because they lopped off 20% of their taxes.
		Because 20% of the people in this country control 92% of the wealth.
		And the founding fathers said, well, then you're supposed to be paying 92% of the taxes.
		They don't.
		They pay approximately 69, 70%.
		They literally took off 20% of their fair share since 1913.
		That's how long they've been gutting America.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		We'll go to David in Virginia Beach, Independent Line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Yeah, hi.
		My name is David in Virginia Beach.
		I'm a certified public accountant.
		I've been preparing, planning, and preparing tax returns for 35 years.
		The idea that, first of all, the top 20% pay 80% of all the taxes.
		And so I just have a question for your listeners.
		Do politicians with unlimited budgets always exceed them?
		And the idea, and I've had clients pay $3.5 million in taxes.
		So it's preposterous to think, and then half the population doesn't pay any taxes.
		They got no skin in the game.
		So the idea that the rich get off without paying their fair share is nonsense.
		It's absolutely preposterous.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		As far as the idea of fairness goes, how would you describe your situation in paying taxes, particularly as a CPA?
unidentified		Well, I don't like paying them, but I just have clients who are middle income, and when I look at their tax bill, it makes $60,000, $70,000, $80,000, and they're paying $20,000 in income taxes, which means federal, state, of course, and their Social Security, small business people.
		I mean, their marginal tax rate is approaching 60%.
		And, you know, by the time you add all those things up, so this idea that the rich don't pay their fair share is absolute nonsense.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		If you are a CPA, then you've heard probably some of our viewers saying about these supposed loopholes that those who are rich could get into.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		But would you say that's a truism?
unidentified		The tax code is designed so that if you have losses, you can take it against, and then there's even limits to that.
		I have clients who have real estate losses that we can't take losses against their wages and their interest and their dividends.
		So that's whoever says that doesn't know anything about taxes.
		They can't even spell tax.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		David and Virginia Beach there.
		It was on the House floor during that debate about the House budget bill that the budget chair Jody Arrington talked about the Democratic opposition to the extension of tax cuts put in by the Trump administration in his first term.
		Here's Jody Arrington from last week.
jodey arrington ▲ ● ▼		They'll also dust off an old playbook where they say that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was simply a tax cut for the rich.
		So just to dispel that with a few points, the Washington Post gave four Pinocchios to their claim that it went to the rich and to the corporations.
		Three out of $4 went to individuals.
		And the lower 10% of our income brackets received the highest tax break.
		And the top 1% actually had to pay a higher share of taxes.
		In addition, we saw 25-year wage increases.
		We saw American families, median household families, be able to put $5,000 back into their pockets.
		And 6 million people were raised out of poverty.
		So all boats rose on the tide of prosperity.
		And yet my colleagues, my Democrat colleagues, are trying to stop us from simply extending the tax relief to our small businesses and tax breaks to our families after a 21% inflation tax that they suffered through for the last few years.
		If they were successful in opposing the extension of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, an average American will have a tax hike of 22%.
		$1,700 would be the extra expense for families of four.
		26 million small businesses would lose their comparable tax break through the 20% 199A deduction.
		Child tax credit would be cut in half for 40 million families.
		The standard deduction for 91% of all Americans would be cut in half.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		That's, again, if you want to see more of that debate from last week when it comes to the budget bill overall, the tax, the task, the tax aspect, excuse me, there too, you can do that.
		This is what Gallup said.
		We showed you this earlier.
		It was 62% of Democrats saying when they were asked about the amount of paid in federal income taxes, if they thought it was fair, 62% said yes.
		From that amongst 45% of Independents and 35% of Republicans giving their thoughts that way.
		We're taking your thoughts as well on the phone lines.
		You can reach out to us on social media as well.
		Rory, in California, Republican line, this idea of the amount of taxes you pay and if it's fair.
		Hello, Rory.
unidentified		Good morning.
		First thing, Trump was going to have about $5,000 returned to every American from the taxes.
		I haven't heard it recently, but is that still on?
		Are they going to mail everybody $5,000?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Don't know for sure.
unidentified		Okay, the other thing is everybody worries about the rich.
		Well, I've made money under Trump as a middle class and lower class, and I think most people, even the rich, make money.
		They don't make less money and give it to the middle class.
		And so there's no social justice, if you want to call it that.
		But the two things I have noticed about the two types of rich, Republican rich earn their money.
		Democrat rich get it from the government, and they're not taxed because they give it.
		They get it from government money.
		Also, a couple of states I heard just did away with their state taxes, and now they're making more money because people come in, keep more money, and live a better life.
		That's about all I'm going to say.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Well, before you go, what about this idea of fairness in paying taxes?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How would you describe that for yourself?
unidentified		It doesn't exist.
		If you have the ability to be rich, be rich.
		Keep your money.
		If you're going to be middle class, you're going to be middle class.
		Right now, the rich are never going to give up money to give to the middle class, and the middle class don't really pay that much more.
		It's your own ability to make money.
		And that's where being a Republican rich and a Democrat rich really come down the line.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Okay, we'll hear from Lawrence, Lawrence in Massachusetts, Democrats lying.
		Go ahead.
		This is Will.
		Hi.
unidentified		Yes, it is Will.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You're on.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
unidentified		Okay.
unidentified		All right.
charles in louisiana ▲ ● ▼		My father passed in 2000, 2020.
unidentified		And I was the executor of the estate, and I had to handle his taxes.
		So I sent them in to the CPA who handled it.
		She filed.
		And months and months went by.
		I called up to find out what was going on.
		They said they never received it.
		I mailed out their facts, their information again, directly to them at their post office box.
		Several months later, they never received it.
		Listen, it's been five years.
		I'm still waiting for a federal and Massachusetts state income tax rebate.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		David is in Massachusetts as well.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Independent line.
unidentified		Hi.
		I guess this is Massachusetts Day.
		Anyway, two things.
		The guy that just called from Massachusetts, there's a reason why we're called Texas.
		We are taxed for everything under the sun.
		Second of all, is the, is it fair?
		Is our taxes fair?
		Do people that are illegals, and there are a lot of them here and we are trying to get rid of them, pay taxes?
		No.
		So our taxes are going towards paying for their housing, their food, all that stuff.
		A couple of years ago, I met an illegal woman from Nigeria who was scamming people.
		She got everything free, housing, food, medical care, and wasn't working.
		So that's where the unfairness is, is get rid of these people who are sucking the air out of the system.
		Then it'll be fair.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Well, as far as the amount you pay, would you describe it as fair or unfair for you?
unidentified		I think it's fair from what I have seen of other things.
		And I have a business, a small business, and I work my butt off to make things happen.
		But I see other people who have been on the system for years and not doing that.
		And that's what bothers me.
		And they can work physically.
		So, you know, that's my take on it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		David, there in Massachusetts.
		This is an analysis from the Heartland Institute.
		This goes back to taking a look at the tax cuts that were passed in the previous administration saying the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, an updated study, which includes IRS data from 2018 to 2022, according to the Heartland Institute, shows that the TCGA has continued to reap big rewards to low and middle income Americans while making the tax code more progressive.
		In terms of the percentage saved per filer, the IRS data show that filers on the lower end of the income spectrum received far larger reductions compared to those on the higher end.
		For example, if you earned $45,000 in 2022 under TCGAA, you received a 19% reduction in taxes compared to 2017.
		If you earn $5 million, you save 2.3%.
		In other words, the Heartland Institute says the TCGA gave all Americans a tax rate cut.
		However, the rate cuts were substantially larger for lower income brackets.
		By design, the law to mostly benefit middle and lower income earners.
		The TCGA resulted in the rich paying a larger share of the overall tax burden.
		The Heartland Institute says this is an indisputable and vital point.
		It also obliterates the left's talking point that the TCGA was a big tax cut for the rich.
		Again, the Heartland Institute making those claims.
		You can read that for yourself and see if you agree or disagree with that.
		You can find it online.
		We're asking your thoughts on this idea of fairness when it comes to what you pay in income taxes on this federal income tax deadline day.
		Oakey is in Ohio.
		Republican line, you're next.
		Good morning.
william in arkansas ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, on this taxes, I don't think they're fair with the taxes because the welfare gets nothing.
unidentified		They don't pay no taxes.
		And them people work for the welfare.
		They sit on their butt, on their desk, never check these people.
		And these 95% of these people, I know, that my family says, why should I work when the welfare gives me more money?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		But as far as you're concerned and what you pay for taxes, would you say that the amount you pay is fair?
unidentified		No, it's not fair.
		If we'd be fair with taxes, everybody pay the same tax.
		If I pay $24,000 a year, everybody pays the same.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is that what you pay?
unidentified		If they make that amount of money.
		But I know rich people, I know a buddy of mine, he makes more on his taxes than he's working because he gets more tax money out.
		Because he buys equipment and sets it off his income tax, and he gets an income tax rebate on it.
		So it's a crooked deal that the rich gets richer and the poor gets poor.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		One more call.
		One more call.
		This will be from Massachusetts.
		Fernando, Independent Line, your last call.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Good.
		Thank you very much.
		Just a few short comments.
		I think everyone cannot avoid taxes unless you're a glorified landlord that makes your billions that way.
		And, you know, the oligarch, the issue is the oligarchs have taken over the lawmaking process.
		And that's where America, unfortunately, is going in the wrong direction.
		Most of us are regular people or middle class or upper class people.
		And the billionaires who have been lucky and gifted think now they can make the rules for everyone.
		So that's unfortunate.
		That's all I have to say.
		Thank you so much.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		That's it for the calls.
		Thank you for those of you who participated this morning.
		One bit of network note for you.
		Former President Joe Biden is set to deliver his first public address since leaving office at a conference supporting the rights of people who depend on Social Security and disability services.
		You can see those comments from former President Biden live from Chicago.
		That will be at 6 o'clock tonight.
		You can see it on one of our many platforms, this channel, C-SPAN.
		You can also follow along on C-SPAN Now, our free video app, and then you can always watch it at c-span.org.
		A couple of guests joining us throughout the course of the morning.
		First up, we're going to have a discussion with Axio senior reporter Alex Eisenstadt about his book, Revenge: The Inside Story of Trump's Return to Power.
		Later on in the program, Ling Ling Wei, the chief China correspondent from the Wall Street Journal, she'll join us to talk about the standoff between the U.S. and China over trade and tariffs.
		Those conversations coming up when Washington Journal continues.
unidentified		C-SPAN's student camp competition challenged middle and high school students nationwide to create documentaries with messages to the new president.
		Our panel of judges evaluated over 1,700 thought-provoking student films on their use of multiple perspectives.
		C-SPAN awarded $100,000 in total cash prizes, and our grand prize of $5,000 goes to Dermot Foley, a 10th grader from Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland.
		Congratulations to all our winners.
		The top 21 winning entries will air on C-SPAN this month.
		You can also watch all the award-winning documentaries anytime at studentcam.org.
		C-SPAN, bringing you democracy, unfiltered.
		This week, watch a primetime encore presentation of our 10-part series, First 100 Days.
		We explore the early months of U.S. presidencies from George Washington in 1789 to Donald Trump in 2017.
		We'll learn about the decisions made and how they shaped the White House, the nation, and history.
		Tonight, the first 100 days of Ulysses Grant's presidency.
		Grant was a famous Civil War general who won the White House in 1868.
		His campaign slogan was, Let us have peace.
		Issues during Grant's first 100 days included reconstruction, the payment of Civil War debt, voting rights, and the fight against the KKK.
		If Grant did not campaign, he would not campaign.
		In fact, he even left Washington to be sure that people wouldn't get after him.
		He traveled west.
		But what did campaign were what were called campaign biographies?
		And there was one particularly wonderful campaign biography written in 1868 so that all Americans knew the story of Grant, that they knew the struggles that he had gone through.
		Watch First 100 Days tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN 2 or online at c-span.org.
		Journal continues.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Joining us now is Alex Eisenstadt.
		He is a senior political reporter for Axios, also the author of the book Revenge, The Inside Story of Trump's Return to Power.
		Alex Eisenstadt, welcome to C-SPAN.
unidentified		Thank you.
unidentified		Thanks for having me.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What sparked this book?
unidentified		You know, I've always loved campaign books.
		I've always been fascinated by them.
		I wanted to write a book about Trump's comeback campaign.
		I knew it would be a fascinating, dramatic, historic tale.
		I didn't know how fascinating and historic and dramatic it would be in the end.
		And so I wanted to create a fly-on-the-wall portrait for people to understand what happened behind the scenes in this two-year ride.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What is the timeframe of the book and why is that important to the story?
unidentified		Sure.
unidentified		So the book actually starts about two weeks before the January 6th Capitol riot and it ends on, well, it ends essentially on election night, 2024, goes a couple weeks after that into the transition a little bit.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And so when you're during that period, describe your role reporting on the campaign, how much access you got to the president, those involved, and ultimately the material that makes up the book.
unidentified		Sure.
		Yeah, so I was at Politico at the time, my former employer.
		And what I basically did was I went to people.
		This is the beginning of the campaign, very early 2023.
		I went to people who are close to Trump, donors, allies, advisors, people who talk to him regularly.
		And I said, look, I want to write a book about what happened behind the scenes.
		I want to talk to you on background, which means that their names won't be used at all, sort of anonymously sourced.
		And a lot of them said yes.
		Some of them said no, but a lot of them said yes in terms of wanting to help participate in creating this narrative.
		And so those are people that I talked to really throughout for the next two years, went back to them again and again and again and asked them, tell me what happened today.
		What happened then?
		What did he say here?
		What was the real story there?
		And just try to create a narrative, TikTok, if you will.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And this would be traveling on the plane or Mar-a-Lago.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How widespread of space did you have when you were talking to people?
unidentified		Sure.
		So I went on the plane twice.
		I went on Trump Force One twice.
		I spent a little bit of time at Mar-a-Lago, and I spent a lot of time in Palm Beach, Florida, where, of course, Mar-a-Lago is.
		And I just talked with people on the phone a lot, had lunches with people here in D.C., stuff like that.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Ever talked to him as the president himself?
unidentified		I had, so I had one on-the-record interview with him on his plane in June of 2023.
unidentified		This was right after he was right after one of his indictments.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So here it is.
		You frame the book with the title, Revenge.
		Talk about that, not only as a title, but is it a driving force within the book and the campaign itself?
unidentified		Yeah, absolutely.
		So revenge means a lot of different things, right?
		When Trump made revenge the centerpiece of his campaign, he was running to be a vessel for the people who are his supporters, for people who he saw as his base, for people who he saw as his voters.
		He could be a vessel for them, someone who got back at an establishment, at a class of elites who they feel frustrated with, who they feel turned their back on them.
		And he identified with them, and they identified with him.
		And so revenge became the centerpiece of his campaign.
		And it also became the central playbook of what is now his White House.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And so you talk about the idea that he's standing in for the people, but how much of it is his own personal sense of revenge when it comes to the campaign and what you see now emerging from this second term?
unidentified		Yeah, 100%.
		He definitely ran, at least in part, because he wanted revenge, people on people who he thought stopped him or tried to impede him when he was president the first time around, people who he thought treated him unfairly in terms of the judicial system on the Democratic Party, on Joe Biden.
		He saw this campaign as a means for him to get revenge on people who he regarded as his political enemies.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Was this idea of revenge something that you think developed during his time in politics, or is there something in his history as well that kind of led to what he would do as far as that involved?
unidentified		Yeah, no, I think grievance politics has always sort of been part of his mindset ever since he got onto the stage, right?
		He's always thought of himself as someone who's aggrieved.
		And it's always been part of his mindset.
		I think it's only intensified since he first burst onto the national stage.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You talk about several specific events in the book.
		And just to give you a sense, we'll start with the arrest of Donald Trump.
		And you wrote this saying, for most people, you write, getting arrested would be the worst day of the life.
		He managed to turn his arrest in the Daniels case, the Stormy Daniels case, into high-octane entertainment.
		And the flight home felt celebratory.
		Upon landing, Trump's fleet of SUVs made its way from Palm Beach Airport back to Mar-a-Lago, where the former president delivered a speech to a crowd of supporters gathered in the ballroom, to which he aired to a national audience, I never thought anything could happen like this in America.
		I never thought it could happen.
		That's the story.
		Set the context, and how does it play to the theme of the book?
unidentified		Sure.
		So this was the first, Trump's first indictment in the Stormy Daniels hush money case in New York.
		And the theme, visuals and Trump's understanding of political visuals plays an important, has an important role in the book, basically.
		He understands the power of visuals in a way that few politicians really do.
		And he and his advisors actually kind of compared, or his advisors did, actually compared the drive from Trump Tower in New York to the New York courthouse to the O.J. Simpson low-speed Whiteford Bronco chase in the 1990s in Los Angeles in terms of they wanted to create,
		they wanted to create sort of a dramatic, you know, a dramatic visuals, dramatic TV, so that viewers saw it in the same way.
		And they were right in that this was a moment that could be heavily orchestrated.
		It was a moment that they were in touch.
		His team was closely in touch with TV networks about.
		And so they understood that viewers like drama.
		They like highly choreographed events.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		He goes on to say, the only crime I have committed is to fearlessly defend our nation from those who seek to destroy it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Again, taking his own personal issues, extending it to those who would ultimately support him.
unidentified		Yeah, absolutely.
		He took his own issues and he kind of globalized them.
		If you were to listen to him speak, he would be able to see how he could connect with people who are in Iowa, a struggling farmer in Iowa, someone in the inner cities in Detroit, all people who feel like the government has treated them unfairly.
		And he was able to identify with those people.
		They were able to identify with him.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Alex Eisenstadt joining us for this conversation about his book, Revenge, The Inside Story to Trump's Return to Power.
		If you have questions for him, you can ask him on the phone.
		202-748-8001 for Republicans, 202-748-8000 for Democrats.
		Independents, 202-748-8002.
		And you can text your questions to it as if you wish.
		202-748-8003 on the legal issues.
		How much of his own, the legal issues against him, how does that play into the revenge narrative?
unidentified		Sure.
		So he was able to take the legal narrative, the legal cases against him, and wrap it into a very tight narrative, which is that there is a broader legal system that is aligned against him, that is trying to destroy him, that is trying to jail him, that is trying to keep him from regaining power.
		And he took it and cast it as this broader amorphous, part of this broader, amorphous, quote-unquote, deep state that was out to get him.
		His supporters began to see it the same way.
		They began to see these as politically motivated.
		And the interesting thing is, and this probably helped Trump, is that the Stormy Daniels Hushmanny case, it was extremely fortuitous for him that that was the first case that he faced because it was the case that most voters felt was like the most politically motivated in terms of there were much stronger cases that Donald Trump faced.
		The January 6th riot case, the classified documents case, the Georgia case about election interference.
		Those were all arguably stronger cases.
		And so the fact that the hush money case was the first case on the docket and the only case that went to trial really helped him.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I can think about, going back, I think about when they took the mug shot, they published that.
		He's got it framed in the White House.
		They made money off of it from selling it.
		How does that fit into the narrative as well?
unidentified		Well, again, Trump's understanding of visuals.
		And there's actually a scene in the book where he is flying back from Georgia where he had just gotten his mug shot taken.
		And he immediately knew that this was a powerful image.
		They used it immediately for fundraising purposes.
		It raised huge amounts of money.
		And it became this iconic, kind of this almost iconic image that was sold by places like Barstool Sports.
		You had other bro sort of oriented websites that really embraced it, sold it as merch.
		And it became an image that his supporters rallied behind.
		It became something that he and his team really got to like.
		Trump liked the way it looked.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You talked about his advisors.
		During this time, who has his ear during this time advising him on how he's going to use these instances for a reelection campaign?
		Who's the closest voice to him?
unidentified		Sure.
		So there are two real main characters in this book on that front.
		The first is Susie Wiles, who was his co-campaign manager, now his chief of staff.
		You can't overstate the role that Susie Wiles played in terms of she came back into his fold right after January 6th.
		Trump had nothing at that point.
		He had no political operation.
		He didn't know what kind of money he had in his political operation.
		He didn't really know who was working for him.
		And she came in and she cleaned the slate and she built his political operation back from the ground up.
		So she's a hugely important figure in this book.
		She's now a hugely important player in this White House's chief of staff.
		The other important figure is Chris La Cevita, who of course is a longtime Republican strategist, big player in Virginia politics.
		He joined Susie Wiles a little later on in the campaign, became co-campaign manager, and was a really important factor as well.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		When did you notice that this would be the theme of the book?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		When did it come to you?
unidentified		You know, it was sort of one of those things that developed over time, but definitely around the time of the Stormy Daniels hush money case.
		That was a real moment where it became clear that he would be running on revenge.
		And then there's a really important moment a few months before that, actually, where Trump, if you go back to early 2023, he was in really dire straits politically, right?
		And he found his footing when early in 2023, he goes on a trip to East Palestine, Ohio.
		Trip organized by a guy by the name of JD Vance, who later on became his vice president.
		And there had been a trail train derailment there, as a lot of your viewers will remember.
		A lot of those people in that small Rust Belt town felt like the federal government and Joe Biden hadn't done enough to help with the trained railman and the cleanup.
		And so Trump made a visit there and really went to a McDonald's, did a lot of, did some retail politics that you didn't see him do during his first term in office.
		And it showed how he was going to run a campaign in which he identified with blue-collar people and people who had felt held back by the federal government.
		And so that early visit, if you talk to people in the Trump campaign, you talk to people close to Trump, they'll tell you that was a hugely important moment.
		It also does.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I'm sorry, it also demonstrates his ability to connect, though.
unidentified		It demonstrates his ability to connect.
		And his visit to a McDonald's, what did you see him do in the months after that?
		You saw him go back again and again and again to McDonald's to do real tail stops in places like waffle houses.
		You saw him go to a McDonald's the week, the two weeks, in the weeks before the election.
		You saw him pose in a dump truck, right?
		He understood the power of these visuals.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And is it something he learned from the first term that he applied to the second term?
		Are those things he practiced in the first term?
		Or how does that work?
unidentified		He actually, here's an interesting thing.
		He actually didn't love doing a lot of those retail stops.
		He didn't love going into waffle houses.
		It's something he kind of rolled his eyes at at times.
		But he understood the power of the visuals.
		And he is someone who, as he's a former TV producer, right?
		He comes from TV.
		He's a TV creature.
		He understands the power of images.
		And so even if it wasn't his favorite thing to do, to go out and go into a Waffle House, it was something he understood the power of doing and the importance of doing politically.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Alex Eisenstadt joining us for this conversation.
		He's the author of Revenge, the inside story of Trump's return to power.
		Our first call comes from Pennsylvania.
		This is Hillgrove, Democrats Line.
		You're on with our guests.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Yeah, good morning.
		On the last diagnosis of his, his physical, there was no mention of bone spurs.
		And that's what got him out of the, you know, the Vietnam War.
		And bone spurs just don't disappear.
		I've had them, and they got to be surgically removed.
		So maybe the whole story about the bone spurs was a lie, which is probably the whole emphasis of his administration.
		And he can get that guy out of El Salvador.
		All he has to do is ask the president of El Salvador, another crook, to have the guy released.
		There's no doubt about it.
		And the guy is innocent.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Gotcha.
unidentified		Yeah, look, I mean, Trump's health is something that has always been, there's always been questions about his health, right?
		I mean, these are questions that have dogged him ever since he's first started running for office.
		He doesn't talk about it all that much.
		He talks about how he plays golf a lot.
		He talks about how he's an active figure.
		But that's something that there actually is, although I'll tell you, there is actually an interesting anecdote in the book, kind of a funny anecdote.
		He would joke around up to his advisors about how he felt they should be on Ozepec.
		So that's something, maybe that's something that applies to what you're calling.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What did you notice about his stamina in campaigning, though, from covering?
unidentified		Yeah, look, I mean, there's no question about it.
		He showed a lot of stamina in campaigning.
		He campaigned long hours.
		He campaigned more than Kamala Harris or Joe Biden did.
		So there is something to be said for the fact that he does campaign quite aggressively.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		From Ohio, we will hear from Tom.
		Tom is on our rhyme for Republicans.
		Hi, Tom.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Yes, I just have a few things I would like to say that like you have a man on there now, Trump's return to power.
		Isn't that kind of a stupid statement to start with?
		Did they say Clinton's return to power?
		Stuff like that there?
		Now, I think our media screws up the whole system.
		And that guy that narrates your programme, I'm at a fathead.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So, caller, since you're calling in supposedly about the book or the topic, do you have a specific question for our guest, please?
unidentified		I just said it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's Tom there in Ohio.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You can answer or respond to it as you wish.
unidentified		Well, with respect to the caller, Bill Clinton didn't have non-consecutive terms, so there was no real return to power for Bill Clinton at all.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		When it comes to the return to power, and you talked about the theme of revenge, you talked about the lawsuits, one thing.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How did other Republicans factor into that, particularly Republicans who were campaigning against him?
unidentified		It made it impossible for them to gain any traction.
		You talk to people who are close to Ron DeSantis, and they'll tell you when Trump was indicted in the Stormy Daniels hush money case, after that, it made it impossible for them to run, basically.
		And that's not to say Ron DeSantis didn't have other problems.
		He had a ton of other problems.
		But when Trump got indicted in the Stormy Daniels case, it got him all the attention in the world.
		And it put his opponents, his primary rivals, in this impossible position where either they were going to have to align behind him, or they were going to have to criticize him for it.
		And or they were going to have to sort of take this sort of, we're not going to talk about it stance.
		What happened, what they all decided to do was they all decided to support him and align themselves behind it because that's where voters were.
		It's really hard to run against someone when you're speaking out in support of them.
		It's just hard to do.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And for DeSantis, was the lining up behind him a consistent thing or did he break ranks?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How would you describe it?
unidentified		It became this impossible balancing act form where he got behind Trump in terms of the legal cases, said he was the victim of a witch hunt, and then he was trying to attack him in other ways.
unidentified		It just didn't work.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You wrote about Ron DeSantis saying betrayal was just the only prism in which the president, Mr. Trump, saw DeSantis.
		In April, he ordered up a TV commercial describing how Trump had dragged DeSantis to victory in 2018.
		Soon after the ad with the narrator grimly intoning, instead of being grateful, DeSantis is now attacking the very man who saved his career, began airing nationally.
		Take it up from there.
		What happens after that?
unidentified		Trump was infuriated by Ron DeSantis' what he saw as his betrayal.
		This is actually an important part of the book, but Trump sees himself as a kind of, he models himself as a big city political boss.
		There is an old, there's a Brooklyn, there's an old Brooklyn political boss by the name of Mead Esposito from decades ago.
		Trump would speak of his fondness for Esposito.
		And Esposito was someone who traded favors and he expected them in return.
		And so Trump, when he endorsed DeSantis in the 2018 governor's race, it helped DeSantis win and Trump took credit for it.
		And frankly, Trump might be right about that.
		He could very well be the reason that DeSantis is governor.
		And after that, Trump felt that DeSantis owed him in return for that.
		And he couldn't imagine that DeSantis would actually challenge him for the 2024 Republican nomination.
		It was just something he couldn't fathom.
		And so when Trump did it, when DeSantis ran, it infuriated Trump.
		And after that, Trump decided that he wasn't just going to defeat DeSantis in the primary.
		He was going to destroy him and make it impossible for him essentially to run for anything else ever again.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You also go on to write that after the ad, it was the next move of Mr. Trump to come did what he always did.
		He wanted to tear someone down.
		He embarked on a quest to come up with the perfect nickname.
		Take it from there.
unidentified		Sure.
		So he looked over a few names.
		He threw some against the wall and he finally came up with sanctimonious.
		And his advisors are like, well, why desanctimonious?
		It's a little long.
		I don't know.
		And he said, because he's sanctimonious.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Alex Eisenstadt joining us.
		This is LaWan joining us from Georgia for our guest Democrats line.
		Go ahead, you're next up.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		How you doing, Alex?
		You know, I find it almost, I find it almost laughable when y'all try to equate Trump with being so smart.
		And, you know, to me, he's just a big BS article.
		artist.
		I'm 72 years old.
		I've seen Trump all my adult life.
		And what he go around is trying to be a big bully.
		But if you ever confront him, you can back him down.
		And as far as that being so smart, if he's so smart, he wouldn't have lost the sector.
		The second time, what he was able to do is get elected by Biden staying longer than he should have stayed.
		Karma, not having enough time to really do retail politician.
		And plus, half of the country wasn't going to accept in no way, especially men.
		And he had some black guys that would not vote for.
		But as far as Mr. Trump being so smart, he can't keep up with his own lies.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's a viewer from Georgia.
unidentified		Yeah, look, there's, and I say this in the introduction to the book, but there are people who, Trump has basically divided the American electorate.
		There are people who either love him or they hate him.
		And there are some people who are in between, but there aren't too many.
		People feel very strongly about Donald Trump, but one of the things I say in this book is that he has proven himself to be someone who has extraordinary political instincts.
		He understands how to present himself.
		He understands how to maneuver.
		And so one of the things that the book tries to capture, a big thing, is his political instincts.
		He won and how he saw the path ahead to winning.
		You look at it, he came from where he was on January 6th to him in November in 2024 and capturing how he got from point A to point B and what happened and how his political instincts helped guide him to that point.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you give a prime example of that instinct, something that benefited him?
unidentified		Yeah, I think, you know, look, just his understanding of images, his ability to connect with, you know, real everyday people.
		He understood that he understood how to expand his base.
		In 2016, when he ran, he won with the support of blue-collar voters, winning in places like Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.
		Those were the three states that pushed him over the top.
		This time around, he went and he expanded his base.
		He found disaffected young men, went on a huge podcast tour in October of 2020, of October of 2024, and he brought a lot of young men into the fold.
		He brought minorities into the fold.
		He brought more women into the fold.
		He found a whole vein of people who felt disaffected and who felt mistreated and ignored by the government and appealed to them.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		The caller I brought up, the former President Biden, also Kamal Harris, but when it comes to former President Bryden, talk about the debate, where Mr. Trump's instincts were, where his feeling was as far as winning, and then what happens when Mr. Biden decides not to run again.
unidentified		Sure.
		So this is an important point of the book, which is you get to the summer of 2024.
		Trump's going into his first debate with Joe Biden, and he's doing some preparations with his team, and he's saying to himself, look, he says to them, look, I don't think it's a good idea for me to come out and hit him too hard, because if I do, he might drop out of the race.
		And his team, they were saying, what?
		Like, you have to play the best game you can.
		You just do the best you can up there in that moment.
		If that involves hitting him hard, it involves hitting him hard.
		And you have to play your own game.
		He said, well, I don't know.
		He might drop out of the race.
		And it turned out to be true.
		Trump saw that Biden was on a ledge and was in a precarious spot and saw that that debate would shape whatever Biden decided to do in the race next.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		And so when the President Biden decides to drop out, how does that affect Mr. Trump?
unidentified		It was a hugely destabilizing moment for Trump and the campaign.
		And let's go back to this moment because it's incredibly important.
		What do you have happen in a few short weeks?
		You have an assassination attempt in Butler.
		You have a few days later, you have a Republican National Convention where Trump is hailed as sort of a Caesar-like character.
		Then you have, and then you have Biden dropping out of the race.
		All this happens in a few short days, basically.
		And for anyone getting shot at, would be understandably incredibly destabilizing.
		But for Trump, that and all these other things happening in such a short period of time kind of makes him feel a little bit unmoored for a little bit.
		And understandably so.
		And so for that, there was a brief period after that, after Kamala Harris got into the race, where you saw him really lose control of his campaign a little bit.
		Your viewers will remember he goes to the National Association of Black Journalists, makes some very racially charged statements about Kamala Harris.
		He goes to Georgia, attacks Brian Kemp, the state's very popular Republican governor.
		And so these were events where you look back on it and it felt like Trump had lost control of his campaign for a little bit.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You're right.
		The lieutenants tried to reassure him that he was in solid shape.
		Harris's honeymoon would be short-lived.
		It did little to mollify the pissed-off Trump to his closest allies.
		It was clear something was going on with him psychologically, like a switch had been flipped.
unidentified		Yeah, this was the moment in his campaign where he could have really lost control or he could have gotten back on track.
		And luckily for his campaign, he did get back on track.
		But you look back at that first month after Kamala Harris got in the campaign and things were anything but clear as to where the race was going to be going.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Let's hear from Roger.
		Roger is in Illinois Republican line for our guest Alex Eisenstadt.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Thank you for taking my call.
		You know, the president has so much power right now.
		He is doing great.
		He is trying to straighten up the mess that former President Biden put us in.
		Let's go back to the assassination plot.
		I mean to tell you right there, God had his hand over this man.
		I knew right then and there that he was going to be our president.
		He's doing an exceptional job.
		It's going to take time for gas prices and grocery store prices to go down.
		It don't happen in two or three months.
		There's a lot got to happen, but they're gradually going down now.
		Our price of our gas has went down over 35 cents since he became our president.
		So it's working in some areas.
		We just have to be patient.
		He has put our country in a situation, man, look at all the tariffs that he put on all these countries, and they've come to the table to negotiate.
		What president has ever been able to do that?
		No president.
		He has done everything in his power.
		There's so much hate that goes out for the Democrats.
		They would not even acknowledge.
		They were asked questions in the Capitol the other day by some of the Fox reporters on what they thought of the bombings and the fires that were put on all the Telescope dealers.
		They couldn't even answer the question.
		They wouldn't even support being against it.
		So it tells you where the Democrats are at.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's Roger in Illinois.
		He brings up the assassination.
		Elaborate on that, how that factors into the theme of the book.
unidentified		So the assassination attempt is obviously, it's an important chapter of the book.
		I tried to not just talk about what happened, those horrible images, horrible images that we saw on stage that day, but also what happened behind the scenes when Trump got to the Butler hospital.
		And so I tried to recreate that and to also show in the months ahead how that assassination attempt shaped the campaign in terms of what happened from a security perspective and the fears that encompassed the campaign, especially as it related to the threat from Iran and that Iran's attempts and its desire to kill him in retaliation for Trump's killing of General Suleimani back in 2021.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		The hospital.
unidentified		Sorry, 2020.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
		The hospital elaborate more on that.
		What happens there?
unidentified		Sure.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How does that shape the campaign?
unidentified		Sure.
		So basically, when Trump goes from the stage to the hospital and Butler, it's unclear, even to Susie Wiles and Chris La Cevita.
		Wiles was there that day and the motor kid heading to the hospital.
		La Sevita was back in Milwaukee preparing for the convention.
		It was unclear to them what condition Trump was in as he was heading to the hospital.
		And if you go back and you look at what happened in the hospital that day, the amount of chaos, the amount of uncertainty about Trump's condition, he came out in a stretcher.
		He was down to his undershirt.
		He was very bloodied at the time.
		And his team, including his campaign communications director Stephen Chung, who's now in the White House, was getting incoming from reporters who were asking if Trump had died.
		There was one outlet who said they were about to report that Trump had died.
		There was an enormous amount of chaos in the hospital that day.
		But what one thing stands out is Trump understood intuitively that the images from that day, in particular the photos that were taken, would be incredibly politically valuable to him and that they would help define not just his campaign for reelection, but also his legacy for decades to come.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Book is called Revenge, the Inside Story of Trump's Return to Power.
		Alex Eisenstadt joining us for this conversation.
		A viewer text in overall is the president's win from being a good campaigner, the election was, quote, stolen or a poorly chosen opponent.
unidentified		I don't know what you say when the election being stolen because there's no evidence that the election was stolen, but he definitely benefited from being a strong campaigner.
		He definitely benefited from Kamala Harris in the eyes of most Democrats, at least, sort of not succeeding in terms of her campaign skills.
		And he definitely succeeded in the sense that he was able to convince, despite the evidence contrary, he was able to convince his supporters that the election was stolen.
		And one of the important points of this book, and if you look at actually the way the book opens, is there's a scene, Trump is sitting with his team in the Oval Offices a couple weeks before the January 6th Capitol riot.
		Sitting with his team in the Oval Office, and there's a bunch of litigation going on about states, elections in states going across the country.
		And he says to his team, you know why we're doing this, right?
		Referring to the litigation.
		And he says, basically, because if we don't win this time, we're going to come back and we're going to run again.
		And it was an indication that he was using the litigation.
		He was using this notion that the election had been stolen from him as a way to set the groundwork and lay the groundwork for him to run again four years later, basically.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Let's hear from Kevin.
		Kevin is in Ohio Democrats line.
		Kevin, you're on with our guests.
unidentified		Hello.
		Hi.
		Thanks for taking my call.
		Alex, the title of your book is interesting.
		And I'm wondering, you know, do you feel that vengeance is the primary motivation for our president?
		It would seem based on recent political actions, maybe that is a case.
		And do you feel that that could have negative impact on his ability to govern?
		Thank you.
		Well, revenge and vengeance was certainly a big part of Trump's campaign.
		And it's something that he would joke about privately.
		If you go back to Joe Biden's State of the Union address in 2024, Trump said, Biden said that Trump would, if he were re-elected, he would be driven by vengeance and revenge.
		And he would take it into the Oval Office with him.
		Trump privately was watching the speech at the time and joked to his advisors and said, if we're elected, revenge will not be part of my White House.
		And he said it with a smirk.
		So he knew that revenge was going to be part of his White House.
		And it was going to be part of his campaign.
		And it was going to be part of his White House.
		And that's exactly what's happened.
		It's become a major theme of his second term.
		And the question now is: as we look towards the midterm elections, are voters tired of it?
		Do they not like it?
		And that's the question right now.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Let's take you back to the inauguration, just a short section of it, because I think it goes to what you're talking about in the themes of the book.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Here's the president from Inauguration Day.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Never again will the immense power of the state be weaponized to persecute political opponents.
unidentified		Something I know something about.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		We will not allow that to happen.
		It will not happen again.
		Under my leadership, we will restore fair, equal, and impartial justice under the constitutional rule of law.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So that's Inauguration Day.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How does that go not only to this idea that you write about the book, but what we're seeing now in the here and now?
unidentified		Yeah, he absolutely went after lawfare and what he saw as an unfair justice system during his campaign, a justice system that he believed was after him.
		And he has turned around and he has made purging of DOJ officials, of anyone involved in the January 6th capital riot.
		He's made that a huge priority for him in his second term.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Mike is in Alexandria, Indiana.
		Republican line, you're on with our guest, Alex Eisenstadt.
		Go ahead.
john in wisconsin ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I was just wanting to talk about mainly that the main reason I think that Trump won the election was the open borders, all the illegals coming in, and also the trans Easter party they had at the White House.
unidentified		That gave Trump almost an automatic win.
		It was and shutting all the oil off in the United States.
		Barrel oil went from $37 up to $97.
dr joel wallach ▲ ● ▼		Raised all our prices up to transport our food and shipping.
unidentified		And I think that Trump didn't even have to campaign.
unidentified		It was just an automatic win for the Republican Party.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Mike and Indiana, let me take out two things, immigration and social issues, how they factored into the president's reelection campaign.
unidentified		Big, big, big factors.
		Immigration clearly was something that Biden was weak on.
		Trump was able to capitalize on.
		Trump has always focused a lot on immigration ever since he ran the first time around.
		It was something that he focused on again the second time around.
		It was an area that Democrats were really weak on.
		Social issues were also important, an issue that people came to see Democrats as too focused on social issues, not focused enough on the core issues, bread and butter, economic issues that mattered to them.
		And that hurt Democrats to some extent.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You talked about how the president reacted after Mr. Biden left the race.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		When Kamala Harris entered the race, what was the strategy from the president, his advisors towards Kamala Harris, how they were going to go against her?
unidentified		Yeah, so basically what they decided they were going to do was they saw her as someone who really wasn't all that strong, someone who was a blank slate, and someone who honestly carried over a lot of the problems that Joe Biden had when he was running, essentially.
unidentified		And so they were able to take their strategy against Biden and essentially use the same playbook against her.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		From Myron?
		Myron is on our independent line.
		He's from Virginia.
		Myron, go ahead.
		You're next up.
unidentified		Yes, thank you for taking my call.
		Though I called in on the independent line, sometimes I vote Republican and sometimes I vote Democrat.
		This last presidential election cycle, I would have preferred either a Chris Christie or a Nikki Haley to have prevailed, but that didn't happen.
		I'd like to know from Mr. Eisenstadt, given his immense research, how does he view the United States coming out of this administration going forward?
		Thank you for taking my call.
		How did Trump view?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I think how you view the U.S. coming out of this administration currently.
		How will the U.S. be after the administration's done?
		I think that's what he's saying.
		Caller, are you there?
		I think he's gone.
unidentified		What do I think or what does Trump think?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I think he's asking what you think.
unidentified		Well, I think how Trump 2.0, Trump 2.0 plays out, I think that's still unfolding, right?
		We'll see what happens with tariffs.
		We'll see what happens.
		He's taking very dramatic steps to reshape the country economically, judicially, and a number of other steps.
		And so I think the answer to that is TBD at this point.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		He did bring up Nikki Haley.
		You wrote this.
		Trump wasn't afraid to get down in the muck with Haley, an indication he saw her as a threat.
		Can you take it from there?
unidentified		Sure.
		So Trump was infuriated that Haley would not get back, would not leave the primary.
		This was back in early 2024.
		Haley was the last opponent standing, and it infuriated Trump that he couldn't focus on the general election, that he would have to spend millions of dollars running against Nikki Haley.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You said, though, as far as him going, one of the things he did focus on was her name and how he was going to use that.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you elaborate?
unidentified		Yeah, absolutely.
		So he focused on her heritage.
		It's something that Trump has done in the past with people that he's running against.
		He focused on her heritage as a way of making her look un-American.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Because he specifically talked about using her board name and, I guess, playing on or making fun of it?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is that what you're guessing?
unidentified		Yes, yes.
		And it infuriated him the night of the New Hampshire primary that he didn't, that she hadn't left the race that night.
		And so there's an anecdote.
		He's actually talking backstage in New Hampshire to Victory and I, New Hampshire, and Steve Wynn's telling him, big casino mogul, right?
		Wynn's telling him, just go out there, just be calm, you know, take the win.
		And Trump says, okay, I'll take the win.
		He indicates he understands.
		He goes on stage and he attacks Haley over everything from her name to how she dresses.
		He kind of lost control for a moment there.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Frank in Philadelphia, Democrats line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Good morning.
		I have a question.
		The one consistent theme that I see in Trump's administration so far is to try to weaken the United States in every possible way, from economically to militarily.
		You can just go on and on.
		I've been trying to figure out what could be motivating him.
		And then I remembered about the Venona papers back in the 1970s, I guess, where we discovered that, in fact, the Russians had placed agents all throughout the United States government.
		Not to the extent that Joe McCarthy was screaming about, but certainly that it was a real problem.
		And I was wondering if the caller had seen any evidence of Russian agents or Russian influence in the campaign, because I just can't believe that they're not there.
		The Russians have been masters at undermining foreign governments all the way back to the Tsars.
		Okay.
		And that's my.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Frank in Philadelphia.
unidentified		So, yeah, we do know that Russians did try to influence this campaign.
		There is a bigger focus in this book on Iranian efforts to influence this campaign, not just on their, what Secret Service and law enforcement saw as their attempt, their desire to kill Trump, but also on their attempts to hack into the Trump campaign's email system.
		That plays an incredibly important role in this campaign.
		And you saw the Trump campaign servers were breached in the summer of 2024.
		What you also saw was Chinese had breached the Republican National Committee servers.
		And so the overall influence attempts of other countries plays a role in the book.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		A viewer asks about the media saying that Mr. Trump knows how to take advantage of the media when he says things, doesn't show proof or where it comes from.
		His statements are often highly false and are repeated so much that fact checkers can't keep up switching on a dime.
		It claims it was the plan all along.
		Those are the examples.
		But when it comes to media coverage, how would you describe his relationship with the media the second time around, particularly from your perspective?
unidentified		It's not terribly different than the first time around.
		He still has this, on the one hand, he's combative towards them.
		On the other hand, he woos them.
		There's always been this double, Trump has always sort of had a double approach to the media where on the one hand, he attacks them.
		On the other hand, he wants to cultivate them.
		And that's always been Trump's approach to the media.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Have you been surprised from the first or second time around about how much time he spends with the media compared to other presidents?
unidentified		It's been surprising to me that he has been, how much time he has spent publicly on air making statements.
		It has been, and you haven't seen him do as many one-on-one interviews with the news media at this point, at least not with the mainstream media.
		But what you have seen him do is talk daily to the pool that's in the Oval Office with him.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		This is Larry.
		Larry is from Tampa, Florida, Republican Line.
		You're next up.
		Good morning.
unidentified		The story of the theme of revenge in this book, the title Revenge, reminds me of Shakespeare plays, some of which have revenge themes.
		And one of those, I think, is the Julius Caesar play, where there are a couple of quotes that seem to address this topic.
		There's a quote in a Shakespeare play that, to me, reminds me of Joe Biden, and then one that reminds me of Donald Trump.
		They're really, very short.
		Joe Biden quote in the Julius Caesar play, to make that the Shakespeare play, Julius Caesar.
		Joe Biden, ye gods, that a man of such feeble temper should so get the start of the majestic world and bear the palm alone.
		Then the quote that's like Donald Trump, why man, he doth destride the narrow world like a colossus.
		And what's the point, Larry?
		That this title is revenge, and there's revenge themes in the Julius Caesar play.
		That's the topic.
		That's the point.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's Larry.
		Let's hear from Mike.
		Mike in Ohio, Independent Line.
		Hi, you're next.
unidentified		Yes, good morning.
		Thank you for C-SPAN.
		I believe one of the biggest mistakes Democrats made after January the 6th was impeaching Trump a second time.
		That was a symbolic gesture.
		I knew the minute they did it, it would backfire.
		And of course, it did, because look, he's in the Oval Office.
		What they should have done instead is gone back to the days of Richard Nixon.
		I believe Nixon was the first president to reveal his tax returns.
		The Democrats have passed a law and said nobody runs for president unless they reveal their tax returns.
		And you could call it the Nixon-Trump law.
		And by the way, I wonder, did Mike Pence reveal his tax returns?
		Did JD Vance recently show his tax returns?
		I believe they force him to show their tax returns.
		But if you don't feel an obligation, if you don't feel an obligation to show your tax returns, you should be disqualified.
		If you can't name the country that your predecessor was born in, you should be disqualified.
		That's not a high bar to go over to know what country your predecessor was born in or to reveal your tax returns.
		Okay.
		Okay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		That's Mike Darren from Ohio.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Let's take the first part: January 6th, how that factored into the president's reelection campaign and his team responding to it.
unidentified		Sure.
		It was remarkable.
		It's been a remarkable political feat how Trump took January 6th and took what was undoubtedly a negative and almost turned it around into a political positive for himself.
		He was able to take January 6th and use it as part of this broader argument that the justice system was engaged in lawfare against him.
		And he convinced supporters of it and he convinced a lot of people against it, of it.
		The fact that he was able to emerge from January 6th and win again was remarkable in and of itself.
		The fact that he was able to take it and put in part of this broader theme that he was the victim of the Justice Department is also extraordinary as well.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How much of the strategy came from his own instinct?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How much of the strategy came from advisors as far as how to respond to January 6th?
unidentified		It definitely appears to be something that he had a big role in coming up with on his own.
		I think Trump is his own most important advisor, and you talk to the people who work for him.
		They'll tell you he's driving the ship.
		They're kind of along for the ride.
		That's not to say they don't play an important role in running things and facilitating things, but they'll tell you he's in charge.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		One of the aspects of 2022 and the midterms, you wrote about the encyclopedic knowledge of races that the president has.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you elaborate on that?
unidentified		He knows, especially districts in New York State, which is the state he cares about a lot, of course.
		He knows a lot about down ballot races.
		He cares immensely about down ballot congressional races.
		He's someone who's enormously focused on electoral politics.
		And so there'd be members of Congress who'd be surprised by how much he knew about their individual congressional districts.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		David up next.
		David's in Arkansas for our guest Alex Eisenstadt.
		He's the author of Revenge, the Inside Story of Trump's Return to Power.
		David in Arkansas, Republican line, go ahead.
unidentified		Yes, I just wanted to say that when Donald Trump stood up after getting shot, that blood running down his face, stood up and he raised his arm up, letting us know to fight back.
		Quit letting them take over everything.
		They've been doing it for years and years and years and years.
		Now it's time for us to fight back and get back what we used to have.
		I don't know a whole lot about politics, but I do know one thing.
		Donald Trump is one of the toughest sons of guns we've had in there.
		And I hope he runs for third time.
		And I hope he wins it.
		And I hope he pulls America out of this stinkhole that we've gotten ourselves into or letting ourselves get into by letting China run over us and everybody else.
		And if it was up to me, I do the same thing to Putin as you've done to old that whatever you want to call it.
		That mean son of a bitch that killed everybody.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's David in Arkansas.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		His sentiment sounds like what you were talking about as far as the president, how he perceived himself and how he got his viewers or his supporters along for the ride.
unidentified		Yeah, absolutely.
		He tapped into a deep vein of frustration.
		There is a wide scope of people in this country who feel ill-served by the federal government.
		And Trump was able to tap into those people to tap into that vein of dissatisfaction and to present himself as a vessel for their frustrations.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is there a place in the book where you write about where the president knew that it was turning around for him as far as the election is concerned?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		He knew that he had a good shot at winning the office again.
unidentified		He was always confident, but here's the thing about Donald Trump that a lot of people don't know is that he's incredibly superstitious.
		There is a scene in the book where Susie Wiles and him are having dinner with a foreign leader, David Cameron from Great Britain.
		And Cameron asks Susie Wiles, this is sort of spring-ish of 2024.
		How do you feel about the campaign?
		And she says, I feel as good as I could feel.
		I think we're in really good shape right now.
		And Trump turns to her and says, you don't know that.
		You don't know that.
		And so Trump never liked to predict victory.
		He felt good about the campaign.
		He felt good when he woke up on election day.
		But he's always been very superstitious, and he was very superstitious about predicting victory.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Jay is in Washington, D.C., Democrats line.
		You are next for our guest.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Thank you so much, Pedro, for taking my call.
		Quick question.
		Has Trump fully released his taxes like his predecessors?
		Thank you very much.
		That's a good question.
		I actually don't totally know the answer to that, but he has definitely been more squeamish about releasing details of his finances than other presidents have been.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I don't know to the extent you wrote about the book, but to the extent his family was part of the second term compared to the first term, how would you characterize that?
unidentified		Trump's family was, if you look at their, so they're different family members, right?
		Don Jr. is incredibly involved in, Don Jr. is incredibly involved in this campaign, a hugely important character in this book.
		But then you have people like Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, who were big players in the first Trump White House, decided to take a step back during this Trump campaign and are not really playing a very active role in this White House.
		Then you have Melania Trump, former first lady, now current first lady.
		She takes a private role during the campaign.
		People think, a lot of people think she's not involved in politics.
		She actually has an interesting role in this campaign from a behind the scenes perspective, helping to guide Trump in terms of offering him advice on any range of topics.
		He listens to what she has to say.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		From Eric.
unidentified		And Baron Trump, too, plays an important role in terms of helping to shape the final stretch of bro, quote unquote, bro podcast interviews that Trump.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you elaborate on that?
unidentified		Sure.
		So there's a scene in the book where Trump tells his advisors, get in touch with, his advisors want to do a push, a late campaign push on podcasts.
		And so they come to him with the idea and he tells them, go talk to Baron.
		And Barron advises them to go do, advises them to have Trump go on the show Patrick Bett David, who's sort of this influential conservative podcaster.
		And he also connects Trump with the Nelk Boys, who are sort of this interesting bro YouTuber set.
		And so Baron is kind of, Barron fancies himself, or at least is kind of one of those bro podcast listeners.
		And so helped to facilitate that with Trump.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		We're going to go to Eric.
		Eric joins us from Maryland, Maryland on our independent line.
		Hi there, you're on.
unidentified		Yes, just a quick question.
		I was curious on the inside, the Trump administration, if your book goes into any detail about Trump's feelings on our debt, why, you know, kind of in his first term, he added to our debt substantially.
		I'm just curious how that's all going to play out.
		I mean, I think most Americans that are independent, like myself, are very worried about U.S. debt in general.
		And they should be, and everybody should be.
		And I just don't, it just seems like there's all this bickering and bipartisanship, and no one's really getting together and solving this.
		And I'll take my question off.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Eric and Marilyn, thank you.
unidentified		Well, it became an issue towards the end of the campaign when Elon Musk was talking about playing a role in the campaign, playing a role in the administration and helping to cut government waste.
		And so in that sense, it played a role.
		But it wasn't beyond that, it wasn't a hugely important factor in Trump's campaign.
		It didn't feel like it was a major theme throughout much of the campaign, anyways.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Beverly in Wisconsin, Republican line.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Thank you for taking my call.
		I'm just wondering how what people are looking at that they don't realize that President Trump constantly is talking in front of other people, so he's not doing it on his own.
		He says, I am doing this for nothing.
		I wouldn't have to do it, but I care about the United States.
		I care about the taxpayers.
		I care about all the persons that are legally in the United States, working for the United States.
		He is a patriot.
		All the people on the Doge committee have volunteered.
		If you listen to them, they say they're coming in there for nothing because they're so excited about cleaning out all the waste that the government has supported through all the years.
		Nobody hears that.
		They're not doing it for money.
		They're doing it to help our United States.
		And I really feel sad that they don't listen to him.
		And no, he doesn't want people to die.
		He wants them to keep living.
		He didn't want wars.
		Okay, Beverly, thank you.
		Is there something I should respond to?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You can respond to whatever you wish.
unidentified		Yeah, look, I mean, this is, and I think it's been interesting to listen to callers today because you get a taste of how people feel about him, right?
		And you've had callers who strongly oppose him, strongly favor him, and this is how Trump has divided the country.
		There aren't too many different, there aren't too many people in the middle on Trump.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What surprised you most from writing this book?
unidentified		What I learned is that Trump actually has a very different mindset approaching into his second term, approaching his second term.
		He went into it.
		A lot of people see Trump as an agent of chaos, and in a lot of respects, he is.
		He likes, he's okay with the chaos he creates, but he's not okay with the chaos from people around him.
		And so what you've actually seen in his White House, you haven't seen anyone really get fired yet, right?
		And eight years ago, people were getting fired left and right.
		There was mass turnover.
		There hasn't been mass turnover this time around.
		And it's because Trump is taking a bit of a different approach.
		He doesn't want that.
		He doesn't want that this time.
		And so I thought that was kind of one of the interesting things.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Our guest serves as a senior political reporter for Axios, Alex Eisenstadt, also the author of Revenge, the Inside Story of Trump's Return to Power.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Thanks for the conversation.
unidentified		Thanks for having me.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		In about a half hour from now, we're going to talk about China and trade with Ling Ling Wei.
		She is the chief China correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, and she'll talk to us about the state of trade and international relations with that country.
		But first, open forum if you want to participate.
		202-748-8001 for Republicans, 202748-8000 for Democrats, and Independence 202-748-8002.
		We'll take those calls in open forum when Washington Journal continues.
unidentified		High schoolers, are you planning to take the advanced placement U.S. history exam on May 9th?
		Then join American History TV Saturday at 7 p.m. Eastern as high school history teacher Matthew Ellington and Southern Illinois University History Professor Jason Stacey, co-authors of Fabric of a Nation, a history with skills and sources for the AP U.S. History course, talk about the exam.
		They'll explain how this year's exam is structured and provide strategies for answering questions and analyzing historical documents.
		Listen in on our discussion and be sure to take notes on the High School Advanced Placement U.S. History Exam 2025, Saturday at 7 p.m. Eastern on American History TV on C-SPAN 2.
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		Washington Journal continues.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Again, the open form lines, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, Democrats, 202-748-8000, Independents, 202748-8002.
		Some of the things you'll see on the network today, the former President Joe Biden expected to make remarks later on this afternoon, 545 approximately, talking about issues regarding social security and disability services.
		You can see that on C-SPAN, our app C-SPANNOW and C-SPAN.org.
		C-SPAN also bringing you town halls during this congressional break, Senator Chuck Grassley's town hall in Iowa.
		You can see later on today, 1245 this afternoon, again, the main network, the app and the .org.
		And then later on this evening, around 6 o'clock, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene holds a town hall in Georgia.
		C-SPAN 2 is where you can see that, as well as the app as the .org.
		The Washington Times on their front page shows the photo of the president and the president of El Salvador.
		This was before the White House visit where discussions took place about that detainee.
		It was during that time that the president, sitting alongside the El Salvadorian president, talks with his advisor, Stephen Miller, about the status of that detainee.
		Here's the exchange.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		What was the ruling in the Supreme Court, Steve?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Was it 9 to nothing?
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		Yes, it was a 9-0 in our favor.
		In our favor, against the district court ruling, saying that no district court has the power to compel the foreign policy function of the United States.
		As Pam said, the ruling solely stated that if this individual at El Salvador's sole discretion was sent back to our country, that we could deport him a second time.
		No version of this legally ends up with him ever living here because he is a citizen of El Salvador.
		That is the president of El Salvador.
		Your questions about it per the court can only be directed to him.
unidentified		I asked him.
		Can President Bukele weigh in on this?
		Do you plan to return him?
		Well, I'm supposed to have suggested that I smuggle a terrorist into the United States, right?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		They tell me.
unidentified		How can I return him to the United States?
		Like, I smuggle him into the United States or what do I do?
		Of course, I'm not going to do it.
		It's like, I mean, the question is preposterous.
		How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States?
		I don't have the power to return him to the United States.
		You can release him inside of San Arthur.
		Yeah, but I'm not releasing.
		I mean, we're not very fond of releasing terrorists into our country.
nayib bukele ▲ ● ▼		I mean, we just turned the murder capital of the world into the safest country of the Western Hemisphere, and you want us to go back into the releasing criminals so we can go back to being the murder capital of the world.
unidentified		That's not going to happen.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		You can see more of that, by the way, on the app and the website, those events that took place inside the Oval Office.
		Our open forum starts with Michelle and Washington State Democrats line.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Good morning.
		There was a recent caller who said, you know, they're not getting paid for any of this.
		Well, no, they're spending our money so crazy.
		What does it cost every weekend that he has to take Secret Service and everybody to go golfing with him?
		You know, the Super Bowl, the Daytona 500.
		There was a fight this last weekend.
		He's already spent like $40 million on vacation time, and he only was supposed to get paid $400,000.
		Talk about waste.
		That's my comment.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Jane from South Carolina, Independent Line, you're next up.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
unidentified		Yes, thank you.
		Donald Trump is a convicted criminal.
		What did we expect?
		After all, they thought he was, a lot of people thought he was a successful businessman.
		He wasn't.
		He bankrupted everything.
		He just played a successful businessman on TV.
		We need to remember he is a convicted criminal.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Brent.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Brent in Washington State Democrats line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Hi.
		I was just calling to talk about how all these Republicans are constantly defending the rich, people like Elon Musk and others.
		You know, for one, why don't any of you show me one charitable thing that Elon Musk has actually done?
		And two, I don't understand why you guys are constantly defending the wealthy when it does nothing for you.
		But what I really am disturbed about is how you seem to have pleasure in seeing cruelty put onto other people.
		You know, like the person down in El Salvador.
		We can't just start disappearing people because we don't like their political viewpoints.
		And if you don't think it's going to happen to you someday, well, you're wrong.
		You know, and then one more thing, as far as the people from Missouri, I'm actually from Missouri.
		I was born and went to school there.
		The state motto in Missouri is show me, the show me state.
		And when I was there, it meant that we didn't take lies or bull.
		Like, you had to show us some facts.
		But anymore, all you people in Missouri sit around watching Fox News, and you've forgotten your own state motto.
		Thank you.
		Bye.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Richard in Wisconsin, Republican line.
		Hi.
		You're on.
unidentified		Go ahead.
		Hi, I'd just like to say I spent a lot of time studying our presidents and stuff like that.
		I'm tired of the four years that we last served.
		And I just wish people would give our president the time of day to let him do his job and be done with it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Richard there in Wisconsin.
		One of the storylines coming out as of yesterday concerns federal grants when it comes to Harvard University.
		WBUR out of Boston reporting that the president said Monday the school will not agree to demands pushed by the Trump administration as a condition for maintaining nearly $9 billion in federal funding.
		In a letter to the campus community, Harvard President Alex Scarber said lawyers for the school have informed the Trump administration that Harvard, quote, will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights.
		There's more if you go to the Harvard website, a letter published by the president saying, I encourage you to read that letter from the administration to get a full understanding of the unprecedented demands being made by the federal government to control the Harvard community.
		They include requirements to, quote, audit the viewpoints of our student body, faculty, staff, and to quote reduce the power of certain students, faculty, and administrators targeted because of their ideological views.
		We have informed the administration through our legal counsel that we will not accept the proposed agreement.
		The university won't surrender its independence and relinquish its constitutional rights.
		That letter going on to say the administration prescription goes beyond the power of the federal government.
		It violates Harvard's First Amendment rights and exceeds the statutory limits of the government's authority under Title VI.
		There's more there if you want to read about that last exchange with the Trump administration.
		Pennsylvania, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, this is Ed on our independent line.
unidentified		Yeah, good morning.
		The Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, proclaimed, if the media reported that correctly, he proclaimed that the defense, the upcoming defense budget was going to be $1 trillion.
		That's my first point.
		Second point is Pete Hakeseth, a few weeks before that was wondering whether we should change the name of from this secret from the Department of Defense to Department of Offense, because it seems that we spend a lot of time, a lot of money interfering in the affairs of other countries.
		I would like to see our country establish a militia, which is basically a defensive position so we can defend this country rather than involve ourselves overwhelmingly in the affairs of other countries.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		One more angle to the Harvard story, by the way.
		This is the former President Barack Obama on X giving his view, saying that Harvard has set an example for other higher ed institutions, rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate, and mutual respect.
		Let's hope other institutions follow suit.
		Christine in Georgia, Democrats line.
		Hello.
unidentified		How are you doing?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Fine, thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
unidentified		Okay, my first question is: how can Congress, whoever is in charge, allow Trump to take former President Portrait down and put his cartoon pictures up?
		How can he do that?
		He did it to Clinton, and now he did it to President Obama.
		There's no type of reason for him to do that other than he just jealous of those people.
		Have anyone answered the question of that?
		Can he get the authority to remove former president pitches from the White House?
		But anyway, my other question is: get someone on the program who will discuss how Trump here can grow back like it did.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Gilbert is in Albuquerque, Republican line.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Hi there.
unidentified		Well, there, I just have a comment about all these people calling in about President Trump playing golf.
		Barack Obama played a whole lot of golf also, and he also went to the gym twice a day.
		So the golf thing is really a big deal.
		It's just a useless whining about what he does.
		And that's all I have to say.
		Thank you.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		The Washington Post has a story taking a look at possible plans for the future of funding for the State Department.
		Adam Taylor John Hudson, writing under the headline plan, would nearly have budget for that department, saying the memo, which was reviewed by the Post, says that cuts contained in an early proposal from the White House Office of Management and Budget for the next fiscal year would leave a total budget of $28.4 billion for all activities carried out by the State Department and USAID, a separate agency that the Trump administration has sought to dismantle.
		That represents a decline of $27 billion or 48% from funding levels approved by Congress for 2025.
		The story going on to say there would be particularly steep cuts for support in international organizations.
		With just under 90% of this funding eliminated in the proposal, funding for the United Nations, NATO, and 20 other organizations will be ended, the memo states, while targeted contributions to a handful of organizations, including the International Atomic Energy Agency and the International Civil Aviation Authority, would remain.
		The memo also describes a total cut in funding for international peacekeeping missions, citing, quote, recent mission failures, close quote, without providing details.
		David, up next, David, Democrats line in Massachusetts.
unidentified		Hello.
		Hi, good morning.
		Thanks for taking my call.
		And longtime listener, I think this is the first time I've talked to you on air.
		Two quick things.
		One is you just showed a clip in the Open Law office with this El Salvadoran president, and Stephen Miller, kind of the president's hatchet man on immigration, completely mischaracterized what the Supreme Court said.
		He said they ruled nine to nothing in their favor.
		That's actually the exact opposite of what happened.
		It's an astounding case of misinformation.
		The court rule that the government needs to effectuate the release.
		That's verbatim, effectuate the or help effectuate the release.
		They did say some deference needed to be paid to the executive branch's role in foreign policy, but the bottom line of the ruling is that the government, the American government, has to help effectuate the release of this guy.
		That's the rule.
		That's the law.
		And we'll have a constitutional crisis if the Supreme Court is defied.
		One.
		Two, I happen to live in Cambridge, where Harvard is located, and I'm glad Harvard is standing up to the lawless maneuvers by the administration to block the funding.
		And what the public needs to know is a lot of this funding goes to Harvard-affiliated hospitals for life-saving research, billions of dollars to go into cancer research.
		And that's a long-valued partnership that's benefited countless people through scientific breakthroughs.
		So this administration's war on our universities is counterproductive to our health and our safety.
		And so it's astounding to me what's going on on multiple levels.
		And thank you very much again for taking my call.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So the caller's first point newsweek follows up saying that the president's officials suggested that the court order regarding the return of that Maryland man improperly deported to El Salvador has been satisfied despite him remaining in prison.
		The Supreme Court ordered April 10th that the government must, quote, facilitate Kilmar Brego Garcia's return to the United States, but stop short of backing a lower court's earlier directive that the government quote effectuate or make that happen.
		His return at a meeting at the Wov Office Monday, it was the U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi suggesting that the government had satisfied the order by offering a plane to bring him back.
		But in the same room, El Salvador's president refused to allow it.
		And then going on to say, President Donald Trump's policy chief Stephen Miller pointed out the government not backing the effectuate order, suggesting its ruling had gone in the government's favor.
		Under the Why It Matters section, it says the court's opinion back pushed back against the government lawyers' argument that the highest court had no jurisdiction once a person had been deported.
		In a statement adjoining the opinion, three liberal justices rebuked the argument, which it says, quote, implies that it could deport or incarcerate any person, including U.S. citizens, without legal consequence, so long as it does so before a court can intervene.
		Dolly is in California, Independent Line.
unidentified		Yeah, I wanted to remind everybody about Ronald Reagan in 1986.
		He gave 3 million illegal immigrants amnesty.
		Marco Rubio, our Secretary of State, who's busy sending out people, his family was part of that.
		So just wanted to remind people that this is all over power.
		And right now, they're using the Palestinian and Jewish people religion to affect it.
		Thank you, Lou Bay.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		This is Mark in Maryland, Republican Line.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I just want to make a quick comment about the previous guest that you had on there.
		He had to take one parting shot at Donald Trump just by saying this is how he divides people.
		And that was truly laughable.
		I voted for Trump the first time around because of the divisiveness I saw coming from the Democrat Party and the identity politics that they play.
		You know, if you're a woman, you're a victim, and Republicans hate you, vote for us.
		If you're black, you're a victim.
		Republicans hate you, vote for us.
		And that comes directly from their leadership, directing their slurs right at Republican voters, actually.
		You know, you look back at Barack Obama and his quotes about conservative voters clinging to their guns and Bibles.
		You know, that's our First and Second Amendment rights, isn't it?
		And Hillary Clinton calling Trump supporters deplorable.
		Joe Biden talking about the only garbage I see out there are Trump supporters.
		So let's be very clear on this: that divisiveness comes from the Democrat Party.
		They own it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Bernie is in Columbus, Ohio, Democrats line.
unidentified		Hi.
		Hi.
		I've been listening, and I'm sort of disappointed in a lot of people discussing, you know, not being real respective for other presidents.
		You know, President Obama did a great job.
		So did Bill Clinton.
		So did Ronald Reagan, in a sense.
		But when we're talking about shipping people off without a trial or anything, that is wrong all the way around.
		It shouldn't be matter what color we are.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Bernie Ver in Ohio.
		The New York Times this morning reporting that the White House planning to ask Congress to claw back more than a billion slated for public broadcasting in the United States, according to two people briefed on the plan, a move that could ultimately eliminate almost all federal support for NPR and PBS.
		The plan is to request that Congress rescind $1.1 billion in federal funding for the Corporation of Public Broadcasting, a taxpayer-backed company that funds public media organizations across the United States.
		One of the people said, if Congress agrees, that will amount to about two years of the organization's funding, nearly all of which goes to public broadcasters, including NPR, PBS, and their local member stations.
		Rita joins us from Arizona, Independent Line.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Yes.
		Yes.
		Hello.
		I'm not really good with politics because I never really got into it, but I had in the last few years by watching what I'm watching.
		I'm also a national spokesperson for victims' rights from California.
		The one thing that I would like to make perfectly clear is that I Googled this.
		27 women since 1972 has reported Donald Trump grabbing their crotch, their breasts.
		And I Googled the whole thing with Mar-a-Lago because I don't know nothing about anything.
		So it showed a party at Donald Trump's place in Mar-a-Lago.
		It showed his arm going.
		You can see this.
		I've Googled this.
		He put his arm around Jeffrey Epstein.
		He said, well, Jeffrey likes him a little younger than me.
		Now, you can Google that.
		It's there.
		And also, there was some women that didn't know who that man was back in the 70s, but he was reported.
		His ex-wife said that he had raped her.
		And it's all, you can Google that.
		And she changed her mind after they had a conversation two weeks later.
		You can Google that.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, but for all the Googling, what sources are you trusting to make these statements?
unidentified		I was just, see, the thing is, I'm looking at the Google, I'm looking at what it says.
unidentified		So I assume that's an information line.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Sure.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Ultimately, it goes back to sources, though, but what sources are you using?
unidentified		I was just using that.
		I was using the sources that I've seen on the news.
		I was using what I had seen.
		And so I was, I'm just as old as I am as a person that heard what this man said before he ran for presidency.
		He was on the Howard Stern show.
		I seen this.
		And it said, so tell me, Howard Stern asked him, since you like your daughter so much, do you think you would ever do her?
		He leaned back and put his hands across his temples.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, I'm going to stop you there.
		I'm going to stop you there.
		Let's hear from Susie.
		Susie in Ohio Republican line.
		Hi.
unidentified		Yeah, I wonder if that woman who was just on is worrying about the 302,000 children that are missing that comes right from human health, human and health department for our federal government.
		I wonder how many of those young girls had their crotches and breasts grabbed by illegal aliens bringing them up through the border with no with no mother, no father.
		I bet a lot of them had their crotches grabbed.
		I wish people would worry about.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, we'll leave it there.
		One more bit from the White House and the Oval Office yesterday, a different topic when it comes to the topic of tariffs.
		The president being asked about exemptions he's considering and for how long those exemptions are going to be in place.
		Here's that exchange from yesterday.
unidentified		Yesterday you mentioned short-lived product exemptions.
		Which specific products are you considering and how long is short-lived?
		Least months.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I'm looking at something to help some of the car companies with it.
		They're switching to parts that were made in Canada, Mexico, and other places.
		And they need a little bit of time because they're going to make them here.
		But they need a little bit of time.
		So like that.
unidentified		What about any Apple products, other cell phones?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Look, I'm a very flexible person.
		I don't change my mind, but I'm flexible.
		And you have to be.
unidentified		You just can't have a wall and you'll only go.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Sometimes you have to go around it, under it, or above it.
		There'll be maybe things coming up.
		I speak to Tim Cook.
		I helped Tim Cook recently and that whole business.
		I don't want to hurt anybody.
		But the end result is we're going to get to the position of greatness for our country.
		We're the greatest economic power in the world if we're smart.
		If we're not smart, we're going to hurt our country very badly.
		We lost with China over the Biden years trillions of dollars on Trey.
		Trillions of dollars.
		And he let them fleece us.
		And we can't do that anymore.
		And you know what?
		I don't blame China at all.
		I don't blame President Xi.
		I like him.
		He likes me.
		I mean, you know, who knows?
		Who the hell cares?
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		Give me updates on.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		But you know what?
unidentified		What?
unidentified		Give me updates for talks with China.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Let me just tell you this.
		I don't blame China.
		I don't blame Vietnam.
		I see their meeting today.
		Is that wonderful?
		That's a lovely meeting.
		The meeting, like trying to figure out how do we screw the United States of America.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		As always, you can see more at our website at c-span.org and our free radio app, our free video app at C-SPAN now as well.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Howard in North Carolina, Democrats line.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
unidentified		Yeah, top of the morning to you.
		You know, I don't hear too many people talking about the border anymore, which, you know, the media don't even show us anything about the border.
		But, you know, and it's very sad that the way the Hispanic, this is a good gentleman, you know, killed this woman.
		And, you know, I feel for the family.
		But it seems to me that that's the only thing that some white people care about is they call them rapists and murderers.
		But we have that right here with the people that we have in America.
		For instance, you don't hear them crying about how this little white boy went inside South Carolina church and killed nine black people praising God in the house of God.
		You know, he don't crying about that.
		You'll hear him crying about how this guy went in Buffalo and killed 11 people.
		And he saw a white guy point a gun and said, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to point the gun at you, sir.
		But why they don't cry about that?
		They crying about this one girl.
		And they passed a law for.
		But when it was time for George Floyd, two white people went over to the Republican side.
		So y'all need to stop talking about that little white woman that got killed by the Hispanic.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, Georgia is next.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		This is Jeff, Independent Line.
unidentified		Yes, good morning.
		I'd like to just say, you know what makes this country so great is the freedom that we have to express things like this on this great station that you have.
		You know, and I'd like to just say that, you know, when Donald Trump was talking about the freedom, you know, or the men and women only being here in America, you know, hey, you know, being happy with who we are is what God wants us all to be.
		You know, and if you're not happy with who you are, you know, I mean, you know, we're sorry, but you can't really just change who you are, you know.
		And, you know, as far as abortions, you know, those are our choices.
		Those are freedoms that we have, you know, and that's not something that our dear Lord would like us to be just taking away from us, you know.
		And, you know, it's just funny that, you know, he uses words like the angel of his eye, you know, talking about Putin, and he uses he's no angel.
		You know, those words are not, those are specific words that he uses, you know.
		And I just like to say that, you know, our dear Lord, Jesus, he provides us the freedom to make these choices.
		You know, and if we infringe on other people's freedoms, you know, of course, you know, we go to jail or, you know, but when you lie, cheat, and steal, you know, I mean, that just says pretty much who you are, you know what I'm saying?
		And that's Jeff there in Georgia.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		The regular feature of this network is the coverage of the White House correspondence dinner, which takes place in a couple of weeks from now.
		Axios and other outlets reporting that true to forum, President Trump will not attend this year.
		A White House official telling Axios the news follows speculation over the president's would attend the April 26 event after he broke with tradition and didn't attend any of the dinners during his first term, saying that this comes as the White House and conservative groups have floated the idea of hosting a rival event on the same night as the dinner, potentially to celebrate First Lady Melania Trump's birthday, according to Politico, this adding that the press secretary Caroline Levitt won't attend the dinner either.
		Missouri is next.
		This is Mary, Republican line.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Hello, I have a couple of things.
		The Harvard response to what Trump is doing says that they want to remain independent.
		Well, if they want to remain independent, why do they need government funds when they have over $56 billion in their pocketbook?
		So I don't think they need our funds to remain independent so they can be independent all they want.
		The second one was the lady who complimented about the fact that Reagan had given amnesty to 3 million illegal citizens.
		Yes, he did.
		He had made an agreement with the Democrats to say that he would give them amnesty if they would come up with a more comprehensive, well-structured immigration policy.
		The Democrats were in charge of the government at the time, the House and Senate, and they never did come up with that.
		So I don't understand her comment.
		And the third one was the gentleman that was just gone that said God wouldn't want us to have abortion right taken away from us.
		I don't know what faith he ever learned about, but God doesn't believe in abortion.
		God believes in the right to life.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Mary Missouri, finishing off this open forum.
		Coming up next, a discussion taking a look at the relationship between China and the United States, not only in the issue of trade and tariffs, but what those specific issues do for the larger relationship Ling Ling Wei.
		The chief China correspondent for the Wall Street Journal joins us next for that conversation.
		And you can hear it when Washington Journal continues.
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pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Joining us now from New York is Ling Ling Wei with the Wall Street Journal.
		She serves as their chief China correspondent talking about trade tensions between the United States and China.
		Ms. Wei, thanks for your time this morning.
unidentified		Thank you for having me, Pedro.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		How would you describe the current state between the United States and China, specifically over what's been done over tariffs?
unidentified		Well, we are witnessing right now is two gigantic economic powers decoupling from each other in real time.
		We have seen the Trump administration significantly hiked tariffs on Chinese products, and China retaliated in response with not just tariff increases, but also with other countermeasures aimed at hitting the United States where it hurts.
		Those measures include restricting exports of critical minerals that U.S. companies use to make products, products like semiconductors and defense-related stuff.
		And also, the Chinese have put more American companies on trade blacklists that are intended to restricting U.S. companies' ability to do business in China.
		And also, the Chinese have launched new antitrust, so-called antitrust investigations into U.S. companies.
		DuPont so far has been one of the most prominent targets for Beijing.
		So, yeah, we are well into a cycle of tit-for-tat retaliation, and we are seeing trade between these two countries dry up in real time.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		What's the potential economic damage not only for the United States, but for China?
unidentified		Right.
		There will be significant economic pain to China's economy.
		Even before the trade war erupted, China's economy was in pretty serious trouble.
		We have seen like, you know, a multi-year property bust that erased trillions of dollars in household wealth, you know, significantly weakening consumer confidence in spending.
		And we have also seen, you know, even a worsening debt crisis in China, mainly involving local governments.
		They, you know, over the years have taken on too much debt to finance infrastructure and other type of investments.
		And that situation was worsening even before the trade war.
		And we have also seen that the job situation deteriorating in China.
		A lot of college graduates having difficulty in finding jobs.
		And we also have seen China continue to invest in manufacturing.
		That led to too much stuff the domestic market cannot absorb.
		So that has led to a cycle of deflation at home in China and rising tensions with China's own trading partners.
		So the economic picture for China is not at all strong.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		From information from the census in 2024, when it comes to U.S.-China trade, nearly $582 billion worth of goods traded.
		The U.S. imported around $438 billion worth of goods and services from China.
		China imported $143 billion from the United States.
		Put that into context of what we're going to see going forward, especially with all these new walls being built between the two countries.
unidentified		Right.
		That kind of trade, $500 billion, as you say, between the two countries, it will take just a little bit of time for that to actually stop.
		And that's very, very significant for, obviously, for these two biggest economies in the world that basically will affect everyone because China these days is so deeply entrenched in global supply chain.
		And for the U.S., a lot of companies really need Chinese components, Chinese raw materials in order to produce stuff.
		So just now I talked about the economic pain on China.
		And obviously, there will be economic pain on the United States as well.
		So we just need to see how this works out.
		And if at all, the economic rising economic pressure would push either side to make some certain adjustments to their policies.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		We heard the Treasury Secretary when this started early on saying, and he's quoted as saying, that the American dream not being about access to cheap goods from reporting on these issues, what does the consumer face if that access is cut off?
unidentified		Right.
		A lot of economists have come out and say, you know, there definitely will be some inflationary pressure on the United States.
		Many consumers like you and me will see prices go up.
		So in the medium term, the big question is whether or not this tariffs war will lead to a recession in the United States.
		So definitely a lot of challenges for Washington these days as well, not just for Beijing.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Our guest is with us until 10 o'clock.
		And if you want to ask her questions about the issues of trade and tariffs between the United States and China, call us on the lines, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, and Independents 202-748-8002.
		You can also text us your comments or questions at 202-748-8003.
		Ms. Wei, talk about the Chinese president, the stance he's taking.
		What's the possibility of a softening of that stance?
unidentified		Right now, there are no signs of him softening in any way because he doesn't want to be seen as weak, leader of authoritarian country.
		The worst scenario would involve him in any way being seen as weak, being trying to kowtow to a leader of your biggest strategic foe.
		So whenever we talk to people on the Chinese side, they say that the Trump administration may have to take the first step in terms of finding an off-ramp from this.
		So we have seen President Trump talking about he's waiting for Xi Jinping to call him.
		But it's unlikely to happen given the kind of tensions we're seeing right now between the two sides.
		And also, I want to add is that I talked about earlier the potentially very significant economic cost on China.
		But in terms of the tolerance for pain, China and leader Xi Jinping does have very high tolerance for pain because the political system is fundamentally different from that of the United States.
		President Trump faces midterm elections next year.
		In China, Xi Jinping doesn't face elections.
		And also here, many administration officials and President Trump himself have indicated that they do not like to see markets tumbling.
		And we have seen in the past few weeks there has been tremendous pressure in the market, both stock market and the bond market.
		And that potentially caused the administration to make some adjustments to the policy over the last week.
		In China, they have huge state-funded resources to help bolster Chinese markets.
		We have seen the so-called national team, mainly state funds, getting into the market just over the past couple weeks, boosting market performance.
		So that means that Xi Jinping is not under as much pressure, market pressure, as President Trump is under right now.
		So overall, China and Beijing do have some levers to play.
		They are positioning themselves to play for the long haul.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Our guest is with us.
		We have calls for you.
		Our first call is from Cheryl.
		Cheryl joins us from New York, Republican Line.
		You're on with our guest, Ling Ling Wei of the Wall Street Journal.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		I'm curious if you think China is going to invade Taiwan for economic reasons, because I think Trump is pushing China into doing this, especially because we have our B team in charge.
		We have Heg Seth, and Trump fired CQ Brown and all of the really good generals.
		And I think China might be preparing to do that.
		And also, I go into the city a lot, and I don't see many Chinese tourists anymore.
		And Chinese tourists used to constantly come to New York City.
		And because Trump is alienating all of these countries, I think it's going to really affect tourism at New York City, Disneyland, Disney World.
		And I think it's going to lead us into a depression.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Okay, that's Cheryl from New York.
unidentified		Thank you, Cheryl.
		I'll ask your second question first because it's relatively easy.
		So to answer your question, as part of China's retaliation against Trump tariffs, authorities in China recently warned Chinese from traveling to the United States and also have warned Chinese students to come to the United States for studying.
		So politically, they are putting up hurdles for ordinary Chinese citizens to come travel to the United States.
		We will see what kind of real impact that will have on Chinese tourists here.
		But I would say, you know, based on our conversations with people on the ground in China, there's still a lot of people who want to come, who want to, you know, come study, come to do business.
		You know, whether or not the up-level directive will go down is still a question.
		On your first question about the Taiwan issue, obviously that is a hugely important question.
		The way I understand it is that the administration has made it clear that they want to deter China from taking aggressive actions against Taiwan.
		And the way they want to, they plan to do that is position deterrence through strengths.
		So whether or not that will succeed, of course, time will tell.
		On the Chinese side, we have seen increased military drills across the Taiwan Street.
		They're continuing to take economic and diplomatic and other measures to try to bring the island closer to China by exerting pressure on Taiwan.
		Right now, we're seeing that tensions rising between the United States and China, mainly in the economic arena.
		The risk of China potentially taking more aggressive actions beyond what they're doing now against Taiwan certainly exists.
		So that's why the U.S. should also have more strategic planning in place, not just about tariffs, but also about all the other things that have a more comprehensive strategic planning that can deal with issues such as those involving Taiwan.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Here's George.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		He's in Massachusetts, Democrats line.
unidentified		Hello.
		Hello.
		Hello, yeah.
		I'm calling, because I was listening, because the first caller pretty much summed up what I was going to ask about.
		Do you think this will lead in towards a war, a turf war with other nations, especially China, with America?
		Thank you for the question, George.
		It's a very tough question.
		And obviously, nobody wants to see a war between the two superpowers.
		But now, because two governments barely talk and tensions continue to rise, the risks of some kind of conflict definitely arising, but hopefully still controllable and manageable.
		This is unprecedented, what we're witnessing right now, in terms of the scale of the tariffs and other measures coming from both sides.
		Two countries are definitely moving away from each other.
		And really the challenge is for both governments, both leaderships to come up with a strategy to still manage to peacefully coexist.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Ms. Way, I know you don't, as a reporter, you don't represent the editorial side of the Wall Street Journal, but one of the editorials this morning takes a look at China's president and how he may be courting U.S. trade partners in light of what's going on with the United States in order to help compensate for what he might lose from the United States.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Can you elaborate on the trade partners that China can talk to in order to kind of help them through this time?
unidentified		That's a great question, Pedro.
		Beijing is fully in this dividing mode in terms of its divide and conquer strategy.
		They have been very proactively reaching out to traditional trading partners of the United States and also some countries in the global south, the less developed countries.
		We are seeing Xi Jinping this week going on a tour in Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia.
		So they're definitely trying to build ties with neighboring countries.
		And also we're seeing senior Chinese leaders holding conversations with leaders in Europe.
		We saw last week Xi Jinping hosted Spanish prime minister in Beijing and potentially there are more European leaders traveling China in the foreseeable future.
		So we're also seeing Beijing actively courting Japan and South Korea.
		Those are U.S. allies in Asia.
		So definitely Beijing is trying to seize on the opportunity, seize on some of the anger that is in the rest of the world toward the current administration in Washington, trying to convince them to still do trade with China.
		Because remember, the sky-high tariffs on the Chinese products means the U.S. market is all but closed to China.
		And given that China's economic model is so driven by manufacturing, they have to find other markets to be able to sell to.
		And whether or not the strategy can succeed is a big question.
		Because even before the trade war, countries in Europe and even in some developing countries already complained about cheap Chinese stuff flooding their markets and jeopardizing their industries and jobs.
		How China can win those countries, you know, solely because of anger toward the United States.
		You know, it is still, you know, we still need, time will tell, and we still need to see, you know, if there are any concrete results coming out of those visits by the leaders, you know, those conversations they're holding with other countries.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		When it comes to the United States and China, I know you said that the top leaders, the presidents, won't talk to each other likely, but what's the possibility that lower-level leaders might be talking under the surface in order to kind of resolve this issue?
unidentified		Yes, we were told that there has been some lower-level conversations between the administration and some diplomats here, Chinese diplomats here in Washington.
		But that kind of channel is, from the Chinese perspective, hasn't been very effective.
		What they wanted and they have been trying to establish is some sort of higher level channel of communication between, for example, cabinet level officials in Washington and senior enough level officials in Beijing, like the foreign minister.
		One line China really wanted to re-establish is a line between China's foreign minister Wang Yi and Biden national security advisor Jake Sullivan.
		To the Chinese, that line of communication proved really effective in terms of stabilizing ties.
		So China have tried to have a line of communication with the current national security advisor under President Trump, but they haven't made much of progress.
		And part of that, also because China itself, you know, sort of like dropped the ball somewhat at the very beginning.
		If you remember, the first conversation China's foreign minister had with Secretary of State Rubio during that conversation.
		Basically, the prime minister, the foreign minister of China, warned Secretary Rubio to, quote, behave yourself.
		So that really didn't put China on a very good start with the administration.
		But fundamentally, there has been such a, you know, such mistrust and even skepticism in both sides toward each other.
		You know, the Chinese felt like Washington hasn't been really sincere in terms of having conversations with them.
		And from Washington's perspective, they're like, you know, okay, we can talk, but we want to talk to people who are really important to Xi Jinping, who have direct lines to Xi Jinping.
		And that's not what the Chinese are offering.
		So we're sort of like stuck in terms of having some sort of meaningful higher level communication between those two sides.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		The Wall Street Journal is Ling Ling Wei joining us for this conversation.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		We will hear next from Kevin in Indiana, Republican line.
unidentified		Hello.
		Just simple question.
		I watched the news, read some things, and nobody's talking about the VAT, the value-added tax that's also charged on U.S. imported goods, but yet China's goods coming to the USA doesn't have a VAT tax on it.
		So no one's adding that in when they talk about the USA being the first one to increase or to have a larger tariff in China.
		That was it.
		Thank you.
		That's a very good question.
		I'm a little out of my depth on this issue.
		Would you mind explaining a little bit more about this VAT, how this factors into China's experts here and the other way around?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I apologize.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I already let him go.
unidentified		Sorry.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		I guess maybe he's talking about the value-added taxes.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Is that what he's referring to?
unidentified		Okay, okay.
unidentified		Yeah.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Let's go to John.
		John in Ohio, Independent Line.
		Go ahead, you're next up.
unidentified		Yes, sir.
		I'd like to know about the supposed debt that China owns of the United States.
		What would happen to me think if they all of a sudden called in their bets and wanted their money?
		Thank you.
		Thank you, John.
		Very timely question, because given the market turmoil in the United States in the past couple weeks, there have been a lot of questions about China potentially selling down its ginormous holdings of U.S. treasuries.
		Based on our reporting, China is not actively selling those holdings, but they have gradually reduced their holdings of Treasury debt over years.
		And it is very likely that they felt much less inclined to increase such holdings going forward, given the tension we're seeing between those two countries.
		China is really, this is a weapon that China can use, but potentially would be very reluctant to use because it would hurt China's economy,
		China's financial market pretty severely as well, because that would destabilize China's already shaking financial system and just too much disability politically for them as well.
		So we will obviously keep a very close eye on this issue.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Ms. Wei, we have Amazon here in the United States.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		Do you know if organizations like Shen or Tamu in China are putting perhaps or lobbying the Chinese government to maybe reconsider their ways in an effort to being able to sell their goods?
unidentified		You mean U.S. retailers, e-commerce retailers?
		So, you know, as we understand it, you know, U.S. companies operating in China and trading with China are really in a very difficult position right now, right?
		A lot of Chinese retaliation measures really target them.
		So the recent action, you know, removing those preferential tariff treatments for the stuff you just talked about certainly would hurt companies like Amazon and even more so would hurt companies in China like Timo and Shein and others.
		So there have been conversations going on in China between obviously Chinese companies and relevant authorities, but we're not particularly aware of any meaningful and impactful conversations going on or lobbying going on involving U.S. companies in China.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼		So we're at a stalemate, so to speak.
		What are you watching for next?
		Not only if the issue is resolved, but really when the economic damage starts getting done.
unidentified		We obviously are on lookout for any alternative channels of communication between the two governments.
		And also, it all comes down to who buckles from the paying first.
		We're closely watching how markets are doing, especially in the United States, and not just stock market, but bond market as well, and also the U.S. dollar.
		And so for China, there's a big high-level political meeting coming up later this month.
		Is called so-called Polybureau meeting.

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