| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
|
unidentified
|
On Washington Journal, we'll take your calls and comments live. | |
| And then Manhattan Institute senior fellow Rafael Mangwal on the Trump administration's expansion of immigration enforcement in Democratic-run cities and its handling of ongoing protests, including the recent demonstrations in Los Angeles. | ||
| Also, talk show host and author Tabby Smiley talks about Juneteenth and political news of the day. | ||
| Washington Journal is next. | ||
| Join the conversation. | ||
| Ideas as to what to do, but I haven't made a final. | ||
| I like to make the final decision one second before it's due, you know, because things change. | ||
| I mean, especially with war. | ||
| Things change with war. | ||
| It can go from one extreme to the other. | ||
| War is war is very bad. | ||
| The world awaits a decision by President Trump this morning on whether or not to involve the United States in the escalating war between Israel and Iran. | ||
| This morning on the Washington Journal, we begin with your message to President Trump as he weighs a U.S. strike on Iran. | ||
| Here's how you join the conversation. | ||
| Republicans, 202-748-8001. | ||
| Democrats, 202-748-8000. | ||
| And Independents, 202-748-8002. | ||
| You can text if you don't want to call at 202-748-8003. | ||
| Include your first name, city, and state. | ||
| You can also post on facebook.com/slash C-SPAN or on X with the handle at C-SPANWJ. | ||
| Wall Street Journal this morning with the headline, Trump privately approved of attack plans for Iran, but has withheld the final order. | ||
| Here's the president in the Oval Office, excuse me, on the White House lawn yesterday with more on what he's deciding to do in this escalating war. | ||
| I mean, nobody knows what I'm going to do. | ||
| I can tell you this, that Iran's got a lot of trouble and they want to negotiate. | ||
| And I said, why didn't you negotiate with me before? | ||
| All this death and destruction. | ||
| Why didn't you negotiate? | ||
| I said to people, why didn't you negotiate with me two weeks ago? | ||
| You could have done fine. | ||
| You would have had a country. | ||
| It's very sad to watch this. | ||
| I mean, I've never seen anything like it. | ||
| It's so, you know, everyone thought it was going to be the reverse. | ||
| I didn't think so. | ||
| And I was telling them, you got to do something. | ||
| You got to negotiate. | ||
| And at the end, last minute, they said, no, we're not going to do that. | ||
| And they got hit. | ||
| Remember, 60 days? | ||
| And then came the 60. | ||
| 61 is going to become a very famous number. | ||
| That was one hell of a hit, that first hit. | ||
| That was one hell of a hit. | ||
| Not sustainable, to be honest. | ||
| That's where it ended on the first night. | ||
| Yes. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Is it too late, though? | |
| Do you think it's too late to now? | ||
| Nothing's too late. | ||
| The only thing too late is Powell. | ||
| Powell's too late. | ||
| Too late, Powell. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Have the Iranians reached out to you, Mr. President? | |
| What? | ||
| Have Iranians reached out to you? | ||
| Yes. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And what did they say? | |
| I said it's very late. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know? | |
| I said it's very late to be talking, Mr. President. | ||
| Mr. President. | ||
| I don't know. | ||
| There's a big difference between now and a week ago, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Big difference. | |
| President Trump on the White House lawn yesterday as the new poll and flag went up on the White House grounds talking to reporters there about the war between Israel and Iran and his thinking. | ||
| What happens next? | ||
| As we said, he has approved a military plan but has yet to give the final decision. | ||
| So this morning, he's keeping the world guessing and we're asking you to give your message to the president. | ||
| What he should do here and what is the role of Congress? | ||
| The Iranian Supreme Leader on X posting the U.S. President threatens us with his absurd rhetoric. | ||
| He demands that the Iranian people surrender to him. | ||
| They should make threats against those who are afraid of being threatened. | ||
| The Iranian nation isn't frightened by such threats. | ||
| The New York Times this morning headline, Iran threatens irreparable damage if the United States intervenes in the conflict. | ||
| Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont, posted a video yesterday titled, Trump, Don't Drag the U.S. into Netanyahu's War with Iran. | ||
| Take a look at what he had to say. | ||
| The main point that I want to make today is that it is absolutely imperative that the United States not be dragged into this war. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Let me say a word about how this war began. | |
| On Thursday, Netanyahu launched an illegal and unilateral surprise attack on Iran, bombing targets across the country and killing hundreds of people. | ||
| Iran has responded with attacks of its own, which have killed dozens of people in Israel. | ||
| Whatever you may think of the corrupt and authoritarian Iranian regime, Israel's attack clearly violated international law and the United Nations Charter. | ||
|
unidentified
|
While every country has the right to defend itself, they do not have the right to launch so-called preemptive wars of this kind. | |
| But let's remember who Netanyahu is. | ||
| He is a war criminal under indictment by the International Criminal Court for starving innocent people and killing civilians in Gaza. | ||
|
unidentified
|
At this very moment, in Gaza, Israel continues to prevent the UN from delivering humanitarian aid. | |
| And just today in Gaza, Israeli tanks fired into a crowd desperately trying to collect food, killing at least 59 people. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So it should come as little surprise that Netanyahu ignored international law to start this war with Iran. | |
| But Netanyahu's decision to strike also directly contravened the express wishes of the United States, which was seeking a diplomatic resolution to the long-standing tensions around Iran's nuclear program. | ||
| In recent months, the United States has held five rounds of negotiations with Iran to resolve these long-standing concerns. | ||
| Let me repeat, in recent months, the United States has held five rounds of negotiations with Iran to resolve these long-standing concerns. | ||
|
unidentified
|
A sixth round of talks was planned for Sunday, but Netanyahu chose instead to start this war. | |
| So let's be clear. | ||
| Israel's attack was specifically designed to sabotage American diplomatic efforts. | ||
| In fact, in its first round of strikes, Israel assassinated the man overseeing Iran's nuclear negotiating team. | ||
| And let's also remember that U.S. intelligence has never indicated that Iran has made the decision to build a nuclear weapon. | ||
| Just a few months ago, Trump's own director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbitt, testified to Congress that, quote, the intelligence community continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon, end of quote. | ||
| But Netanyahu chose to attack, crippling diplomatic efforts and risking a full-blown regional war. | ||
| Senator Bernie Sanders in a video posted on YouTube yesterday laying out the arguments against U.S. involvement in the Israel-Iran war. | ||
| What do all of you think? | ||
| What is your message to the President and to the lawmakers here in Washington? | ||
| Who do you agree with on this question about whether or not the U.S. should strike Iran? | ||
| The President has said, I may do it or I may not do it. | ||
| Ed in Lawrenceville, Georgia, Republican, let's hear from you first. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, thank you. | |
| Good morning. | ||
| Can you hear me all right? | ||
| We can. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| When I was growing up, you know, I lived in a neighborhood where there were many Jewish people and they were wonderful people. | ||
| And I hate to see the Israelis being attacked so bad. | ||
| I think we have to get rid of the nuclear over there because if we don't drop those buster bombs on their facilities, they are going to build a bomb. | ||
| And God knows where they would shoot it off at. | ||
| And we sure don't want any nuclear bombs destroying the atmosphere. | ||
| We have to get rid of them. | ||
| And I'm hoping to God that President Trump, I have faith that he'll make the right decision on what to do. | ||
| He's kind of stuck in a hard place. | ||
| You know, it's do it or don't do it. | ||
| And I think he's going to have to do it. | ||
| All right, Ed. | ||
| And so you say get the military involved, and you mention Israel's request these B-2 bombers. | ||
| The U.S., as the President said yesterday, noting that the U.S. is the only one with the capability with this military equipment to take care of these nuclear facilities that are deeply embedded in the mountains of Iran. | ||
| So you say it's a go. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I think what happened is I heard somebody the other day say a good idea was that we could maybe have the bombers loaned to the Israelis and let them go ahead and use them. | |
| And so not involving any U.S. military personnel. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Correct. | |
| All right. | ||
| Ed there in Georgia, Republican caller, front page of the Washington Times. | ||
| Trump to make a very big move on Iran. | ||
| Ways bombing versus bargaining with the regime's leader. | ||
| About the military posture right now. | ||
| As the president contemplates a strike on Iran, the U.S. has shifted more forces to the Central Command area of operations. | ||
| Significant numbers of fighter jets and cargo aircraft, including F-16s, F-22s, F-35s, C-17s, are arriving. | ||
| They also report that the State Department started evacuating non-essential diplomats and their families from the U.S. Embassy in Israel. | ||
| And this week, the U.S. sent a large fleet of refueling tankers, presumably to keep U.S. bombers in the air, and deployed other aircraft, including F-35 Lightning, it says, excuse me, let me go to the jump page. | ||
| Lightning aircraft and F-16s fighting Falcons. | ||
| On Monday, the U.S. sent a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East. | ||
| The involvement of the U.S. military likely would be aimed at taking out Iran's underground nuclear facilities using the precise guided U.S.-made bombs that can be delivered only by the U.S.-made B-2 bombers and American pilots. | ||
| Analysts say it's the only weapon in the world capable of penetrating 200 feet underground before detonating and destroying the nuclear complexes. | ||
| That reporting from the Washington Times this morning. | ||
| Otis in Orange Park, Florida, Democratic caller, we'll go to you next, Otis. | ||
| What do you say? | ||
| What should the President do here? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think, good morning. | |
| I think the President should stand back right now. | ||
| Should stand back. | ||
| Yes, we do not need to approve this strike. | ||
| We don't, we can wait just in case. | ||
| But to me, it's a bigger point. | ||
| We just got out of a war in the Middle East. | ||
| It seemed like elderly people want to always commit young people to go to war. | ||
| I had my chance in the war. | ||
| We can't do, we cannot put our young soldiers in a war unless we absolutely need to. | ||
| And, Otis, who makes that decision, in your opinion? | ||
| Is it the president as commander-in-chief, or is it Congress that makes that decision? | ||
|
unidentified
|
The president can commit, can't commit the ground forces for just a little while, but Congress has to approve the war. | |
| He can disguise it as saying that it's not a war, it's a strike, and maybe he get away with it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But ask yourself this question. | |
| America needs to ask themself this question. | ||
| Once we drop the bunker bomb, what happens then? | ||
| All the chemicals, the air thing is not going to stay sealed out now. | ||
| It's going to leak out. | ||
| So what's going to happen when they decide to do dirty bombs, walking in briefcases, people don't mind if they die? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Don't commit young kids for no reason. | |
| All right. | ||
| Otis, there in Orange Park, Florida, Democratic caller. | ||
| His message to the president and to Congress this morning, first hour of the Washington Journal, conversation with all of you as the president weighs whether or not to strike Iran. | ||
| Let's hear from Ted in Buena Vista, Colorado Independent. | ||
| Ted, good morning. | ||
| What do you say? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, good morning. | |
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| I'm totally against bombing Iran. | ||
| You know, there is plenty of documentation that we knew that what Gaza and the government of Palestine were planning on Israel. | ||
| And Israel has been providing funds for Hamas for years and years prior to, it's just like we supported Iraq before we entered the war there. | ||
| We got to stop these wars and the energy that it takes to keep bombing. | ||
| You know, we're at a humanitarian crisis where that's going to affect our food chain. | ||
| You know, we, you know, if they drop the bomb in Iran, that's going to legitimize all the hospitals and children and all the humanitarian people that have been killed in Gaza. | ||
| And we got to learn to negotiate. | ||
| And if we're the wealthiest country in the world, why are so many people starving? | ||
| And corporate America has got to learn to start taking care of the veterans when they come back from war. | ||
| My father served in the Marine Corps in World War II, and he went to Guam in the Philippines and set up the power lines for the Ko Pakers. | ||
| And when he came back, he made amends to the Japanese by helping Japanese nurseries in California. | ||
| All right, Ted, let me go back to what you started out saying. | ||
| And do you see this? | ||
| If the U.S. gets involved, that this is a forever war, as it was, the decision in Iraq and Afghanistan has been called by recent presidents, those decisions to engage and involve the U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan. | ||
| Do you see this situation in Iran as the same thing? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Absolutely. | |
| I mean, look what the Trump family has done after the Vietnam War. | ||
| Now in Hanoi, they're setting up their hotel and golf courses. | ||
| And it wouldn't even surprise me that the end result all this, if this keeps going on, that the Trump family is going to have their resorts in Gaza. | ||
| And, you know, we already got a crisis. | ||
| Yeah, the Mediterranean Sea is one of the most viable, you know, it's the history of the world. | ||
| And everybody around the Mediterranean Sea should enjoy the same benefits as France and Spain and Greece. | ||
| And, you know, why is one area of the Mediterranean so rich and other areas of the Mediterranean just in poverty and war torn? | ||
| All right, Richard in Bemidji, Minnesota, Republican. | ||
| Richard, where do you come down on this? | ||
| Do you agree with the president or some in the Republican Party who disagree with the president here and they do not want the U.S. to engage in a war with Iran? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, this is a hard one. | |
| I really missed the wars. | ||
| I'm 59 years old, so I didn't get a chance to serve. | ||
| My brother did. | ||
| I really think that if it needs to be done, which I think it does, we need to take some stiff action and eliminate the threat. | ||
| I feel America's gone downhill a lot on our status. | ||
| Is war the way to bring our status up? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Not really, but Iran, in my eyes and what I view is too dangerous to let stay unfettered. | |
| A prolonged war would be ridiculous with anybody. | ||
| I think it could be done quickly and decisively. | ||
| But it's all the way around. | ||
| Do you share concerns by Tucker Carlson and others that say there are warmongers in the White House advising the president and that this will not be quick? | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's a hard one. | |
| I mean, the government's so twisted on all accounts. | ||
| I mean, I consider myself Republican, but I do have a lot of views that don't align with Trump. | ||
| But this one, I don't know. | ||
| I think he'll make the best decision. | ||
| If it does happen to go to where we need to use force, I just hope it's quick and it ain't prolonged. | ||
| I don't think war is good for anybody. | ||
| All right, Richard. | ||
| I'm going to leave it at that point on the interparty fighting over this decision for the president in the Republican Party, front page of the New York Times. | ||
| Trump backers in bitter schism on Iran. | ||
| And it talks about that viral video between Tucker Carlson and Ted Cruz. | ||
| Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, who is on the side of striking Iran, sits down with Tucker Carlson on his X program. | ||
| And the confrontation's 97 seconds. | ||
| It goes viral. | ||
| Here it is. | ||
| Okay, so you topple the regimen by whatever means. | ||
| What happens then? | ||
| How many people live in Iran, by the way? | ||
| I don't know the population at all. | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, I don't know the population. | |
| You don't know the population of the country you seek to topple? | ||
| How many people live in Iran? | ||
| 92 million. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| How could you not know that? | ||
| I don't sit around memorizing population tables. | ||
| Well, it's kind of relevant because you're calling for the overthrow of the government. | ||
| Why is it relevant whether it's 90 million or 80 million or 100 million? | ||
| Because if you don't know anything about the country. | ||
| I didn't say I don't know anything about what's the ethnic mix of Iran. | ||
| They are Persians and predominantly Shia. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| You don't know anything about Iran. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I am not the Tucker Carlson. | |
| You're not an expert on Iran. | ||
| You're a senator who's calling for the government. | ||
| You're the one who's the government. | ||
| You're the one who's worried about the country. | ||
| No, you don't know anything about the country. | ||
| You're the one who claims they're not trying to murder Donald Trump. | ||
| I'm not saying that. | ||
| Who can't figure out if it's a good idea to kill General Suleimani and you said it was bad? | ||
| They're trying to murder Trump. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, I did. | |
| Because you're not calling for military strikes against them in retaliation. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And if they really believe that they're carrying out military strikes today. | |
| You said Israel was. | ||
| Right, with our help. | ||
| I said we. | ||
| Israel is leading them, but we're supporting them. | ||
| Well, you're breaking news here because the U.S. government last night denied, the National Security Council spokesman Alex Pfeiffer denied on behalf of Trump that we were acting on Israel's behalf in any offensive capacity. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We're not bombing them. | |
| Israel's bombing them. | ||
| You just said we were. | ||
| We are supporting Israel. | ||
| Sir, Senator, if you're saying the United States government is attacking. | ||
| We're with Iran right now. | ||
| People are listening. | ||
| Senator Ted Cruz, with an exchange there with Tucker Carlson on his ex-program, the video posted by Tucker Carlson, 97 seconds, and racked up tens of millions of views in a matter of minutes and hours. | ||
| This is from the front page of the New York Times yesterday. | ||
| Steve Bannon, former White House chief strategist in the first Trump administration, sat down with reporters at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast here in Washington yesterday. | ||
| And here's what he had to say: his assessment of how President Trump's most devoted supporters would react if the U.S. became directly involved in the conflict between Israel and Iran. | ||
| I think as President Trump thinks over the next couple of days and gets a range of alternatives, I think the voices of his most loyal supporters will say, look, we have your back. | ||
| You're our guy. | ||
| But we've got an invasion in this country. | ||
| The number one priority here is to get our sovereignty back by deporting 10 million illegal alien invaders in a mass deportation, okay, which is going to be, as you saw in Los Angeles, not going to be easy. | ||
| The second priority I think we have is in the South China Sea and around Taiwan because of the Chinese, and they're not doing exercises right now. | ||
| I can tell you, as a former 7th Fleet naval officer, they are doing rehearsals for Taiwan. | ||
| That's the second party. | ||
| And yet we've taken a carrier battle group out of there and sent it. | ||
| Now we have three carriers in the Middle East. | ||
| So no, I think that the more information the president hears, the more he sees where his base is. | ||
| But I will tell you, if the president, as commander-in-chief, makes a decision to do this and comes forward and walks people through it, the MAGA movement, you'll lose some, but the MAGA movement, the Marjorie Taylor Greens, the Matt Gates, we will fight it up till the end to make sure that he's got full information. | ||
| But if he has more intelligence and makes that case to the American people, the MAGA movement will support President Trump. | ||
| Steve Bannon had a breakfast yesterday here in Washington saying the MA movement would be behind the president. | ||
| If you consider yourself part of the MAGA movement this morning, we want to hear from you. | ||
| Are you backing the president on a U.S. strike against Iran? | ||
| What do you think he should do here? | ||
| Sheila in Carleton, Georgia, you're an independent. | ||
| Share your thoughts with us, Sheila. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, no, I don't support the president. | |
| I don't support anything that has to do with Israel at all. | ||
| This is ridiculous. | ||
| This is taking his eye off of all our eyes off of Ukraine and what's going on over there. | ||
| And like that gentleman just said on his show, taking our eyes off of Japan and that area over there. | ||
| We have got to stop this man. | ||
| And Ted Cruz, he liked Ted Cruz. | ||
| I mean, he doesn't know anything about Iran. | ||
| Iran, Trump wouldn't even let them have enough power to facilitate medical. | ||
| Now, this has just got ridiculous. | ||
| I have nothing against the Israeli people, but Netanyahu is a warmonger and he's out to destroy everyone who's not Jewish. | ||
| All right, Sheila there in Carleton, Georgia. | ||
| You said, Sheila, they need to stop him. | ||
| Who's they and who's him? | ||
| Are you talking about President Trump stopping him from a U.S. strike against Iran? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| And who needs to do that? | ||
| We do. | ||
| The Congress does. | ||
| The Senate does. | ||
| The Republicans up there need to quit being so scared of him. | ||
| They are afraid that he's going to, well, it's just like Musk saying that if he didn't go along with the president, that he was going to stop you from another term. | ||
| He's going to put out all this money and everything. | ||
| And they are scared. | ||
| Now, they've got to get to get a handle on themselves. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Sheila in Carleton, Georgia, with her thoughts, the opinion pages of the New York Times. | ||
| The editorial board says America must not rush into war against Iran. | ||
| The decision to declare war rests with Congress alone. | ||
| They say that the president should make the case to the nation for committing American blood and treasure. | ||
| To refuse to put the issue to vote in Congress is to concede that the American public does not support yet another foreign war with ill-defined aim and no plan for what happens next. | ||
| The recent history of regime change wars is hardly encouraging, especially in the Middle East. | ||
| Decisions about when and whether to go to war are often difficult and always important. | ||
| For these reasons, the Constitution does not vest them in any one person, not even the commander-in-chief. | ||
| The American people and their elected representatives must have their say. | ||
| Let this vital debate begin. | ||
| Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, on the Senate floor Tuesday, has a resolution requiring approval before the Trump administration takes any military action against Iran. | ||
| Listen to what the Virginia Senator had to say. | ||
| And I told myself when I came to the Senate that if I ever had the chance to stop this nation from getting into an unnecessary war, I would do everything I could to stop us from getting into an unnecessary war. | ||
| I happen to believe that the United States engaging in a war against Iran, a third war in the Middle East since 2001, would be a catastrophic blunder for this country. | ||
| I think there are some in this body who have a different point of view than me on that point, but I think we should all be able to agree that the fundamental constitutional principle that says we shouldn't be in a war if Congress doesn't have the guts to debate it and vote on it, | ||
| we should all, having taken an oath to the Constitution, at least support the principle that war is something that should be for Congress to declare. | ||
| Mr. President, just recently, right before I walked to the floor, the New York Times published this article, and I'm just going to read this to demonstrate the imminence of the threat that this country faces. | ||
| The article New York Times dated today, Iran is preparing missiles for possible retaliatory strikes on U.S. bases, officials say. | ||
| And I'll just read the first few paragraphs. | ||
| Iran has prepared missiles and other military equipment for strikes on U.S. bases in the Middle East should the United States join Israel's war against the country, according to American officials who have reviewed intelligence reports. | ||
| Fears of a wider war are growing among American officials as Israel presses the White House to intervene in its conflict with Iran. | ||
| If the United States joins the Israeli campaign and strikes Fordo, a key Iranian nuclear facility, the Iranian-backed Houthi militia will almost certainly resume striking ships in the Red Sea, the officials said. | ||
| They added that pro-Iranian militias in Iraq and Syria would probably try to attack U.S. bases there. | ||
| Other officials said that in the inventive attack, Iran would begin to mine the Straits of Hormuz, attacking Mentipen American warships in the Persian Gulf. | ||
| Commanders put American troops on high alert at military bases throughout the region, including in the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. | ||
| The United States has more than 40,000 troops deployed in the Middle East. | ||
| Senator Tim Kaine on the Senate floor Tuesday outlining his argument for a resolution that would require President Trump to seek the approval of Congress before any military strike against Iran. | ||
| Do you agree with the senator there? | ||
| How do you want your senator to vote on that resolution? | ||
| Chris Murphy, Democratic Senator from Connecticut, in a conversation on CNN says, for those unconditionally cheering the attacks on Iran, remember that our early strikes in Afghanistan and Iraq were successful, but we ended up getting dragged into costly wars that created more terrorists than we killed. | ||
| The American people haven't forgotten that. | ||
| And you also have Brian Schatz, Democrat of Hawaii. | ||
| It is not in the national security interest of the United States to militarily attack Iran. | ||
| The best way to ensure regional stability and protect American lives is to reach a negotiated agreement. | ||
| It is on President Trump to avert a regional catastrophe. | ||
| And then you also have this from Mark Warner, Democratic Senator of Virginia. | ||
| If I, as a U.S. Senator and vice chair of the U.S. Intelligence Committee, have no answers on what this administration's policy is when it comes to Iran, what signals does that send to our allies and to our foes? | ||
| John Kennedy, Senator from Senator John Kennedy, Republican, Louisiana, thank you. | ||
| Don't want Americans. | ||
| He said, I don't want America to be the world's policeman, but I don't want China, Russia, and Iran to be the world's policemen either. | ||
| Those were his thoughts that he posted on X. Tim Scott of South Carolina. | ||
| A nuclear Iran is a threat to the United States. | ||
| And then you have Ram Paul, the senator from Kentucky. | ||
| Let me be totally clear. | ||
| I will not vote to send one American soldier to Iran. | ||
| Not one. | ||
| Some perspective there from Republican senators on both sides of the aisle as we ask all of you this morning, what is your message to President Trump as he weighs a U.S. strike on Iran? | ||
| This is what the president had to say to reporters at the White House yesterday on the escalating tensions in the Middle East. | ||
| Very simple. | ||
| Unconditional surrender. | ||
| That means I've had it. | ||
| Okay, I've had it. | ||
| I give up. | ||
| No more. | ||
| Then we go blow up all the military, you know, all the nuclear stuff that's all over the place there. | ||
| No, they had bad intentions. | ||
| You know, for 40 years, they've been saying death to America, death to Israel, death to anybody else that they didn't like. | ||
| They were bullies. | ||
| They were schoolyard bullies. | ||
| And now they're not bullies anymore, but we'll see what happens. | ||
| Look, nothing's finished until it's finished. | ||
| You know, war is very complex. | ||
| A lot of bad things can happen. | ||
| A lot of turns are made. | ||
| So I don't know. | ||
| I wouldn't say that we won anything yet. | ||
| I would say that we sure as hell made a lot of progress. | ||
| And we'll see. | ||
| The next week is going to be very big, maybe less than a week, maybe less. | ||
| But is there anybody here that said it would be okay to have a hostile very, you know, zealots, really, but to have a hostile country have a nuclear weapon that could destroy 25 miles, but much more than that? | ||
| Could destroy other nations just by the breeze blowing the dust. | ||
| You know, that dust blows to other nations and they get decimated. | ||
| This is just not a threat you can have. | ||
| And we've been threatened by Iran for many years. | ||
| You know, if you go back and look at my history, if you go back 15 years, I was saying we cannot let Iran get a nuclear weapon. | ||
| I've been saying it for a long time. | ||
| I mean it more now than I ever meant it. | ||
| President Trump yesterday talking about the rising tension between Israel and Iran, the war there between those two countries, and his argument that Iran cannot get a nuclear weapon. | ||
| Updates for you on the situation between these two countries. | ||
| Here's the Times of Israel. | ||
| Heavy damage, injures, injuries as Iranian missiles have hit a hospital in Israel and dozens hurt in many cities. | ||
| And then from Al Jazeera and their live update this morning on their website, Israel threatens to eliminate the supreme leader after those Iranian missile strikes hitting the hospital there in Israel. | ||
| So that is the latest on the situation in the Middle East as we turn to all of you this morning here on the Washington Journal to tell the president what you think he should do. | ||
| He says, I may, I may do it, I may not do it on a U.S. strike against Iran. | ||
| Stephen, Florida, Republican, what do you think you should do? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I see a lot of radical and fanatical religious ducks over there that have been for years calling for the destruction of America and the Jewish people, the Jewish state. | |
| Just seeing what they've been doing the last four days, five days, attacking civilian locations while Israel is surgically striking the places that need to be hit is proof that if they had a bomb, they would spread carnage throughout the world. | ||
| All I see is if they get a bomb and they have the ability to launch it or to somehow get it to our country and explode it over our country, we are going back to the 17th century. | ||
| There will be no electricity grid. | ||
| People will be dying by the millions. | ||
| And that's a fact. | ||
| We need to look at the threat for what it is. | ||
| And if Trump needs to go in, or any other president would have needed to go in, and do a surgical strike to take out those locations that are a threat to the world, then they need to do it. | ||
| If it escalates into a war, if it does, then Congress certainly needs to be involved. | ||
| Steve, the president campaigned on ending these wars. | ||
| Do you believe that this is in line with what he campaigned on if he were to make the decision to strike Iran? | ||
| Does that line up with what he said on the campaign trail? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Things change. | |
| President, no matter who it is, Republican, Democrat, gets into office, they promise the best they can do. | ||
| I see President Trump as following through on a lot of his promises. | ||
| But this is a change. | ||
| This is a major shift. | ||
| We are in a threat. | ||
| We cannot stand idly by and allow a country such as Iran to cause us harm, severe harm, or any other country in the world. | ||
| One bomb could decimate Israel. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Steve, for you and others, you may be interested in the analysis in the Washington Post and other newspapers this morning. | ||
| Trump, unpredictable as ever as he weighs bombing Iran is the headline that the Washington Post used. | ||
| And they go back and they quote him what he has repeatedly said over the years. | ||
| We will quickly restore stability in the Middle East and we will return the world to peace, he said during a campaign event in September. | ||
| They also note that during his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump often invoked the Middle East as a lesson of misadventures in American foreign policy. | ||
| He called the original deal with Iran on curbing its nuclear ambitions a disgrace and an embarrassment. | ||
| And he frequently spoke out about military involvement in Iraq as a way to ridicule his Democratic opponent. | ||
| That's the Washington Post this morning. | ||
| Trump is as unpredictable as ever, even when faced with war, is what they write there. | ||
| And then from the New York Times this morning, the diplomatic rout, they report that Israel had begun preparing in December for an attack on Iran after the decimation of Hezbollah, an Iranian proxy, and the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria, opening up airspace for a bombing campaign. | ||
| Mr. Netanyahu made his first visit of the second Trump term to the White House on February 4th. | ||
| He presented a gold-plated pager to Mr. Trump and a silver-plated pager to Mr. Vance, the same devices the Israelis had secretly packed with explosives and sold to unwitting Hezbollah operatives who would later be maimed and killed in a devastating remote control attack on the Iran-backed Lebanese group. | ||
| Mr. Trump later told an ally he was disturbed by that gift. | ||
| Mr. Netanyahu gave Mr. Trump a presentation about Iran in the Oval Office, walking him through images of the country's various nuclear sites. | ||
| So according to the New York Times, this has been planned by Israel since December. | ||
| Let's go to George, who's in Columbia, South Carolina, and independent. | ||
| George, good morning. | ||
| It's your turn. | ||
| Tell us what you think. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning. | |
| Morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning. | |
| What is it about Israel to everybody? | ||
| Hey, what is going on? | ||
| In World War II, they had the Holocaust. | ||
| And they treated the Israelis really bad, killed a lot of people, killed a lot of Jewish people. | ||
| Now the Jewish people in Israel are doing the same thing to the Palestinians. | ||
| What happened to them? | ||
| This is crazy. | ||
| What they need to do is grow up. | ||
| People in the Middle East, the Southeast, anyway, Europe, anyway, they need to grow up and act like men and act like women and sit down and negotiate and work it out. | ||
| It's just killing, killing babies, 30,000 kids and women over in Palestine. | ||
| I understand. | ||
| It's just crazy. | ||
| All right, George. | ||
| Heard your thoughts there. | ||
| Paul in Houston, Texas, Democratic caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Morning, Paul. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm totally against any strike in Iran. | |
| You know, I don't think our government needs to get involved in that. | ||
| I know that they had to have, Israel had to have the okay from the Trump administration to even go into Iran. | ||
| So Trump's sitting here playing like, well, I might and I might not. | ||
| Hey, man, people's lives are at stake. | ||
| And you sitting here act like you don't know whether you need to strike or not strike. | ||
| No, you need to stay out of that league. | ||
| And one day, I mean, who's to say when this country might get hit? | ||
| You know, we don't want nobody bombing this country. | ||
| So what about them Iranians? | ||
| They got a right to live a peaceful, free life just as well as the Israelis. | ||
| And Netanyahu and Trump is two of a kind. | ||
| Either one of them is unfit to be running a nation. | ||
| All right, Paul in Texas, his thoughts from the New York Times front page. | ||
| Netanyahu bet on persuading Trump on Iran. | ||
| President shift driven by nuclear threat. | ||
| This is the article we just read from the New York Times, the jump page. | ||
| It's on their front page this morning and talking about how Mr. Netanyahu has threatened to attack Iran through previous presidents, but has always backed down when previous presidents, U.S. presidents have asked him to do so and pursue a diplomatic route. | ||
| Not this time. | ||
| It says that Mr. Netanyahu decided and was making plans back in December for this. | ||
| It also says, contrary to Israeli claims, senior administration officials were unaware of any new intelligence showing that Iran was rushing to build a nuclear bomb, a move that would justify a preemptive strike. | ||
| But seeing they would most likely not be able to deter Mr. Netanyahu and were no longer driving events, Mr. Trump's advisors weighed alternatives. | ||
| This morning, the president weighing a U.S. strike on Iran, and it's your turn to tell him what you think he should do. | ||
| Liz in Texas, Republican Liz, good morning. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Morning. | |
| All right, Liz, we're listening to you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I remember when Iran started against us in 1979, and they took hostages. | |
| And they've also bombed some of our bases. | ||
| They've sent assassins to our shores. | ||
| In fact, I think recently they arrested someone who was trying to assassinate Mr. Bolton last year. | ||
| As far as I can tell, I've been watching the news for a long time and history and some of the things coming out of what's been going on, it's been pretty clear that we've actually been in a war with Iran for a long time. | ||
| And no, based on the words coming out of the Ayatollah, not necessarily the Iranian people. | ||
| It's my understanding the Iranian people want to be free of this regime. | ||
| But that's their decision, and they should be the ones to decide who they want to run their country. | ||
| I don't believe in regime change, but I don't believe that the Ayatollahs should have nuclear. | ||
| And based on the most recent news coming out of the IAEA, they are on the verge of getting a nuclear bomb. | ||
| So do I want to, I don't know, sit back on my hands and do nothing and wait until they drop a bomb on Israel and eradicate the entire area or bomb the United States or England or, you know, there's a lot of countries around there that they are against. | ||
| Anyone in the Western world, they are against. | ||
| They've been chanting death to Israel, death to America. | ||
| You know, they don't like the Western world, period. | ||
| Do we want to wait until they drop a bomb before responding? | ||
| Or do we just go in and do a surgical strike and take out their nuclear capabilities? | ||
| And Liz, do you think that the United States can do that without being drawn into a larger war? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I don't see why not. | |
| When Trump was in office before, he took out Soleimani. | ||
| Did he draw us into a regional war? | ||
| No. | ||
| And Israel didn't launch this attack out of the blue. | ||
| Hamas, who is run by Iran, launched an attack against Israel first and killed 1,200 Israelis. | ||
| Now, I'm not a Jew, but you don't go and attack people over and over and over again and not expect a response. | ||
| I'm sorry, but if you break into my house, I'm going to shoot you. | ||
| I mean, that's just the way I feel. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Liz there in Texas, a Republican caller. | ||
| In other news this morning to share with you, front page of USA Today, the Supreme Court upheld the gender care ban. | ||
| It was a 6-3 ruling that says minors can be denied transgender care. | ||
| This is a Tennessee law, and there are several other states that have similar laws. | ||
| If you missed that oral argument and you're interested, you can find it on our website at c-span.org. | ||
| USA Today also with a headline this morning about the Republicans spending and tax cuts bill. | ||
| According to New Poll, a majority of Americans oppose this GOP tax policy bill. | ||
| And then also this morning, the front page of the New York, the Washington Times, Washington Post, excuse me, as we continue to talk about the President's decision, Trump says he warned the Iranians, the ultimatum given on nuclear work, and President is coy on any plans for joining the conflict. | ||
| We have about 15 minutes left here in this conversation. | ||
| We want to hear from you on this. | ||
| Bill in St. Paul, Minnesota, Independent. | ||
| Hi, Bill. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Good morning, Greta. | ||
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| And thanks, C-SPAN. | ||
| I'll answer your question. | ||
| No, we should not get involved in this conflict between Israel and Iran. | ||
| And the reason for that is I think we really need to go back and look at something that Obama had in place several years ago. | ||
| He had a structured deal with the Iranian people that we could go in anytime and look at their sites and stuff like that. | ||
| Then Mr. You Know Who comes along, Mr. President Trump, and he's saying we're giving them all this money. | ||
| And it was their money who we had tied up. | ||
| And he destroyed that deal. | ||
| This is what he does. | ||
| And now, present day, look where we're at. | ||
| This is the same situation that seems to happen when he talks about, well, we shouldn't be involved in the United Nations. | ||
| We should pull out. | ||
| They're not paying their fair share and all that. | ||
| I think it said, it's been said that back then it said, I'm going to say it now, he's not presidential. | ||
| You can't solve everything with dropping a bomb and this rhetoric talk about surgically removing somebody. | ||
| We did the same thing with Iraq when they said there was weapons of mass destruction and there were none found. | ||
| I guess the bottom line is what I'm saying here is you can always go to war. | ||
| You can always shoot a gun, but you can't put that bullet back in or that missile back in the launcher once it's out. | ||
| And we really need to take our time and figure out a diplomatic way of dealing with this. | ||
| The bottom line is here is that we're dealing with someone who's in the White House that's unhinged and has no real filters of how to deal with diplomacy. | ||
| This is the same man that told us that he could end the war between Ukraine and Russia in one day. | ||
| And we haven't seen anything but rhetoric and talk and talk and talk. | ||
| All right, Bill. | ||
| Let me go to Carol, who's an Iowa City Democratic caller. | ||
| Carol, you're next. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, Greta. | |
| Morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
This is sad. | |
| This is so sad. | ||
| Another war. | ||
| It's like George Bush telling us we're going to war. | ||
| And look what happened 20 years later. | ||
| We're still plugging the war on the TV and the radio. | ||
| They need to go to Congress. | ||
| Senator Kaine's right. | ||
| They cannot go to another war unless Congress has backed that idea. | ||
| All right, Carol. | ||
| Carol there in Iowa, agreeing with Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, and others who want a say in any decision by the president. | ||
| Congress needs to approve any military action in Iran. | ||
| Do you agree or disagree? | ||
| Rick in Idaho, Republican. | ||
| Rick, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Greta. | |
| C-SPAN, Washington Journal, Third Times of Charm. | ||
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| Having spent 20 years in Marine Corps America, seven years across the pond, a year and a quarter in the Middle East, what is predictable is that Iran is suicidal. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And I'm going to open up Pandora's box, and I'm going to tell you what they're going to do before they do it. | |
| They will do a self-detonate of a nuclear warhead in their own country to create world media that it was Israel and America's fault for all these innocent human beings, women, and children being killed due to a nuclear fallout. | ||
| That nuclear fallout is going to be created by Iran. | ||
| So Iran, I hope you're listening. | ||
| I just opened up your plan, and I hope you're paying attention, media. | ||
| With that in mind, Washington Journal, C-SPAN, get wise to the ways of the world. | ||
| You get mean about being an American. | ||
| Thank you for listening, and I'll take your thoughts. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| All right, Rick in Idaho, Republican caller there. | ||
| Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has been up on Capitol Hill over the past couple of weeks talking about military priorities, the budget for the Pentagon, as well as these conflicts across the world. | ||
| He was up there yesterday, and here's an exchange between Republican Senator Dan Sullivan of Alaska and the Defense Secretary on preparations ahead of a potential U.S. strike on Iran. | ||
| Mr. Secretary, Iran's military and leadership is in complete disarray right now because of the bold actions by Israel. | ||
| Is this an opportunity now to once again, like we did in the first term of the Trump administration, reestablish deterrence against this terrorist regime by making sure one way or the other they never have the capacity to enrich or produce a nuclear bomb, a goal that President Trump has repeatedly emphasized? | ||
| And again, I thank you for focusing on reestablishing deterrence. | ||
| It's critical, and you're right. | ||
| It's difficult to reestablish that if we lost it, which we did under the Biden administration. | ||
| We know right now that Tehran understands exactly what the president is saying. | ||
| He said 60 days. | ||
| The world can believe it, and the world cannot believe it. | ||
| He said 60 days. | ||
| They had an opportunity to make a deal. | ||
| They should have made a deal. | ||
| President Trump's word means something. | ||
| The world understands that. | ||
| And at the Defense Department, our job is to stand ready and prepared with options, and that's precisely what we're doing. | ||
| So is this an opportunity now to reestablish deterrence the way it was done in the first administration? | ||
| Senator, I think we already have, in many ways, in this environment, reestablished deterrence. | ||
| The question is in the coming days exactly what direction that goes. | ||
| The Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Capitol Hill yesterday, if you missed the hearing, you can find it on our website at c-span.org. | ||
| Roseanne in San Diego, Democratic caller. | ||
| Roseanne, what is your message to the president? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, thank you for taking my call. | |
| I would tell this president, oh, for God's sake, this is George Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Powell, all over again, WMD all over again, regime change all over again. | ||
| We didn't learn anything from that, obviously, because so many Americans want to see Iran bombed. | ||
| It doesn't make any sense. | ||
| Bernie Sanders, who was at the beginning of your show, is 100% right. | ||
| We need to stay out of it. | ||
| Of course, Trump won't because Trump will go along with whatever Netanyahu wants to do. | ||
| He's just stringing us along for right now. | ||
| Iran is not going to drop a bomb on anybody because that would assure their destruction. | ||
| And contrary to what the previous person said, they're not suicidal. | ||
| They're just trying to establish a deterrent in the Middle East against Israel because Israel right now goes around, bombs everybody they don't like, and they need to have a deterrence. | ||
| If Israel gets to have nuclear weapons, then Iran should get to have nuclear weapons, and it's a draw. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Kevin and San Antonio, Independent, your turn, Kevin. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, watching that old man standing by the flagpole, rambling on, babbling on. | |
| I'll repeat what one of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General, said. | ||
|
unidentified
|
He said he's an idiot. | |
| And I actually blame your Washington Journal and C-SPAN first. | ||
| You showed his rallies, and then you never fact-checked any of his lies that he constantly told, like they're eating the dogs and cats type of situations. | ||
| And you guys should fact check any politician or guest you have on there. | ||
| It is you promote his lives, and it doesn't help, but it hasn't helped the United States at all. | ||
| Kevin, what we do is that we show the rallies of the president. | ||
| We show the rallies of Kamala Harris and others in their entirety to let our audience make up their own mind without interruption, without analysis. | ||
| We certainly had conversations here on the Washington Journal about remarks that are made by the candidates, and you can see those conversations if you go to our website. | ||
| As a moderator at this table, it's difficult to be a walking encyclopedia and fact-check in real time. | ||
| There are a number of fact-checking websites out there. | ||
| You can go to them and put in what politicians say to see if what these fact-checkers say is true or not. | ||
| They dig into what the remarks are. | ||
| They spend a lot of time on determining whether or not what the politician has said is factual. | ||
| John in Arlington, Virginia, Republican. | ||
| John, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Morning. | |
| Good morning. | ||
| First of all, the Trump administration's own intelligence people say they assess that the Iranians haven't made a decision to go for a bomb. | ||
| That's the first thing. | ||
| Secondly, we had the JCPOA that was negotiated. | ||
| The Iranians were keeping it. | ||
| Our people said they were, and Trump pulled out of it. | ||
| So that was that. | ||
| As far as this goes, actually, Trump's strongest position is to say, we're here ready to negotiate anytime you want to negotiate and be in a position that we can encourage maybe a ceasefire over there. | ||
| But to go ahead and bomb that fortune and say, okay, that's it. | ||
| That's the end of everything. | ||
| We don't have to do any more. | ||
| Just probably won't work. | ||
| So, I mean, it'll probably destroy that facility, but it'll mean we're involved in the war. | ||
| So I think Trump's strongest position is actually say, why don't you guys come on and we'll work this out? | ||
| Well, John, I mean, there's reporting in the papers this morning that the Iranian leaders have said and that the president said that they have asked to come to Washington and that he's considering a meeting with the Iranian leadership to whatever it is. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Let's just get it done on that level and then get a ceasefire with the Israelis and stuff because things are getting a little dangerous in the exchange. | |
| There are targets on both sides that could be hit that would cause major problems and they both have the capability to hit those targets. | ||
| They know what they are and it's starting to get a little crazy over there. | ||
| All right. | ||
| And this morning, Israel is threatening to take out the supreme leader after missile attacks by Iran today. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The Iranians could hit that would be disastrous if they hit them. | |
| So, you know, this has to slow down and we have to start slowing this conflict down and get an agreement. | ||
| The Iranians are, everybody agrees they shouldn't have a bomb. | ||
| And the intelligence people say they're not, they haven't made the decision to go for the bomb. | ||
| So let's get it back. | ||
| Trump has a way to reestablish what we had before he pulled out of it, and hopefully that will settle the issue. | ||
| All right, John. | ||
| On the diplomatic front from the Washington Times reporting, they say that European officials are prepared to hold talks with Iran on Friday in Geneva, according to a European official familiar with the matter that telling the Associated Press that detail. | ||
| So there are diplomatic talks scheduled in Geneva on Friday. | ||
| Diplomats from Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, as well as the European Union's top diplomat, will be involved, but there will not be an immediate U.S. presence in the talks. | ||
| Kim in Florida, Democratic caller. | ||
| Kim, what do you think should happen? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I don't think we should go to war with them or take any part. | |
| I just want to say that earlier, a Republican lady said they invaded our embassy. | ||
| They did, but we also killed their only elected president. | ||
| We assassinated him. | ||
| And if she Googles it, she'll find out. | ||
| We've done bad things to them before. | ||
| So whether they have a thing, they hate us or that's kind of natural. | ||
| If they had killed our president, we would hate them too. | ||
| All right. | ||
| I'm going to go to Vienna, Virginia. | ||
| Barry's watching there and independent. | ||
| Barry, what do you think should happen here? | ||
| What's your message to the president? | ||
| He says he may do it, he may not do it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
First of all, good morning. | |
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| Although I'm not generally a Trump fan, I'm closer to his position on this one. | ||
| I haven't heard anyone mention the IAEA report that came out very recently that showed, first of all, Iran's widespread cheating on the prior agreement, and secondly, that they were rushing towards both enrichment level, not needed for a civilian nuclear use, but it could only be used for a bomb. | ||
| And no one has also mentioned that that would be in violation of the nuclear non-proliferation agreement, of which Shireen Iran is a signatory. | ||
| And I just wanted to mention one other point, which is I've read several articles suggesting a middle ground on the action against the Fordo underground facility, and that is a suggestion that Israel could adapt its large-scale transports to carry the 30,000-pound bunkerbuster MOP. | ||
| And this would avoid having direct involvement of the U.S. with its B-2 bombers by simply providing arms, which is just an extension of what we've been doing. | ||
| And Israel would be the one proceeding. | ||
| And that's if an agreement can't be reached, an agreement, an enforceable agreement, unlike any prior agreement that we've had, would be optimal. | ||
| But if that can't be done, then this is a middle ground to avoid direct U.S. involvement. | ||
| So I hope that more or less answers your question. | ||
| All right, Barry there in Vienna, Virginia, an independent caller. | ||
| We're going to take a break. | ||
| When we come back later on this morning on the Washington Journal, we're going to have a conversation with syndicated talk show host and author Tavis Smiley joining us from Los Angeles to talk about the immigration protests there as well as the significance of today's Juneteenth holiday. | ||
| But first coming up after the break, we're going to speak with Rafael Mangual from the Manhattan Institute, who says these anti-ICE protests are a political loser for Democrats. | ||
| We'll talk to him right after this break. | ||
| It's consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to SRES 259. | ||
| The clerk will report. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Senate Resolution 259, recognizing June 2nd, 2025, as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN chronicling democracy in the Senate. | |
| By a unanimous vote, the United States Senate passed a resolution honoring C-SPAN's four decades covering the Senate. | ||
| The resolution thanked cable and satellite operators for providing C-SPAN as a public service to the country. | ||
| C-SPAN does not receive one penny of taxpayer dollars, is funded primarily from satellite and cable providers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And called on all television providers, including streaming services, to deliver C-SPAN as well. | |
| We're at a different stage in our history and a lot of people are seeing their news this way, so we need to expand it and make sure we're on all of those platforms, as well as the ones we already are on. | ||
| So thank you again to Senator Grassley for working with me to highlight C-SPAN's critical role. | ||
| and thanks to everyone who has had a hand in C-SPAN's success. | ||
|
unidentified
|
In a nation divided, a rare moment of unity. | |
| This fall, C-SPAN presents Ceasefire, where the shouting stops and the conversation begins. | ||
| In a town where partisan fighting prevails, one table, two leaders, one goal, to find common ground. | ||
| This fall, ceasefire on the network that doesn't take sides, only on C-SPAN. | ||
| Washington Journal continues. | ||
| We are back with Rafael Mangual. | ||
| He is the author of Criminal Injustice, and he's also the Nick O'Nell Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, here to talk about immigration enforcement in cities and protests that we're seeing. | ||
| Let's begin with your thoughts on the ICE protests in LA and just the argument behind those that are opposed to them. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, well, I think the most important thing to note about the protests is how quickly they devolved into riots. | |
| And I do think that that's ultimately going to be the story that sticks here with what we saw in Los Angeles, and rightfully so. | ||
| You know, the rule cannot be that the basic enforcement of laws that have been on the books for many decades now, you know, it justifies a violent response. | ||
| And I think that has been particularly frustrating for the public to see. | ||
| I think it's been incredibly frustrating for the administration that's trying to carry out its electoral mandate. | ||
| But I think ultimately it highlights a pre-existing political problem for the American left, which is that they're increasingly becoming associated with violence and disorder as sort of part of the political activism brand. | ||
| What is the argument for these ICE raids? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I think the basic argument is that at least what we saw in LA, these were raids that were targeting criminal offenders who had judicial warrants for removal. | |
| And ICE exists to enforce existing immigration law. | ||
| And unfortunately, over the last several years, we have seen a massive influx of people into the country who don't have a right to stay here. | ||
| And the reason that we have immigration enforcement officers is to carry out the legal mandate of enforcing immigration law, which means that when people are found to have either overstated visa or to have crossed into the country illegally, we have mechanisms in place through which they need to be removed. | ||
| That is something that has broad public support. | ||
| And it is something that I think is a pretty basic federal law enforcement function. | ||
| What I think we should not be seeing, that we're seeing increasingly regularly, is that these basic enforcement measures are being met with violence, with resistance, and in Los Angeles' case a couple weeks ago with riots. | ||
| What is a sanctuary city and what is your stance on it? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, so the sanctuary city policy is basically a policy through which a municipality decides that they are no longer going to cooperate with the federal government's immigration enforcement efforts. | |
| So, for example, there might be a detainee in a city jail or a county jail that is set to be removed from the country for an immigration violation. | ||
| Immigration authorities will often issue what's called a detainer, which is basically a request to the municipality to hand over that individual once they are out of being released from the municipality's care to federal immigration officers so that they can smoothly carry out their deportation efforts. | ||
| Sanctuary cities, that policy basically says we are not going to do that. | ||
| We're not going to take those steps to facilitate the enforcement of immigration law, which means that immigration authorities have to kind of take a more aggressive approach. | ||
| They have to, you know, it requires more officers. | ||
| They can't simply, you know, go into the jail and take custody of somebody in a much more controlled environment. | ||
| Instead, cities are often releasing these individuals without notifying ICE immigration and customs enforcement or Border Patrol or whichever agency is in charge. | ||
| And that ultimately, I think, is an unpopular thing in most of the country. | ||
| As you know, three Democratic governors testified on Capitol Hill recently, Governor J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota, and Governor Kathy Hochle of New York on sanctuary policies. | ||
| Listen to the New York governor talk about the, before the Oversight Committee, about sanctuary policies and immigration. | ||
| She defended this state's policies and said there's no sanctuary for people who commit crimes. | ||
| Some of you will use this hearing to stoke fear. | ||
| I'm here to talk about the facts. | ||
| New York has managed an unprecedented immigrant influx because of a broken border. | ||
| Yet at the same time, our state has become stronger and safer. | ||
| Today, New York has the lowest homicide rate among the nation's top 10 states. | ||
| We didn't achieve this with indiscriminate roundups, not by tearing apart innocent families, but by investing $2.6 billion in public safety, engaging in smart, targeted policing, and partnering with law enforcement, federal law enforcement, to apprehend and deport serious criminals. | ||
| And since I become governor, we've cooperated in handing over 1,300 convicted criminals to ICE. | ||
| But what we don't do is civil immigration enforcement. | ||
| That's the federal government's job. | ||
| New Yorkers need their state troopers on our highways seizing guns and drugs. | ||
| States like mine are doing our part, but we can't be expected to fix the broken immigration system. | ||
| Rafael Mangual, respond there to the New York governor. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I think she's engaging in a kind of interesting sleight of hand. | |
| I mean, notice that she says that they have turned over 1,300 and emphasized the word convicted criminals, right? | ||
| This is sort of a key part of the sanctuary city policy, right? | ||
| It does not apply to instances in which somebody has been convicted and is in state custody. | ||
| Those individuals will be turned over, but there are a number of people who have been arrested and charged with serious crimes who may have prior conviction records. | ||
| But because those individuals have not been convicted in the instant case, those individuals are not being turned over despite a detainer request. | ||
| And that's where I think more cooperation could exist. | ||
| Where, you know, in lots of jurisdictions around the country, for example, ICE sometimes has an office within a county or municipal jail so that individuals who have detainers on them can be very smoothly transitioned into federal custody in a controlled environment. | ||
| The state is pretending there that it would take some significant amount of law enforcement resources to be taken away from traditional policing in order to facilitate the detainer requests. | ||
| And that's just not the case. | ||
| In a lot of these instances, these are individuals who are already in local custody for pending criminal charges that could easily be turned over, but are not pursuant to a misguided policy. | ||
| We are talking this morning with Rafael Mangual. | ||
| He is with the Manhattan Institute, the Nick O'Nell Fellow there, and also the author of the book Criminal Injustice. | ||
| We invite you to join the conversation this morning to talk about sanctuary city policies, these ICE raids and immigration here in the United States. | ||
| Republicans dial in at 202-748-8001. | ||
| Democrats 202-748-8000. | ||
| And Independents 202-748-8002. | ||
| You can also text if you'd like at 202-748-8003, just include your first name, city, and state. | ||
| Rafael Mangual, I want to show our viewers a recent poll, a Pew Poll, that found that the Americans have mixed to negative views of the Trump administration's immigration actions. | ||
| 42%, 47% approve, while 47% disapprove. | ||
| What do you make of this? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I mean, it's not entirely surprising. | |
| I mean, when you look at what has essentially become a sort of coordinated mass media campaign to demonize this administration's immigration enforcement efforts, you know, and you consider that most people are really just casual observers of these sort of public debates and casual consumers of mainstream news. | ||
| It's not at all surprising that some people are coming away with the impression that the administration's approach to immigration enforcement is reckless or misguided or even malicious. | ||
| You have people in positions of power, whether that's LA Mayor Karen Bass or California Governor Gavin Newsom and media personalities across various institutions, referring to ICE agents as sort of massed secret police or the Gestapo or calling these raids sort of irresponsible, chaotic, and examples of sowing terror. | ||
| That sort of rhetoric eventually bleeds through. | ||
| It's also why I think we've seen kind of the violent response to these basic immigration enforcement campaigns that we saw in LA. | ||
| So ultimately, I don't think that rhetoric really helps anybody. | ||
| It doesn't provide clarity for the public. | ||
| It creates confusion and actually is the source of some of the chaos that a lot of these individuals are decrying themselves. | ||
| All right, President Trump in a Truth Social post this week. | ||
| I want ICE, Border Patrol, and our great and patriotic law enforcement officers to focus on our crime-ridden and deadly inner cities and those places where sanctuary cities play such a big role. | ||
| He wrote, the American people want on Truth Social our cities, schools, and communities to be safe and free from illegal ALA and crime, conflict, and chaos. | ||
| That's why I have directed my entire administration to put every resource possible behind this effort and reverse the tide of mass destruction migration that has turned once idyllic towns into scenes of third world dystopia. | ||
| Cheryl in Pennsylvania, independent. | ||
| Welcome to the conversation. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, and good morning to you. | |
| Morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks for the job you do. | |
| I live in a small borough in Westgrove, Pennsylvania, okay? | ||
| And we have had three explosions. | ||
| They've thrown the bombs in. | ||
| And we also had an immigrant, an illegal, who shook a baby and brought the baby here to Westgrove and hid it in the house. | ||
| When I asked the state police, he said, well, we've got to deal with them. | ||
| They're here. | ||
| That is not an answer. | ||
| I don't want to live in fear. | ||
| It is just me and my cat smoking McGee and my sisters up on Harmony. | ||
| And I witness drug dealing, sir. | ||
| Drug dealing right in front of me. | ||
| And then the cars. | ||
| And there's roaches on top of roaches. | ||
| We never live like this. | ||
| We never change diapers. | ||
| My mother raised nine of us children, you know, and then they throw it. | ||
| They change the oil. | ||
| They look at you. | ||
| They run. | ||
| I don't want to live in fear. | ||
| I've lived a long time. | ||
| I'm a cancer survivor and the good Lord has taken care of me. | ||
| All right, Cheryl. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Rafael Mangual. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, look, you know, I think it's important for people to feel secure in their communities. | |
| And, you know, when they see these stories of, you know, really horrific crimes being committed by people who didn't have a right to be here in the first place and who could have and should have been deported, you know, it really begs the question, which is like, what exactly are we doing here? | ||
| Why aren't we taking advantage of the laws that are at our disposal to remove people who are clearly a risk? | ||
| And it starts to create the impression that there's something else going on when you see the efforts to frustrate the administration's effort, despite the fact that the administration has made very clear that they are still in a stage in this enforcement campaign where they're prioritizing people who are either convicted of or suspected of committing crimes. | ||
| And one of the reasons for that is that you can have, I think, reasonable debates about the rate of criminality between and among people who are here as immigrants versus the native population and how that breaks down with respect to the different subgroups. | ||
| But at the end of the day, when you have serious crimes being committed by people who are here illegally, those are crimes that we don't need to experience and that we wouldn't be experiencing if we did a better job of enforcing the border. | ||
| And so I think lots of people have a reasonable beef on that front. | ||
| Rafael Manguel, did you agree with the president's decision to pull back on ICE raids in some major industries, farms, hotels, and restaurants? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I think the president has a really tough job to do with respect to prioritizing the limited resources that he has. | |
| So to the extent that this is a function of a calculation that, A, there's a better way to go about addressing certain subpopulations of the illegal immigrant population. | ||
| And B, that there's a bigger payoff to be had for concentrating enforcement in other sectors. | ||
| I think that's a perfectly reasonable decision to make. | ||
| And I think he's probably in the best position to make it. | ||
| We'll go to William, who's in Burlington, North Carolina, independent. | ||
| William, what do you say on this? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I think what we're getting is the same old rhetoric that a lot of the people that support this kind of thing have been saying for months. | |
| They keep talking about all these immigrants creating all these problems and causing all these crimes. | ||
| When you go to Office Depot and you arrest people who are working and contributing to our economy and then call them illegal aliens, which is such a terrible expression, but you turn around and make it sound like there's such demons and they're working and they're paying taxes and they're not receiving the benefits from Social Security, which is the lie that is constantly perpetrated. | ||
| Plus, the person who's doing this, who's leading these, is telling people to do this, is breaking the law every day by not following the Constitution that he took an oath to. | ||
| And ICE just barges into people's homes now. | ||
| They don't have warrants. | ||
| And when you say judiciary warrants, they're not. | ||
| They're not warrants from a judge. | ||
| They're not official warrants in that sense. | ||
| They're done by this Pam Bondi, who, again, is just another lackey. | ||
| So a lot of these people are actually contributors to our society. | ||
| And they're being terrorized. | ||
| The reason immigration is so demonized now is because that's all that you people talk about. | ||
| All right. | ||
| William, let's get a response from our guests. | ||
| Mr. Mangual. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, look, I think the first thing that I would say is that neither working nor paying taxes immunizes someone from immigration enforcement, right? | |
| I mean, the law is the law, and whether or not you have a right to be in this country is an objective legal inquiry. | ||
| And the outcome of that inquiry doesn't change based on your work history, based on your behavior while you were here illegally. | ||
| So that's an important thing to get out of the way. | ||
| With respect to how ICE and BPD has under Border Patrol has undertaken the enforcement efforts, look, to the extent that people have complaints about the constitutionality of the tactics, and we have mechanisms in this country through which to challenge those. | ||
| And I'm sure that those mechanisms will be taken advantage of. | ||
| I'm sure lawsuits will be filed and courts will make appropriate decisions in those cases. | ||
| And I think we have to trust the system to do that. | ||
| What I don't like is this new trend where we're trying to have these legal disputes in the street in the middle of the enforcement actions themselves, which creates a lot of danger, increases the likelihood of a use of force, and requires a bigger showing of force, requires more officers to carry out these detentions. | ||
| And so, look, I think the other thing that you have to understand here is that just because someone is working, it doesn't mean that they don't have a criminal history, doesn't mean that they don't pose an ongoing threat. | ||
| And so I think that's really important. | ||
| When you look at the public support for this, it is very, very broad. | ||
| I mean, the vast majority of the American public supports removing criminal immigrants, criminal aliens. | ||
| And that is, again, a huge part of what's being done now. | ||
| Now, the administration has made clear that if they encounter other people who are here illegally who may not have criminal histories while they are focusing on that sub-criminal population, criminal subpopulation, then they're going to go after those people as well. | ||
| But there's also pretty broad public support for that. | ||
| I think that same Pew Research poll found that about 33% of the American public supports deporting all illegal immigrants regardless of criminal status. | ||
| We'll hear from Richard next. | ||
| Spring Valley, California, Republican. | ||
| Richard, what's your take on the ICE raids and sanctuary policy? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, Rafael, I think you're doing good, man. | |
| I like your attitude. | ||
| Greta, I'm going to have to be honest with you. | ||
| I need a Democrat to call in And tell me why we so worried about Donald Trump. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And he only got four years left. | |
| Actually, he got three left. | ||
| My question is. | ||
| Worried about Donald Trump on immigration? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, but I'm just asking. | |
| We got four years of Donald Trump. | ||
| We had four years of a dead president. | ||
| So now we got a president that I'm saying is trying to do his best for us. | ||
| And what I'm asking you is, can you tell me another country in the world that has black, white, brown, green, Chinese anywhere in the world other than the United States? | ||
| Please have a Democrat call me. | ||
| And Richard, is that a bad or a good thing in your opinion? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I'm just asking. | |
| I'm just asking the man, can we just give the guy his last three years in office? | ||
| All right. | ||
| Understood, Richard, there in Spring Valley. | ||
| Rafael Manguala, the title of your book, Criminal Injustice, what the push for decarceration and depolicing gets wrong and who it hurts the most. | ||
| What did you find out? | ||
| Who does it hurt the most and why? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, who it hurts the most are the very members of the vulnerable communities that a lot of criminal justice reformers have said they speak for. | |
| And that was really what I wanted to get at with that book. | ||
| I mean, there has been a broad push to pull back in criminal justice enforcement, right? | ||
| To lower incarcerated populations, to restrict police power. | ||
| And a lot of that conversation has been driven by viral incidents of police use of force and by a really stubborn and, in my opinion, misguided narrative that the U.S. is a draconian incarceral state. | ||
| And what we've seen in the way of policy movement, particularly between, you know, say 2005 and 2020, was a massive shift to the left in how we do criminal justice in this country. | ||
| We saw many examples of bail reforms and decarceration efforts, decriminalization efforts. | ||
| We saw the prison population decline by about 25% in that period. | ||
| The jail population decline significantly. | ||
| The number of police officers dwindle without investment in reinforcing the ranks. | ||
| And what's happened in the wake of those efforts are crime increases that have not been evenly distributed. | ||
| When you look at what happened in 2015 and 16, and especially in 2020, when we had a 30% increase in homicides across this country, that crime increase disproportionately affected low-income minority communities. | ||
| I mean, black men especially, who found themselves with a homicide victimization rate that was about 10x that of their white male counterparts in this country. | ||
| That's a massive disparity that very few people talk very much about. | ||
| And I think what has made it significantly worse is this sort of posture of de-emphasizing enforcement that we see embedded in movements like the progressive prosecutor movement, but also embedded in ideas like sanctuary city policies, right? | ||
| I mean, it's really kind of all part and parcel of the same ideological disposition, which holds that, you know, enforcement is bad because it produces, you know, negative externalities. | ||
| But the people who make that argument often forget about the positive externalities associated with enforcement. | ||
| And one of the things that we saw in this country, particularly after the mid-1990s, when we saw criminal enforcement really ramped up, we saw massive investments in state and local policing. | ||
| We saw a really sharp increase in the incarcerated population. | ||
| That came with one of the sharpest declines in serious crime that we've ever witnessed as a nation. | ||
| I mean, homicides declined by about 50% between 1990 and 2014. | ||
| And just like the homicide increases of recent years, the homicide decline was also not evenly distributed. | ||
| So if you look at the effect that that had, say, on life expectancy, and you broke it down by race, what you would find is that that homicide decline added about 0.14 years of life expectancy for white males, but it added a full year of life expectancy for black males, which is a massive disparity in terms of the distribution of the benefits associated with enforcement. | ||
| And what I wrote that book to do was to kind of make the case that a lot of people who have been, understandably to some degree, focused on disparities in enforcement and what that says about our criminal justice system, that they have at the same time ignored disparities in the benefits associated with that enforcement. | ||
| And by rolling back, the criminal justice system has sort of systematically denied the most vulnerable communities access to the kind of safety that we know the system can produce if it's allowed to function. | ||
| Rafael Mangual is our guest this morning. | ||
| He's the author of the book Criminal Injustice, and he's also a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. | ||
| We'll go to Detroit. | ||
| Bernice is there, Democratic caller. | ||
| Welcome to the conversation. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, Greta. | |
| And as I was listening, the man that called that said he wanted the Democrat to call in, one was on the line, which is me. | ||
| And I want to say that I'm a very, very strong Democrat, but I'm also a critical thinking human being. | ||
| I agree totally with the gentleman from North Carolina. | ||
| It's just that his topic, his conversation came in on a different line subject than mine. | ||
| And I called to talk about sanctuary cities. | ||
| Go ahead, Bernice. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Sanctuary cities do house illegals and do give illegals a place to live to become. | |
| But sanctuary cities don't house criminals. | ||
| We were not meant to live by executive orders. | ||
| First of all, that's illegal. | ||
| No one is complaining about the things that are done. | ||
| They're complaining about them being done illegally. | ||
| And to watch California and to put riots on the people that are marching Saturday at the No Kings Rally, I watch so many people marching without any problem until law enforcement rolled their horses up on people that was backing down off the steps. | ||
| They never started. | ||
| It was so many of them. | ||
| They were trying to get away from those horses being driven down on them. | ||
| But that's not what your guest saw. | ||
| He saw people rebelling and doing illegal things. | ||
| I've been watching and I haven't seen anything. | ||
| I saw a few cars on fire. | ||
| I'm calling from Detroit. | ||
| I saw a few cars on fire, but they also explained how those few cars got on fire. | ||
| All right, Bernice, let's have our guest respond to your comments. | ||
| Mr. Mangual. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, look, I think it's going to be a tough sell if the argument here is to tell the American public not to believe their lying eyes, right? | |
| I mean, you know, we all saw what happened in Los Angeles. | ||
| We all saw the Waymo cars being stopped in the street and graffitied and broken and set ablaze. | ||
| We all saw crowds of people hurling large rocks onto the pass onto the highway from an overpass at passing police vehicles. | ||
| We all saw Molotov cocktails being prepared and thrown. | ||
| We all saw stores being looted. | ||
| I mean, yes, are there people who are doing peaceful protesting? | ||
| Sure. | ||
| That's always the case, right? | ||
| I mean, nothing is ever 100% of one thing. | ||
| But I think the problem is, though, is that these riots, which are not as isolated as I think a lot of people want to say they are, are becoming an increasingly regular feature of political protest. | ||
| And that is not a positive development. | ||
| Now, to the extent that the argument here is that ICE and Border Patrol are not doing their jobs legally, well, again, we have mechanisms for that, right? | ||
| I mean, this country is not one built on the idea that anytime you don't like what the government does, you get to riot in the street. | ||
| No, we have courts, we have systems through which you can file complaints and try and get restitution for whatever wrongs have been done. | ||
| And I'm sure that there are a lot of people doing just that. | ||
| But what we cannot do is tolerate or excuse the kind of behavior that we saw in Los Angeles. | ||
| We'll go to Bessemer City, North Carolina. | ||
| Mike, a Republican. | ||
| Good morning, Mike. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Greta. | |
| I'm Mr. Raphael. | ||
| How are you? | ||
| I just want to say, you know, the Democrats are always talking about this so-called border bill that they had up above to vote for. | ||
| But you can explain it a lot better than I can, but that was basically an amnesty bill, which allows 1.2 million people in a year, you know, fight at 5,000 a day, then it doesn't away with the Remain in Mexico policy. | ||
| But also, too, you see, the Democrats must be doing some kind of Oscar awards because look at the acting they're doing from the guy in New York who got arrested trying to interfere with the ICE process, the Congress lady from New Jersey, and that big drama thing with Alex Padilla. | ||
| But these people out there. | ||
| All right, Mike, I'm going to have our guests respond to what you said first about this bipartisan Senate bill. | ||
| Rafael Munguel, what was your take on that piece of legislation? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, look, I think, you know, a lot of Republicans had a very legitimate beef. | |
| The argument was whether or not we could get a bill that was going to help reduce the illegal immigrant population. | ||
| I think a lot of people reasonably read the language of that legislation and came to the conclusion that this was really just a bill that would slow the increase of that population, and that wasn't good enough. | ||
| And look, you know, elections have consequences. | ||
| And the political reality was that, you know, the crowd that wanted the most watered-down version of an immigration bill just didn't have the numbers. | ||
| And so the nature of our system is that if you cannot generate broad support for a legislative initiative, that legislative initiative is going to fail. | ||
| You know, I think there are reasonable arguments that can be made on both sides with respect to the particulars of that bill and whether or not we should have considered moving forward with it. | ||
| But at the end of the day, the representatives took positions based on what they were elected by their constituents to do. | ||
| And so, you know, frankly, I think it's on Congress as a whole to get a better bill together. | ||
| But until then, immigration authorities are going to enforce the law as it exists on the books. | ||
| And contrary to what your prior guest said, those laws are not found in executive orders, but in existing legislation. | ||
| We'll go to Michigan. | ||
| Kenneth, Independent, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Go ahead, question or comment. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'd like to ask your guest why it's reckless and dangerous to support the law when the previous administration did not support the law. | |
| Does he feel that was reckless and dangerous? | ||
| I do. | ||
| I wish he could give a good answer, but I don't think he could. | ||
| Well, let's give him a chance. | ||
| Mr. Mongwell. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I'm not sure I understand the question. | |
| I don't think this administration is being reckless in how it enforces immigration law. | ||
| And I do think that the prior administration, the Biden administration, was reckless in how unsecure it left the border. | ||
| So if that was the direction that the caller was going in, I think we agree. | ||
| Howard in North Carolina, Democratic caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, top of the morning. | |
| You know, this gentleman, he's saying a lot of things that really acts as in line with the GOP MAGA Republican. | ||
| But he always saying something about illegal, illegal. | ||
| When the West was one and all those people come over, white people, ran the Indians, reservations, were they illegal people who came in when they or the West was won? | ||
| Illegal, was African Americans or Africans when they were stolen from their country? | ||
| Which one broke the law on that particular issue? | ||
| But here's my question. | ||
| What I would like to ask you: why will a man who had over 60, 70% of Hispanics voting for him, not even thinking about a Democrat, because they touched shoulders with the white man, they felt like the white man loved them. | ||
| And now they're seeing something that's totally different than what they voted for. | ||
| Are you guys happy about what's going on because it's illegal what the president is doing and his staff? | ||
| Mr. Monguel. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, look, I mean, I'm not sure that the Hispanic supporters of Donald Trump were actually taken by surprise at all by the immigration enforcement trends. | |
| I mean, you know, Donald Trump, I think, has been very clear about a few things, but one of the things that he's been incredibly clear about for his entire political career is his stance on immigration. | ||
| And I think that's actually a feature of why a lot of Hispanics ended up supporting him politically. | ||
| I mean, I'm Latino myself. | ||
| You know, so I think it's just worth noting that. | ||
| But, you know, there is a lot of support in the Latino community for stricter immigration enforcement. | ||
| I mean, a lot of the American public that falls into the category of Hispanic or Latino are people who came here or whose parents or grandparents came here legally, who fought and waited to get a visa and followed the path to citizenship and did things the right way. | ||
| And I think a lot of those communities are frustrated when they see people cross the border illegally, undercut wages, and end up making their communities worse off. | ||
| So I think the assumption is just incorrect that the identity of Hispanic somehow predicts where someone's going to stand on immigration efforts. | ||
| And I think that the president's Hispanic supporters were quite aware of what he was going to do on the immigration front and I think largely supported it. | ||
| Ericsson, Alabama, Republican. | ||
| Eric, good morning to you. | ||
| Question or comment here for our guest. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, sir. | |
| To America, I'd like to make some comments. | ||
| One, I live in the South, so my outtake on what it looks like versus the people that are actually living in those areas that are affected by when they come directly into those areas with those jobs and stuff. | ||
| You know, I only see what television shows me. | ||
| Now, if you talk to those people that live out there, those black folks that live out there, they'll tell you those people are being displaced by groups. | ||
| All these people that come in, that's one. | ||
| Two, when they, all Donald Trump is doing, whether you like him or hate him, is the same thing that's being done in any of these other countries. | ||
| You can slip into Germany and you can hide for 30 years. | ||
| When they catch you, they're going to send you back. | ||
| They have immigration policies. | ||
| Is that true? | ||
| Rafael Manguel, you've studied this issue. | ||
| Is that true, how other countries deal with illegal immigrants? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, you know, deportation is not an enforcement mechanism that's unique to the United States. | |
| And there are a lot of countries around the world that would not tolerate anywhere near the level of illegal immigration that has been tolerated in this country, particularly over the last decade. | ||
| I mean, in the United States, I mean, there are places in this country where illegal immigrants are able to get, you know, public benefits, who are given work permits, who are, you know, whose decision to break the law is actively facilitated at several stages. | ||
| You know, so I do think that the contrast can be stark with other countries that would be significantly stricter in terms of how they enforce their own immigration law. | ||
| But I also think that the problem here in the U.S. is always going to be unique because the U.S. is always going to be, or at least, you know, for the foreseeable future, going to be one of the most desired destinations for people from around the world because of the opportunities that are given in this country. | ||
| And that's a beautiful thing. | ||
| And that place as a sort of city on the hill is something that we should preserve. | ||
| But again, we also have to guard against the level of immigration that we have seen. | ||
| I mean, at the end of the day, immigrants will consume resources. | ||
| They will also contribute. | ||
| But the country has a right to decide who comes in, how long they get to stay, and under what circumstances. | ||
| And the idea that people should be able to cross a border irrespective of what the law is and get to stay, even when they've broken that law, really undermines the very concept of what a nation state is. | ||
| Mr. Munguel, on the uniqueness here in the United States, what role do companies play in this uniqueness and their hiring of illegal immigrants? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, I think it's a significant one. | |
| We just saw immigration officials talking earlier this week about how a lot of their enforcement efforts are going to be actually targeting not just individuals who are here legally, but also employers who are benefiting from the ability to pay below market wages to people who are not here illegally and are working under the table. | ||
| I think the word that they used was exploitation. | ||
| And I think that's absolutely something that we ought to be concerned about because I think that there is a role that's played by these companies who are actively courting illegal immigration labor so that they can get an advantage in the marketplace. | ||
| Kate in Adrian, Michigan, Democratic Caller. | ||
| Hi, Kate. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| I've called this program before and spoken about how enhanced I feel our community is because I live in a town of 20,000 people and probably 40% are Hispanic. | ||
| And we love every part of that. | ||
| I never feel afraid. | ||
| But the other day, what happened to our community, I'd like to know what you think about this. | ||
| A family was going to Dollar General to buy things for their child's case, Seniora. | ||
| Unmarked cars pulled them out of their cars. | ||
| They were masked men dressed like my husband, like a regular guy. | ||
| They took these guys, they put them in handcuffs and took them away. | ||
| The children were crying, the women were screaming, and the community was outraged. | ||
| There was no due process. | ||
| We do not know where those people are. | ||
| And they have been in this community for years and have served wonderfully for us. | ||
| And then we went to have lunch in the Mexican restaurant. | ||
| There were two men in there filming everybody in the Mexican restaurant. | ||
| So what do you think about that? | ||
| And I just want to know what happened to due process. | ||
| Yeah, I mean, look, I don't think that there's any evidence where you can suggest that there was no due process in those cases. | ||
| I mean, you know, the fact is that people are arrested in this country every day for all kinds of offenses. | ||
| You know, they see the judge after the arrest is made. | ||
| You know, so for a lot of individuals who are being taken by immigration authorities, these are individuals that have already been identified for removal, that have already been processed. | ||
| And now immigration and customs enforcement are looking for those individuals so that when they find them, they can carry out those arrests pursuant to the process that's already taking place. | ||
| JC in Richmond, Virginia, Independent, question or comment here this morning for our guest. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, my question is, this is a quote from our great farmers, and people in the hotel have been stating that very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long workers away from them. | |
| Those jobs are almost impossible to replace. | ||
| We're going to have to do something about that. | ||
| They've been over here for 20 years. | ||
| They're good people. | ||
| This wasn't made by Joe Biden. | ||
| This comment was made by Donald Trump. | ||
| And so he's reversing his own actions based on his consensus of his voters to support. | ||
| So in actuality, is Donald Trump creating sanctuary cities and Republican areas about doing this because he's not applying the law towards everybody? | ||
| It seems like he's only going out to Democrat cities, but illegals that help out farmers and stuff, he's going to give a pass to that. | ||
| So in essence, is he actually creating sanctuary cities in red states? | ||
| Yeah, I'm not sure I would characterize it that way. | ||
| I think right now it's still just a different prioritization of enforcement and where it's going to be. | ||
| I mean, at the end of the day, the federal government has limited enforcement resources. | ||
| And so I think it's perfectly rational to concentrate those resources in places where the government thinks that there's going to be a bigger public safety payoff. | ||
| Now, I think that the president is right to be responsive to concerns from certain constituents. | ||
| But I wouldn't liken that to the kind of sanctuary city policies that we see. | ||
| I mean, first off, sanctuary city policies largely refer to policies of refusing to cooperate with requests to deport people who have been convicted of crime or not convicted of a crime, but charged with a crime. | ||
| And so I don't think that the president is saying that we shouldn't deport people Who are criminals, but who happen to work in these industries. | ||
| So I do think that there's a distinction. | ||
| And I think a lot of people would like to see some kind of legislative compromise that accommodates the industries that are being heavily affected or that could be heavily affected. | ||
| But that's a job for Congress. | ||
| Rafael Mangual is the author of the book Criminal Injustice and a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. | ||
| Thank you for the conversation this morning with our viewers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you so much. | |
| Later on this morning, after a short break, the Washington Journal will have a conversation with syndicated talk show host and author Tavis Smiley. | ||
| He'll be joining us from Los Angeles. | ||
| We'll talk about the immigration protests going on in his city and the significance of today's Juneteenth holiday. | ||
| That conversation in our last hour of the Washington Journal after the break coming up will be an open forum. | ||
| Any public policy or political issue on your mind, there are the numbers. | ||
| Start dialing in now. | ||
| We'll get to that conversation in just a minute. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Book TV, every Sunday on C-SPAN 2, features leading authors discussing their latest nonfiction books. | |
| Here's a look at what's coming up this weekend. | ||
| At 1:15 p.m. Eastern, University of Richmond School of Law professor Karina Lane, with her book Secrets of the Killing State, takes a critical look at the use of lethal injection as a method of capital punishment and argues that it's more brutal than is widely understood. | ||
| Then at 4:15 p.m. Eastern, Book TV's coverage of the 2025 Gold Coast Book Fair from Oyster Bay, Long Island. | ||
| Authors discuss Long Island history, American myths, the creation of New York City, and World War II spies. | ||
| And at 8 p.m. Eastern, Chef Jose Andres with his book, Change the Recipe, on the life lessons he's learned through the World Central Kitchen, a nonprofit he founded in 2010 to feed people in conflict and disaster zones. | ||
| Watch Book TV every Sunday on C-SPAN 2 and find a full schedule in your program guide or watch online anytime at booktv.org. | ||
| I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to SRES 259. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The clerk will report. | |
| Senate Resolution 259, recognizing June 2nd, 2025, as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN chronicling democracy in the Senate. | ||
| By a unanimous vote, the United States Senate passed a resolution honoring C-SPAN's four decades covering the Senate. | ||
| The resolution thanked cable and satellite operators for providing C-SPAN as a public service to the country. | ||
| C-SPAN does not receive one penny of taxpayer dollars, is funded primarily from satellite and cable providers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And called on all television providers, including streaming services, to deliver C-SPAN as well. | |
| We're at a different stage in our history, and a lot of people are seeing their news this way, so we need to expand it and make sure we're on all of those platforms, as well as the ones we already are on. | ||
| So thank you again to Senator Grassley for working with me to highlight C-SPAN's critical role. | ||
| And thanks to everyone who has had a hand in C-SPAN's success. | ||
|
unidentified
|
There are many ways to listen to C-SPAN radio anytime, anywhere. | |
| In the Washington, D.C. area, listen on 90.1 FM. | ||
| Use our free C-SPAN Now app or go online to c-span.org/slash radio on SiriusXM Radio on channel 455, the TuneIn app, and on your smart speaker by simply saying play C-SPAN radio. | ||
| Hear our live call-in program, Washington Journal, daily at 7 a.m. Eastern. | ||
| Listen to House and Senate proceedings, committee hearings, news conferences, and other public affairs events live throughout the day. | ||
| And for the best way to hear what's happening in Washington with fast-paced reports, live interviews, and analysis of the day. | ||
| Catch Washington today, weekdays of 5 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern. | ||
| Listen to C-SPAN programs on C-SPAN Radio anytime, anywhere. | ||
| C-SPAN, Democracy Unfiltered. | ||
| Washington Journal continues. | ||
| Welcome back, and we are in open forum here for the next 45 minutes in the Washington Journal. | ||
| Any public policy debate or political that is on your mind, we will take this this morning in the 45 minutes, and we can begin with the president's decision on whether or not to strike Iran. | ||
| The Wall Street Journal this morning, Israel-Iran trade fire today as the U.S. weighs its options. | ||
| The president privately approved of attack plans for Iran, but is holding off on giving the final order. | ||
| Here he is in the Oval Office yesterday. | ||
| I have ideas as to what to do, but I haven't made a final. | ||
| I like to make the final decision one second before it's due, you know, because things change. | ||
| I mean, especially with war. | ||
| Things change with war. | ||
| It can go from one extreme to the other. | ||
|
unidentified
|
War is very bad. | |
| The president this morning from Reuters is keeping the world guessing about U.S. military action against Iran. | ||
| We'll take your thoughts on that this morning, as well as other policy debates, including a poll in the USA today, a story about a poll in the USA today about the majority of Americans opposing the GOP tax and spending cuts bill. | ||
| A majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of President Donald Trump's sweeping tax policy bill, according to from the nonpartisan health research group, KFF. | ||
| The bill would extend Trump's 2017 tax cuts, implement new tax cuts for tips and overtime, pour billions into the administration's deportation plans, and make cuts to Medicaid and food stamps. | ||
| It is expected to be the biggest legislative accomplishment of Trump's second term. | ||
| And a majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of it, 64%. | ||
| You can talk about that legislation as well here in open forum this morning. | ||
| The Supreme Court also, with a big decision yesterday from its term, upholding the gender care ban out of Tennessee in a six to three ruling. | ||
| It said that minors can be denied access. | ||
| Alexander in White Plains, Maryland Democratic Caller Alexander, what's on your mind? | ||
|
unidentified
|
What's on my mind is, number one, I can't understand why anybody would believe anything That comes out of the Trump administration because everything has been proven, just about everything has been proven to be false or some kind of distortion of truth. | |
| The other thing is this thing with Israel and Iran, of course, Trump knew about it. | ||
| They don't do anything like that without having some kind of dialogue between each other to see what the fallout might be as a result of taking such a horrendous action. | ||
| Alexander, the New York Times reports that Israel has been planning this since December, and that in February, during the first couple months of the president's second term, Netanyahu was one of the first visitors to the White House, and he laid out the case against, laid out the case for an attack on Iran and its nuclear program. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay. | |
| So that just confirms what I'm saying: there's no way they could have been planning this thing since December, and the administration doesn't know anything about it. | ||
| They tried to say that they didn't know anything, just like Trump said he didn't know anything or he had nothing to do with Project 2025. | ||
| This guy is a liar, a thief. | ||
| He's stealing all the money he can from the American people when he talks about, well, we're not going to touch Medicaid. | ||
| We're not going to touch Medicaid. | ||
| We're not going to touch any of these programs that are helpful to people that we fought years and years and years to try to put in place so we would have a safety net as people who pay taxes in this country and deserve to have some safety net instead of being laying on the street with no means of being able to take care of ourselves or anything like that. | ||
| And what's going to happen to people when they get so old they can't take care of themselves and they can't get into a nursing home. | ||
| This guy is really a dangerous person. | ||
| And people need to realize whether they're Democrat or Republican or anything in between, they need to get information. | ||
| They really need to understand that when these people lie, and then this guy you just had on recently, and he filibusted on every answer. | ||
| You know, he went on two, three minutes on every answer so that nobody would have time to call in and challenge him. | ||
| I wish there would be people to call and challenge these people who actually know the issues. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| I understood, Alexander, Alexander, there in Missouri. | ||
| Now, on the president's decision here and the role that Israel played, the New York Times, how Trump shifted on Iran under pressure from Israel. | ||
| They said that at one end of the spectrum for the United States, was sitting back and doing nothing and then deciding on next steps once it became clear how much Iran had been weakened by the attack. | ||
| At the other end was joining Israel in the military assault, possibly to the point of forcing regime change in Iran. | ||
| Mr. Trump chose a middle course, offering Israel as yet undisclosed support from the U.S. intelligence community to carry out its attack and then turning up the pressure on Tehran to give immediate concessions at the negotiating table or face continued military onslaught. | ||
| Five days after Israel launched its attack, Mr. Trump's posture continues to gyrate. | ||
| The administration at first distanced itself from the strikes, then grew more publicly supportive as Israel's initial military success became evident. | ||
| That's the New York Times reporting this morning. | ||
| Linda in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania, Republican. | ||
| Linda, what is on your mind this morning? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, thank you for taking my call. | |
| I wish that I took your screen as Ken. | ||
| But the thing that makes me so angry is I wanted to ask some questions. | ||
| Linda, I apologize. | ||
| It is too difficult to understand you. | ||
| Please call back on a better line. | ||
| Jared in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Independent. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Joining Israel. | |
| Yeah, hi. | ||
| This is Jared. | ||
| First, I want to say that I really, really, really big up C-SPAN. | ||
| You've been on for a long time, and you really are a truthful channel. | ||
| And I just want to pick you up, first of all. | ||
| What we're not, no one's talking about is Project 2025, because Project 2025 is playing out right now. | ||
| And the president said he did, and he was against it. | ||
| He didn't know much about it. | ||
| And yet, many of the people that wrote Project 2025 are in his administration. | ||
| And the number one problem in the world today is the United States does not want a dictator. | ||
| Everything the administration is doing with law firms, universities, everything is towards a dictatorship. | ||
| All right, Jared, I'm going to leave it there and ask that you and others turn down, mute your television when you call in, listen and talk through your phone. | ||
| Randy, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Republican. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| Morning, Randy. | ||
| Yeah, I think Trump's weak on Russia. | ||
| He needs to give Ukraine enough weapons to chase the Russians back to Russia. | ||
| Now, yes, he should take out that nuclear plan. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Okay, you think that he should use B-2 bombers to take them out? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, the one nuclear plan, he should take it out. | |
| And what would that do? | ||
| Do you have any concerns, Randy, about that escalating the situation in an attack by Iran? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, no. | |
| We got enough weapons to defend ourselves over there. | ||
| Any time to tackle trees, we take them out. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| That's Randy's thoughts there in South Carolina. | ||
| Headline in the New York Times this morning, Iran threatens irreparable damage, it says, if U.S. intervenes in conflict. | ||
| The Supreme Leader posting this on X, it isn't wise to tell the Iranian nation to surrender. | ||
| What should the Iranian nation surrender to? | ||
| We will never surrender in response to the attacks of anyone. | ||
| This is the logic of the Iranian nation. | ||
| This is the spirit of the Iranian nation. | ||
| That is what their Supreme Leader, Khamini, had to say yesterday. | ||
| Let's go to Judy in Ortonville, Michigan, Democratic Caller. | ||
| Judy, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Just to talk about the immigrants, one thing that guy was saying. | ||
| My problem with it is sending people to other countries when they sent all the Venezuelans, as they said, to El Salvador. | ||
| I think that's awful. | ||
| And I also feel that people that have visas, they shouldn't be taken away without their knowledge. | ||
| And they're arresting people for not crimes, but because of what they believe and what they've stood for. | ||
| And the only regime change I see that should be taken care of is in Israel. | ||
| That country needs to change. | ||
| It's awful. | ||
| The Palestinians, now the Iranians. | ||
| I don't understand how we've stood back and allowed this to happen to people. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Judy there in Michigan. | ||
| We'll go to Glendale, who's in Slidell, Louisiana, Democratic caller. | ||
| Your turn. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, this is Glendale Laurent from Slidell, Louisiana. | |
| I'm calling about this false premise about Christianity in our country. | ||
| We say we are a good Christian people, but we always for wars and hatred amongst each other. | ||
| We say, God says to love thy neighbor as we love Jesus. | ||
| And although we're supposed to love Jesus, we don't show love to Jesus by hating your neighbor. | ||
| Your neighbor is just like you are. | ||
| He's Christ-like, no matter what crime he did or no matter what he does in life. | ||
| God created him in God's image, not in man's image. | ||
| And we want to stop putting down everybody, each other. | ||
| We should show love one to another. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| All right. | ||
| That was Glendale in Slidell, Louisiana. | ||
| This morning, new poll out on the Republicans and the president's spending and tax cuts legislation, the so-called big, beautiful bill, as President Trump refers to it. | ||
| This is from Punch Bowl News this morning. | ||
| The Republicans, Republicans know they have a big, beautiful problem. | ||
| The centerpiece of President Donald Trump agenda is polling like garbage. | ||
| Public surveys from this month paint a grim picture for the GOP's most important legislative push of the 119th Congress. | ||
| A plurality of Americans oppose the GOP reconciliation bill. | ||
| Just 67 percent of Republicans support the package. | ||
| 71 percent of independents have an unfavorable view of the effort. | ||
| In other words, it's not only Democrats that don't like the bill, it's independents and Republicans too. | ||
| In case you aren't great at math, this is bad. | ||
| And instead of spending all their time selling the bill publicly, Hill Republicans remain locked in an internal struggle over its particulars, with the stakes enormously high, both politically and policy-wise. | ||
| A handful of conservatives, Representative Chip Roy of Texas, along with Senators Ram Paul of Kentucky and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, are saying the bill, as currently written, is fatally flawed. | ||
| We also reported Wednesday's p.m. edition that Speaker Mike Johnson wasn't kept in the loop about the drastic changes that Senate Republicans made to the Medicaid provider tax, a provision that could reduce funding for rural hospitals. | ||
| The larger question for Trump and Hill Republicans is this. | ||
| Is the one big beautiful a replay of what Obamacare or Build Back Better was for Democrats? | ||
| Is it a bill that's so large, complex, and all-encompassing that it's impossible to sell? | ||
| Top House Republicans worry right now that Democrats are beating them to the punch in defining what the bill does and doesn't do. | ||
| That conversation on the table this morning in open forum as well. | ||
| John in New York, Independent. | ||
| Good morning, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| I'm listening to this last thing about the Democratic Party. | ||
| You're reading this article from your, I guess, the left-wing media outlet. | ||
| Do you have any articles that are telling us how well the Democratic Party is doing in the polls and how much their party loves all the things that they're doing right now? | ||
| Or is it just the Republicans that you want to pick on today? | ||
| But okay, let's let that go. | ||
| The thing that's going on there in the Middle East with whether the bombs should be dropped, Biden was in office for four years. | ||
| Two of these things occurred during his administration. | ||
| The invasion by Russia into Ukraine and also The terrible things that when the in Gaza with the Israel and the murder of their people, and that started that war. | ||
| So I guess, you know, I guess Trump inherited this mess. | ||
| He's only been in office, I'm going to guess, five months, January, February, March, April, May. | ||
| Okay, maybe five, six months. | ||
| I think it'd be a great idea if maybe you took the time or one of the left-wing media outlets would to contact maybe Joe Biden, who was the president for four years in his administration, and asked him, well, since this all occurred during his administration, maybe they could offer some good advice because obviously your Democratic callers are very upset with Trump and they think that he's doing it all wrong. | ||
| He's a dictator. | ||
| He's this, that, and the other thing. | ||
| So I think just out of courtesy to all your Democratic callers, I think you ought to find out if you can contact one of the Biden administration people to bring it in and maybe offer some advice to Donald Trump and see how he, you know, how maybe make recommendations to say how they were going to handle this whole mess. | ||
| All right, John there in New York. | ||
| And John, here are some polling numbers that you may like. | ||
| This is also in Punch Bull News. | ||
| A recent poll of competitive seats that showed that removing undocumented immigration from Medicaid polled at 82%. | ||
| So these are popular provisions in the Big Beautiful Bill. | ||
| Taking dead people off Medicaid rolls polled at 86%. | ||
| And the Republicans' new Medicaid work requirements polls at 72%. | ||
| So the NRCC, the NRSC, those are the campaign wings of the House and the Senate Republican parties are begging their rank and file to go out and sell these popular provisions of the Big Beautiful Bill. | ||
| Charlie in Charlotte, North Carolina, Republican? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Morning, Greta. | |
| Hey, I had a couple of things. | ||
| On this Juneteenth, I would like to recommend that you bring a guy named Coleman Hughes on Washington Journal to discuss racial politics. | ||
| His new book is Colorblind, The End to Racial Politics. | ||
| He's been interviewed by commentators like Bill Maher, Margaret Hoover, Joe Rogan, kind of a diverse group there. | ||
| As you well know, the NAACP has just announced that for the first time in 116 years, they're not going to invite the president to come to their meeting in Charlotte. | ||
| So Trump is not invited. | ||
| And then in another bit of news, the United Methodists are having regional conferences this week around the country. | ||
| They're going to be voting on a resolution to put in their discipline that this would condemn a destructive current day, present-day white supremacy, white privilege, institutional, and systemic white racism and colonialism. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| Charlie, and that author you're talking about was on book TV, and you can go to our website, cspan.org, to find that. | ||
| And then also just a headline to share with you what Charlie was talking about. | ||
| This is from the Associated Press. | ||
| Donald Trump is the first president in 116 years to not be invited to the NAACP convention. | ||
| Miriam in Grovetown, Georgia, Democratic caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, good morning, my 30 days. | |
| One of the things that isn't talked about a lot, and I went to, you know, you keep seeing this pro-Israel on corporate media, and it's every politician is all for Israel. | ||
| So I went to openseecrets.org to see just how much money does the Israeli AIPAC lobby give to our politicians. | ||
| And I was really, really surprised. | ||
| At least, I mean, the numbers of politicians, it was almost like every single politician is getting money from Israel. | ||
| So I thought, well, no wonder they're out there pushing the Israel line. | ||
| And then I thought, and this is something I can't find, and maybe you can, how many have dual citizenship that are in Israel? | ||
| I mean, American Israel, because it really does seem like Israel is sort of leading us. | ||
| And maybe we should make Israel the 51st state. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Miriam's thoughts there in Grovetown, Georgia, Democratic Caller. | ||
| Happening in Washington today at 9 a.m. Eastern Time, actually, this is Tampa, Florida. | ||
| U.S. Conference of Mayors annual meeting is taking place. | ||
| We will have coverage of that here on the C-SPAN networks on C-SPAN 2 at 9 a.m. Eastern Time on C-SPAN Now, our free video mobile app, and as well as online on demand at c-span.org. | ||
| At 1 p.m. Eastern Time, the White House will hold a briefing with the press secretary, and we will have coverage of that. | ||
| You can watch that free on C-SPAN Now video app or online at c-SPAN.org as well as here on C-SPAN. | ||
| And then at 8 p.m. tonight, it's a discussion on climate justice and health in the black community with talk show host Tava Smiley, who's our guest coming up here on the Washington Journal, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, former independent presidential candidate Cornell West, and others. | ||
| And it's hosted by KBLA Radio in Los Angeles. | ||
| Watch it at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free video mobile app or online at c-span.org. | ||
| Let's go to Charlie here in Rosalind Heights, New York, Independent. | ||
| Hi, Charlie. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, how you doing? | |
| How you doing? | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| I'd like to touch on two quick issues. | ||
| Please don't forget about Netanyahu, who's committing genocide against the Palestinian people right now, who happens to be an international criminal. | ||
| Okay? | ||
| I want to jump over to the immigrant issue right now. | ||
| I don't hear any truth on this. | ||
| It seems like the facts are like illegal immigrants, also known as undocumented immigrants, pay taxes. | ||
| Not only do they pay taxes, they get nothing for those taxes. | ||
| We're very privileged as Americans. | ||
| For how to work, we get food stamps. | ||
| They don't get food stamps. | ||
| Okay? | ||
| I don't understand how this is being turned around and nobody's talking about the facts about this. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Charlie, with two issues there. | ||
| Bill in Santa Barbara, California, Republican. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Bill. | |
| Yeah. | ||
| I wish everybody could have seen Steve Bannon on the monitor breakfast. | ||
| That answered a lot of questions. | ||
| But one of the things he brought up, why are we trusting Israeli intelligence since October 7th was the biggest intelligence failure since 9-11? | ||
| And also, he called out the UN for not forking up money to be a respected force enough to keep Putin out of Ukraine. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Bill, and we covered that conversation at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast here in Washington yesterday with Steve Bannon. | ||
| And you can find that on our website, c-span.org, or online on our, or a free video mobile app, I should say, C-SPAN Now. | ||
| In economic news yesterday, we heard from the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. | ||
| The president has been pressuring him to reduce interest rates. | ||
| Here's what he had to say about keeping them steady. | ||
| My colleagues and I remain squarely focused on achieving our dual mandate goals of maximum employment and stable prices for the benefit of the American people. | ||
| Despite elevated uncertainty, the economy is in a solid position. | ||
| The unemployment rate remains low, and the labor market is at or near maximum employment. | ||
| Inflation has come down a great deal, but has been running somewhat above our 2% longer-run objective. | ||
| In support of our goals, today the Federal Open Market Committee decided to leave our policy interest rate unchanged. | ||
| We believe that the current stance of monetary policy leaves us well positioned to respond in a timely way to potential economic developments. | ||
| Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell yesterday announcing that interest rates would stay unchanged here at his news conference that he holds after the Federal Reserve Board meets. | ||
| Also, happening in Washington, in case you missed it, the Senate adjourned for the week yesterday, and we made a little news of our own. | ||
| A resolution was approved by, and it was offered by Senators Chuck Rassley and Amy Klobuchar to recognize June 2nd, 2025 as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN, chronicling democracy in the Senate. | ||
| And the resolution called on all television providers, including streaming services, to make delivery of C-SPAN a priority so Americans can watch Congress in action in real time. | ||
| Here's a little bit of the floor. | ||
| I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to SRES 259. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The clerk report. | |
| Senate Resolution 259, recognizing June 2nd, 2025, as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN chronicling democracy in the Senate. | ||
| Sarah Cutcher will proceed with the measure. | ||
| Is there an objection to proceeding to the measure? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Without objection. | |
| Without objection? | ||
| The committee is discharged and the Senate will proceed. | ||
| On the U.S. Senate floor yesterday, again, that is Senate Resolution 259. | ||
| If you're interested in reading more, it chronicles and marks the anniversary of C-SPAN 2 and our coverage of the Senate by calling on all TV providers, including streaming services, to offer C-SPAN. | ||
| Let's go to Scott, who's in Hutchinson, Kansas, Democratic Collar. | ||
| Hi, Scott. | ||
| Good morning to you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Greta. | |
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| I really, really appreciate C-SPAN with all the diverse views. | ||
| I have two small issues. | ||
| One is the cutting of meals on wheels and some of the programs to help feed children while cutting taxes at the very top level, 1,000 people, would be, they were saying $120 billion. | ||
| That number could be wrong, but it was in the billions, many, many billions. | ||
| And at the same time, some older people, that is the only meal they get that day in a rural community, people that can't get out. | ||
| To cut that wheels-on-meals while giving many billions on the top 1,000 families, it seems to me they could start chipping at that, saying, oh, let's keep kids' meals. | ||
| Let's keep meals on wheels and take away those costs from the upper part of the tax cuts. | ||
| All right, Scott, there in Kansas on this so-called big beautiful bill. | ||
| That's what the president calls the GOP tax and spending cuts legislation. | ||
| The Senate will pick that up on the floor next week. | ||
| Tune into C-SPAN 2 for our gabble-a-gavel coverage of that debate. | ||
| We're going to take a break when we come back. | ||
| Syndicated Talk Show host and author Tavis Smiley will be here with his take on the political news of the day, including the significance of today's Juneteenth holiday. | ||
| We'll be right back. | ||
| I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to SRES 259. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The clerk will report. | |
| Senate Resolution 259, recognizing June 2nd, 2025, as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN chronicling democracy in the Senate. | ||
| By a unanimous vote, the United States Senate passed a resolution honoring C-SPAN's four decades covering the Senate. | ||
| The resolution thanked cable and satellite operators for providing C-SPAN as a public service to the country. | ||
| C-SPAN does not receive one penny of taxpayer dollars, is funded primarily from satellite and cable providers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And called on all television providers, including streaming services, to deliver C-SPAN as well. | |
| We're at a different stage in our history, and a lot of people are seeing their news this way, so we need to expand it and make sure we're on all of those platforms, as well as the ones we already are on. | ||
| So thank you again to Senator Grassley for working with me to highlight C-SPAN's critical role. | ||
| And thanks to everyone who has had a hand in C-SPAN's success. | ||
| It's a story from the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. | ||
| The book by Claire Hoffman is called Sister Center: The Miraculous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Amy Semple McPherson. | ||
| FSG, the publisher, further emphasizes that the story is, quote, the dramatic rise, disappearance, and near fall of a woman called Sister Amy who changed the world. | ||
| Author Claire Hoffman, who has a master's in religion from the University of Chicago, says Amy Semple McPherson may not be known to many today, but she was a global star at the inception of global media. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Claire Hoffman with her book, Sister Center, The Miraculous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Amy Semple McPherson on this episode of Book Notes Plus with our host Brian Lamb. | |
| BookNotes Plus is available on the C-SPAN Now free mobile app or wherever you get your podcasts. | ||
| Washington Journal continues. | ||
| We are back here with Tavis Smiley, Syndicated Talk Show host and author. | ||
| Mr. Smiley, I want to begin with front page of USA Today, Juneteenth celebrations, Communities Keeping Rich Traditions Alive. | ||
| What does Juneteenth mean to you and how do you celebrate? | ||
|
unidentified
|
First of all, Greta, thank you for having me on. | |
| It's a pleasure to be with you once again. | ||
| Juneteenth is ultimately about freedom. | ||
| By any other definition, that's what it's really about, freedom. | ||
| And there will be all kinds of celebrations and commemorations all across the country today here in Los Angeles. | ||
| We are celebrating the fourth anniversary of this talk station, this black talk station. | ||
| There are thousands of talk stations across the country, but literally about five or six black-owned talk stations, black-operated talk stations. | ||
| We're pleased to be one of those, the only one, frankly, west of the Mississippi. | ||
| And so we launched this station four years ago on this day. | ||
| I figured if we're going to be a black talk station, we might as well launch on a day that has meaning and purpose and value. | ||
| And so today is literally literally the fourth anniversary of KBLA Talk 1580, based in LA, but heard across the country. | ||
| So we have a huge celebration today of the work and witness that we are attempting to do every single day, but also celebrating this day again, to my mind, in a word that is ultimately about freedom. | ||
| The scary part of these commemoration celebrations today is that one could argue that in many respects, Greta, this America that we now occupy is less free than it was even 10, 15, 20 years ago. | ||
| We are in the midst, as you well know, of the month of June, and all of these Supreme Court decisions starting yesterday are coming out. | ||
| We expect more of these rulings that we're watching live coverage of on C-SPAN over the next few weeks. | ||
| And this country is always at its best when it's expanding rights. | ||
| That's what Juneteenth was about, expanding the rights, expanding freedom for my people. | ||
| And so America is always at her best when we're expanding rights, not when we're shrinking. | ||
| But with each passing day, it seems, this Supreme Court, the Trump administration, and so many other ways, we see America contracting and not expanding when it comes to the rights of everyday people. | ||
| So on the one hand, it is a day of commemoration, a day of celebration. | ||
| On the other hand, a day of reminding us how far we have to go. | ||
| This democracy, in many ways, I believe, is fragile. | ||
| And it's up to us to save this experiment in democracy. | ||
| And now is a good time for us to take that mission more seriously, I think. | ||
| KBLA radio station out of Los Angeles, that's where you are this morning. | ||
| What are you hearing from your viewers, your listeners on the immigration protests in that city? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Last night, when we recorded this conversation that you and I will discuss later about climate justice plus black health, our second year doing a climate justice symposium on C-SPAN, and for that, we're grateful that C-SPAN covered this again this year. | |
| So last night, to your question, Greta, our mayor, Karen Bass, joined us to welcome the national audience. | ||
| You will see that program tonight on C-SPAN at 8 p.m. Eastern. | ||
| I know we'll talk about it later, but since you asked, we recorded it live here last night in L.A. in front of an amazing audience. | ||
| And Mayor Bass showed up last night and had a few words to say about this. | ||
| So the nation will hear her talk about this issue specifically as the mayor of the city tonight on C-SPAN. | ||
| But I can tell you now that she is none too happy with the way that the Trump administration moved against her wishes, against the wishes of the governor of this state, Gavin Newsom, to send those National Guards troops, to send those Marines here to Los Angeles. | ||
| It was just yesterday, I recall, that she finally canceled the curfew. | ||
| There had been a curfew, Greta, in downtown L.A. for some days, but she canceled that curfew yesterday. | ||
| So, you know, it's not as if things were ever out of control here anyway. | ||
| We've got thousands of sheriffs and thousands of police and thousands of state police. | ||
| We have more than enough law enforcement in this city, in this county, in this state to handle any protests that might have gotten out of control. | ||
| But Donald Trump, again, against the wishes of our democratically elected leaders, forced those troops down our throats. | ||
| And they were really doing much of nothing, just sitting around guarding federal buildings at which nothing was happening. | ||
| It was a horrible waste of taxpayer money. | ||
| You saw Pete Heckseth here on C-SPAN, the Defense Secretary, talk about the fact that they were spending about $135 million to send those troops to L.A. and we did not need them. | ||
| And so things were never completely, never really out of control in the first place. | ||
| But things are as calm now as they ever have been. | ||
| Again, the curfew has ended. | ||
| And so it seems like we're making progress in this regard, but it shouldn't have taken the governor of California having to sue the Trump administration over these guards and Marines that we never wanted or needed here in the first place, Greta. | ||
| President Trump yesterday once again defended his decision to send the National Guard to Los Angeles. | ||
| This is what he had to say. | ||
| I'll tell you one thing. | ||
| If I didn't bring in the military to Los Angeles, you wouldn't even have a sit. | ||
| You probably wouldn't be here. | ||
| You'd be covering the riots in Los Angeles right now. | ||
| We got a great ruling, as you know, yesterday from the judge. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Absolutely. | |
| If we didn't bring in the military in Los Angeles, you would have maybe no city. | ||
| You'd have just what you have with the housing burned to the ground. | ||
|
unidentified
|
How will you ensure that? | |
| Tavis Smiley, no city if he had not sent the National Guard. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, Donald Trump doing what Donald Trump does, this God complex he has, that he is the savior of all. | |
| And but for him, the world is going to hell in a handbasket. | ||
| And so we should be thanking God today on Juneteenth that Donald Trump saved the city of Los Angeles. | ||
| That is the narrative, ridiculous as it, though, as ridiculous as it sounds, that is the narrative that Donald Trump wants to advance, that he saved the city of Los Angeles. | ||
| I'm not naive about this. | ||
| California is a big prize. | ||
| It's a big blue prize. | ||
| And Donald Trump has this penchant for taking on the biggest person, the biggest institution in the room, so as to make a point to others that if I can do it to them, I will do it to you. | ||
| It's the reason he's going after Harvard in the way that he has, to take down the granddaddy of these academic institutions. | ||
| It's the reason why he's behaving or misbehaving, as it were, when it comes to California. | ||
| No naivete here. | ||
| Again, California is a huge political prize. | ||
| And so he has taken it upon himself to smack down California and our Democratic elected officials. | ||
| He has no love for California whatsoever. | ||
| And so for him to suggest that were it for these troops, were it for these Marines who absolutely did nothing, they did absolutely nothing. | ||
| So what he believes in his mind that he did to save the city of LA is absurd. | ||
| What he did was waste people's money. | ||
| $135 million, I repeat, was the initial number. | ||
| That number likely has gone up. | ||
| But that's what he did. | ||
| He wasted taxpayer money. | ||
| He wasted the time of these persons who, again, sat around and did much of anything, much of nothing. | ||
| And so again, it's just Donald Trump's Godplex, God complex, suggesting that were it not for him, America would just fall flat. | ||
| And so one has to take those words with a grain of salt. | ||
| But it's just not true. | ||
| Donald Trump continues to be the liar in chief. | ||
| I'll leave it there. | ||
| As you said, Karen Bows, the LA mayor, attended your event on black health and climate yesterday evening. | ||
| We covered it, and that's going to air at 8 p.m. tonight on C-SPAN. | ||
| You can also watch it on C-SPAN now or free video mobile app or online on demand at c-span.org. | ||
| What is this event, Tavis Smiley? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, Greta. | |
| So last year, we assigned ourselves here in Los Angeles at this station, KBLA, to put climate justice, climate equity, climate resilience higher on the American agenda. | ||
| I believe that there are so many issues that threaten our democracy. | ||
| Dr. Cornell West, who you will see on C-SPAN as a part of this conversation tonight as well, wrote a book with me. | ||
| I was honored to write a book with him, I should say, some years ago. | ||
| That book was called The Rich and the Rest of Us. | ||
| It went to top of the New York Times bestseller list, I'm honored to say, a book about poverty that goes on the bestseller list. | ||
| So people were really fascinated by this issue some years ago. | ||
| And we argued in that book a number of things, not the least of which is that poverty is a threat to the very existence of this democracy. | ||
| And I tend to call it, Greta, more often an experiment in democracy. | ||
| To my mind, we have a Madisonian framework for democracy. | ||
| We've not quite as yet achieved that. | ||
| So it really is an experiment in democracy more than it is, in fact, a democracy. | ||
| That said, poverty is one of the greatest threats to our democracy. | ||
| And we wrote that book, I guess, over 10 or 12 years ago. | ||
| I could add to that list these days a number of issues that I also think are rather intractable in some ways that are threats to the existence of this very democracy. | ||
| Poverty is at the top of the list, but certainly climate justice, climate equity, climate resilience now has risen so much higher on that list. | ||
| One does not need to be a rocket scientist to look around every single day as we are now entering hurricane season, just reading about this new hurricane that's about to hit Mexico as a category four. | ||
| So we're going to see a busy hurricane season. | ||
| We see tornadoes in all kinds of strange and bizarre places. | ||
| The heat index, of course, is rising every single day. | ||
| And never mind those Republicans in the House and the Senate who want to deny the science. | ||
| The data is incontrovertible. | ||
| Something is wrong. | ||
| And so much of this is man-made when it comes to the way our environment is maltreating us these days because we for so long have maltreated it. | ||
| One of the guests on our program tonight on our panel is Ben Jellis, the executive director of the Sierra Club. | ||
| So we brought in all the big boys, all the big girls to have this conversation tonight. | ||
| What makes this uniquely different, and again, we thank C-SPAN for covering it live last year for covering it again. | ||
| This year, tonight, at 8 o'clock, is that last year when we did this was the first time that this nation, Greta, had ever seen a stage full of black folk, black folk, on or around the Juneteenth holiday, no less, talking about issues of climate. | ||
| This conversation in this country still tends to be far too white, and I have nothing against my white brothers and sisters who have made this issue a priority. | ||
| I thank God for them. | ||
| But those persons who are most victimized by these climate maladies, those persons who are most victimized by these climate catastrophes, have been left out of this conversation. | ||
| And so last year, we assigned ourselves to take this issue, to wrestle with it, and to push it higher on the African American agenda. | ||
| This station is based in LA, but heard all around the country thanks to our app and our website and all the other platforms that we have, the podcasts that we push out every single day. | ||
| We have a huge national and international audience for that. | ||
| I am grateful. | ||
| But we assigned ourselves once again to take this issue of climate justice head on. | ||
| And so tonight, you will see again a stage full of brilliant experts talking this year about the link between climate justice and black health. | ||
| There's so many pre-existing conditions already amongst the black community. | ||
| And as these climate maladies get worse and worse, the persons who are most going to be victimized by those already we see a data that suggests that the persons being most displaced by climate catastrophes happen to be black people. | ||
| Think of what happened in Katrina, in New Orleans, all those years ago, and all those black folks who were displaced out of New Orleans. | ||
| This is going to become the new normal. | ||
| As these climate catastrophes hit, people of color and the poor are the ones who are going to be displaced. | ||
| And then that leads to an issue of gentrification. | ||
| And that's a whole other conversation. | ||
| But the bottom line is that the people who are most victimized every day by these climate issues are the ones who are least present in these conversations. | ||
| And our aim is to change that. | ||
| And I think you'll be very impressed tonight with the panel we assembled and the conversation that we're going to have tonight about climate justice and its linkages specifically to notions of black health. | ||
| And we invite our viewers to have a conversation with you now here on the Washington Journal about that and the other news of the day. | ||
| The lines have lit up for you here, Tavis Miles, so let's get to calls. | ||
| Thomas in Derwood, Maryland, Democratic Caller. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Thank you for having Mr. Smiley on there. | ||
| My biggest complaint is that I don't see enough brown people sitting across the desk from the moderator. | ||
| But Mr. Smiley, I would like to thank you for all your work in the black community. | ||
| And also today I just heard that the NAACP is not inviting President Trump to the annual meeting. | ||
| And I'd like to know, I think it's a good thing. | ||
| I think it should have been done a long time ago. | ||
| But why do you think Mr. Trump is so against African people or brown or Latino people and to think that we don't see through it? | ||
| We are smart people. | ||
| Why do you think he feels that he can just say anything and brush us off like that? | ||
| Yeah, it's a great question. | ||
| I am not the person to ask to get inside the head of Donald Trump. | ||
| That's the last place I'd want to be is inside Donald Trump's head. | ||
| I can't speak to why he is pushing an agenda that is antithetical to the best interests of black people. | ||
| That is a question for Donald Trump. | ||
| To your issue about the NAACP, you are correct. | ||
| In its 116-year history, the NACP, for the first time, is not inviting the president to speak at their annual conference this summer. | ||
| I mentioned Ben Jellis earlier, who is now the head of the Sierra Club. | ||
| He was the youngest person, as you recall, to lead the NAACP. | ||
| Derek Johnson, of course, is now the president of the NAACP. | ||
| And that decision obviously made all kinds of national news. | ||
| Again, 116 years, I believe, of this institution being around and the first time ever, they are not inviting the president to speak. | ||
| But again, one can understand why. | ||
| Again, when you are pushing an agenda that is absolutely against the best interest of this particular community, and you have shown time and time again, you have no regard for African American voters, even though months ago you were campaigning for the black vote. | ||
| You were campaigning certainly for the votes of black men. | ||
| And let me just be honest, and you know this, my dear brother. | ||
| There were a number of African Americans who voted for Donald Trump in this last election. | ||
| I am sad to say. | ||
| More African Americans voted for him this time than they did the last time. | ||
| And I've asked repeatedly on my program, when are these black folk who voted for Donald Trump going to speak out? | ||
| When will he have crossed the line for you? | ||
| His pushing back against diversity, equity, and inclusion, that hasn't gotten your goat. | ||
| That hasn't riled you up yet. | ||
| He's trying to destroy the Black Sonian, as we call it, the Black Museum in D.C., that hasn't riled you up. | ||
| I could do this all day long on the issues that Donald Trump, his complete disrespect of Cyril Ramposa, the president of South Africa, when he was in the White House a few weeks ago, that didn't get you riled up. | ||
| I mean, again, his Department of Justice announcing that they're no longer concerned about police accountability, even in cities like Minneapolis, where they killed George Floyd, in Louisville, where they killed Breonna Taylor, in Memphis, where they killed Tyree Nichols. | ||
| This administration no longer cares about consent decrees and police accountability. | ||
| Time after time, day in and day out, he shows his disdain for African-American people in this country. | ||
| And so I don't know what it's going to take for those black folk who did support him to speak out against him. | ||
| But the reality is that he does not have any love. | ||
| He does not care for. | ||
| He has no concern for the plight of black people, even as we commemorate and celebrate this Juneteenth. | ||
| So the NACP, I think, may be on solid footing to not waste their time with Donald Trump. | ||
| I'll just simply say this very quickly. | ||
| You recall last summer when he was running for president, when he showed up in Chicago at the NABJ, the Black Journalist Convention, and all the hell that broke loose there, the disrespect that he afforded, accorded to his interlocutors at that gathering. | ||
| It was just shameful and disgraceful. | ||
| And I mean that, shameful and disgraceful the way Donald Trump showed out last year at the NABJ convention. | ||
| I think NACP just decided a year later. | ||
| They don't want none of that. | ||
| And so not that President Trump was excited about going to the NACP anyway. | ||
| But I think they made the right decision. | ||
| Order, Las Vegas. | ||
| Dawn, good morning to you. | ||
| An independent caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| How are you, Greta? | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I have to say congratulations to the guest for his show. | |
| However, I have to push back a little. | ||
| I am a black voter, a black female voter, and I don't agree with diversity, equity, and inclusion. | ||
| But a few of the things that he said, I really, I'm not agreeing with. | ||
| I can't understand what the issue was with National Guard and military being deployed when several of the police chiefs said that they were overwhelmed. | ||
| and they were there to prevent people from doing more destruction to like small business owners and whatnot. | ||
| As far as the climate initiative, I don't get it. | ||
| I'm a person where I feel like Mother Earth has been here way longer than us and she will outlive all of us. | ||
| And do you not think that like cloud seeding and those kinds of things contribute to the environment and to the weather and the way that it's disrupted? | ||
| And lastly, I think it's shameful for the NAACP not to invite Donald Trump. | ||
| I think that it is offensive and it's, to me, it's very racist. | ||
| I come from a family where, you know, my great-great-grandpa was one of the first black dentists in West Virginia. | ||
| My uncle was a judge in Dayton, Ohio, has a park named after him. | ||
| And my other uncle was a Buffalo soldier. | ||
| So long line of black history there. | ||
| But I think that what they're doing is shameful. | ||
| All right, Don. | ||
| Mr. Smiley. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Sure. | |
| Let me take off all three issues. | ||
| I'll take them in the order that she offered them. | ||
| First of all, to the issue of DE and I, it's clear in this country that there's a huge racial divide in employment, in housing, pick any category. | ||
| It is also true that African Americans still lag far behind, far behind in every single leading economic indicator category. | ||
| In every category, African Americans still lag far behind. | ||
| Here again, the data is incontrovertible. | ||
| You can be an African American, go to the best schools in this country, graduate with the same degrees, the same grades, have the same or similar resumes, and you will not get the job when you're up against somebody who happens not to be an African American. | ||
| We see stories every day about black folk trying to sell their homes. | ||
| And until they, as I would say, de-blackenize their home, the value just doesn't measure up. | ||
| But when they take all the black stuff out, when they make that house neutral, we see stories all the time about how two, three, four, five-fold the value of that property rises. | ||
| I don't need to convince you. | ||
| I hope not. | ||
| Perhaps I do, and I could if I had more time, perhaps. | ||
| But again, the gap between black and white in this country is still there. | ||
| The gap between the have-gots and the have-nots, which is oftentimes connected to race and class. | ||
| Those realities, those disparities continue to exist. | ||
| And that is the reason why you need programs like diversity, equity, and inclusion. | ||
| Respectfully, we just disagree. | ||
| Secondly, to your point about these police chiefs saying they're overwhelmed. | ||
| It's just not true. | ||
| It's a lie. | ||
| If you believe it because Donald Trump said it, then you believe Donald Trump's lies. | ||
| Because Donald Trump said that a couple of times. | ||
| Jim McDonough, the chief of LAPD, made it clear that he did not tell Donald Trump that he needed help. | ||
| There is no local police authority. | ||
| I had Sheriff Luna, the chief, the sheriff rather of LA County Police on my program days ago. | ||
| The sheriff here, the police chief here, no law enforcement in Southern California said they were overwhelmed. | ||
| Nobody asked, certainly not a litany of them, as you suggested, ma'am. | ||
| None of them asked for these troops, for these National Guards, for these Marines to come here. | ||
| It's just not true. | ||
| Don't believe everything you read or everything you hear. | ||
| Finally, to your point about the NAACP and how shameful you think it is they're not inviting him, I would simply ask you this. | ||
| If you knew that there was someone who despised you, who hated you, who had a record of maltreating you and the ones you love, would you invite them into your home? | ||
| I doubt it, and I digress. | ||
| We'll go on to Richard, Oceanside, California, Democratic caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, Tavis. | |
| Yes, sir. | ||
| Richard in Southern California, Oceanside. | ||
| Thank you, sir. | ||
| I was born in Los Angeles, and I went to an elementary school there named Budlong Elementary School. | ||
| Oh, yeah, North Well, North Well. | ||
| Yeah, I went to school there, and you know, there was a lot of people with good can going to that school, and I'm a pale boy, so I got along with everybody fine, and I'm glad what you're doing, and you keep doing it. | ||
| Man, you're doing a good job, and I always like to hear about you. | ||
| So you guys keep it up, and don't give this lying, cheating, stealing, sexist, racist, rat think president calls Donald Trump a chance because he doesn't deserve a chance. | ||
| The only thing he could do that would make me cheerful is if he would do the job that good old Jimmy Carter didn't do and put those new boys in Iran out of business. | ||
| The people that I know, the Persians, they don't like that bunch of government Khomeini guys at all. | ||
| They like to be here. | ||
| A lot nicer places. | ||
| Thank you for your job, sir. | ||
| I appreciate your help for everybody. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Have a good day. | ||
| Thanks, Richard. | ||
| Tabby Smiley. | ||
| We haven't talked about the potential U.S. strike against Iran. | ||
| The president is weighing whether or not he will do that. | ||
| Your thoughts and what are you hearing from your listeners? | ||
|
unidentified
|
A couple of things. | |
| One, it'd be a huge mistake. | ||
| I think it'd be a huge mistake for us to get involved in this. | ||
| It seems to me that Donald Trump is itching to drop a bomb in Iran. | ||
| And I don't think we have truly calculated the fallout from that. | ||
| There are other players in the Middle East, to my mind, or at least the way I read it, Greta, the other players in the Middle East at the moment who are keeping their powder dry. | ||
| They've stayed out of this. | ||
| And there are all kinds of countries we could talk about that are on this list again of keeping their powder dry at the moment. | ||
| But a huge miscalculation, a huge mistake will be made if Donald Trump gets us involved in this and drops any kind of bomb, any kind of weapons on Iran, number one. | ||
| Number two, he has been so politically schizophrenic, not just on this issue, but on so many issues. | ||
| One day he says this, one day he says that. | ||
| And not even one day. | ||
| In the morning, he says one thing. | ||
| At lunchtime, he says something else. | ||
| In the evening at dinner time, he says something altogether different. | ||
| So it's hard to know what Donald Trump is really thinking, what he really intends to do, because again, he's so politically schizophrenic on these issues. | ||
| He just bounces around like a pinball machine. | ||
| It's hard to follow him. | ||
| And I know this because I'm trying to follow him every day at this station. | ||
| And again, he says one thing at one part of the day and something else another part of the day. | ||
| But I think it'd be a huge mistake to engage us and involve us in that. | ||
| And Donald Trump campaigned saying he wanted to be an anti-war president. | ||
| He did not want to be a war president. | ||
| Again, all these promises made during the campaign, these promises not kept. | ||
| All these statements he made then, he's done to 180 on now. | ||
| Well, if you said you didn't want to engage us in wars when you ran, what changed? | ||
| And even just even on his, you know, his sentiment, his statement about Iran needing to stand down. | ||
| One minute you're talking to Iran about a deal. | ||
| The next minute you're telling them to surrender. | ||
| He just bounces all over the place on these issues. | ||
| And that's difficult and challenging to bounce around the way he does on domestic issues. | ||
| But when you do that on the international front, particularly when issues of war are on the agenda, when lives are at stake and you're bouncing around and we can't really understand where you're going and where you're headed, that's a real problem. | ||
| But again, I just think it'd be a huge mistake to engage us in this. | ||
| The fallout, we have not as yet predicted. | ||
| All hell could break loose if he does it. | ||
| I just think it'd be the wrong decision to make, but I'm not the president. | ||
| Kathy in Waynesboro, Georgia, Republican. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, hi. | |
| I also had seen the video of the Los Angeles police chief saying he was overwhelmed. | ||
| I saw that several times. | ||
| I think, Washington Journal, I would really like you to play that. | ||
| Secondly, I would like to say that the BET, Black Entertainment Television founder, praised President Trump in the White House several, I don't know about several times, but he was very pleased with all the programs that he did, President Trump did for black people. | ||
| Thirdly, I remember seeing you many, many moons ago on NPR, and you said, only buy from black businesses. | ||
| Don't buy from white businesses. | ||
| I would consider that racist, wouldn't you? | ||
| And lastly, you complain that Democrats, I mean, blacks are not educated enough and all that and let down. | ||
| Well, the Democrats are in charge of the school systems. | ||
| They're in charge of the blue cities where most of these black people live. | ||
| I would blame the Democrats. | ||
| And I'll take your answer off air. | ||
| You said a lot there. | ||
| Let me just say this. | ||
| I know that to some of our white brothers and sisters, we all look alike black people. | ||
| We all look alike. | ||
| You have never heard me say, only buy from black businesses. | ||
| Perhaps you're confusing me with some other black guy. | ||
| But I have never said that. | ||
| Having said that, I absolutely support black people supporting black businesses. | ||
| It is impossible to live a life in this country where a black person could only, there's your key word, there's no way that we could only support black-owned businesses. | ||
| Most of us don't even work at black-owned businesses. | ||
| That's another conversation about why there are so few black businesses as compared to others, primarily because of racism and a lack of access to capital. | ||
| You don't want to go down that rabbit hole with me. | ||
| But I have never said only support black businesses, even as I'm in solidarity. | ||
| I am a black business. | ||
| And I like people supporting my black business called KBLA Talk 1580. | ||
| But that would be impossible. | ||
| I couldn't run this company. | ||
| I couldn't run my life if I were only buying at black businesses. | ||
| So I've never said that in the first place. | ||
| So perhaps you confuse me again with someone else. | ||
| But at the end of the day, Bob Johnson, who you referenced earlier, I used to work for him. | ||
| My television career started many years ago when I didn't have any gray hair. | ||
| It started years ago at BET. | ||
| And I'm grateful for the five years I spent at BET. | ||
| But Bob Johnson, just because he's black, it's because he founded BET, does not make him write about everything. | ||
| Bob Johnson is not the spokesperson. | ||
| He's not the press secretary for Black America. | ||
| And so there are any number of African Americans you could quote who might be a fan of Donald Trump. | ||
| I'm not. | ||
| And more importantly, most black Americans are not. | ||
| While the number of black folk, as I said earlier, who voted for Donald Trump, went up this year as compared to last time, the overwhelming majority of African Americans did not, and I might add, do not, support Donald Trump. | ||
| So to quote one particular African American who supports Donald Trump, okay, you can have that, but he does not speak for the breadth and depth of black America. | ||
| What did your response to her about Democrats in charge of education in these blue cities across the country? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| Well, education is in this country, has some challenges, no question about that. | ||
| I don't like the fact that in this conversation about education, we always want to beat up on the teachers. | ||
| I believe teachers are the most undervalued resource in this country, and we too often use teachers as a whipping post. | ||
| It's the students who we ought to be concerned and care about. | ||
| The reality is that so many Americans now continue to push for privatization of schools. | ||
| And so I'm not a fan of that either. | ||
| I don't believe the answer is school choice. | ||
| The question is, how do you make all schools choice? | ||
| But the part that really cracks me up about that, Greta, and I literally was laughing on the inside, to get a call from a Republican line about Democrats running school boards when it's the Republican president and Linda McMahon right now who are trying to destroy the Department of Education smacks of hypocrisy to me. | ||
| You can't call me complaining about Democrats running school boards and just complete and flat out ignore that the president right now, a Republican and his party in Project 2025, are trying to completely dismantle and destroy the entire Department of Education. | ||
| I don't know how the caller thinks that that, in fact, would aid and to bet education in this country, how that would fix the problems that education is confronted with right now. | ||
| So again, we're playing politics on this particular issue, but I just remind people, it's not Democrats who are trying to wipe out the Department of Education. | ||
| That would be the Republicans and Donald Trump. | ||
| But again, I digress. | ||
| Melissa's in Bloomfield, Iowa, Independent. | ||
| Welcome to the conversation. | ||
| Melissa. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, thanks for taking my call. | |
| The young lady from Nevada and gal from Georgia, they kind of stole my thunder. | ||
| But absolutely, what they were saying was absolutely correct, Mr. Smiley. | ||
| I, again, as well, seen the videos, live feed, not what was on the news, but live feed videos from individuals showing that the police chiefs were very happy that Donald Trump sent in the military and sent in the National Guard to control the rioters, not protesters, rioters, because when you destroy other property, other people's property, that's considered a rioter. | ||
| All right, Melissa, let's take your point between the rioters and the protesters. | ||
| Tabba Smiley. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, in every protest, first of all, America is all about protest. | |
| Again, I am always troubled by Americans, by fellow citizens who think there's something wrong with protests. | ||
| This country started with a protest. | ||
| You remember the Boston Tea Party? | ||
| So America has always been about protests. | ||
| And the beauty of America is that it is a place that we are allowed to protest for right. | ||
| That is the greatness of America, that we are allowed to protest for right. | ||
| And so for those who have forgotten how this country came to be in the first place, perhaps we need a civics lesson to sort of remind us of that. | ||
| But whenever there are protests, there are always rogue persons in any protest. | ||
| Oftentimes, those rogue protesters have infiltrated these movements to make it look and appear a certain way to advance a particular narrative in the media. | ||
| And so a protest is, again, is as American as apple pie and baseball. | ||
| But in any protest, there are always going to be persons who are rogue, but that does not give you the license to call all of these law-abiding protesters who are exercising their First Amendment right to free speech a bunch of looters, a bunch of rioters. | ||
| I just don't accept that. | ||
| And again, the numbers are clear. | ||
| If you look at the number of protesters who were in those streets and look at the number of arrests that were made, clearly the data tells you that the majority of folk out there were protesting peacefully. | ||
| They are not rioters. | ||
| So I do not accept that language to impugn and to cast dispersion on all those persons, again, who were rightly exercising their right to free speech inside of those protests. | ||
| And again, I would love to see video of any police chief in this area asking Donald Trump to send the National Guard. | ||
| People keep using the word overwhelmed. | ||
| I don't know what video you're referring to of somebody saying they're overwhelmed, but I don't see anybody. | ||
| I have not seen anybody. | ||
| I cover these issues every day for three hours a day on KBLA. | ||
| I have not seen video of any law enforcement asking, any law enforcement officer, asking for the Marines to come, demanding that we need National Guard troops. | ||
| I've just not seen that. | ||
| I'd love to see it if you have it, but saying they're overwhelmed or feeling overwhelmed. | ||
| When you're running a police force and you've got people on call and on high alert, that can be overwhelming. | ||
| But let's just break down this language. | ||
| I've not seen anybody, certainly not Jim. | ||
| The two major players are Jim McDonough, the chief of LAPD, and Robert Luna, the L.A. County Sheriff. | ||
| At no point have I seen or heard either of them ask for Donald Trump to send National Guards or Marines to LA. | ||
| If you know otherwise, I'd love to be enlightened, but I've not seen it. | ||
| Tyvis Smiley is our guest here, syndicated talk show host and author. | ||
| He bought KVLA in 2021, LA's first black-owned radio station. | ||
| Let's go to Terry in Atlanta, Democratic Caller. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning, Tavis. | |
| Oh, MG, there's not enough time. | ||
| January 6th, we had rioters. | ||
| Let's just get that straight. | ||
| Those were rioters. | ||
| And I'm totally in agreement with what you said to the lady about Bob Johnson. | ||
| He doesn't speak for us. | ||
| But again, that lets us know how pathetically uneducated so many people are. | ||
| They hear a snippet on TV and they run with it and they think, oh, look at that, look at that. | ||
| And the fact that that one made a reference that these black people, like, whoa, these black people. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| I've got some things that are concerning me. | ||
| I'm really upset that Donald Trump said he's done more for black people than Abraham Lincoln. | ||
| That one, I think about daily. | ||
| And I don't know what programs he did to promote services or help black people. | ||
| So if you know of some, please enlighten me. | ||
| I got a problem with the fact that they chartered a jet to bring Afrikaans over here. | ||
| Are they the only ones or more on the way? | ||
| Do we know? | ||
| And then I'd like you to comment on that. | ||
| And I'd like you to comment on the renaming of these military bases after these Civil War traitors. | ||
| He wants to go back and rename them. | ||
| I mean, what's up with that? | ||
| Talk to me, Smiley. | ||
| Enlighten me, Tavis, please. | ||
| Yeah, first of all, you sound pretty enlightened already. | ||
| You don't need much help from me. | ||
| Your commentary and analysis is spot on. | ||
| With regard to those Afrikaners, I said this on my radio program when Donald Trump made this announcement. | ||
| He and Elon Musk, who of course is from South Africa. | ||
| It was genocide. | ||
| They could use the G word as it relates to these white South Africaners. | ||
| They could use the G word in that instance, genocide. | ||
| And so they were rescuing these good white folk out of South Africa who were being subjected to genocide. | ||
| But they could not and cannot use the G word as it relates to what's happening in Gaza, in the Middle East. | ||
| There again, I could go on and on and on about this point, but there is the hypocrisy. | ||
| You really think that what's happening in South Africa is genocide? | ||
| And Cyril Ramposa, the president, pushed back on that pretty aggressively in the White House when Donald Trump offended and insulted him. | ||
| So it's genocide in South Africa, so we've got to rescue all these good white people, but it's not genocide in Gaza. | ||
| I digress on that point. | ||
| I think you take the point I'm trying to make, number one. | ||
| Number two, to your question about Donald Trump's agenda, what he's done for black people, to his point, done more for black folk than Abraham Lincoln did. | ||
| Again, it's just some of this stuff is so silly and so asinine. | ||
| I find it difficult to even respond to it. | ||
| He is the president, and so we can't ignore him. | ||
| But I try not to go down the rabbit hole every day responding to all the nonsense that Donald Trump says every single day. | ||
| There is absolutely no way. | ||
| There's no comparison between Lincoln deciding to fight to save the Union and thereby end the institution of slavery ultimately. | ||
| There's no comparison between that and anything that Donald Trump has ever dreamed, much less done for African Americans. | ||
| I don't want to waste good C-SPAN time responding to something that is as absurd and as ridiculous and as asinine as Donald Trump suggesting he's done more for black folk than African Americans. | ||
| I don't even understand that. | ||
| Tavis Smiley, we'll go to International Falls, Minnesota. | ||
| Brad is watching there, Republican. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, good morning, Greta. | |
| You know, I don't write down what I'm going to say or anything. | ||
| It's just off the top of my mind. | ||
| But the longer I listen, because I was on hold for probably 20 minutes, right? | ||
| This guy's just a lightning ride, Rod. | ||
| And first of all, he cracks off that I'm listening to about George Floyd. | ||
| The cops killed him. | ||
| No, the cops did not kill him. | ||
| He died of a drug overdose. | ||
| He did not die of asphyxiation. | ||
| And so when he started talking just dumb, I just like this person to the black people, I would tell all the black people that I know, which there's not any in the internet. | ||
| Well, there's a few in international falls. | ||
| But if I ever do meet people, I'm going to tell them never to listen to this guy. | ||
| All he is is a lightning rod. | ||
| All right, Brad, we'll get a response. | ||
| But Tavis Miley, you were shaking your head. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| Is he referring to me as a lightning rod? | ||
| I guess he is. | ||
| And he would tell black folk not to listen to me. | ||
| Again, something is wrong in this country when we cannot have objective facts. | ||
| Kellyanne Conway in the first Trump administration was wrong. | ||
| There is no such thing as alternative facts. | ||
| I'm sorry, Kellyanne. | ||
| I'm sorry, Donald Trump. | ||
| There is no alternative facts. | ||
| You can have your opinions, but you cannot have your facts. | ||
| And for a caller to suggest that what we saw on that videotape of Derek Chauvin with his neck on George, his knee rather, on George Floyd's neck five years ago for nine minutes. | ||
| So I guess what we saw, we didn't see. | ||
| We can't believe our lying eyes. | ||
| This is the problem with America. | ||
| There's no objectivity about what is true and what is false. | ||
| And even when there's videotape that we're all watching, the whole world got riled up by what happened to Derek Chauvin. | ||
| It ain't just black folk. | ||
| It's black. | ||
| It's red. | ||
| It's brown. | ||
| It's yellow. | ||
| Don't you recall, sir, all the Americans who were in the streets protesting? | ||
| You don't recall all the protests around the world five years ago when they murdered, that's right, I said it. | ||
| They murdered George Floyd. | ||
| And so we're watching what Derek Chauvin did. | ||
| He's saying, I can't breathe. | ||
| He is asphyxiating in real time. | ||
| He's calling for his mama. | ||
| Do you know what it feels like? | ||
| I can't imagine calling for my mother in that moment of crisis. | ||
| His mother was already deceased, but his mind, his heart, his spirit is reaching out for his precious mother as he is being murdered in real time in front of our eyes. | ||
| And you can't accept that what you saw on that videotape is real and you have some alternative understanding, some alternative idea about what he died from and how he died when we all watched it. | ||
| It's nonsense. | ||
| Again, it's a waste of good C-SPAN time to respond to callers who don't want to deal with reality. | ||
| If you want to deal with reality, I can talk to you, but if you're going to make stuff up in your head, but you're going to deny and ignore the facts of what we're looking at in real time, then you can't, you and I can't have a conversation, brothers. | ||
| You can tell all the black folk you know, which is apparently not many, in whatever neighborhood you live in. | ||
| That may be the problem. | ||
| Let me just say this right quick. | ||
| The only way that we ever solve this intractable issue of racism. | ||
| Racism may be black America's problem, but it's white America's burden. | ||
| And until we get to know each other, until we have conversation, until you stop believing things that are just not true, and engage in conversation with folk who don't look like you, the best part of talking to people who don't look like you is that it challenges you, sir, to re-examine the assumptions you hold. | ||
| It will help you expand your inventory of ideas. | ||
| It will allow you to see the world through a different prism. | ||
| So I invite you to download the app at KBLA Talk 1580. | ||
| You need some knowledge. | ||
| You need some understanding. | ||
| The Bible says, in all thy getting, get an understanding. | ||
| You need an understanding. | ||
| That understanding, I think, starts with relationships, with expanding your circle of friends, but I'll leave it there. | ||
| Tavis Smiley, again, we are airing the conversation you had yesterday at the climate justice conversation, climate justice and black health, and that at 8 p.m. Eastern Time on C-SPAN. | ||
| Mr. Smiley, thank you this morning for a conversation here on the Washington Journal with our viewers. | ||
| We appreciate it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You've been kind to have me on, Greta. | |
| I appreciate it more than that. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Have a great rest of your day. | ||
| Same to you. | ||
| And same to all of you. | ||
| Have a good rest of your day. | ||
| Thank you for watching here this morning on the Washington Journal. | ||
| We'll be back tomorrow morning, 7 a.m. Eastern Time, with another conversation. | ||
|
unidentified
|
This morning, the U.S. Conference of Mayors will look at how the GOP tax and spending cuts bill could impact cities across the country when it comes to housing, local tax deductions, and health care coverage. | |
| This comes as the Senate is about to consider the legislation, which was passed by the House last month. | ||
| We'll have that live from Tampa, Florida, just after 10 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, and online at c-span.org. | ||
| I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to SRES 259. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The clerk will report. | |
| Senate Resolution 259, recognizing June 2nd, 2025, as the 39th anniversary of C-SPAN chronicling democracy in the Senate. | ||
| By a unanimous vote, the United States Senate passed a resolution honoring C-SPAN's four decades covering the Senate. | ||
| The resolution thanked cable and satellite operators for providing C-SPAN as a public service to the country. | ||
| C-SPAN does not receive one penny of taxpayer dollars, is funded primarily from satellite and cable providers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And called on all television providers, including streaming services, to deliver C-SPAN as well. |