Chet Love and Michael LaRosa clash over 2026 midterm strategies, with Love citing Trump’s 87%-90% base approval and rising costs (25% since 2020) as GOP priorities, while LaRosa highlights Democratic economic concerns. Cliff Young defines nativism—68% of Republicans now favor native-born hires—as the core of polarization, contrasting it with civic identity. Callers link restrictive immigration to rule-of-law arguments or critique authoritarian comparisons, revealing deep divides over belonging and policy. [Automatically generated summary]
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For a Sunday political roundtable, we are joined this morning on the Washington Journal by Michael LaRosa from the Democratic side of the aisle and by Chet Love from the Republican side of the aisle.
And Chet Love, I want to start with your perspective as we sit here 338 days until Election Day 2026.
If Republicans want to keep the House and the Senate 11 months from now, what is the most important metric or poll that they should pay attention to?
Is it inflation?
Is it presidential approval?
Is it something else?
I think it's what President Trump is actually doing.
So if you look right now at President Trump's approval rating among those who voted for him in 2024, he's in the high 80s and 90%.
He's delivering on his promises for his voters.
And I think at the end of the day, that's the most important thing because you want those people to remain engaged and to show up and to vote in 2026.
Show up and vote in a midterm election when Donald Trump is not on the ballot.
How do Republicans get voters who are Trump voters to show up?
Well, I think, again, the most important thing is for those Trump voters to understand that in order to continue President Trump's agenda and to see things like we had with the Big Beautiful bill, you need to continue to have Republicans in the House.
We know that the Senate is going to remain Republican controlled, but the House is up.
And so it's going to be a fight.
And so we need every Republican to show up to vote to continue to further President Trump's agenda.
Michael LaRose said, same question.
What is the most important metric that Democrats should pay attention to if they want to take the House or the Senate or both?
Well, I don't think there's any one metric.
I think let's look at where we are today versus where we were a year ago.
And what we know, according to government statistics, is that inflation is higher than it was a year ago.
Unemployment is higher than it was a year ago.
Job workforce participation is lower than it was a year ago.
And consumer confidence is lower than it was a year ago, according to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.
So, you know, I think Democrats are going to be focusing on how voters, or at least they're going to be targeting how voters feel about the economy under the Trump administration.
unidentified
And I think what you can say right now is that a year in, there's been a lot of action on the Trump White House's part.
They certainly project action and strength.
Whether that action is translating into consumer or voter confidence is yet to be seen.
But they managed to get past a big bill, the big beauty.
No one is necessarily feeling the impact of that yet.
We'll wait and see whether they do.
But they haven't achieved much else aside from that legislatively.
They've done a lot through executive action and executive authority, and that's fine, but that's not permanent.
And so it's always laws are made and policy is made when lawmakers in both branches come together and find a compromise and pathway through.
A year from Election Day, this NPR Marist poll asked Americans what the Trump administration should focus on.
Here's the answers from the poll.
unidentified
57% of respondents chose lowering prices, 16% controlling immigration, reducing crime at 9%, ending the war between Ukraine and Russia at 7%, war in Israel and Gaza, 6%, and so on down the line.
57% at lowering prices, immigration down to 16%.
Chetlove, immigration was such a major issue in the 2024 election.
I wonder if last week's shooting here in Washington, D.C. puts asylum and immigration issues back up further in the spotlight.
What's your read?
As we still are waiting on a motive and a whole lot from this investigation last week.
And that situation was in quarterly traffic and getting prayers to the families in terms of that.
But I think at the end of the day, what we saw, even with President Trump and with the new mayor Mamdani out of New York, they aligned on the issue of affordability.
And I think at the end of the day, that's what Americans are really going to be focusing on.
We know since 2020, prices have risen over 25%.
So it's very, very costly for rent, for food, et cetera.
And so at the end of the day, for most Americans, that's what's going to be the major driver is pocketbook issues.
So you don't think immigration is an issue Republicans want to get back to in 2026?
I think immigration is certainly always going to be a top-line issue for Republicans, certainly.
And they appreciate what President Trump has done in terms of enforcing immigration.
And they're very frustrated with what Democrats are doing around the country in terms of trying to stall and protest and to prevent President Trump from actually effectuating immigration issues.
But at the end of the day, pocketbook issues are going to be the number one thing.
So I think, first of all, housing is the number one driver of inflation.
And certainly housing is much more expensive, whether you're renting or owning than it was a year ago.
But over the course of the last several years, housing has become a huge problem for core inflation.
And that was one of the issues that President Trump and Mayor Mandani did sort of focus their agreements on last the other week, talking about housing and affordability in that context.
I think you're going to see the Trump White House and the Trump and the Congress over the next couple weeks focus, hyper-focus on trying to pass a healthcare fix to Obamacare in some way.
I think that there's going to be two probably side-by-side companion bills in Congress in December, both of which will fail, which will lead to the expiration of the ACA subsidies, unfortunately.
That's my gut.
unidentified
But I do think what President Trump is going to do and the Republicans are try to do some sort of reform effort with Obamacare income eligibility requirements.
And that's what Democrats have to be careful about is constantly being the party of no and voting down act, being opposed to action, whereas Trump is opposed to Democrats opposed to action and Trump's supporting action on anything.
Chet Love, Republican strategists, what is the strategy for dealing with this health care cliff that's rapidly approaching?
unidentified
Yeah, at the end of the day, what we know is that access to health care is important and Republicans certainly support it.
What we saw in the fight with the government shutdown was Democrats focusing on a very small issue where Republicans are simply saying we need to have a holistic plan to address health care in this country.
And President Trump's talked about this as well in terms of lowering drug prices, making things more affordable for the average everyday American.
And so you see Republicans taking steps to address health care issues in this country.
And I think that's being well received.
But I do think that Congress needs to have an actual bill, I mean, a budget.
The problem we have really, at the end of the day, the big elephant in the room is that for the last 30 years, we have not had an actual budget passed by Congress that specifically lays down where America is on health care.
And so you can't have these small little fights every other month or every other year around these issues.
What we need to have in America is a comprehensive plan with Republicans and Democrats sitting down and actually voting on health care.
Well, number one, I think that we need to get rid of the filibuster.
I think that's been a huge issue that's limited our ability to be effectual.
And so what you see is that Congress's overall approval rating is somewhere around like 10%.
I mean, it's absolutely terrible.
Most Americans are frustrated with the fact that Congress is basically doing nothing.
And so I think if we can get rid of the obstacles to actually get legislation passed, I think that's going to be really important and effectual in terms of getting budgets passed.
Well, I think there's two separate issues under the healthcare sort of umbrella, right?
There's the short-term ACA subsidy, which will increase premiums.
And people are going to get that first of the year kind of premium, you know, sort of whiplash, I think.
And that can be prevented.
We have until December 31st, technically.
The markets will obviously be in disarray.
They're in disarray now, but we technically, the Republican Congress and the Republican president could save the American people a lot of money by just extending these subsidies at least temporarily, maybe for a year.
And in that year, we could be negotiating and debating a larger health care reform package.
And I think you'll probably see plans from Senator Cassidy, Senator Marshall, a few Republicans over the next few weeks and a few months, Senator Johnson.
They'll probably be debating a lot of that throughout the spring.
A Sunday political roundtable this morning on the Washington Journal.
Let me come to another question as the New York Times has an article today about Marjorie Taylor Green and where she fits in the Republican movement right now.
How united is the Republican Party right now heading into the midterm elections?
I think at the end of the day, what we see with both political parties is an issue around idealism and populism.
And so you see that with AOC and Bernie Sanders going around the country criticizing Democrats.
You see that with Marjorie Taylor Greene going around the country criticizing Republicans.
So at the end of the day, America is trying to find a new way in terms of how do we address this affordability crisis?
How do we actually bring back the American dream for the average American?
And those are the issues that politicians are really focusing on.
Yeah, like every family, we have a lot of family disputes.
unidentified
And we are no stranger to sort of having a shared goal, but different ways of getting there.
But I will say, I think the off-off year election two weeks ago, three weeks ago, was a big shot in the arm for the Democratic Party all across the country.
I think Governor Newsom's ability to put together a 90-day campaign and sort of even the score with Texas on the redistricting fight was incredibly energizing and incredibly motivating, perhaps, to a new governor in Virginia who now has a trifecta governor-elect Abby Spamberger.
Could we see her do the same, possibly?
unidentified
Could we see Westmore sort of speed up the process there that has really stalled in Maryland to get to squeeze another Democratic seat out of there?
So I think Democrats are getting a little bit more energized about the redistricting fight.
But what I saw on that election at the local level in a state like Pennsylvania in places like Northampton County, Erie County, two counties that flipped from Obama to Trump to Biden back to Trump, just Democratic blowouts at the county level, which is really, that's the kind of thing that matters for the Democratic Party.
unidentified
That, those two counties, plus Luzerne County and the Supreme Court statewide in Pennsylvania, that matters.
But if I can't, I would argue that the leader of the Democratic Party is Donald Trump.
The whole message from Democrats consistently has been anti-Trump.
The way they've gotten energy is to go around and create these no-kings rallies and try to go.
Biden's whole message was anti-Trump.
And that's why Democrats were so frustrated in terms of they saw Democrats really doing nothing during Biden's term in terms of moving their agenda because it was all about anti-Trump.
And now that Trump's back in office, again, it's just simply, we don't like Trump and everything that Trump does is bad.
That's not effectuating policy.
Nobody really believes that Democrats are actually going to be able to leave.
And what we saw in this off-off election was races that Democrats were already set to win.
I mean, Virginia, every single year for their governor's races, they always flip-flop.
They always go from Republican to Democrat, Republican.
So it was their turn.
It was Democrats' turn to win.
So again, they're grasping at straws for anything that they can see that's daylight that gives them some hope in terms of being able to say that they're winning on these issues.
And again, we're about 335 or 38 days away from Election Day 2026.
His first point, going back to our question earlier about religion and politics.
unidentified
We can set that aside and focus on Citizens United for a second.
In terms of spending in the midterms, the 2026 midterms, have you seen any expectations about what the number is going to hit?
Are we going to set another record for ad spending in the midterms?
I'm sure we will.
I think the way ads are placed are different now.
That's a lot of digitally targeted, micro-targeted digital advertising.
But I still think the spending, whether you have the outside groups like the 527s or the super PACs, and then you have the party committees and the DNC, the Driple C, the DSEC, the equivalent on the Republican side, and then you have the individual campaigns.
So I think it's going to be probably record-setting for a midterm.
I'm sure.
I have no doubt that consultants will make a lot of money.
Did Donald Trump change the way we try to target messages, especially with a social media focus in 2024?
Does that play out?
Does that work on a House and Senate level, or is that just more of a national level?
No, absolutely.
I mean, I've talked to a lot of my Democratic strategist friends, and there's tons of money being poured into now by Democratic donors to social media and to podcasting.
They realize that a lot of the right-pill guys have done a fantastic job in terms of reaching key demographics.
And so now they're going to try to compete.
And so you're seeing that being done at the Democratic side.
But I think what's important, what the caller was talking about in terms of money and politics, you see Marjorie Taylor Greene going around the country and actually talking about these issues.
So this is a bipartisan issue in terms of, hey, the system's not working for the average everyday American, and we need to be finding more ways to get back to that.
Let me just get, as a Republican strategist, your take on what's going on with Marjorie Taylor Greene and what you think her next step is.
unidentified
This is Tressie McMillan Cottam in today's New York Times.
And this is what Tressie writes.
We aren't watching a political renaissance or a feel-good story about deprogramming the MAGA faithful.
We're watching a middle-aged career woman time the market on her political and professional ambitions.
She has recognized, perhaps rightly, that there's no place for women like her in Trump's halls of power.
So she's building herself an escape route, building her own brand.
What do you think is next for her?
I think what you see is a natural fight, which is what people voted for Trump initially in 2016, which was he said he was going to come in, he was going to drain the swamp, and it was all about America first.
And so ultimately, at the end of the day, what we're seeing is this fight about, well, what is America First?
What are the policies that make sense?
Or who are we prioritizing?
Why are we spending money in foreign countries and foreign wars versus allocating funds here in the United States?
So these are issues that are being grappled with, I think, that are really important.
Michael LaRosa, opportunity there for Democrats or go ahead and let them have that fight and stay out of it if you're a Democratic.
unidentified
Yeah, for me, it's just sort of not my clowns, not my circus.
I'll let them figure out their.
We have enough to deal with inside of our own party, whether it's on cultural issues, figuring out a coherent message or just the ability to have courage at all to talk about them.
What's that cultural issue that comes top of mind for you?
Well, I think the cultural issue that we see a lot of candidates run away from or run scared from is the trans issue, the trans and sports issue.
It's obviously an issue that is highly emotional, highly triggering, but also extremely rare.
At that same time, because it's so rare and, you know, unlikely in terms of being an issue facing your community, it does face some communities for sure, but all the more reason for people to have a straight answer.
And I think I wish that more Democrats would speak more clearly, take a position to sort of take away the issue.
Well, can they define women?
Well, what a woman is?
I hope so.
I would encourage them to say that there are men and there are women.
I would encourage it.
That's where the electorate is.
That's where the voters are.
There's a way to take a position without alienating the marginalized or also with having compassion for the marginalized, but also having conviction, having a position, and most of all, just having an answer.
Six in 10 blame congressional Republicans or Donald Trump for the government shutdown.
unidentified
And six in 10 say President Trump's top priority should be lowering prices.
Is any of that fake polling, you think?
No, I mean, look, I think we've seen President Trump have these poll numbers in his last term.
I mean, I think the lowest he got was around 34%.
And that was during the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax that we saw going on.
And so now he has lower poll numbers slightly overall because we've talked about the Epsom files, and that's been a big issue.
But I do think at the end of the day that the focus really needs to be on the fact that one, affordability, and two, continuing to deliver for the American people.
I think you can't get rid of the ACA at this point, just practically, I think from a logical perspective.
But I do think that there are reforms that do need to be made to the ACA.
But again, what that actually is going to look like is really going to be about the midterms and what Congress looks like after 2027.
Michael LaRosa, you're taking notes during that?
Sure.
Well, I think President Trump has caught a little bit of the Biden flu because he's in the territory where President Biden was for the last three years of his presidency in that 36 to 40 percent approval area, 57 to 62 percent, 60 percent disapproval.
None of that's good for President or the Republicans.
And as you mentioned, that 14-point advantage is exactly where Democrats should be.
Any lower will be problematic for Democrats when it comes to the generic ballot, I would think.
So I think Democrats have all the right tools heading into next year.
Chet Love, I think you were the Republican person that Janet was referring to.
unidentified
What was your response?
I think the challenge that we have in this country is that there's politics.
And in politics, Republicans don't want Democrats to win and Democrats don't want Republicans to win.
And so, yeah, there's going to be divisiveness in this country.
And as much as President Trump may try to extend an olive branch, people are going to try to create division.
Give me some examples of the olive branch.
Well, I mean, you just saw Mamdani go into the White House to meet with President Trump, and you saw how great that was.
I mean, most people thought it was going to be a knockdown, drag out fight.
And in fact, many Democrats were highly upset with the fact that he didn't go to task against President Trump.
You even see Democrats criticizing Mayor Bowser here in D.C. for trying to work with the administration with their messages, resist, resist, fight against the president.
He's a dictator.
He's a Nazi.
So again, this rhetoric that's being pushed by Democrats.
It's local politics in D.C., but do you think that's any reason why she's not running for office again for another time?
Well, absolutely.
I think it's incredibly frustrating.
I mean, I think you've seen this across the country.
I mean, you've seen other mayors like in San Francisco who found it very difficult to govern in these extraordinarily far-left cities, which again, go beyond reality.
I mean, when you're trying to control for crime, trying to control for regular everyday things, these Democratic cities are really, really, really difficult because as a mayor and as a person responsible, you have to work across the aisle.
You have to be bipartisan.
But again, right now, we're seeing an environment where it's very polarizing on both sides.
But Democrats carry a lot of that weight in their messaging and their rhetoric, especially if you look on online, on X, on Twitter, and those kind of things.
Just about 15 or 20 minutes left and lots of calls for you gentlemen.
unidentified
Let me get Rob in Ruskin, Florida, Democrat.
Good morning.
Good morning, fellas.
I guess I want to start with Mr. Love and the one caller who said, you know, we're talking about polls and how they're all Democratic run and this and that.
And I will say that some polls favor certain politics and issues.
My thing is, you know, people like Mr. Love, one of his first statements when he came on was like, hey, you know, Trump is 87% and in his polls, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But then when the host here asked the question, hey, do you believe in polls?
You know, he kind of veered off and didn't really want to make a statement on it of very, you know, true or false and this and that.
And I think you originally were talking about a poll about Trump voters and whether they thought he was doing a good job.
unidentified
That's right.
Yeah, look, I mean, polling's not an exact science, but yes, I mean, we do believe in polling.
Polling does is helpful directionally to understand where America is.
And so, yes, the facts of the matter is Trump's approval rating among most Americans is somewhere around in the 30% range right now, ranging between the mid-30s to high 40s.
And again, a lot of that is the reason it's lower is because, again, like I said before, it's his democratic messaging that's been going around saying Trump's a bad, evil person when he's doing things that in a lot of cases are similar to what President Obama did around immigration, around Venezuela, et cetera.
But everything that Trump does now is a bad thing.
So I think what we need to get away from is getting hyper-focused on the polling and really start more focusing on bringing more Americans together instead of having this hyper-partisanship and this messaging that everything that Trump does is bad, everything that Democrats do is bad, because America's not working for the average everyday American right now.
And that needs to be the major focus for politicians here in D.C. Michael LaRosa, there's an old adage on negative ads that nobody likes negative ads, but they wouldn't run them if they didn't work.
That's exactly right.
They're the best kinds of ads because they are meant and targeted at, you know, to draw emotion and to be a little bit hyperbolic and to be to really drive voters to the polls through either fear or anger or resentment.
And, you know, that's their intent.
So it works.
And look, there is a look, we have a two-party system.
And in that two-party system, when it becomes team sports, one, like blue versus red, that means, you know, everything is seen through the lens of your tribe.
And there's a huge tribalism problem when it comes to the information we consume, when it comes to the polling we consume, when it comes to the news and friends that we have even.
And that's a problem.
I think we need, as a country, we need to be more open-minded.
Polls themselves are not necessarily meant to be instructive, but they are meant to sort of inform a campaign or the public about where things stand at that particular moment.
I mean, I wish my old friends on the Biden re-election campaign had started taking polls a little bit more seriously because when polls show trends, that is, it's incredibly informative.
It either reminds you of like Joe Biden, which is either smart and they're trying to turn people off, or it's just meant to be something useful that is provocative and different to sort of make people, to stick with the voter or the viewer to get audience attention.
And like attention is the biggest part of the message you're sending to the viewer.
She's going to have the goodwill because she's been elected twice statewide.
So they're smart to be spending money early.
At the same time, really smart choice by Senator Schumer and the Democrats to, you know, not lean, but, well, yeah, I'll just say it, to lean on Governor Mills and ask her to run.
It was a good recruiting victory for Senator Schumer and the Democrats.
And the idea that these are not your ads of the past of candidate walking in a field talking about what they've done.
unidentified
This is something that tries to get your attention.
It's not a typical bio ad.
It's a negative ad.
It's a contrast ad, as they would say, or it's just a, like I said, just a negative ad on Janet Mills, it seems to be, which, hey, they're trying to define their challenge early.
And that is smart.
That is politically smart.
I would expect Democrats to be probably doing something similar at some point, I hope.
And it's been a few years since I looked at it, and I imagine it's not real far.
But our cost of health care in the country, all the dollars we spend together, the last time I looked was about $1.7 trillion.
If you look at 350 million people in the country, that equates to basically $500 to $600 per person.
When you look at the cost of health care, though, on that side, I've seen numerous reports that the administrative cost in the health care system is in excess of 50%.
The reports I've seen put it at 65 to 67%.
And so when 65 cents of every healthcare dollar is not providing health care, I would think, and that's where Obamacare didn't look at the call side of it and do anything about it, is a normal company, administrative costs would run in about the 15% range.
And so we have a lot of health care dollars not providing health care.
So at $500 to $600 per person, say a family of four, total health care cost annually would be about $2,000.
And on a company-paid plan, when I retired, I was paying my family plan was already costing me $630,000.
This is the kind of question that I've spoken to numerous physicians and nurses.
And on the inside, they see it.
They see the problem.
We have for-profit, which is taking money out of the system.
We have not-for-profit hospitals that pay CEOs.
Locally here, each bed in this hospital near me has to produce $1,000 a day to pay one person.
And these are the kind of problems that should be addressed.
If these problems, Jim, before you go, if they don't get addressed, if it isn't fixed, and right now we're just talking in December about the healthcare subsidies and whether they should be extended or not.
If it doesn't happen and we're stuck a year from now in this same system that you just described, whose fault is it?
When you go to the ballot box, how do you express your displeasure with this system?
unidentified
Who do you vote against?
Well, see, being an independent, I'm not tied to either party because I don't see either party with an answer.
That's why I'm particularly interested in your answer to this question.
Well, One thing is that I would health insurance companies, which, again, take money out of the system, need to start with not paying dollars an immediate drop in what they pay, because if we know that 50% goes to administrative costs, that would immediately cut the amount to pay to 50%.
Not-for-profit hospitals already have a 15% advantage because they don't pay federal taxes.
So if they can't pay wages out of the 15% tax burden, that means 100% of my money that I pay would go directly to healthcare.
And, you know, one of the big drivers of healthcare costs, when he was talking about administrative costs, one of the biggest drivers is the hospital consolidations into these health care systems where it's just where there's mergers of different hospitals in regions of your state.
Particularly, there's one going on in Indiana, actually, in Terre Haute, a big hospital merger.
And when there are mergers of hospitals, and there's less competition, less choices, less options, rates go up.
The reimbursement rates go up in these hospital systems.
I would encourage the caller to check out what's happening in Terre Haute.
unidentified
But also keep in mind, Obamacare, while it may have not, and I don't think it did really address the cost problem, it was meant to close a gap and allow and provide access to healthcare to people who didn't have it before.
And that's a good thing.
But now it's time to move on from Obamacare and start focusing on costs for people like the color and what the caller mentioned, the administrative costs, the hospital costs, the cost of care.
Chad, love you're nodding your head to some of that.
unidentified
Well, yeah, absolutely.
And I always love calls coming in from independents because more of America is becoming independent.
I mean, that's just the reality.
Because again, as we said before, the polling shows that the approval rates for Congress is really, really low.
And so, yeah, addressing these issues and getting rid of the bureaucracy in healthcare, understanding we need more innovation in healthcare, the way that the healthcare system is set up, it just doesn't work.
It's not delivering for the American people.
Let me go to Rick in Homestead, Florida, Republican.
But I think that 2020 primary was such a great example of what the caller is talking about.
You know, there's a lot of noise and there's a lot of high volume on Twitter, on social media, on cable news when it comes to the progressive side or the left-leaning side of the Democratic Party.
But the silent majority of Democrats, and I think the 2020 primary was a fantastic case study for that.
The silent majority of Democrats are not from the extreme left.
And when I was on that Biden primary race, we certainly tried to run as somebody who had the experience to sort of work with both sides of the aisle.
That was a big part of what Joe Biden talked about during those primaries in 2020.
And while we got our butts kicked in the first three, once we won South Carolina and once the primaries spread out across the country, I think we saw the majority of Democrats just overwhelmingly support Joe Biden.
That's why he became the nominee.
And I think there's a good argument to make that he may have been dragged too far to the left when he was in the White House.
Well, because I think we've seen reporting that's come out that talked about how the DNC sort of manipulated these issues to kind of hurt Bernie Sanders.
And Bernie's talked about it at NASDAQ.
Right, but how do you think?
How do you manipulate states that vote and choose their own primaries?
And how do you manipulate the people?
You can have that fight with Bernard Shaw.
You have to fight anybody.
No, no, no.
I'm saying the DNC can have that fight with Bernie Sanders, but Bernie Sanders has clearly said it.
You've also had it with Biden.
I don't think the party was with Trump.
Trust me, no one handed that to a rigdar primary.
And then you had Kamala Harris, right?
Who, again, didn't go through a primary, right?
He was put on the voters and lost abysmally.
So Democrats have this problem of not actually being able to listen to their base in terms of who they really want to be their champion.
In terms of the primary field, I know we've been talking midterm elections in 2026, but go ahead to 2028 if you could.
unidentified
The candidate that the caller describes, the purple candidate that could get his vote as a moderate Republican, who is that right now in the Democratic Party in your mind?
Hard to say.
I think there's a lot of talented candidates.
There's a lot of talented potential candidates.
It sounds like what the caller was referring to, what he reminded me of, was Governor Bashir in Kentucky.
It sounded like somebody like that who is a Democrat who has to work with a Republican legislature, Who has successfully navigated the tricky cultural waters of abortion and trans issues at the same time?
I don't know how well he performs.
This is what's great about primaries.
You kick the tires, you lift the hood up and you kick the tires.
And I agree with Chet on the Harris situation.
It was a problem of historic proportion, unfortunately, not of her making, of Joe Biden's making.
And Joe Biden will have to live with that legacy.
And it kills me to say that because I love him and I love his wife.
And I worked for them tirelessly for three years and devoted my life to them.
But there is a major miscalculation or so, I guess, by choosing to run and then by choosing to get out as late as he did.
To Chet Love's point, do you think that situation has served to undermine the Democratic base's trust in a future primary system?
Is there trust that needs to be rebuilt before you can have a big open primary and make people feel like their voices are being heard and everybody's getting a fair kicking of the tires?
I don't think it helped.
I think I'm sure it did hurt trust.
At the same time, everybody came together pretty quickly, from the delegates to the left to the center, to rally behind Harris and ultimately Harris Waltz and sort of unite around one basic idea was that we need to beat Donald Trump.
Going forward, I imagine that there's going to be a lot of discussion about how debates are run during the primary, how primaries, you know, there's going to be states, sitting state parties choosing when to hold their primaries in conjunction with the DNC's calendar.
So look, there's a lot to be sorted out, and I'm sure there's a lot of discussion to be had about the fairness of the next primary.
But the last several primaries, 2024 aside, I would say, were very fair and populist and certainly not rigged, at least no matter what you want to read in the conspiracy theory land.
He's Gavin Newsome.
Just say it's Gavin.
You know you guys are going to run Gavin and December.
Do you think it'll be Gavin?
There's no you guys.
It's either people vote in primaries or they don't.
I mean, there's no back room.
I wish there was, but there's not.
We'll all get to find out together and hope the two of you join us down the road to do it.
We'll talk about that in some of the latest polls after the break.
unidentified
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Tonight on C-SPAN's Q&A, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro went to prison in 2024, convicted of contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena from the January 6th committee after being found guilty on two counts.
In his new book, I Went to Prison So You Won't Have To, Peter Navarro lays out the Justice Department's case, his arrest and trial, and what it was like for him behind bars.
It's like everybody told me there that they'd rather be in a cell because only I have to worry about one other guy.
unidentified
You know, there's a thing called the lock, lock in the sock, right?
You take a padlock, you throw it in the sock, and a lot of rough justice goes on like that.
White House trade advisor and author Peter Navarro tonight at 8 Eastern on C-SPAN's Q ⁇ A. You can listen to Q&A wherever you get your podcasts and on the C-SPAN Now app.
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Washington Journal continues.
I was glad to welcome Cliff Young back to our desk.
And so we have, you know, the mid-1800s, you have the know-nothings, you have the Irish, a little bit later you have the Germans coming in and the European immigration.
It's something that's sort of there, but it's not operant, let's say, in politics, right?
It's not used.
It's only when you have high levels of immigration, whether that be in the mid-1800s, the turn of the last century, or now, which were all super high.
We're about 15% foreign-born right now in the United States, and in Europe, by the way, the very equivalent experiences today.
That's when nativism, these sort of more essential or existential debates about belonging kind of crop up and become center, front and center in politics.
Our basic argument is all the other terms are terms, right?
They're important.
Populism is the belief in the people over, let's say, the establishment.
Racial or economic grievance are sort of critiques of the system, feeling alienated.
Authoritarianism is another one that often is used.
That is like taking strong, firm sort of directive and pushing forward policies.
We can see that especially in present politics today.
But all those other sort of beliefs and values are a function of, or at least we argument, a function of nativism.
Ultimately, our central conflict today in the United States, the polarization that we see in the United States today is a function of who belongs and who doesn't.
So how do we see that for our visual learners on the Washington Journal in this poll?
The poll asks, the percent of people who agree that when jobs are scarce, employers should prioritize the hiring of people in this country over immigrants.
The top line is Republicans.
unidentified
Today, 68% saying that they should prioritize the hiring of Americans over immigrants.
It was 63%, not too different, back in 1995.
For Democrats, today it's 36% say that they should prioritize the hiring of people in this country over immigrants.
Yeah, and so we've had that, it's a great trend, kind of show.
It's a great question that kind of captures the essence of nativism.
In this case, it's economic in nature, favoring native-born over foreign-born.
And what we see is three decades ago, two generations ago, or a generation and a half ago, Republicans and Democrats were really very similar on this issue.
They were equally restrictive in nature.
They wanted more restrictions, not less restrictions.
And what's happened over time over the last three decades is that Democrats and Republicans have increasingly become different from each other on this issue.
Indeed, in some ways, it's interesting because you have Republicans that have basically stayed flatlined.
They've been about as nativist as they were three decades ago.
It's Democrats who have become increasingly less nativist over time.
And this is a function of a variety of things, mostly because of education.
unidentified
Dive into that.
What has changed over the past 30 years that you think moved that number from 57% in 1995 to 36% today?
People kind of select into one party versus another given, let's say, the party's overall orientation.
The more nativist one, the Republicans, are going to attract nativists.
So you have the sorting going on on the one hand.
You also have a wholesale shift in the party composition.
The Democrats were a party of the working class a generation, generation and a half ago.
Now they're the party of the well-educated marginalized.
It's a very different profile.
And so ultimately, this sort of reflects that, a much more sort of liberal, progressive view of the world, a much less restrictive view of the world than, let's say, a generation or two ago.
unidentified
So, what would be your advice to a candidate running today on the issue of nativism and how they should factor it in in their messaging for 2025?
There's a policy and then there's a political level.
Let's talk about the political level.
Obviously, it's a minority view.
Strong nativists represent about a third of the population.
Nativists adjacent, maybe another 20%.
So we're around 50% of the population plus a little bit that we can characterize or we characterize as nativists in the book.
So it's a difficult coalition to keep together ultimately, but it's one for the Republicans that really shores up the base.
So it's really a base issue, right?
That has done them well over the last few electoral cycles, last three at least since 2016.
So messaging to these sorts of issues, sort of restrictive sort of immigration policy, resonates very well and still does with Republicans.
That's one of the reasons that Trump has had a lot of staying power over this first year of his administration.
At a policy level, it's more difficult because ultimately we have two very different views of the world.
One more restrictive.
Americans should be native-born, maybe they should be more white, maybe they should be more Christian, more restrictive, more ascriptive in their characteristics.
You have another view of the non-nativist, which is more diffuse, less restrictive.
That maybe someone who has come here as a child, who's lived here their whole lives, maybe doesn't have on paper the fact that they're a citizen.
But they speak perfect English, they feel American, they root for their local sports teams, they are American, and we don't have consensus on who definitively is an American today.
I think any sort of policy solution would need to be some sort of compromise between these two views, a more restrictive one and a less restrictive one.
It represents the nativist view of the world, the native view of the world.
When we ask questions of identity, you know who is who is.
What are the sorts of characteristics that an American has?
The number one thing that nativists cite is actually being born here in America.
You know that that's the number one, most important characteristic to define who is a true American or a real American.
And I think the birthright citizenship issue is just a function of this conflict that we're seeing today between a more restrictive view of America and what America is and a less restrictive one.
The less restrictive view also includes a lot of the kind of civic values that are there, pull yourself by, up by your bootstraps, Equal protection before the law, diverse society.
America is a country of immigrants.
And so that more sort of civic view of what an American is, America is more of an ideology, and that's all that matters.
It doesn't matter if you're born here or not.
It matters what you believe versus being born here is the conflict we see today.
unidentified
I thought one of the things you might mention there is English as the primary language.
So this was a process of trying to understand America.
And I would say that it's a book about the big, broad social trends.
It's not about who's going to win the next election.
It's about what's shaping America, what's shaping the world.
And what I would say is that in 2015 and 2016, we were trying to understand the rise of Trump as pollsters.
And he wouldn't fall in the polls.
He wouldn't implode.
We remember that moment.
We started sort of taking bits and pieces from his speeches and testing them.
And what we found was there was massive resonance for this more restrictive view of what an American is, this more nativist view.
And from that time on, we tracked the issue, that we tracked the issue globally.
We found that it has resonance around the world, not just the United States, but it's the primary determinant of politics globally speaking as well, especially in Europe.
And this was really supposed to be just a memorialization of this process of discovery, that we found this phenomenon, we measured this phenomenon, we understand it now, we understand it as being a very important determinant.
We wrote the book or were writing the book and Trump won his second term, and now we're in the middle of it.
And obviously, it's very topical given everything that's going on.
I just find it funny that it's unfortunate that for the past 30 years, I mean, you go back to the news and you go look at immigration during the 90s, it was almost the same as it is today.
And it just seems like the senators and House of Representatives are taking these issues and making them a career-long issue.
And running on it for 20, 30, 40 years.
And it's just, to me, that shapes America in the nativism you're talking about, right?
And I just think it's unfortunate that then people that can stay in power for 20, 30, 40 years can help shape what we think today and how we feel today, right, towards people that are not from this country.
I just think it's just outlandish, you know, because these ain't not rocket science, right?
To figure out how to restrict the border and allow people in and out, right?
It's, you know, it just, it's a career-long issue.
I do believe that the nativist phenomenon today exacerbates all the other isms.
It exacerbates polarization.
It exacerbates tribalism.
And I do believe I'll take my pollster hat off.
I'll put on sort of my policy wonk hat on.
And I do think that America needs at one point a social contract on belonging, a new one.
We have to come together and have a consensus on what it means.
And it might include more restrictivist and less restrictivist elements.
Close the border, strong border control on the one hand, some sort of very selective, restrictive way of bringing in new immigrants that's detailed and there's a consensus around detailed and focused.
There's a consensus around it.
And what do we do with all the people that are here that are not legal?
Some sort of path of citizenship, but some sort of deportation, all done in a humane way.
But the point being is, we're not there yet, obviously.
This hasn't been an issue that's been run on necessarily on the left as strongly as the right.
Right, it really is a critical issue that resonates with the base and brings and mobilizes the Republican base.
It's not necessarily one that has in the past.
That's one of the reasons, at least in my assessment, that we haven't had some sort of broad-based consensus is because you need an election or you need elections where these things are run on in conjunction.
But ultimately, ultimately, it would be part of the solution, if not the entire solution, to our tribal problem.
unidentified
Let me go to John in McLean, Virginia.
You're on with Cliff Young.
Good morning.
Hi, good morning.
Thanks for taking my call.
Thanks for C-SPAN.
The comment I guess I want to make is that the nativist approach doesn't quite capture the civic approach, which is what does it really mean to be an American, to have American values.
My own take on it as a Republican is that the American values are individual rights, personal responsibility, Republican forms and institutions, our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, all through equal protection and due process.
So it's not, for me, a nativist question.
It's a civic question.
I think we want the people who come to this country to embrace those American values.
And that's the difference between your take on a nativist issue or approach versus a civic approach.
John, can I ask you before we get to Cliff Young, how do we judge whether people have embraced those values?
What is the system by which we acknowledge that they've embraced those values?
unidentified
Well, I can start with the two most basic points from my point of view: individual rights and personal responsibility, our social contract.
Basically, I would say I'd look at whether or not the migrant to our country takes the position that I am going to respect the individual rights of others.
I'm going to take on my personal responsibility as a citizen of the United States.
Yeah, that's a, you know, nativism has always been, I don't know the exact timing or when it did, but I think there's a pejorative element or connotation to the word, right?
We think of populism, kind of nativism, these isms like that, in a more negative way.
Maybe they're less democratic.
I think many authors and scholars would think.
If you do kind of a Google search, you find that the sentiment's a little bit more negative than positive.
And what we just wanted to do was become very operational with our definition that's favoring native-born over foreign-born and be very generic about that.
And ultimately, like I said, if you're very sort of mechanical about the definition, it allows you to sort of open your eyes and see, listen, there is one belief system that's about a much more restrictive view of the world.
There should be restrictions on the border, stronger restrictions to who comes in to be more selective, whatever that means.
Let's set that aside for a second.
That there needs to be sort of a rigorous execution and dealing with the sort of those that are here.
And what we try to do is kind of take away that sort of the value judgment around the word and try to treat it as much more of a scientific concept.
unidentified
Heading down to Austin, Texas, Alfredo, Independent.
Good morning.
You're on with Cliff Young.
Hi.
Good morning, Mr. Young, and thank you for this program.
I was listening just earlier.
I just love this conversation.
It's wonderful.
The notion of nativists being kind of needing to be more generic, I do take some umbrage with that and think that perhaps either on the left or maybe toward the middle, I'm calling, of course, on the independent line, but perhaps the sort of oppositional, you know, iron striking iron gets closer to the point and closer to what we mean.
Perhaps an opposition group to or an oppositional position to the nativist position would be an integrationist position.
And that may be where the left or the middle part of the Democratic Party or others can, I guess, look at the nativist position and challenge some of these notions.
You just said, Mr. Young, I think that nativist politics or understanding of the term and development of the term needs to be more generic.
An integrationist position would be it needs to be more contingent and specific to individuals coming from different parts of the world.
Someone coming to my home state of Texas from South Asia is going to have a different mode or a different sort of look at integrating themselves into American and Texas society than someone from Central America fleeing Civil War or from Mexico, you know, looking for work.
That's all.
I just wanted to offer that as maybe a position that could counter and sharpen and intensify light only comes from heat, our debate and understanding of these current political modes of thinking.
I mean, we ultimately, any sort of consensus, and indeed I'll just reiterate my point, which is we see nativism as a central driving force of politics today.
It defines whether you find yourself with the Republican or Democratic Party.
Specifically, it helps understand the coalitions that we have today.
But any sort of solution around that is going to have to include a more restrictivist notion of who belongs and a less restrictivist notion of who belongs ultimately.
And you know, I think we, Nativist Nation obviously has a nice ring to it as a title, but I think we used it because we wanted to take on a term that's taken on a pejorative meaning.
We wanted to just say, I think throughout, if you kind of read the book, and it's a short book, that won't take long.
It's 174 pages.
It was purposely so.
We didn't want a huge tone.
But ultimately, we wanted to make the argument that, listen, there's legitimacy to wanting a restrictivist notion.
And by the way, historically speaking, there have been moments when America has said we want more restriction, not less.
We think that's important.
We think that's important in a consensus-based solution.
When you take both sides, you have to kind of understand the other side ultimately.
And I think the undertone of the book is a bit that, to show the phenomenon, show its importance, and show that it really goes for our politics today.
unidentified
From the book, and I want you to dive into this, a counter-argument on nativism suggests that nativism will fade as younger, more diverse generations become the majority.
I think right now, you know, nativism as a sentiment measured by pollsters like myself is declining ever so slightly, even though it's becoming more important politically because the parties are increasingly becoming distinct on that issue.
On average, it's becoming less important.
But I just think that's a momentary trend.
Ultimately, it goes at a human condition of belonging.
Well, I mean, the one that I've been like, the base case I've used, like maybe since 2016, is that it will just work itself out with generational replacement.
As new generations come in that are less restrictivist or less nativist, they'll become a non-nativist or a less restrictivist nation.
That's one base case.
The other one is that it's part of the human condition and things sort of reset.
And as long as you have especially high levels of immigration like we do today, we're at 15 or 16 percent foreign-born somewhere in that sort of range.
That's sort of the tipping point range where it becomes a societal and a political issue.
If we keep on having these high levels of immigration this way, it will continue as a critical point.
The other one is it can take on another form, right?
In some countries, we have nativism, but we don't have immigrants.
Because you don't necessarily need immigrants to have nativism.
You can have internal conflict, internal ethnic differences, or socioeconomic differences.
Take Brazil, you have socioeconomic status and regional differences.
You have South Africa or India where you have different ethnicities.
And so it can take on different forms that way.
Are we headed into a have-and-have-not world with AI and technology?
We don't know.
I think there's a lot of worry about that.
But nativism could be turned on its head.
We could have humanism.
So the point being, I think, critically is it goes to the condition of being a human being.
And us humans are social creatures.
And we have a need to belong.
And when we feel that threatened, we react.
unidentified
Chris in the Steel City Line for Democrats.
Good morning.
Good morning.
I think you kind of just answered my question.
I was just thinking, listening to your talk about whether you considered people moving from one area of the country into another area of the country and interacting with people that maybe have been there for three generations and you're the outsider moving in from a different city and maybe have different experiences and nativism is maybe plays out the same way there.
And in the back of my head, I'm thinking varieties of spice alike and it's great to have the cultural aspects of local areas that are dramatically different than other parts of the country.
I'll give you one, which is like it's in the chapter on identity, which goes to this restrictivist versus less restrictive notion of an American.
And my son, my older son, he was a wrestler at the time, wrestled in Potomac, Maryland, was a really good wrestler.
He got stuck in the state that year.
And I talk about the difference in the ceremony between the wrestling match in Potomac, Maryland and the wrestling match in Front Royal, Virginia.
Two Americas, two very different Americas.
Potomac, Maryland, everyone is respectful, respectful of the national anthem, but it was more like a ritual that had to be done.
We did it.
We put our hands on our hearts and we were done.
When you went to go to Front Royal, the national anthem, the pre-match sort of ceremony was not just routinized.
It was felt by people viscerally.
They came in with a color guard.
Veterans basically saluted.
And the point of that vignette is that our relationship to symbols is highly differential.
How we hold those symbols in our hearts and our minds is differential.
And it goes ultimately to this notion of nativism.
We know by the data that that part of Virginia is much more nativist.
We know by the data that Potomac, Maryland, where I'm from, is less nativist.
It goes, once again, to a much more restrictive view of what an American is.
They have certain sort of characteristics that are very important to another one where ultimately an American is much more diffuse sort of concept.
I'll give you an example.
I use this example a lot.
Think of a two-year-old that comes here from Honduras.
She's lived her entire life, speaks fluent English, loves the commanders.
Let's say we're here in D.C., loves the commanders, is everything that an American would be, except that she doesn't have a piece of paper.
She wasn't born here.
She doesn't have legal status.
The more restrictive view is, like, that individual is not an American, maybe could become an American, but is not an American.
The less a restrictive view, the more diffuse view, the more Potomac view versus Front Royal view is ultimately that that is an American because that person, culturally speaking, is an American.
I mean, and if we were to peel away the onion and look past the specific policy questions we embedded in those questions in those items, we would find that, like, you know, the one view is much more restrictive, and we need to follow the rules.
We need to sort of deal with those here illegally.
They are not an American.
They don't necessarily have a right to be here.
And you have another group of non-nativists that feel the contrary, very much so.
And, you know, in polite company, talking to both sides, right, engaging with people just in general, professionally and personally, you know, there's a huge gulf and empathy on both sides for understanding each other's arguments, right?
The less restrictive side, the more Potomac side, let's say, says, well, if everyone just knew them, that is the illegal immigrants, like they knew them, they had a little bit more empathy for them, they would feel for them.
The other side is, listen, you know, they didn't follow the rules to come in here.
My great-grandparents did, or, you know, our schools are swamped.
I live in a border town in Texas.
You know, the schools are swamped.
We can't handle this.
There needs to be some sort of control.
There's a huge gulf right now in terms of our understanding because we live in these two very different worlds.
The book, again, Nativist Nation, Populism, Grievance, Identity, and the Transformation of American Politics.
That's been the subject of our discussion.
We will head to the natural state.
This is Richard in North Little Rock, Republican.
unidentified
Good morning.
Yeah, this is all a very light academic topic and discussion that I've been hearing.
If you were to present these same topics and discussions and questions to, let's say, the Somalian community in Minneapolis or the Muslim community in Dearborn, Michigan, or the Haitian community in Miami, they would look at you like you had your, you know, had three heads coming out of your neck because none of this stuff matters to them.
What matters is tribalism.
And unfortunately, Caucasians are the only people on the planet, except for some, that refuse to be tribalistic in the sense of looking out for their own people and their own kind.
Look at South Central LA, who the majority of the people there are all from Central America or Mexico.
They're all very tribalistic.
They don't care what you and I are having this discussion about on TV.
This is all meaningless problem to them.
What they care about is their immediate tribe, their immediate family.
And I think that what I would say is I'm glad that it's a little bit sanitized our discussion.
I'm glad that we're dealing with it in a scientific way because I think there needs to be a bit less emotion and a bit more data and science to kind of discuss and reflect on these things.
That said, the point he's making is a legitimate point in a democracy.
And the point is we should have a right, at least to have our voice heard about who should and should not belong.
That's as old as a democracy has ever been.
I think it's one of the only things that goes to reconstituting our notion of like a collective notion of belonging.
And obviously, who comes here and who doesn't should be on the table.
People should feel like they have their voice heard on this oh so critical issue.
And I think what we heard In the viewer's voice, was that emotion that angst that reaction, and probably, though I don't want to put words in his mouth, but like not feeling heard.
unidentified
Time for one or two more calls.
Robert, here in D.C., Independent, go ahead.
I need to say something, but before I do, one thing that you missed was indigenous peoples.
See, there's native which sanctifies generations, indigenous as original inhabitants and citizens as belonging.
But now, the reason why I call is I got a very unique one for you here.
Now, I'm a native Washington County, third generation.
Now, I went to school outside of the college, right outside of D.C.
And it's all about the registration office and some registrants for classes.
And so, the council asked me to say, okay, well, where are you from, exactly?
I said, Washington, D.C.
Well, the council dropped a pen, looked at me, and said, You are not a United States citizen.
I said, Excuse me.
I said, That's the nation's capital.
He said, No, you're not a citizen.
See, you live in a district.
You are not in a state.
And you are considered as a resident.
So I said, Wait a minute.
She said, See, we couldn't even let you in school even at all, even though I had not taken the entrance exam because I was on the West Coast.
And so he said, Well, look, this is what you need to do in order to get your state citizenship.
Now, I'm in New Mexico.
I went to UNM.
So she told me, said, This is what you need to do in order to get state citizenship.
Well, Robert, let me hold off on that part, but start on the first comment that he made about Native peoples in this country and this idea of nativism.
Any public policy, any political issue that you want to talk about, now's the time to call in.
will get to those calls right after the break.
unidentified
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For those C-SPAN viewers who stick around, after our program today, we will take you right to this week's Ceasefire.
Ceasefire host Dasha Burns sat down with Union Theological Seminary President Cornell West and Princeton University Professor Robert George for a dialogue on rising political polarization in the U.S. and the top issues facing the country that will air right after this program ends at the top of the hour, 10 a.m. Eastern.
Until then, your phone calls in open forum, and Richard is up first out of the show me state.
Democrat, good morning.
unidentified
Good morning.
I'm calling about this Venezuela deal we got going here.
You know, Cortez and they went to South America to steal all their gold.
The Spanish did.
Now, we're down there.
We're after their oil.
You see, we're just like the old guys in the old days.
If you got Mike, you can take it.
And this deal about blowing them boats up out there, murdering them people, that head of our army and President Trump, both of them ought to go to world court and be hung.
All right, that's Richard in Missouri on Venezuela.
unidentified
This is the lead story in today's Washington Post.
President Trump on Saturday said that commercial airlines should consider Venezuelan airspace closed, increasing the pressure on the country's leadership after weeks of escalating tensions between Washington and Caracas and the growing threat of the U.S. attack against that country.
The story notes, though, Trump does not have the legal authority to close airspace.
His declaration follows a massive buildup of U.S. military forces in the region in recent weeks as he's ramped up his threats against Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro.
This lead story in today's Sunday Washington Post.
This is Mike, Jarrettsville, Maryland, Republican.
unidentified
Good morning.
Hey, good morning, John.
It's so nice to see you again.
You're one of my favorite hosts there at C-SPAN.
And listen, thank you so much for doing this.
And I think I have your tie, by the way.
I think I bought that a few years ago.
This exact same necktie that you have.
Good taste, Mike.
I'll be real quick here, John.
I wanted to speak with your last guest.
And here's the problem.
I don't think it's really nativism that we have a problem that divides us or the whole scheme that he was presenting.
I think it's not that much.
I'll tell you really what it is.
It's respect for rule of law.
You know, as Americans, you know, we are a state, a country of laws, very strict laws.
And if you drop a candy wrapper on the sidewalk and a policeman sees you do it, you know what?
He might come over and ask for your ID and tell you to pick it up.
John, you live in Virginia.
I know, listen, you're driving in Virginia and the state trooper sees you.
Maybe you do a lane change without a turn signal.
He pulls you over.
Oh my gosh, you were at the Christmas party.
He's going to, listen, we all are subjective to these laws that are very, you know, you have to watch your step here in America.
You can get into trouble all over the place.
So here I have to worry about my gum wrapper when I'm eating my candy on the street.
I have to worry about my lane change, put my turn signal on when I'm driving in Virginia or Maryland.
Hey, listen, you know, but yet I'm going to take my entire family.
Let me get this right.
I don't understand this.
You're going to move your entire family from one country.
You're going to go into another country illegally.
I mean, this is the problem that Americans have, John, I think, with this whole thing is because we are a nation of laws.
We're a people of laws.
It doesn't matter the color of your skin.
We all have to respect the law.
And the fact that these people, these illegals, as Trump says, and they are illegal, have come over and this was their first offense.
By virtually, by coming into the country, in and of itself, is breaking the law.
And this is what Americans, I nailed it.
This is what Americans, I believe, really dislike.
Yes, I'm just calling in to let you know that at one time that we were thinking the last few years that the white race was losing their voting block, then they allowed Donald Trump to get back in there so they can try and change the Constitution.
Even they changed the Supreme Court where these guys on Supreme Court are answering to the Republican Party.
The Republican party is run by a white evangelical.
They don't want to lose their voting block, so they're doing whatever they can to fix stuff because they know there's not going to be a chance for them later in the years to come.
So they didn't give us the opportunity to even learn our own heritage.
They told us it was against the law for us to read.
Still, when they say it was possible for us to read, they gave us the King James.
All those stories in there is allegory.
Somebody walking on water, somebody making them blind seed.
I've been a Democrat, but I've been supportive of all the presidents.
My first question is: how can a convicted felon who is the president of the United States be allowed to pardon anyone?
And my second question is: I'm Valenzuela.
He's killing these people on the boats with no rights for supposedly the drugs, but yet he's pardoning this other guy from another country who has recently been doing 45 years in prison and he's giving him a pardon that he was one of the biggest drug dealers in their country.
Tell me what's in it, Max, because I've got two minutes left here.
unidentified
You guys, I'll read the first paragraph very quickly.
It says, any alien who is physically present in the United States or arrives in the United States, whether or not at a designated port of arrival, including an alien who is brought to the United States, after having been interdicted internationally or in the United States waters, irrespective of such alien status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section, which is U.S. Section A or Title VIII-1158 is talking about.
You're talking about the asylum process in this country, Max.
Yes, sir.
And I mean saying that because there's so many people that keep calling these humans illegals when they're not illegals.
They're asylum seekers.
They have the right according to our laws.
So everybody's saying, yeah, we're in a country of laws.
It says exactly what I just read: that if Max, if they don't show up for their asylum hearing or otherwise disappear into the country after claiming asylum, are they illegals at that point?
unidentified
I don't think they would be illegal.
I think they would have to go before a board that would designate whether they were illegal or a board would decide that.
I don't think they just automatically become illegal.
And again, I'm a little fuzzy on that part of it, but the laws say that if you were present physically in the waters or on this land, you can seek asylum.
So it blows my mind.
All the people that say we need to follow the laws, well, this is the law, but you're calling them illegal.
There's something wrong here.
There's like a misconnection, it seems to me.
So that's why I brought that up.
And I wanted to say the title because hopefully everyone will look it up and realize, wow, we are calling these people that are seeking asylum illegals, and that's not the right thing.
And that's not American.
That's kind of, sorry to use this word, but it's very Nazi-ish.
Nazi-ish.
Sorry about that.
But yeah, that's what I'm referring to.
Just that we're a country of laws, yes, but this is the law.
Max, our last caller on today's Washington Journal.
unidentified
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington, D.C. to across the country.
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Tonight on C-SPAN's Q&A, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro went to prison in 2024, convicted of contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena from the January 6th Committee after being found guilty on two counts.
In his new book, I Went to Prison So You Won't Have To, Peter Navarro lays out the Justice Department's case, his arrest and trial, and what it was like for him behind bars.
People think you're in a dorm rather than a cell.
It's like everybody told me there that they'd rather be in a cell because only I have to worry about one other guy.
You know, there's a thing called the lock, lock in the sock, right?
You take a padlock, you throw it in the sock, and a lot of rough justice goes on like that.
White House trade advisor and author Peter Navarro tonight at 8 Eastern on C-SPAN's QA.
You can listen to QA wherever you get your podcasts and on the C-SPAN Now app.
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court hears oral argument in Cox Communications v. Sony Music, a case questioning whether internet service provider Cox and companies like it can be held liable for their users' copyright infringement.
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Next, this year's National Civic Speed Championship in Washington, D.C., middle school students competed before judges, including former Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson, who served in the George W. Bush administration, and former Clinton administration Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater.
The two and a half-hour annual Civics competition was hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation.
Please welcome to the stage our emcee for the day, Mario Lopez.