CSPAN - Washington Journal 01/11/2026

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Jan. 11, 2026 07:00-10:00 - CSPAN

02:59:49

Washington Journal 01/11/2026

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donald j trump

admin 05:25

henry olsen

26:13

kimberly adams

cspan 35:45

oliver libby

24:51

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brian lamb

cspan 01:20

chuck schumer

sen/d 00:57

jd vance

admin 02:13

stephen miller

admin 01:48

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jake tapper

cnn 00:24

peter doocy

fox 00:08

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barbara in north carolina

callers 06:32

steve in north charleston

callers 03:38

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Speaker	Time	Text
Cannot Understand Monroe's Divide 00:15:07
unidentified		This morning, along with your calls and comments live, we'll talk about campaign 2026, Trump administration policies, and political news of the day with Henry Olson of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
		Also, Democratic donor and venture capitalist Oliver Libby discusses his book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling, Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		C-SPAN's Washington Journal is next.
		Join the conversation.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
		It's Sunday, January 11th, 2026.
		In both domestic and foreign policy, the Trump administration has an expansive view of presidential power, though many of the more controversial uses of that power are being challenged in court.
		According to recent polling, a slight majority of Americans think Donald Trump's use of presidential power goes too far.
		But this morning, we want to know what you think.
		Do you support the way President Trump is using his presidential power?
		Our phone lines for Democrats, 202-748-8000.
		For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
		If you'd like to text us, that number is 202-748-8003.
		Please be sure to include your name and where you're writing in from.
		We're also on social media at facebook.com slash C-SPAN and on X at C-SPANWJ.
		That polling I was referencing comes from Quinnipiak.
		They ran this poll a little bit earlier this month and found that about 54% of Americans think that Donald Trump's use of presidential power goes too far.
		37% say he's handling it about right.
		And 7% think Trump isn't going far enough in using the power of the presidency.
		Now, when you break that down by parties, again, all voters, 54%, say that he's going too far using presidential power compared to 96% of Democrats.
		Now, when you go to independents, 59% say the president is going too far.
		But for Republicans, only 11% say that the president has gone too far in his use of presidential power.
		Now, one area that has sparked quite a bit of controversy in terms of the use of presidential power is President Trump's recent actions in Venezuela in ousting Nicolas Maduro, as well as the military strikes there.
		There's been some recent YouGov polling from earlier this month finding that U.S. military action in Venezuela remains unpopular, but Republican support has risen.
		While Americans remain more opposed than in favor of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela, support for intervention has risen in the past two weeks, particularly among Republicans.
		Most Americans believe that Trump should seek congressional authorization before intervening in the country, but support for seeking authorization has declined, especially among Republicans.
		Democrats and Republicans have grown more polarized on questions of what role the U.S. should play in world affairs and what effect U.S. military interventions have on the countries they occur in.
		President Trump earlier this month spoke defending the attack on Venezuela and reasserting the Monroe Doctrine, which he calls the Donro Doctrine.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Furthermore, under the now deposed Dictator Maduro, Venezuela was increasingly hosting foreign adversaries in our region and acquiring menacing offensive weapons that could threaten U.S. interests and lives.
		And they used those weapons last night.
		They used those weapons last night, potentially in league with the cartels operating along our border.
		All of these actions were in gross violation of the core principles of American foreign policy, dating back more than two centuries, and not anymore.
		All the way back dated to the Monroe doctrines.
		And the Monroe Doctrine is a big deal, but we've superseded it by a lot, by a real lot.
		They now call it the Donroad Document.
		I don't know.
		It's Monroe Doctrine.
		We sort of forgot about it.
		It was very important, but we forgot about it.
		We don't forget about it anymore.
		Under our new national security strategy, American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Now, there has been pushback in Congress to those actions in Venezuela, including a war powers resolution that is advancing in the Senate.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Last week, Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia, reacted to the advancement of that war powers resolution.
unidentified		None of us should want this president or any president taking our sons and daughters to war without notice, consultation, debate, and vote in Congress.
		And so this was a big win today to have every Democrat unified for this principle that this needs to be taken out of the skiff and put before the American public so they can see what's at stake and whether the administration has a plan or not.
		I applaud my Democratic colleagues and I really applaud the number of Republicans who, with some urging by Senator Paul and our discussions, got on board.
		What does this mean?
		This was a motion to discharge my war powers resolution from the committee.
		The committee was going to lock it up and it was never going to see the light of day.
		So now it becomes the pending business of the Senate.
		What you will likely see next week is a vote on a motion to proceed, which we would expect simple majority, similar vote to today.
		And then a debate, finally, after months about this military operation, the whole thing, including where it's going in Venezuela and possibly in other nations.
		That's a debate that under the procedure of the Senate could allow for amendments.
		But this is all about letting the public in on what's going on.
		It is so frustrating.
		If I'm at church and I was on New Year's Eve and somebody comes up to me and says, my kid's an Army Ranger, don't let the president send him into war.
		Or I have people ask me, what's the legal rationale or what's the targeting criteria?
		What are we doing?
		Even when I know answers to these questions, thus far I've been unable to tell them because we only know what we know from classified hearings.
		It's time to get this out of the skiff, get it on the floor of the Senate, get it before the American public and do what the Constitution demands of us.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Once again, our question this morning is what do you think of the president's use of presidential power?
		Support or oppose how President Donald Trump has been using his authority.
		Our phone line for Democrats 202748-8000.
		For Republicans 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202748-8002.
		Let's start with our independent line with Jeffrey in Greensboro, North Carolina.
		Good morning, Jeffrey.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Thank you for taking the call.
		And I hope I can express this.
		It is, I'm very much opposed of it because it's just three branches of government.
		We're losing that.
		The democracy that we're supposed to be a light of the free world.
		I mean, he's indicating all the time dictatorship, dictatorship of these other countries abroad, and the violence is here in America.
		You cannot pretend today when your other guest is going to speak about this, there is just so much violence and so much injustice going on.
		And you just cannot take one person who, okay, is elected to be in this country right now, our president, but to just skip over so much that is attached to that presidency.
		It is not bringing any evidence of all these boats that allegedly had drugs in them.
		I mean, you would have to show the American people, this is why we're doing it, to protect Americans and hope that it will send a message where drugs can't be tolerated no longer.
		That's just one.
		And then you just absolutely talking about taking over Greenland.
		I mean, or buying it or taking it over.
		So you think about the logic of that statement.
		That's powerful.
		That's dangerous.
		But you're saying we can buy it or take it, but then you refuse to acknowledge people living in the streets, hungry, homeless.
		So much to spare in America, but you can find money to do that or the resources now taking over Venezuela and for the rich, powerful oil tycoons that just met him.
		It's so much now available for that research to build that up, to benefit.
		Who is it going to benefit in America realistically?
		You know, it's time for people to really stand up to this man.
		He is really dividing America.
		He's definitely changed the narrative.
		I know I'm not crazy saying this and your audience is hearing this, but it's a fact.
		It is just dangerous.
		And how can America keep allowing this to be just the normal?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Jeffrey referenced President Trump's statements on Venezuela as well as Greenland.
		And while answering reporter questions in the White House, President Trump did address the U.S. interest in Greenland.
		Here are his comments from Friday.
peter doocy ▲ ● ▼		How much money are you thinking of giving people in Greenland to get them on board with a possible U.S. I'm not talking about money for Greenland yet?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I might talk about that.
		But right now, we are going to do something on Greenland, whether they like it or not, because if we don't do it, Russia or China will take over Greenland, and we're not going to have Russia or China as a neighbor.
		I would like to make a deal, you know, the easy way.
		But if we don't do it the easy way, we're going to do it the hard way.
		And by the way, I'm a fan of Denmark, too, I have to tell you.
		And they've been very nice to me.
		I'm a big fan, but the fact that they had a boat land there 500 years ago doesn't mean that they own the land.
		I'm sure we had lots of boats go there also.
		But we need that because if you take a look outside of Greenland right now, there are Russian destroyers.
		There are Chinese destroyers and bigger.
		There are Russian submarines all over the place.
		We're not going to have Russia or China occupy Greenland, and that's what they're going to do if we don't.
		So we're going to be doing something with Greenland either the nice way or the more difficult way.
		Please go ahead, ma'am.
unidentified		Mr. President, why is it so important to you to own it when you have a military presence there, which you could expand to affect security?
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Because when we own it, we defend it.
		You don't defend leases the same way.
		You have to own it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Back to your calls with your thoughts on how President Trump is using his presidential authority.
		James is in Atlanta, Georgia on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, James.
unidentified		Oh, yes, good morning.
		You know, what we actually see here is a dictatorship.
		Just like JD Vance said, the American Hitler.
		This guy kept Hitler's memoirs mine on his nightstand.
		This is what his wife said during his first divorce in Van DeFair magazine.
		You know, what I can't understand is why all the white people in this country support this.
		You know, if you really look at what's happening and what's going on, what you'll see is the proud boys and these different type of people in the streets again.
		They are the ones who are a part of this ICE.
		This power is unchecked.
		And when it speaks about the Constitution, this is when it talks about picking up arms and things against your government.
		It's a tyrannical government, Don Amok.
		This is what the Constitution says.
		This guy don't respect the Constitution.
		You know, he's delusional also.
		Marco Rubio and these people who are with him, Christian Ngone, they need to be brought up.
		You know, this is what I'm saying.
		And the Supreme Court is complicit with this because they also gave this guy immunity.
		But what they must realize, when the Democrats get back in office, they have that same power.
		These same people, Jim Jordan, Rubio, and J.D. Bands and people, they would be complaining about what a Democratic president, but we're going to wield that power also.
		And we're going to make you all people pay for these crimes that you're committing against American citizens.
		You're killing American citizens on American soil, you know, with this presidential power with this run amok.
		But what I can't understand, like I said, this is the last thing I have to say.
		I can't understand why the majority, the big majority of white people in this country, they support this.
		But these are the same people talking about freedom in America and stuff.
		And we need to get, I agree with Trump on some of these people.
		We need to get rid of some of these immigrants who we brought over here.
		You know, they are not good for this country.
		Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, and these different type of people.
		Marco Rubio, he's using the military, the United States military.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		The Supreme Court's ruling on immunity for the president.
		That was back in 2024 in July when the Supreme Court said that Trump has absolute immunity for core acts of the presidency.
		Here's a story about that from NPR from around that time in July of 2024, saying that in a historic, consequential, and controversial decision on Monday, the Supreme Court granted substantial immunity from prosecution to, at the time, former President Donald Trump on election subversion charges.
		The decision almost certainly would delay his trial until after the November election, if it takes place at all.
		Obviously, that trial did not take place because the president won the election.
		The vote was six to three, with the court's Republican appointees all in the majority and the Democratic appointees in fierce dissent.
		One of those dissents came from Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and she said, let the president violate the law.
		Let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain.
		Let him use his official power for evil ends.
		Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not even be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be.
		That is the majority's message today.
		Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done.
		The relationship between the president and the people he serves has shifted irrecomably.
Supporting The President: A Military Perspective 00:00:48
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		In every use of official power, the president is now a king above the law.
		Back to your calls.
		Kevin is in Staten Island, New York, on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Kevin.
unidentified		Hi, good morning.
		I study Constitutional Law in College.
		I'm a former U.S. Navy veteran, served overseas two tours.
		I support the president on every field.
		I support JD Vance, who is a former Marine and a military mind.
Joanna On Globalization And Executive Power 00:15:16
unidentified		One, the president has received nothing but praises throughout the country and throughout the world From the right people who stand for democracy.
		And as far as oil-wise goes, exploiting the oil, several U.S. major oil companies developed those fields in Venezuela.
		They spent hard-earned money.
		They were given grants from the government to research.
		And they developed the fields, only to have it nationalized.
		Just like what happened in Libya with the Nelson and Bunker Hunt, Momwakaddafi nationalized the oil fields.
		So, I mean, as far as capitalizing, we literally and figuratively own those oil fields and we own the rights to them.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So, as far as Kevin, can I pause you a moment just because I want to read you something and then get your thoughts on it?
		This is a story from BBC, but it was reported widely about that meeting that Trump had with the oil executives.
		The headline here: Trump seeks $100 billion for Venezuelan oil, but ExxonBoss says the country is uninvestable.
		U.S. President Donald Trump has asked for at least $100 billion in oil industry spending for Venezuela, but received a lukewarm response at the White House as one executive warned that the South American country was currently uninvestable.
		Bosses of the biggest U.S. oil firms who attended the meeting acknowledged that Venezuela, sitting on vast energy reserves, represented an enticing opportunity, but they said significant changes would be needed to make the region an attractive investment.
		No major financial commitments were immediately forthcoming.
		Kevin, what are your thoughts on the way that these oil executives have reacted?
unidentified		Well, I mean, the way they reacted would be anybody's reaction to a newly overthrown regime of tyranny.
		Everybody would be skeptical.
		I mean, I'm in the international field myself.
		I'm into produce very deeply.
		And you're going to certain countries like Ecuador and Nicaragua and stuff, which have also had unstable governments, which have now changed.
		And the changes are forthcoming.
		The people are supporting us in Venezuela, and it's the Venezuelan people who are doing the brazing that we help them out.
		I mean, people look upon the United States as the policeman of the world, and they look upon us as the peacemaker.
		And Donald Trump has made several attempts and inroads and to squash many, many skirmishes and has had very good results.
		As far as anything else goes, if you look back at the Obama-Biden regime, their use of COINTELPRO and Project M in the federal prison systems was quashed fast.
		And there were court orders issued for the FBI to cease and desist such programs that were deemed unconstitutional by a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and Hobson versus Wilson and also by the Supreme Court in Sims versus the CIA.
		So, I mean, as far as throwing mud, there's a lot of mud that can be thrown towards Obama-Biden.
		I mean, as far as Black Lives Matter goes, Obama approved $2.5 billion in reparation to the Enry Black Farmers Asset Litigation Act.
		And we can go on.
		But the idea is, is President Trump has done nothing but try to undo the wrongs that were done to people.
		And And to me, it's not a racist because if you look at all his wives, they were foreign-born.
		And two, his employees in the hotel industry and construction industry are what he calls a rainbow.
		So we're really, really disraped.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I'm Carl in Los Angeles, California on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Carl.
unidentified		Good morning to you.
		Yes, I'm glad your last caller agreed that black farmers should get reparations and that black America should receive reparations coming from the White House from Donald Trump immediately as soon as possible.
		Donald Trump.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		He's just saying that it did happen under the Obama administration, not necessarily that he was for or against it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		But go ahead.
unidentified		Yeah, because there is some discrepancy with farmers right now and the funding that they're not receiving.
		But European farmers are.
		Back to my Donald Trump and his running the country incorrectly overpowering other countries.
		I think he's overstepping his boundaries, but he's finding legal ways to do it.
		And those legal ways are keeping him in order to start a war or take something from some other country that shouldn't be taken from another country.
		Now, what needs to happen is we need more federal funding here in Los Angeles, California, all over the United States for housing.
		Emergency vousing housing vouchers are being taken away this year.
		This is going to be thousands and thousands of people back on the sidewalk here in Los Angeles, all over the United States, because he won't give the federal government the funding they need to keep these senior citizens that's 70 years old in wheelchairs, wheelchair bound, can't get out the house to go get groceries, can't do anything.
		They're wheelchair bound.
		They worked all their life for Social Security.
		He wants to cut everything from the federal government.
		Please help this president understand that you have senior citizens out here, and we're not going to be voting for him on the sidewalk.
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Joanna is in Monterey, California on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Joanna.
unidentified		Hello there.
unidentified		Let me take my phone off, speaker, just a second.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay, can you hear me?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Yes, we can hear you.
unidentified		Excellent.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		So just a couple of things in regards to the presidential power.
		The previous caller that was studied constitutional law, I think what we've done here is we've gone away from the basics.
		If we all think back about a year ago, same time, maybe right before Donald Trump took office, I didn't believe this country was in such chaos.
		And I ask everyone, everyone, Democrat, Independent, Republican, what has he done to benefit American people?
		Something factual.
		How have we benefited from this so far?
		And then regarding the constitutional law, back to basics, Section 3, 14th Amendment.
		Anyone who gives aid and comfort to insurrectionists cannot hold public office.
		When he pardoned the J-6ers, in my opinion, that's aid and comfort.
		So we're forgetting about that old worn-out document, the Constitution.
		And it's there for us to protect us.
		If you feel he's overreaching, if you think he's overstretching, if you think he's not doing his job, that's what it's there for.
		And we all really need to get burst on it.
		Now, Venezuela, the U.S. had to charge Maduro.
		They had to.
		Because they need retroactive justification for the bombings in the Caribbean.
		Now, if Maduro takes a plea, very simple.
		No evidence, no discovery necessary.
		Everyone can stand there and say, hey, look, see, we were right.
		No one's going to ask any questions.
unidentified		Those are my thoughts on that.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		So, oh, C-SPAN, 2014, Senator Rubio.
		Six minutes and 45 seconds into that video.
		What civilized population turns their own National Guard against their own people?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		That's all I have, Ms. Joanna was referencing what actual accomplishments the Trump administration may have had.
		The accomplishments that they tout, at least supporters of the president, are many of his executive orders that he has issued.
		Here's coverage of those executive orders in the Washington Post, finding, and this is a story from mid-December, that Trump signed more executive orders in 2025 than during his entire first term.
		The threshold reflects Trump's efforts to dramatically expand presidential authority with moves that have tested the bounds of the Constitution.
		Now, just some of those many executive orders that he signed include securing our borders and the National Emergency Declaration, as well as an executive order establishing the Department of Government Efficiency, DOE, an executive order that, as they said, unleashing American energy, ending federal diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and preferencing, and as Joanna mentioned, pardoning the January 6th rioters, withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement,
		having the federal government recognize two sexes only, a reciprocal tariff act implementation, restrictions on birthright citizenship, which are being challenged in the Supreme Court, revoking 78 Biden executive orders all at once, eliminating U.S. AID, and requiring independent federal agencies to submit their rules to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review.
		Just a fraction of the many executive orders that President Trump has signed in his first year in office.
		Let's now go to Kathleen in Maryland, New York on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Kathleen.
unidentified		Yes.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Kathleen, what do you think of how President Trump is using his presidential authority?
unidentified		I think he's fine.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
unidentified		I don't agree 100% all the time, but I think he's on track most of the time.
unidentified		All right.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of the more expansive view that this White House has of how to use presidential authority more broadly?
unidentified		Like I said, I think he's got advisors that tell him, you know, what bounds that he can stay within.
unidentified		And that seems reasonable to me.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Next up is Alan in Mertstown, Pennsylvania on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Alan.
unidentified		Yes, hello.
unidentified		Hello.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of how the president uses the presidential authority?
unidentified		Oh, I don't know the way it sounds.
		I may be one of the few Democrats that still uses critical thinking.
		All those executive orders that you just read off, 90% of them help the American people, helps the United States.
		I just don't understand.
		I've been a Democrat all my life.
		My parents and grandparents were.
		I guess that's why I was.
		I'm ready to switch to independent because I just don't understand what people aren't seeing.
		Everything that the Democrats have been doing recently is not for the American citizen.
		It's for the world.
		They're trying to do globalization.
		I would love globalization and everyone to live together if that was possible, but it's not possible.
		So I was born in America.
		I think our president should do for American citizens, and I feel that's exactly what he's doing.
		That's what he was elected to do.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Alan, one of those executive orders was the attempt to rescind the idea of birthright citizenship.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of that?
unidentified		I don't like that.
		I said when I first got on, I said 90% of his orders were good.
		There are a couple I don't agree with.
		There's always going to be a couple.
		I'm not 100% on pretty much anything.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		All right.
		Well, President Trump was defending his efforts to roll back birthright citizenship back in June.
		He vowed to push ahead in that attempt despite the Supreme Court ruling.
		This was after the Supreme Court ruled that a lower court had overstepped in blocking the president's executive orders nationwide.
		Here's President Trump from back in June.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I'm grateful to the Supreme Court for stepping in and solving this very, very big and complex problem, and they've made it very simple.
		I want to thank Justice Barrett, who wrote the opinion brilliantly, as well as Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Thomas.
		Great people.
		Thanks for this decision, and thanks to this decision.
		We can now promptly file to proceed with numerous policies that have been wrongly enjoined on a nationwide basis.
		And some of the cases we're talking about would be ending birthright citizenship, which now comes to the fore.
		That was meant for the babies of slaves.
		It wasn't meant for people trying to scam the system and come into the country on a vacation.
		This was, in fact, it was the same date, the exact same date, the end of the Civil War.
		It was meant for the babies of slaves, and it's so clean and so obvious.
		But this lets us go there and finally win that case because hundreds of thousands of people are pouring into our country under birthright citizenship, and it wasn't meant for that reason.
		It was meant for the babies of slaves.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Back to your calls.
		Paul is in Romeoville, Illinois, on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Paul.
unidentified		Yeah, I don't like a lot of things that Trump's saying, but he has a right to say his own opinion, though.
unidentified		You know what I'm saying?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of how he uses his presidential authority, though?
unidentified		It's not good.
unidentified		He's overstepping his boundaries quite a bit.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		In what ways?
unidentified		Well, he really shouldn't have ICE people, you know, just killing people on the streets and stuff.
unidentified		That's not cool.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Let's hear from Michael in Far Rockaway, New York on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Michael.
unidentified		Good morning.
unidentified		And thank you for accepting my call.
We Won't Sit Idle 00:15:18
unidentified		I believe the president is doing everything he needs to do.
		I believe most presidents that we had in the past was too passive.
		This is a country of prosperity and opportunity, not just here, but around the world.
		We are not going to sit by idle and allow things to happen while we don't have no control over it.
		This is a country where what you put in, you get out.
		It's just like the new technology.
		If you don't get with the program, you get left behind.
		And Donald Trump is not allowing this country to fall to the wayside.
		I believe everything he's doing is good.
		He's doing it not just like the other gentleman said, not just for us, but for the world.
		And I will vote for him again if he gets the chance to run for election again.
		And I'm a black man living in the United States.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Michael, you mentioned what President Trump is doing for the world.
		When he was campaigning this time around, he did campaign that he was going to be less involved in foreign conflicts.
		Do you think that his recent actions have been consistent with that?
unidentified		Yes, because time changes.
		Situations come up where you have to take a stand on certain things.
		He might not want to do it, but he's looking at China's on one side, Russia's on another side.
		Like you said, you don't want nobody having more control over our own country.
		And that's a threat to us.
		Like you said, certain neighbors, you just can't be.
		And I believe that.
		Truly, wholeheartedly believe this man is trying to make this country great again.
		And like I said, if people not learning to understand the politics of this country, then they need to leave.
		I mean, it's real simple.
		You know, like I work hard all my life.
		People getting free housing, don't want to participate.
		They're comfortable getting free food stamps.
		And I have to get up every morning and go work hard and be able to support my family and myself.
		When people sitting around, like I might have a neighbor, I'm paying $1,800 for rent, and this person getting free housing, paying $100 a month for the same apartment.
		I don't think that's fair.
		Everybody has the opportunity to make it in this country.
		What you put into it is what you get out.
		That's how I feel.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's hear from John in Batvavia, New York, on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, John.
		And how do you say the name of your town?
unidentified		What's that?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		How do you say the name of your town?
unidentified		It's Batavia.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Batavia.
		Thank you.
		What's your comment?
unidentified		Well, I was born into a Democratic family.
		And, you know, Democrats in my family ran for office and everything else.
		But I can't disagree with Trump.
		He's the only president I've seen that actually has a set of cojones to do what he says and not worry about everybody else.
		He's going to do what he says, and it's for the country.
		And everything that we see and hear and all the crying from the Democrats, my ex-people, is because he's dismantling their system.
		And their system is to stay in power and run things.
		And the other caller said that they're worried about the world.
		They're not worried about the world.
		They're worried about getting voters.
		And Trump doesn't care.
		He's going to do what he says and what's best for the country.
		And they can spin it any way they want.
		But he didn't go to Venezuela to get their oil.
		He's protecting us and trying to stop that war in Russia.
		Everything this man is doing, he's a true patriot.
		He loves his country.
		And he's not tied like the rest of the politicians where he's owned by somebody.
		That's why they hate him and they're scared of him.
		I mean, as a person, I don't think I like Donald Trump.
		But as the leader of the free world and our president, I love the guy.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Joshua is in El Cajon, California on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Joshua.
		Good morning, Joshua.
		Go ahead.
unidentified		Well, I spying these policies part of a big dynamic of a level that's almost like playing Singong chess.
		There's so many levels to the problem.
		You can't decide just the easy yes or no on everything.
		You have to make very dynamic choices.
		I'm not in favor of Trump as much of his policies are not working the way he expects, but he is at least listening to his advisors and staying mostly within the political purview of the executive office.
		Now, if we were to, he's not, you know, he's not just one man in power.
		He's one of many people in power that has caused our country a dynamic hardship over the years.
		And positivities too, and economically speaking.
		You never see just one politician get behind something.
		You see many.
		And until we start looking at what the individual politicians are doing in our own state, for example, my own, you always have the same dynamics.
		We haven't had as many independents lead in Congress or Senate or any other political office through the entire United States.
		Why?
		Because policies are run by parties, not individuals.
		And that's not going to change anytime soon.
		Hopefully President Trump will continue to try to make things better.
		But at the same time, going after Greenland is not a wise political move.
		It comes every 10 years.
		And it causes a lot of political drama between Denmark and the United States.
		It's not going to stop tomorrow, but it's something that it's not going to be the same every year either.
		If we really wanted to help a lot of people, we would invest very heavily in the K-12 system for counseling because of the amount of trauma that is seen in early childhood.
		And Vanderbilt University reported a study a few years ago that 80% of LGBT has had childhood trauma.
		And that's a big, big segment of our culture now.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So Josh, I want to go back to the point that you were making about Greenland because last week on CNN, White House advisor Stephen Miller outlined the administration's approach to the U.S. interests in Greenland and possible military action there.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		Can you rule out that the U.S. is ever going to try to take Greenland by force?
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		Well, let me go back a step.
		The president has been clear for months now.
		So I know you're treating this as breaking news.
		The president has been clear for months now that the United States should be the nation that has Greenland as part of our overall security apparatus.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		Right, but your wife posted that like hours after the Venezuela operation.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		That's why it's newly relevant.
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		No, no, and I'll talk with you about it for an hour.
		I think it's really important conversation.
		I just wanted to reset, Jake, by making clear that it has been the formal position of the U.S. government since the beginning of this administration.
		Frankly, going back into the previous Trump administration, that Greenland should be part of the United States.
		The president has been very clear about that.
		That is the formal position of the U.S. government.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		Right, but can you say that military action against Greenland is off the table?
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		You're going to need military action against Greenland.
		Greenland has a population of 30,000 people, Jake.
		The real question is, by what right does Denmark assert control over Greenland?
		What is the basis of their territorial claim?
		What is their basis of having Greenland as a colony of Denmark?
		The United States is the power of NATO.
		For the United States to secure the Arctic region to protect and defend NATO and NATO interests, obviously Greenland should be part of the United States.
		And so that's a conversation that we're going to have as a country.
		That's a process we're going to have as a new community of nations.
		So you can't.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		I'm not going to take it off the table that the U.S. would use military force to seize Greenland.
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		I understand, Jake.
		I understand you're trying very hard to, which, again, is your job.
		I respect it.
		It's great to get exactly the headline, right?
		That catchy headline.
		I'm trying to get an answer that says Miller refuses to rule out the United States should have Greenland as part of the United States.
		There's no need to even think or talk about this in the context that you're asking of a military operation.
		Nobody's going to fight the United States militarily over the future of Greenland.
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		One last question.
stephen miller ▲ ● ▼		Does that make any sense?
jake tapper ▲ ● ▼		One last question.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Back to your calls on how you think the president is using his presidential authority.
		Arthur is in Utica, Michigan, on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Arthur.
unidentified		Good morning.
		She stand.
		And what I would like to say, I agree with the president because if you look and go back into history, we've only had World War II.
		Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan, Iraq.
		They were all conflicts.
		And our president had sent military over there without Congress authority.
		So I just say he's doing for the country, like he said.
		And that's why 70 over 70 million people voted for him to clean up the country because there's a lot of fraud going around and people have worked all their lives, taxpayers have worked all their lives.
		And to have all this fraud come out now, it's got to be stopped.
		So that's all I got to say.
		He's doing it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's go to Linda in Orange, Connecticut on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Linda.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I listen to this show every single day for over at least 10 years.
		But I'm calling really this morning because, number one, I'm a Democrat.
		Number two, I believe in the United States Constitution, but I also believe that United we fall.
		We just have to not let this president divide us to the point where it's us against them.
		And because the bottom line is, we thrive as a nation.
		And our Constitution enables us to have open and free discussion.
		But we cannot stifle that based on political party.
		And that's really my message for the day.
		We fail if we divide.
		And the bottom line is, this nation will thrive after this person is out of office.
		And we have to remember that.
		And that's all I called to say.
		Have a good day, everyone.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		David is in Cincinnati, Ohio, on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, David.
unidentified		Hi, how are you?
		Thank you for having me.
		I'm calling about the is he using his power wisely?
		If he doesn't do the executive actions like most presidents, nothing will ever get done.
		Because if it goes to Congress, it has to sit there for months.
		If it goes to the Senate, it has to sit there for months.
		Henceforth, nothing gets done.
		At least now things get done.
		That's all I have to say.
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is Betty in Blacksburg, South Carolina, on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Betty.
unidentified		I support Donald Trump all the way.
		He's doing a good job.
		I know everybody might hate that man, but he don't even take his pay.
		And that man from New York and the morning before him, I believe it's Illinois, they was right on just right.
		Everything they said, they didn't lie.
		They didn't lie one time.
		And people all understand that this was not going on when he was in before.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		Everybody, the Democrats wants to blame him for everything.
unidentified		He's that woman that got shot.
unidentified		If I'd been that woman and that policeman told me to get out of the car, I would have got out.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		That's the way you supposed to policeman.
unidentified		You supposed to get out.
unidentified		And that's what she should have done.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		On Capitol Hill last week, the caller was just referencing the shooting in Minnesota that happened.
		And on Capitol Hill last week, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer reacted to that shooting in Minnesota and addressed ICE enforcement.
		Let's listen.
unidentified		Senator Sher, do you have any comment on the shooting in Minnesota and ICE ball shooting?
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		Well, I saw the video.
		It just turns your stomach.
		We need a quick and full investigation to get to the bottom of this.
		But when you have these ICE agents all over the streets of our cities without any cooperation with local law enforcement, local communities, tragedies, horrible tragedies, killings occur.
unidentified		Say they're ICE to suspend their operations as the mayor has called for?
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		Well, I've never been for ICE going into our cities, period.
		It doesn't belong there.
		And the mayors and county executives and others throughout the country believe they can handle it much better themselves than having people from the outside come in.
		What's your message for the protesters down there?
unidentified		Should they remain civil?
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		Well, of course, there should never be violence, but there should be protest as an American right.
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		And when things like this happen, people feel the need to protest and their right to do it.
Ken and Beth's Perspective 00:12:05
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		We salute them doing it.
unidentified		What do you mean by?
		It's saying that this was an act of domestic terrorism by the person who was shot.
		What do you think of that?
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		We need a full investigation.
unidentified		Should Democrats use the appropriations process to try to rein in DHS and ICE?
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		Well, the appropriators on the Homeland Security Committee are working on some things like that, I believe.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Now, Chuck Schumer, they're referencing Americans' right to protest.
		There are many protests happening in Minnesota and elsewhere in reaction to that shooting there.
		But on Thursday, Vice President Vance talked about the shooting death of the Minneapolis woman by that ICE agent and criticized the way the media has been covering the event.
jd vance ▲ ● ▼		When I was actually walking out here, somebody sent me a photo of a CNN headline about what happened in Minneapolis.
		And this is the headline.
		I'm just going to read it.
		Outrage after ICE officer kills U.S. citizen in Minneapolis.
		Well, that's one way to put it.
		And that is the way that many people in the corporate media have put this attack over the last 24 hours.
		And I say attack very, very intentionally because this was an attack on federal law enforcement.
		This was an attack on law and order.
		This was an attack on the American people.
		The way that the media, by and large, has reported this story has been an absolute disgrace, and it puts our law enforcement officers at risk every single day.
		What that headline leaves out is the fact that that very ICE officer nearly had his life ended, dragged by a car six months ago, 33 stitches in his leg.
		So you think maybe he's a little bit sensitive about somebody ramming him with an automobile.
		What that headline leaves out is that that woman was there to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement operation in the United States of America.
		What that headline leaves out is that that woman is part of a broader left-wing network to attack, to dox, to assault, and to make it impossible for our ICE officers to do their job.
		If the media wants to tell the truth, they ought to tell the truth.
		That a group of left-wing radicals have been working tirelessly, sometimes using domestic terror techniques to try to make it impossible for the president of the United States to do what the American people elected him to do, which is enforce our immigration laws.
		The president stands with ICE.
		I stand with ICE.
		We stand with all of our law enforcement officers.
		And part of that is recognizing that you people in the media, not everybody in this room, but many people in this room have been lying about this attack.
		She was trying to ram this guy with her car.
		He shot back.
		He defended himself.
		He's already been seriously wounded in law enforcement operations before.
		And everybody who's been repeating the lie that this is some innocent woman who was out for a drive in Minneapolis when a law enforcement officer shot at her, you should be ashamed of yourselves, every single one of you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Vice President JD Vance, there.
		Now let's get back to your calls.
		Robert is in Akakeek, Maryland, on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Robert.
unidentified		Man, I don't know where to start.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of how the president is using his presidential authority?
unidentified		You know, the man is unorthodox, and he has to be, because there's a lot of things in our country that he has to deal with that he's not in control of, but he's got to be strong because the world does not always comply with this world or the United States.
		So that's what I love about the man.
		I don't like his kind of prejudice mindset, but he has to control and protect the country that he's the president of.
		That's my bottom line.
		And when he's trying to do things up in Greenland, yes, I understand.
		He's trying to control or up above our country before Russia and China try to take control and have control of us.
		And down in the south, he has a job to do.
		That's my bottom line.
		Trump seems prejudice, but he's prejudiced towards the United States, believe it or not.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is James in Madison, Wisconsin, on our line for independence.
		Good morning, James.
unidentified		Thanks for taking my call.
		I'd like to say that I'm not necessarily in disagreement with some of the things he did, but President Trump reminds me of a kid with a muscle car and all his friends, JD Vance, and everybody's riding in it.
		Go faster, go faster.
		Oh, yeah, they're all screeching.
		Yee-hoo-yahoo.
		And sooner or later, they're going to wreck.
		It seems like the president's very brave with someone else's kids' lives at risk.
		I wonder if he'd be the same if Dow Jr., Brandon, or Jared or Ivana was in the helicopter going into these countries.
		He has no skin in the game.
		There's not a single Trump in any of his family that served in the military.
		I don't, I mean, I don't even know how JD Vance could stand on the same stage with him all throwing up.
		But as far as Trump goes, it seems, ask not what you can do for your country.
		Ask what your country can do for you.
		Because none of the Trumps have skin in the game.
		And if I was that, if I had been dragged previously by a car, I'd be the last one jumping in front of that vehicle with my cell phone and A gun out.
		If a law enforcement officer did that, he'd lose his job videotaping by his cell phone.
		If the ICE wants to tape stuff, then they should wear body cams.
		I guess that's the end of my opinion.
		And the Democrats deserve this.
		This is what you get when you take no action and don't do anything and take care of these problems, the border, and all these other things.
		Then you get someone like Trump in there to handle it.
		And like I said, it's going to wreck sooner or later.
		You can't keep pushing that muscle car faster and faster.
		Something's going to happen.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is John in Sykesville, Maryland, on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, John.
unidentified		Yeah, hello.
		I just, I like, I like what President Trump is doing, and I think his policies are, in the long run, I believe that they're going to reveal just how fragile these socialist, communist dictatorships really are.
		And they're going to also, it's going to reveal how fragile the European influence over America has been.
		And without these Europeans pulling puppet strings for the last 45 years patrolling our democratic process in this country, these third world countries wouldn't be suffering right now.
		They've exploited the situation for years to prosper the central bankers of Europe.
		And the poor people of the world are tired of it.
		They finally have someone who's going to do something about it.
		You may not like him, and you may not agree with him, but I do believe he's on the right track doing wonderful things for us.
		That's just my opinion.
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Beth is in Chicago, Illinois, on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Beth.
unidentified		Good morning, Kimberly.
unidentified		Thank you for taking my call.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of how the president has been using his powers?
unidentified		Well, I really don't like the way he's been using his executive powers.
		I think he's been stepping over the line.
		The reason he doesn't go to Congress and he does these executive orders is because the man doesn't like to ask questions.
		He doesn't like his authority questioned in any way.
		So this is his way of skirting around the issue of having to take any sort of accountability for why he's doing this.
		And that's the reason why there are so many pending cases that are going against him that are trying to reverse his executive orders.
		And I feel that when he went into Venezuela, even though President Biden may have had a, they had the indictment for Maduro, and President Trump acted on it.
		But in the pretense to it, he was blowing up all these boats around Venezuela, and he was saying that they were full of drugs.
		And there is actually nope, I haven't seen any proof that they were actually carrying any drugs.
		There came a lawsuit from a in Colombia, a woman who said her husband was a fisherman on one of those boats and was killed.
		So I don't, and Greenland, why are we bothering them?
		They're not doing anything up there.
		If he wants to go and have a presence up there, let him put one of his super freighters out there, just like China's doing over by Jamaica.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is Ken in Washington, D.C. on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Ken.
unidentified		Good morning, ma'am.
		At the top of the hour, you started with an individual who gave a sufficient amount of time.
		I won't take that much time.
		But he identified himself as a Marine, which is an embarrassment to Marines.
		You're not born in the world in a uniform.
		You're born with gender and race to identify yourself.
		If you use a typical political party or anything to hide behind, then that sort of hides your true motives.
		As somebody that saw the events prior to January 6th and immediately after January 6th on the day, I can tell you that what the White House just wrote and what those January 6th people that were pardoned and were walking on the hill last week, and again, what the White House posted was that the police officers incited the riot that day.
		Well, that's just a bold-faced lie.
		But what he does, and he does very well, is that these same, in particular, and mostly white folks, does affect others, but people that don't think for themselves anymore.
		Meaning that the things that he's doing or that they are quoting him as doing do not particularly benefit them financially at all.
		So how does it motivate them?
		It makes them emotionally feel good about this.
		The United States has instigated war and has overthrown nations for years, financially.
		It's a capitalist society.
		That's what he's doing is benefiting from the office.
		That is the abuse of power.
		He is benefiting from this.
		He has prevented himself from being locked up for his 34 felonies.
		He is getting a plane from a different nation.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right, we are about out of time for this segment, Ken, but I think we have your point.
		I do want to close out with one comment we received via text from Sue in Whiting, New Jersey.
		There are valid reasons why we have separate branches of government.
		All the power and decisions shouldn't rest with one person.
Henry Olson Discusses Recent Events 00:03:36
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		It's a multi-layered process of weighing all pertinent information, exchanging ideas and opinions, and making informed decisions.
		President Trump, while he may have the best interests of America at heart, should not circumvent Congress.
		And that's it for this segment.
		But later on Washington Journal, we're going to be joined by Democratic donor and venture capitalist Oliver Libby to discuss his new book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling: Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		But up next, we'll be joined by Henry Olson of the Ethics and Public Policy Center to discuss last week's events in Minneapolis and Venezuela, Campaign 2026, and the political news of the day.
		We'll be right back.
unidentified		Watch America's Book Club, C-SPAN's bold original series.
		Today, with our guest Hall of Fame baseball player and best-selling author Cal Ripken Jr., who has authored and co-authored more than a dozen books, including The Only Way I Know, Get in the Game, and a series of children's books.
		He joins our host, civic leader, best-selling author, and owner of the Baltimore Orioles, David Rubenstein.
		I thought writing kids' books were a good way to Broach certain subjects that might have been tough when you're kids or whatever else in the backdrop of a travel team, travel baseball team, because we all worry about things as kids, and it was a way to communicate a good message through books.
		So I just enjoyed the process.
		Watch America's Book Club with Cal Ripken Jr.
		Today at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific.
		Only on C-SPAN.
		On this episode of Book Notes Plus with our host, Brian Lamb.
brian lamb ▲ ● ▼		After 15 books on revolutionary America, John Ferling still has more to say about the early period in the life of the United States.
		Ferling is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of West Georgia.
		In the preface of his current book, Shots Heard Round the World, Professor Ferling opens with this: Quote: Now that America will be commemorating the 250th anniversary of its War of Independence, what pops into your mind as you hear or witness references to that conflict?
		Professor Ferling gives his answer in a 500-page book focusing on America, Britain, and Europe in the Revolutionary War era.
unidentified		A new interview with author John Ferling about his book, Shots Heard Round the World: America, Britain, and Europe in the Revolutionary War.
		Book Notes Plus with our host Brian Lamb is available wherever you get your podcasts and on the C-SPAN Now app.
		Washington Journal continues.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back.
		We're joined now by Henry Olson, who's a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
		Welcome back to Washington Journal.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Thank you for having me back.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I want to talk about the tragic situation in Minnesota that happened this past week.
Midterms And The Great Reinsurer 00:15:43
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		The killing of Renee Nicole Goode by federal immigration agent in Minneapolis, which has been incredibly controversial.
		The Trump administration, the vice president have stated this was self-defense.
		Homeland Security Secretary Christy Noam said that Good's actions were an act of domestic terrorism.
		Obviously, Democrats and many others have a different perspective.
		Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey called the self-defense claim a garbage narrative.
		There's video of this shooting.
		What is your take on all of this?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, I think one thing, from a political standpoint, people are viewing it through the prism that they bring to President Trump, that if they're strongly opposed to President Trump, they're taking the most negative view.
		If they're strongly supportive, they're taking the most positive view with respect to the administration's narrative.
		I think it's a tragedy that this is a woman who was in a place and doing something she ought not to have been doing, and an officer who overreacted, even if he was in front of the car and touched.
		You know, that doesn't mean you should shoot the driver.
		And it's just a tragedy that, unfortunately, we have to deal with.
		It's not that different in kind than what happened in Kent State in 1970.
		Student protesters shot by nervous National Guardsmen.
		And I think it's unfortunate, but we have to deal with the aftermath.
		Hopefully, ICE agents can be better trained not to overreact, even when they're dealing with citizens who are doing things in places where they ought not to be.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		This is prompting protests and increased even action in Congress in terms of ICE's actions nationwide and whether or not that role is too expansive.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of movements both in Congress and in the streets to rein in the role of ICE in communities across the country?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		You know, I think the laws are the laws and they need to be enforced.
		The question is: are they being enforced in an efficient and professional manner?
		If we look at what ICE is doing and we decide, well, you know, they're sending people in too many dangerous circumstances or not being targeted enough with their deportation efforts, then clearly those need to be reformed.
		But there are millions of people who are here illegally.
		The government is enforcing the law when they're trying to identify, apprehend, and remove those people.
		And citizens should not be getting in the way of people who are enforcing the law, especially when they are in the field trying to do so, which under circumstances which are always going to be nervous.
		They don't know if the person they're going to apprehend is going to flee or going to shoot or something.
		And so they're always on triggers.
		And normal citizens can protest and ought to protest, but they should not be interfering with law enforcement officers who are doing nothing more than enforcing the law.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I want to turn to the U.S. military action in Venezuela and the capture of former President Nicholas Maduro.
		There is a YouGov poll that showed that nearly three-fourths of Republicans say they somewhat or strongly support the U.S. using military force to invade as opposed to 19% of Democrats, 40% of Independents.
		But this has changed.
		Back in December when there was polling about this, people were pretty opposed to this idea.
		What do you think has shifted?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I think what shifted is success, that the president did something that what everyone thinks about the law, the justice is clearly on the side of apprehending a murderous dictator who has ruined his country.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		And the fact that the president was able to do what he did with the military at the order of the president and succeeded beyond expectations without a loss of an American troop is what's turned that around, is that Republicans and Republican-leaning independents see success, and so they support it, and they want to see more of it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		There are some Republicans who, along with Democrats, are taking issue with the way in which these strikes were conducted.
		Indiana GOP Senator Todd Young was one of five senators to advance a war powers resolution that would limit the president's ability to conduct further attacks against Venezuela.
		I want to read you a bit of what he said at the time.
		He said, President Trump campaigned against forever wars, and I strongly support him in that position.
		A drawn-out campaign in Venezuela involving American military, even if unintended, would be the opposite of President Trump's goal of ending foreign entanglements.
		The Constitution requires that Congress first authorize operations involving American boots on the ground, and my vote today reaffirms that long-standing congressional role.
		Now, there has not been a lot of Republican pushback to much of what the president has done in his second term so far.
		What's different here?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I think what's different here is the possibility of an extended, long-term American presence that necessarily is going to involve some type of guerrilla warfare.
		You don't think that if Americans did move into Venezuela in order to rebuild that country, that the regime's security forces are suddenly just going to surrender.
		They're going to retreat to heavily forested highlands that's nearly ideal for terrorists and guerrilla operations to try and fight back against the Americans.
		And I think Senator Young and other Republicans who are saying, no, we need to have congressional authorization for this, are telling the president, no, this is more serious.
		It's one thing to remove one person in a lightning raid.
		It's another thing to remake the country with an extended expedition of American forces.
		And if you're going to do that, you need to get our consent.
		That's the concern that they have, and I think they're right to have it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		And you had a piece about Venezuela before the military action in the Washington Examiner.
		The great reinsurer, a Trump doctrine, emerges.
		Can you explain this concept, what you mean by Trump as the great reinsurer or America as the great reinsurer?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, what I'm trying to, you know, what we've had throughout the last 50, 75 years is America building a global network of alliances in order to secure its safety and the safety of its allies.
		And what Trump is essentially saying is what that turned into, no matter what it was in 1950, was America paying all the bills and paying all the price.
		It was as if an insurer wasn't charging the right premiums and not conducting any fraud investigations on claims that were put to it.
		He says that day is over.
		And what a reinsurer does is they take an insurance company and they say, when you've exceeded certain losses, we will come in and backstop you.
		And I think that's what Trump is moving towards, is that in Europe, he's telling the Europeans that you are rich enough and big enough that you can contain Russia on your own.
		Do it, and we'll back you up if it's too much.
		And the same thing with the Asian allies with respect to China.
		In the Western Hemisphere, there is no other power.
		We have to be the insurer of our own security.
		And I think that's what Venezuela shows, is that Trump is willing to be more like Israel in its sphere of influence, the Western Hemisphere, the way Israel acts in its interest in the Middle East to strike Hezbollah or strike Gaza or with respect to Iran.
		He wants each country or each area in its area of security to act as an insurer, be more like Israel.
		And in the Western Hemisphere, that means expect a more muscular America.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		And that muscular America, the administration is trying to expand this, especially in terms of the narrative this past week, into Greenland.
		Last week, Trump's senior aide, Stephen Miller, said that Greenland rightfully belonged to the United States and that this administration would be justified in seizing it or taking over in some capacity.
		Where do you think this is headed?
		And do you think that this is a good policy for the administration?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, first of all, Miller is completely wrong.
		We have no legitimate right to Greenland.
		We've never owned it.
		We have a security interest in Greenland, but that does not mean that we have a right to the territory.
		The idea that might makes right, which is what he's advancing, is simply antithetical to American ideals.
		That doesn't mean we don't have a security interest in Greenland.
		And what we should be doing is pursuing that to the fullest extent that we can with our Danish allies.
		Denmark has been a fabulous ally to the United States, losing troops in Afghanistan in support of our objective, not withdrawing until we withdrew.
		It is contrary to American interest for us to be angering the European allies at exactly the moment when we're trying to get them to stand up and be, to use the analogy from the previous question, the insurer of their own security, to act in a way that says we're not going to be the reinsurer of you if it's in our interest not to be.
		That's the wrong way to act, and I think Miller is completely wrong.
		I think what we should be doing is pursuing an agreement with the Danes that America will substantially increase its involvement, economic and military, there.
		I think the Danes would be happy to do it, and we should be doing it through discussions, not through saber-rattling.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		The saber-rattling, if actually turned into something else, several folks have said that this would effectively destroy NATO.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		If it wouldn't destroy NATO, it would put it on life support, and that is not in our interest.
		I wrote a piece most recently in the Washington Examiner that came out over the weekend on that point.
		And it's America is secure when it has allies that combine technological prowess and economic power.
		If Europe and the other NATO allies were to leave, we would lose the strongest economic bloc outside of ourselves and China.
		That would be folly to throw away.
		It would be contrary to American interest.
		It would severely damage national security.
		The European alliance has to be restructured.
		The Europeans can't free ride on us anymore, but the European alliance should not be dissolved, and invading Greenland would put that at risk, and we should not do it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		For folks who have questions for Henry Olson, you can call us Democrats at 202-748-8000.
		For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
		Before we get to callers, I want to talk to you about another area where there seems to be an increasing fracture between Republicans and the White House in a way that many did not expect, which is on health care.
		You know, on Thursday, 17 House Republicans voted for a measure which would provide a three-year extension to the Enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that were originally passed, obviously, in response to COVID-19.
		That bill passed 230 to 196.
		It seems a bad look, not just for the White House, but also for Speaker Johnson.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		It does.
		But again, you have the old dictum: all politics is local.
		The fact is, of those 17, 15 of them were in among the most threatened districts that Republicans hold going into the midterms.
		They were voting their districts.
		They were voting their political interests.
		That's a classic American political tactic, and we should not be surprised when they do that, especially when they know that the bill is DOA in the Senate because of the filibuster.
		They could cast the vote that helps them in the district, knowing that something else would come out of the Senate that would be more palatable to the president.
		And of course, that's where the game is being played right now.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		You referenced the midterms, and last week, President Trump spoke before a meeting of House Republicans and discussed the prospect of another impeachment effort against him should the Democrats retake the House in the midterms.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's listen to his comments.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		You got to win the midterms, because if we don't win the midterms, it's just going to be, I mean, they'll find a reason to impeach me.
		I'll get impeached.
		We don't impeach them, you know why?
		Because they're meaner than we are.
		We should have impeached Joe Biden for 100 different things.
		They are mean and smart, but fortunately for you, they have horrible policy.
		They can be smart as can be, but when they want open borders, when they want, as I said, men and women sports, when they want transgender for everyone, bring your kids in.
		We're going to change the sex of your child.
		Just send them our way.
		In some cases, like in Minnesota, they don't even tell the parents.
		Is that right?
		And nobody believes it when I say, I think we have six states.
		Nobody, am I correct?
		Okay, Tom Emmer said yes, so.
		But it's true.
		Where the kid comes back, they keep the kid.
		They operate on the kid.
		They don't tell the parents.
		It's not believable.
		We have great, solid common sense policy.
		They have horrendous policy.
		What they do is they stick together.
		They never have a no vote.
		They impeached me.
		I never knew I was going to be impeached.
		I get a phone call.
		You just got impeached.
		I said, what does that mean?
		It took them 10 minutes.
		They impeached the president who did a damn good job.
		I rebuilt our military, Space Force.
		I got everything.
		I did a lot.
		They impeached me for nothing, twice, for nothing.
		Fortunately, you were on our side and we were unanimous.
		And the second time, the few people in this little group, like Rice and this, they're all gone.
		Every one of them is gone, except one that we're going to sort of let ride with.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		The president covered a lot of ground there, but taking it back to the issue of the midterms, given everything that's happened in regards to ICE, in regards to health care, in regards to Trump's military actions and how different members of Congress are responding, what do you think are the GOP prospects for the midterms right now?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, historically, you have to say they'll lose the House.
		And the reason why is you're going back into the mid late 19th century is there's like three midterms or four midterms where the power party of the president lost four seats or fewer.
		So historically, you have to say that Republicans are going to lose the House.
		The Senate, the map is very good for Republicans.
		It's highly unlikely they would lose the Senate, even where things stand now, where President Trump's job approval is around 44 or 45 percent.
		They might lose a seat or two, but they'll keep control of the Senate.
		The key figure to look at in assessing the midterms is the presidential job approval rating, is that people who approve of the president are 90 to 95 percent likely to vote for the president's party.
		If he can get his job approval rating up to 46 or 47, then the Republicans might have a fighting chance to hold the House.
		If it goes back much further from where it is, then I think you're talking about significant losses and you're talking about the possible loss of the Senate or requiring JD Vance to literally camp out there and cast the deciding vote every day.
Approval Ratings Hold Steady 00:00:52
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Right now, these things are not hurting the president.
		That immigration is his strongest job approval subpart.
		People approve of his immigration policy, even with everything.
		We'll see if what happened in Minnesota changes that.
		But so far, even the protests in Los Angeles and the calling of the National Guard did not disturb his rating on immigration.
		Americans want the law enforcement.
		We'll see whether these other things drop his approval rating when polls start coming out.
Suspect Oil Solutions 00:11:30
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's get to calls.
		Scott is in Hutchinson, Kansas on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Scott.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, thank you so much for taking my call.
unidentified		And I appreciate the insights of your guests this morning.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I consider myself a pretty moderate Democrat, not really looking through a prism of hard left or hard right.
unidentified		And the shooting in Minnesota, the video, and then hearing what the rules were for what the ICE people are supposed to do, there was a violation of the policies, and this woman was killed.
		And I think back during the Obama administration, the amount of people that were deported were even a greater number than today.
		And the ICE people wore windbreakers, and they didn't wear masks, and they didn't go into armed in an armed way.
		That is kind of disrupting society.
		So my question about what can be done to bring a fair trial and do you think that they're actively trying to aggravate people to create civil disharmony?
		And I'd appreciate what the guest has to say about that.
		Thank you so much for taking my call.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, those are some great questions.
		I think that with respect to a fair trial, you may need to move the trial outside of Minneapolis.
		I would expect that there will be very difficult to find an untainted jury pool in Minneapolis.
		With respect to what the president's actions and his subordinates' actions are, understand that they're trying to do something dramatically more expansive than what President Obama was trying to do.
		President Obama was trying to remove some illegal aliens, and he did do so, but he never made an attempt to remove the entire illegal population.
		That is the goal of the Trump administration.
		It requires a much more expansive and direct approach.
		I would prefer if the President and Congress authorized mandatory use of e-Verify so that employers would be held liable if they hire people who are not legally here in the United States.
		I think that would be a dramatic, nonviolent way of persuading people to go home.
		If they can't get jobs, they can't stay here practically.
		I think that's something that would particularly increase the numbers of people leaving, which is what the president wants, and decrease the need to have the sort of fraught, targeted actions that unfortunately led to the killing in Minnesota.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		John is in West Island, New York, on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, John.
unidentified		Hello?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Yes, go ahead.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		You're on with Henry Olson.
unidentified		Hi.
unidentified		Thank you very much for letting me speak with you guys.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What's your question?
unidentified		Well, I just kind of made a statement that, you know, all these states are sanctuary cities and states, and they don't want to allow.
		What if they just said, you know, if you want to be a sanctuary city or a sanctuary state, that's okay.
		But don't expect any money coming in from for welfare, for schooling, for anything.
		And maybe make it so that, you know, we don't want to punish people, but if they decided to go back to whatever country they came from and they would have an advanced way to get back into the United States illegally after a very, very extensive questionnaire or whatever to get back into the United States.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So this is an interesting point that John raises about if a state or city wants to be a sanctuary area that they should lose funding.
		I mean, in this case, there's been, this is reporting from CBS and elsewhere, over $120 million in USDA award payments to Minnesota has been suspended, according to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins.
		And that is tied more so to these allegations of fraud in the state.
		But there have been several administration officials who've come out and said that Minnesota should lose funding or that funding should be pulled back from some of these communities and states that oppose Trump policies.
		What are your thoughts on that?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, constitutionally, states cannot impede federal law enforcement, but they are not required to help them.
		And that's what a lot of these states and cities have been doing.
		But the federal government has an equal constitutional ability to withhold funding in areas where they have shared partnerships.
		And that would be the nuclear option for either the administration or the president.
		Every state is largely dependent on federal funding to run income security programs, welfare programs, certainly health programs.
		Medicaid is largely funded.
		And in the Medicaid expansion states, almost entirely funded by the federal government.
		Law enforcement, transportation, education, all of these things are either partially or wholly dependent on the federal government.
		And if the Republicans really wanted to have the nuclear option, that would be something that they could pursue.
		Of course, what that would mean is that lots of people would go without health care in these states, and they may not want to have the circumstance where poor people or disabled people are thrown out of nursing homes because of pulling back that money.
		The circumstances and the consequences of pulling that money back would be severe, and it may be considered by Americans to be out of proportion to what the sanctuary cities or states are doing.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		There's a question from Barb in Longrove, Illinois.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What is Mr. Olson's view of the fact that with Maduro out, and this is referencing Venezuela, the regime still remains?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I think that's a big problem for the administration.
		They think that they can have their cake in ETA too, remove Maduro and work with the people who enabled Maduro.
		I suspect that what they're going to find is that that's not something that will work, that people who have supported dictatorship and repression and socialism for all of their adult lives are not suddenly going to become loyal American clients.
		And I suspect that sometime in the next couple of months, the president is going to realize these aren't people that he can do business with.
		And then we get to the question that Senator Young advanced, which is that if you're serious about changing Venezuela, you're going to need American boots on the ground and an extended involvement in order to pacify and rebuild a shattered country.
		I think the president's going to have to come to that conclusion because I can't imagine that the socialist leopard is going to lose their spots just because their leader was removed.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Jim is in Winter Park, Florida on our line for Republicans.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Jim.
unidentified		Good morning, Mr. Wilson Olson.
		I have a couple of questions.
		One, well, first of all, we're coming up on 3,500 days of Trump derangement syndrome since the day he came down the escalator.
		And that's why anything that he does, if he was to cure cancer, you know, the Democrats would go against it.
		But I saw a gentleman on a thread the other day who made a point about the fact that when we went into Venezuela, if everybody wants to talk about it, it was about the drugs.
		It was about the oil.
		But we don't need their oil.
		What this gentleman said was, what we need is the ability to control their oil.
		Because according to him, China gets about 90% of Venezuelans' oil.
		And then they get Iranian oil.
		And we attacked Iran, too.
		And this man talked about Trump doing what is known as an endgame, a long game.
		And that's what China does.
		China doesn't look at us at things going on in this world for this week, this month, this year.
		They look at it for the next century.
		And I really believe, I wonder whether you believe that Trump and his group of people that are in the office are literally doing exactly what China does.
		They were looking at the long game.
		We're trying to stop China from being the head of AI, from attacking Taiwan.
		If they don't have the oil and the fuel to be able to fuel their ships and fuel all their military might, and they don't have the power to be able to build AI centers, we can win this thing.
		But we need people to stop hating Trump and start thinking about the long game.
		I'd like your answer, and thank you for being on the show.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Thank you very much.
		I think there's a significant amount of truth to that, is that China is dependent on Venezuelan oil, but even more so on Iranian oil.
		And they get it at cut rate prices because of the sanctions.
		So they get a lot of oil, and they get it relatively cheaply.
		You take both of those states out of the equation.
		It's not going to cripple the Chinese, but it's going to put a crimp in them.
		They're going to need to find that oil somewhere else and the places where they can find that oil, given the fact that they're already taking a lot of Russian oil, they're going to find it from places that America can directly influence, and that's not something that the Chinese want.
		I think the Trump administration does have some sort of a long-term strategy.
		Part of it is what I mentioned and that Kimberly brought up earlier: the reinsurance approach, which is we're going to keep our network of alliances, but we're going to invest in allies that are good risks, not in allies that are freeloaders.
		And we're going to build up our own military, hence the president's statement that he wants to increase the defense budget by 50%, something we've never done outside of wartime in the next budget from $1 trillion to $1.5 trillion.
		And things like depriving China of cheap oil supply, like building up alternative supplies of rare earth minerals so that we're no longer dependent on China for things that we need for our modern economy.
		I do think those are elements of a long-term strategy that the president is pursuing.
		And I suspect those are things that if you turn the microphone off and took Trump's name off it, many Democrats would approve.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Amanda is in Hurt, Virginia, on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Amanda.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Your guest said that we need to support our police officers when he was talking about ICE.
		ICE are not police officers.
		ICE are not local and state cops there to control local laws.
		They are federal enforcement officers that should only focus on immigration and custom laws, and they should leave the regular local enforcement to the local and state police.
Legislative Branch Failures 00:14:41
unidentified		ICE, in fact, are ICE holes, and they use deceptive, aggressive tactics, often impersonating local cops.
		And they wear intimidating garbs because that is their mission, is to intimidate their citizens.
		If they had approached Ms. Good in a nonviolent way, the Ms. Good would be here today.
		Rest in peace, beautiful lady.
		Your guest is obviously a maggot supporter, and I'm sick of this.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Did you have a question there specifically because you don't deserve to insult our guests?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Do you have a question for Mr. Olson?
unidentified		My guest is support anyone that's not more than a fourth-generation American to be appreciated or sent out of the country.
		That would include Stephen Miller.
		Stephen Miller is pushing all this, get them all out of the state.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I think they're all out of your idea.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, look.
		Sorry that the lady has a misimpression of what I said or what I believe.
		Obviously, ICE is not local law enforcement.
		They do operate locally because they have to operate locally in order to enforce federal laws.
		You know, with respect to American citizenship, I'm a fourth-generation American.
		I think anyone who becomes a citizen is automatically an American citizen and should remain an American citizen absent an act of armed insurrection or rejection of their own American citizenship.
		We are a nation of immigrants.
		We always have been a nation of immigrants.
		And we should support lawful, legal, and fair immigration.
		What we're talking about with ICE is people who came here illegally and have no legal status, and they are not here legally, and it's a violation of the law to turn the other eye, and we should not turn the other eye.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of the president's efforts to undo birthright citizenship?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I think that birthright citizenship is a very difficult legal question when you actually look at it.
		I certainly do not think that anyone who has already received citizenship because of birthright citizenship should have it removed.
		If the Supreme Court agrees with the President's desire to end it, it should be done prospectively and not retrospectively.
		People who came under the existing law should maintain their citizenship, and no effort should be supported or countenanced that would undo that.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		But do you have an opinion on whether or not it should be changed?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		The question turns legally on the interpretation of under the jurisdiction thereof, because that's what the 14th Amendment says, is that anyone who's here under the jurisdiction of the United States is an American citizen.
		And I've read good arguments on one side or the other as to what that means.
		I actually haven't formed my own opinion on that precisely because it's a close question, is that what they're talking about is does under the jurisdiction thereof only exclude foreign diplomats or people who are here but are really here doing official business for the other nation,
		or does it mean people who are here legally under a immigration statute of the United States?
		The test case of in the 1890s that a Supreme Court precedent in favor of birthroot citizenship, which is Wang Arc versus the United States, dealt with a Chinese immigrant who was here legally.
		I think legal immigrants, it's clear they're here under the jurisdiction of the United States.
		Illegal immigrants, it's a tough question for me.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Kevin is in New Orleans, Louisiana, on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Kevin.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Thank you for taking my call.
		I was wondering if your guests, Mr. Olson, could speak to the policy or philosophy of accelerationism or accelerationist policy as expounded by Nick Land and supported by the Silicon Valley tech bros that President Trump has embraced.
		And this speaks to the developments of artificial intelligence and the necessity of maintaining superior defense in this country so that we can have whatever remains of democracy, because you won't have that if China or Russia proved superior in weaponry with hypersonic missiles, which we would be using Greenland to defend against,
		or using oil from Venezuela to fund the encroachment of communism in South America and our hemisphere.
		And I think this accelerationist policy is more of a necessity of a short-term war than a long-term thinking.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So, Kevin, I'm going to pause you for just a moment because your description of accelerationism is slightly different than what I'm seeing because several outlets actually refer to this idea as a white supremacist ideology, that the existing state of society is irreparable and that the only solution is a destruction or collapse of the system.
		Obviously, based on what you said, Kevin, you have a different interpretation of that.
		Mr. Olson, have you heard of this concept?
		Are you familiar with?
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		No, I was going to say that I'm not familiar with accelerationism, so it's not something that I want to comment on.
		I don't like to comment on things that I'm unfamiliar with.
		The question of AI development in order to ensure our freedom and independence is something, you know, it's clear that we cannot allow our adversaries an edge and a technology that could lead to our destruction.
		On the other hand, AI obviously also has difficulties and moral questions that should be considered while we're pursuing our own security.
		And I confess to not knowing enough about the technology to have a deep understanding of what's at stake, but I do think that you should not move so quickly as to disregard the possibilities of autonomous, genuine intelligence that moves faster and through networks that would be very difficult for human beings to control.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Barbara is in North Carolina on our line for Republicans.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Barbara.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		Am I on to speak now?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Yes, you are with Henry Olson.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		Thank you for this guest this morning.
		I think he's very well informed.
		My questions pertain to his comment about the Trump administration's efforts to reinsure our economy.
		And my question would pertain to China's Belt and Road project, which is so extensive that it does threaten our very economic substance.
		It is one of the largest distribution footprints on the face of the earth.
		And I don't believe Americans are cognizant of the efforts that Trump is making to fortify our economy.
		And when I see how we have fallen behind, and I particularly appreciate the term that your speaker used, the backstop, I'm not a Horton graduate, but I can recognize that this speaker is very well versed in his international finance and policies.
		So I wish our population could appreciate that Trump is in what I would classify as a catch-up period that is just tremendous.
		And I'm very grateful that he has the kind of energy, foresight, and intelligence to do what he's doing.
		My other question would also be: what would the speaker believe Trump might do to address what I see as a real fallacy in this country that's developed that people believe that they can be innocuous and harmless or nice when they confront or when they are in the presence of law enforcement?
		And this has become so pervasive.
		And it's such a tragedy about the loss of life of the lady in Minnesota.
		But you could, I perceive that this lady felt that she could be friendly and oppositional.
		And yet, with law enforcement, when you do face their objectives, I can't imagine that you wouldn't understand that you yield and you are very obsequious to that.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Barbara, you've raised several points.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I want to let Henry Olson respond.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		With respect to that.
unidentified		Thank you.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Thank you very much, ma'am.
		I appreciate this.
		The latter question.
		Citizens should not get in the way of law enforcement trying to do their jobs.
		You're just taking risks.
		You know, if you were somebody who objected to drug laws and you ran into DEA agents who were trying to arrest people while in pursuit of traffickers of drugs, you would understand that you are taking a risk that somebody who is heavily armed pursuing people who are heavily armed, you might be caught in the crossfire.
		And when you see pictures of people throwing themselves on the hoods of ICE vehicles to stop them, and where you've got this woman who, again, tragically was murdered.
		I'm not saying that the ICE agent did the right thing, but the fact is when you're obstructing ICE agents and there's an ICE agent in front of you and you hit the accelerator, that's a bad decision.
		You shouldn't put yourself in a position where bad decisions can result in tragedy.
		With respect to the long-term confrontation of China, I do think that there is a quiet, unarticulated strategy behind the containment of Chinese power.
		And part of that is military, part of that is building up the allies, and part of that is economic.
		And I think it was something that was started under President Biden, but it's been dramatically sped up and expanded under President Trump.
		And I think she is still figuring out how comprehensive this is and trying to figure out how to respond.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is Steve in Freeland, Maryland on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Steve.
unidentified		Good morning, Mr. Olson.
		I think 95% of our problems come from the legislative branch, the Belt Roads Initiative.
		I think we're just being outworked, outplayed, and outpaced.
		And the legislative branch they had earlier about executive orders, well, every president does it now, and that's how we do business.
		The worst part about that is we don't make it a law, and so things are just going to go right back to where they were.
		I'll give you the example.
		I think if we get another Democratic president, like a Gavin Newsom or Les Moore, I think we'll be right back to open borders.
		I think when it comes to the budget, nobody even spoke about this, the budget this year.
		Once again, we didn't pass a budget that will be 29 years of no budget.
		We have insider trading spill taking place.
		I think our legislative branch is just a useless body.
		I'd love to get your thoughts on the legislative branch, their inability to do their jobs each and every year, which lead us to all these difficulty problems in our society because they're not doing their jobs.
		Love to get your thoughts on the legislative branch and how inept they truly are.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		I think the legislative branch has dramatically underperformed over the last 20 to 30 years.
		I think some of that is attributed to the incentives that they face now, which is politicians act in self-interested ways, and when they can get notoriety less by legislating and more by pontificating to niche audiences, they will be tempted not to do their jobs and instead to do media hits.
		But I think we really have to look at the elephant in the room or the donkey in the room, and that is the partisan filibuster.
		The partisan filibuster effectively means that, and by the partisan filibuster, I mean using the filibuster as a partisan objective to obstruct anything the other party wants to do with the majority.
		That was not the way this country operated for the first nearly 200 years of its existence.
		It was the filibuster did not exist until the early 20th century, so a minority could not stop a majority in the Senate.
		Its use for partisan reasons did not become a major element of policy until the oughts.
		This is a new development, and it makes the legislative process impossible to operate, especially in polarized times, because when 41 senators can object and stop a platform of people who have 53, 55, 57 votes in the Senate, what it means is the only thing they can get through are things of the least common denominator.
		And that's not the problems this country needs to solve.
Going Back to the 60s 00:04:24
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		We have majorities.
		Democrats have majorities under President Biden.
		They should have been able to enact their policies.
		Republicans have majorities now.
		They should be able to enact their policies.
		You remove the partisan use of the filibuster.
		Suddenly Congress can act in ways that are consistent with the wishes of the people who elect them.
		And I think if you removed that, you would see Congress actually step, perhaps not to the ideal, there'll still be the temptations, but you give them the ability to act, and I think they would act.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Jeff is in Benton, Arkansas on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Jeff.
unidentified		Yeah, I was wondering, where do you think President Trump and ICE has done with our local law enforcement, state law enforcement?
		They spent so much time trying to rebuild trust with the public.
		And it seems like we're going back to the 60s with this.
		And, you know, I don't know.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you mean by going back to the 60s, Jeff?
unidentified		Well, I was born in 1968, so all you saw was whenever the Vietnam War, civil rights movements, protesting, and just the way that the police treated the minorities, especially the African black people.
		You know, and it just seems like the trust that we have going on now, because local law enforcements across the United States have done their best to clean up and get rid of the bad apples.
		And so I'm just wondering, like, what do you think that ICE is doing?
		Are they helping?
		Are we going back to the 60s?
		You know, I don't know.
		I just see like everything.
		There's been money spent for public relations and whatnot.
		So I'm just wondering, you know, what do you think?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's let him respond.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Thank you, sir.
		I don't think we're going back to the 60s, but I am troubled by things that I see.
		Again, you never know what is being presented via the media, how representative that is.
		But I think what's clear is that ICE agents are regularly put in positions where they are conducting operations that have the possibility of tragedy.
		And that's not necessarily the wisest course.
		It's particularly not the wisest course if you don't have extremely well-trained individuals.
		I, again, would prefer to see an administration that passes things like dramatically higher taxes on remittances.
		We have a 1% tax on remittance.
		What happens if we have a 15% tax?
		People who are here illegally for the purpose of sending money home to their families may not find that they can do that anymore.
		They may decide to leave.
		If the objection, if the objective is to have people who are here illegally no longer be resident in the United States, then you have to take a look at the beating heart of that system.
		And the beating heart of that system is employment in the United States.
		There is no amount of ICE agents that can systematically remove people who are here illegally as effectively as cutting off the supply of money and jobs to people who legally cannot work here, but do so anyway, because we do not have a law system.
		We do not have laws that require employers to verify the legal status.
		They're only required to take papers and pass them along.
		And if they look legal, they are absolved of responsibility.
		They never have to check if those papers are legitimate, whether those Social Security numbers they're presented are fake or not.
		We should put those burden on employers.
		We should cut the economic lifeline that keeps people who are here illegally afloat.
		And I think we would see a lot more people leave for a lot less social and physical confrontation.
Calls for Debate 00:07:05
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Well, thank you so much.
		Henry Olson is the senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and also the host of the podcast Beyond the Polls.
		Thanks again for your time and expertise.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Well, thank you for having me, Kimberly.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Coming up later on Washington Journal, we'll be joined by Democratic donor and venture capitalist Oliver Libby to discuss his book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling: Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		But up next, we'll take more of your calls and comments in our open forum.
		Our phone line again for Democrats, 202-748-8000.
		For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
		You can start calling in now, and we'll be right back.
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		I received a call directly from Mrs. Ford and she said, Gary, would you go up and make sure that Jack is up?
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		That's kind of a tricky role, isn't it?
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		No, not when the president and the first lady said, get him up.
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		shop now or anytime at cspanshop.org and is as unbiased as you can get You are so fair.
		I don't know how anybody can say otherwise.
		You guys do the most important work for everyone in this country.
		I love C-SPAN because I get to hear all the voices.
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		On this episode of Book Notes Plus with our host, Brian Lamb.
brian lamb ▲ ● ▼		After 15 books on revolutionary America, John Ferling still has more to say about the early period in the life of the United States.
		Ferling is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of West Georgia.
		In the preface of his current book, Shots Heard Round the World, Professor Ferling opens with this, quote, Now that America will be commemorating the 250th anniversary of its War of Independence, what pops into your mind as you hear or witness references to that conflict?
		Professor Ferling gives his answer in a 500-page book focusing on America, Britain, and Europe in the Revolutionary War era.
unidentified		A new interview with author John Ferling about his book, Shots Heard Round the World, America, Britain, and Europe in the Revolutionary War.
		BookNotes Plus, with our host Brian Lamb, is available wherever you get your podcasts and on the C-SPAN Now app.
		Washington Journal continues.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back.
		We're in open forum, ready to take your calls with comments about public policy issues of the day.
		Our phone lines again, for Democrats, 202-748-8000.
		For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
		Some other news that we are following today include recent strikes in Syria by the United States.
		Here's coverage of that in the Associated Press.
		U.S. launches new retaliatory strikes against IS in Syria after deadly ambush.
		The U.S. has launched another round of retaliatory strikes against the Islamic State group in Syria following last month's ambush that killed two U.S. soldiers and one American civilian interpreter in the country.
		The large-scale strikes conducted by the U.S. alongside partner forces occurred around 12.30 p.m. Eastern on Saturday, according to the U.S. Central Command.
		The strikes hit multiple IS targets across Syria.
		The Jordanian military later announced it had taken part in the strikes.
		Saturday strikes are part of a broader operation that is part of President Donald Trump's response to the deadly IS attack that killed Sergeant Edgar Brian Torres Tovar, Sergeant William Nathaniel Howard, and Ayad Mansoor Sakat, the civilian interpreter in Palmyra last month.
		That's just one of the many stories happening this weekend that we have been following here.
		But let's get to your calls in open form.
		We'll start with Steve in North Charleston, South Carolina, on our line for Republicans.
Cash Economy Immigrants 00:05:13
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Steve.
steve in north charleston ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
		I'd like to revisit the sanctuary city problems if you don't mind, just briefly.
		Here's a problem.
		Here's a big problem for large, medium to large cities all over the country.
		I live in, well, I'm not from North Austin, although my zip code pulled that up.
		I'm in the bedroom community next door.
		So I'm real near North Charleston in Charleston.
		Several years ago, the mayor of North Charleston was on a talk radio show, and somebody called and said, Is North Charleston a sanctuary city?
		He says, No, he said, I don't proclaim it to be a sanctuary city.
		He said, What you have to understand is some cities are kind of sanctuary cities by default.
		He said, The illegals know that the local, we don't have the resources, the local resources and police to keep up with immigration.
		He said, That's a federal function.
		And at that time, I think he said there are like six agents to handle all of this part of South County.
		He says, Now, we will work jointly with them.
		He said, But the illegals know, we just don't have enough people to handle our own business, much less federal functions.
		So people kind of congregate there.
		And it's just the way it is.
		They're smart.
		And they know.
		And another big problem with that is that a lot of the illegals, in fact, most of them, are part of the underground economy.
		What I mean is they live in a cash world, which means they aren't contributing by paying federal and state income tax.
		Now, a big problem with living in that cash world is the local bad guys.
		They know these guys are just rich with cash all the time, so they will rob them.
		Well, guess what?
		They're not going to call the police because they know that if they call the police, they're going to realize that, hey, they come to my house, they're going to find out I'm an illegal, and I might possibly get deported.
		So, see, it contributes in so many ways, in negative ways.
		It contributes to crime.
		They're not contributing with state and local income tax.
		It's just a big mess across the board.
		So, it is a federal function for sure with local help if needed.
		But it's just not enough people to keep up with it at all.
		It's just the way it is.
		Can I say a word about the drug boats they've been shooting?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		About what?
steve in north charleston ▲ ● ▼		The drug trafficking boats they've been shooting.
steve in north charleston ▲ ● ▼		Can I say a word about that?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead.
steve in north charleston ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I worked with the federal contractor for several years, and I worked with two former naval officers who used to be part of the Joint Interagency Task Force South down in Key West, and their function was to intercept drug trafficking boats.
		This is an interagency unit made up of DHS, FBI, DEA, Coast Guard, whatever, several, and they would try to intersect what they call GoFast, these big Roshan racing boats with three or four outboards on the back.
		But what they discovered long ago, and this is something that disturbs me about what has been going on with the drug boats.
		These people discovered long ago that the drug crews, boat crews, are not always willing participants.
		The cartels hold their families hostage and tell them, they say, as long as you don't give up and you don't throw up your hands, we will always take care of your families.
		If you do, well, I don't even know where to go from there.
		So, what they would do, they actually, and I've seen videos of this, some of the crew members would strap themselves across the top of the outboards because they knew that they just wanted to disable the boats and not kill the people because they knew they weren't willing participants.
		So, that's a big mess.
		And I, you know, and I just, I'm not sure if I like the way that's being handled.
		Sure, I want the drugs out of the gone.
		I want that boat stopped.
		But again, I think the government knows all these people aren't willing participants, and that's troubling.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Let's go to Gene in Batvia, Illinois, Batavia, Illinois, on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Gene.
unidentified		The question is, as long as everybody hates immigrants so much, is why are they coming here in the first place?
		And the good person of the reason why they're coming here is for jobs and because their own countries have been destituted by the United States of America for the last 200 years.
		We sucked everything out of their country.
		We get fresh fruits and vegetables, potatoes, everything under the sun we want out of Central and South America.
		We benefit for the last 200 years, and they live like propers.
		Why aren't we helping these countries in Central and South America to bring up their standard of living and be able to support their own populations?
		We should have been doing this long ago, but all the white boys in the country want to make sure that the black and brown people stay out.
		And all they do is go on and on about the immigrants.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Next up is Kurt in Morgantown, North Carolina on our line for Democrats.
Draft Dodger Debunked 00:07:30
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Kurt.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I'd like to talk about Venezuela and all the distractions.
		The boats, distraction, the oil distraction.
		It's all about the gold.
		You looked at the White House, it's all about the gold.
		Amen.
		Have a good time, America.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Next up is Everett in Colorado on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Everett.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Good morning.
		I'd like to talk about the draft during the Vietnam War.
		And I'd like to say, because there's so many people out there who believe that the president is a draft dodger, I'd like to make it real simple.
unidentified		In the Vietnam War, the draft started for the year 1970 and 1969.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		The draft numbers went up the first year to 190, and it affected people that were born from 1950 to 19 that date, basically, when they started the draft.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		And all you need to do is type in on your search engine, if there's people that believe this out there, selective service chart.
unidentified		And you take the date of their birth, or anybody's birth, and you can go down to the number for each of the years, each of the numbers, to 1993, or 1973.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		And you can determine whose number is which number that they were drafted by, or if they had a deferment.
		It's simple history.
		And the president was not eligible during that time.
unidentified		Neither was President Biden because he was born in 1942, November 20th.
		And President Bush was born June 14th, 1946.
		So I'd encourage people to do that and straighten this accusation out and get to the truth of it.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		And that's the truth.
unidentified		He was not a draft Dodger.
henry olsen ▲ ● ▼		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Richard is in Tyler, Texas, on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Richard.
unidentified		Good morning.
		I have a couple of questions.
		As far as the ICE that happened, that lady that lost her life that day, I watched the videos also with other people.
		I have one question.
		The man or the ICE agent that shot that lady, And y'all can look at that video again.
		He had no regards about anybody's safety, especially the other ICE agents that were next to that car when he fired.
		No warning saying stop or I will shoot.
		Never, ever.
		Nobody said anything.
		And when he shot, there were two ICE agents right there.
		They could have been hit.
		So yes, he did.
		He put them in jeopardy.
		Like I said, people, y'all need to go up.
		Donald Trump has lied to the American people, to the Republicans.
		That lady that died and the cops that were died that day on January 6th, they were willing to kill their fellow Americans over a lie.
		I would like somebody to explain to me: if Donald Trump has the proof that this election was stolen, where's the proof?
		I have not heard anything about the proof.
		No evidence, no proof, nothing.
		Why?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right, next up is Bronson in Pueblo, Colorado on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Bronson.
unidentified		Good morning, America.
		My name is Bronson.
		I'm a disabled veteran, served during the Vietnam War, born in Mexico.
		And during the Vietnam War, 50,000 plus Americans were draft Dodgers.
		Over 50,000 draft Dodgers that President Carter later pardoned.
		What does that tell you?
		It tells you that nobody likes wars.
		And if Donald Trump was a little bit smarter in the letter, I want to address myself to the legislators.
		They should pass a law to allow some of these undocumented to join the military.
		Because when a real war erupts, when a large war erupts, we're going to need these people.
		I think that some of these undocumented should be screened, of course, and allow them to join the military on a non-combat service, non-combat.
		You know, I was a mechanic in Fort Carson, Colorado.
		I traveled to Oklahoma for training.
		When I was in Oklahoma, a doctor called me.
		He says, you know, you got problems with your feet.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So, Bronson, I think we have your idea about the idea of undocumented folks serving in the military.
		Let's go to Nancy in Florida on our line for Republicans.
		Good morning, Nancy.
unidentified		Good morning, Kimberly.
		I'm calling up, not necessarily with a political statement, but to take a moment and ask all of our viewers and everyone to say a prayer for the family of Dr. Janelle Green-Smith, who tragically lost her life in childbirth.
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Stephen is in Quincy, Illinois on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Stephen.
Larry's Legal Analysis 00:09:13
unidentified		Good morning, Kimberly.
		Nice to see you again.
		You and Mimi do the best job.
		I'm a former elected state's attorney, a two-term state's attorney in Illinois.
		I was also a college professor at a major university in the law enforcement administration department where I taught and was an expert in deadly use of force by law enforcement officials.
		I have examined all of the tapes that have been available on the different television channels.
		And at the common law, the ICE agent is guilty of murder.
		According to Minnesota law, there's an argument that he's guilty of voluntary manslaughter.
		But that's not the problem.
		In communist countries where the government murders citizens, they take a two-step approach.
		First of all, they abort the truth and present falsehoods about the circumstances surrounding the death.
		Secondly, they smear the innocent murder victim.
		The Trump administration is following the communist playbook.
		Several hours after this poor girl was murdered, Trump said that she ran over Officer Ross, which is a falsehood.
		Several hours later, Secretary Noam stated that the woman was a domestic terrorist, which was an outrageous statement.
		And then our vice president stated the poor woman was deranged when there's no evidence to that.
		This is all an absolute disgrace in regard to how this is being handled.
		I would additionally add that Vice President Vance a few years ago was an atheist.
		He then became a Roman Catholic in order to pursue his political plans to be a U.S. Senator from Ohio and get on the Trump ticket.
		I think he should be denied communion until he presents the truth and admits he's a liar.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Next up is John in Vero Beach, Florida on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, John.
unidentified		Good morning, C-STEN.
		How are you?
		Two things.
		Could somebody please, Brian Lamb's favorite employee, walk down the hall, beg him to show all nine hours of the Smith deposition.
		Nobody else has done it.
		The government has effectively buried it.
		We haven't seen anything but snippets of that.
		And I know it's nine hours, but it could be broken up.
		It could be done with intelligent commentary.
		And it could be informative as hell.
		Also informative was Mr. Olson.
		Thank you very much.
		I'm almost already forgive him for his persecution of President Clinton.
		And as to the president conspired with a corrupt doctor and his father and his brother to diagnose a false condition that didn't exist in return for reduced rent in choice, New York real estate, so that he wouldn't even have to register with Social Security.
		Joe Biden was a married law student with two young kids.
		Thank you for hearing me, C-SPAN.
		And you guys are great.
		Appreciate it.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		John is in Massachusetts on our line for Republicans.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, John.
unidentified		All right.
		Let me break the sorry truth about people's history.
		Your history was created by the Rockefeller family.
		And on top of that, all your presidents, with the exception of one, are all related to King John of England.
		Hillary and Trump are cousins.
		So if it's not white supremacy, colonial imperialism, this is part of a plantation of European and British colonization.
		It just continues.
		It's about resources and oil.
		You got the ones that correct me.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Where are you getting the information about the family?
unidentified		Racism.
		That's what you're saying.
		And C-SPAN is a corporation, too.
		You're an LLC.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		It's a non-profit, but Robert is in North Carolina on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Robert.
unidentified		Hey, good morning.
		Good morning.
		I got a couple things to say.
		First of all, I'm not a racist.
		That's first of all.
		Second of all, Mexicans don't care about nobody else no way, but the self.
		They don't interact with people.
		They say that.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I do find that a sweeping statement about that large of a group of people is not racist.
unidentified		They don't speak English.
unidentified		Well, what I'm saying is they're not culturally nice.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Lucius is in Etwel, Alabama, on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Lucas.
		Lucius.
unidentified		Well, good morning.
unidentified		Couple questions I would like to ask about the boats, blowing up the boats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I'm guessing you mean American citizens are creating the market for the drugs that are coming into the country, correct, Lucius?
unidentified		Yes, that's the question I'm going to ask.
		They talk about the drugs coming in here and killing my kids.
		Now, when the drugs lawyers bring his drugs in here, he's not no chicken chain money.
		It's big-time money.
		So who paying for the drug once you get to American to get in there to America and be killing your kids?
		Who paying for the drugs?
		So, and don't no one have no gun upside your kid head to take their drugs for them to kill themselves.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right, next up is Larry in Southport, North Carolina, on our line for Republicans.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Larry.
unidentified		Yes, ma'am.
		I was calling Reverend's very science.
		Angry from Mexico without the girl was wrong.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Larry, it's a little bit challenging to understand you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I'm wondering if you can say that again, please.
unidentified		Yes, ma'am.
		A lot of these news, all of them, have the DS has cup design to my senator.
		John Hoffger put out a research that showed that liberals, 47% women and 28% men, have mental illness.
		And there the proof is going to put.
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I believe that what Larry is referencing there is a Johns Hopkins study showing the differing ways that groups deal with depression.
		And this is a study that was published in September of 2024.
		And among other things, it says a new study published in September in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice sheds light on the mental crisis gripping millions of Americans.
		And the findings suggest that depression is a bipartisan issue that affects people across party lines.
		According to the study, there is, however, a striking divide on whether people seek mental health treatment, with Republicans less likely to have access to care despite reporting similar rates of depression compared to Democrats and Independents.
		Frank is in Akron, Ohio, on our line for independence.
		Good morning, Frank.
unidentified		Good morning.
		Years ago, Vice President Vance said Trump is America's Hitler.
		And now he's proving it by telling Venezuela, give me your oil or else people will get killed.
		He's telling Denmark, give me your Greenland or you will get hurt.
		That's called aggravated menacing in local law enforcement.
		Well, you go to jail for those kind of things.
		He's also, Marjorie Taylor Greene says he's obstructing justice by not releasing the Epstein files.
		They only released 1% of them.
Restore the Sabbath Day 00:02:40
unidentified		She says that there are no such things as Democrats and Republicans.
		There's only people hungry for money and power and greed.
		And we have a government of liars, not of honesty.
		And also, he told Marjorie Taylor Greene that he's protecting his friends by not releasing the Epstein files.
		What friends is he protecting from jail and law enforcement?
		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Jean is in Detroit on our line for Democrats.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Jean.
unidentified		Good morning.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		I just want to say that I feel very strongly that as a nation, we have lost our way morally.
		We've elected a man that does everything that the Bible says that we should not do.
		I had said before he was elected that he was an enemy of the state as well as an enemy of the word of God.
		And he has proved me right over and over again.
		And I really think that things started changing in this country when we no longer honored the Sabbath day.
		I grew up when businesses were closed on Sunday.
		So you went to church, you had time with your family or your friends.
		And it just seems like, you know, I tried to do a little bit of research and went online, and it says that it was in 1973 that we made the change that J.C. Penny petitioned to be able to open on Sunday because there were discount stores that were opening up.
		And I just think that we need, first of all, to be obedient to the word of God, which is about the fourth commandment to honor the Sabbath day.
		And we need to restore, for Christians, it's Sunday because that's when Jesus was resurrected.
		And I feel like we need to restore the Sabbath day and not go after this pursuit of money, which it seems like is the number one thing in our country.
		And we have a president who really exemplifies the love of money, which the scripture says is the root of all kinds of evil.
C-SPAN Takes You Where Decisions Are Made 00:03:10
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		And I just think we should begin to honor God, and maybe that would help us to have a moral compass and not elect a person who has no morals.
barbara in north carolina ▲ ● ▼		Thank you.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Thanks to everyone who called in during Open Forum.
		Coming up next, we will be joined by Democratic donor and venture capitalist Oliver Libby to discuss his book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling: Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		We'll be right back.
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		Tonight, on C-SPAN's QA, in his book, White House Memories, 1970 to 2007, Gary Walters, chief usher from 1986 to 2007, shares stories from his time in the executive residence, serving seven different U.S. presidents and their families.
		He discusses the role that he played, especially in managing the day-to-day operations, presidential transitions, and major events at the White House.
		I received a call directly from Mrs. Ford and she said, Gary, would you go up and make sure that Jack is up?
		I know he had calls put to him earlier.
		And so I did that twice.
		And both times I was told, Yeah, I'm getting ready.
		I'll be ready by the time I'm supposed to be ready.
		That's kind of a tricky role, isn't it?
		Waking up the president's son?
		No, not when the president and the first lady said, get him off.
		That was an easy decision for me.
		Gary Walters with his book, White House Memories, 1970 to 2007.
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		Today, with our guest Hall of Fame baseball player and best-selling author Cal Ripken Jr., who has authored and co-authored more than a dozen books, including The Only Way I Know, Get in the Game, and a series of children's books.
		He joins our host, civic leader, best-selling author, and owner of the Baltimore Orioles, David Rubinstein.
		I thought writing kids' books were a good way to broach certain subjects that might have been tough when you were kids or whatever else in the backdrop of a travel team, travel baseball team, because we all worry about things as kids, and it was a way to communicate a good message through books.
Strong Floor, No Ceiling 00:15:43
unidentified		So I just enjoyed the process.
		Watch America's Book Club with Cal Ripken Jr.
		Today at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific, only on C-SPAN.
		Washington Journal continues.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Welcome back.
		We're joined now by Oliver Libby, who's the co-founder and managing partner of HL Ventures and also the author of the new book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling: Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		Welcome to Washington Journal.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Thanks so much for having me.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Can you talk a little bit first about your background in business as well as civic engagement?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Well, thanks so much for having me here.
		I have spent my life kind of between all the sectors.
		At the very beginning of my career, I actually started in the federal government, and then I went from there to consulting, learning about business.
		I've also worked with a number of my very close friends to start a nonprofit that helps college students around the world start social responsible businesses across the America and around the world.
		And then, yes, I co-founded a venture firm that's focused on companies that are both really great businesses, but that also help people on the planet called HL Venture.
		It's been at that for now close to a decade and a half, a little over that.
		And so, you know, blending all those sectors together is what actually gave me a lot of the kind of perspective to start thinking about strong floor and no ceiling and what that might mean for our country.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		So what do you mean by that, strong floor, no ceiling?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What does that title mean?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		So, you know, for me, when I think about the things that are a real danger to our country, we all grow up, whether we're born here or we came here learning about the American dream.
		And I think you and I both know that that dream is something that hasn't worked for a lot of Americans for a long time.
		And actually, something like a quarter of Americans believe today like it is real.
		And that, to me, more than any external threat or anything, is a danger to our country because people need to believe that if they work hard, they play by the rules, that they can get ahead and leave their kids and their families better off than them.
		And I started to think to myself eight years ago, what would the ingredients of that be?
		And no one party, no one group of people or thinkers has the answer to that.
		But I thought that one of the key ingredients is a strong floor.
		A strong floor has the planks that would help build opportunity for folks.
		It's education, it's healthcare, it's housing and jobs and justice and access to opportunity, the things you'd stand on to reach into the middle class, to reach higher than the middle class if you can.
		But a fundamentally American idea is that it shouldn't stop there.
		That if you do work hard, you play by the rules, you do great things, that there should be no ceiling to what you can achieve in this country as long as you play by those rules and that you're supporting a system that has that strong floor.
		And in fact, Kimberly, that those ideas are not contradictory, that they are related, that we can only afford the strong floor if we have no ceiling for our people.
		And that is one of the most fundamentally American ideas I can think of.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		This concept, strong floor, no ceiling, has been picked up by quite a few Democrats.
		Most famously, Hakeem Jeffries has been citing this idea quite a bit.
		Can you talk a little bit about your relationship with Democratic leaders as well as your own political ideology?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, so thank you for asking.
		I myself have been a Democrat my whole life.
		I've worked as a volunteer on Democratic campaigns.
		I've also given.
		But actually, unusually, perhaps, I've also worked for Republicans and with Republicans.
		My time at the beginning of my career in the government was during a Republican administration.
		And I count among my friends, people on both sides of the aisle.
		It's actually one of the reasons why I think this idea came to me in the way that it did.
		I mean, it's just my lived experience to want to take the best ideas from both sides.
		And actually, one of the interesting things about Strong Floor and No Ceiling, for those who do read it, is the ideas in it aren't just the boring middle, and they're not just from the left or from the right.
		The idea if we want to solve tough problems in our country now is a first admission that neither side has all the answers and that neither side has led us particularly effectively over the last 50 years.
		I mean, we have that breach of faith with the American dream, not because one side has been right and the other side wrong.
		Now, I think what you'll find in the strong floor is a lot of the policies that you'd recognize as democratic policies.
		But some of the overlays in the no-ceiling are things that would normally be thought of as conservative.
		And I think the concert between those things is where we can find good quality answers to reignite the American Dream for people.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Can you talk a little bit more about that concert between the two?
		Because we are in an era of extreme economic inequality, growing economic inequality.
		So while I imagine you can find a lot of folks, especially on the left, agreeing with you that there needs to be this strong floor, the idea of no ceiling, unlimited wealth in some people's minds, might be an anathema to folks.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Look, first of all, you're right.
		We are in the era where affordability is on everybody's mind and rightfully so.
		And actually, people are angry and rightfully so.
		I said it just before and I'll say it again.
		For a long time, our institutions have been failing our people.
		And that is something that all of our leaders ought to own.
		But at the end of the day, it's not just enough to say that there should be limits arbitrarily, right?
		And I think everybody in America wants to believe that if they do the right thing and work hard, that there should be no ceiling to what they can do.
		And by the way, I want to emphasize no ceiling should not mean no rules, right?
		And we have laws and we want to enforce the tax code, which we do a poor job of.
		And we ought to have a real national conversation about what the tax rates are, particularly for people who are amassing wealth that is unlike most of what we've seen in history before.
		But at the end of the day, I would ask back the question, like, what is the maximum amount of wealth?
		Why should we be thinking about a cap?
		And if people are upset, as they rightfully should be, about people, for example, dumping huge amounts of money into politics, I think that's a problem we ought to solve as a country.
		There should not be the opportunity for a almost trillionaire to put a quarter billion dollars into a campaign cycle.
		But as you and I both know, that's not illegal yet.
		And so if we believe that should be one of the rules, we should make it one of the rules.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		As I mentioned earlier, your idea has gotten quite a bit of traction amongst Democrats.
		And Hakeem Jeffries cited your book and its title as sort of this democratic counter almost to some of the messaging that's been targeted at Democrats, this idea of socialism that the Republicans are trying to pin on Democrats.
		Some have even talked about this concept as a counter to the Make America Great Again slogan.
		What do you think of that?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Look, I think that America has long had at really important parts of our history a plan.
		And we kind of know the names of those plans, right?
		There's the Great Society, the New Deal, being the arsenal of democracy.
		Some of those plans worked out better than others, but we kind of knew what we were getting out of bed to do as a country.
		And today, we don't have that.
		I mean, a solid minority of the country believes in MAGA, but that is not a broadly popular view that is unifying America right now, I think is fair to say.
		And so I believe we should be in search of that.
		I think strong floor and no-ceiling could be that.
		If it's not, I welcome other great ideas.
		But I want something where no matter at what dinner table, what Thanksgiving party you're at, where if you said, hey, we should have a strong floor and no ceiling for our people, that's a way to breathe new life into the American dream, that that would be welcomed and something that would inspire people.
		And actually, you know, out there talking to folks about this, especially folks who aren't on either fringe, it is amazing to the extent that people find this an inspiring message.
		And I think that's something we should want as a country.
		We should want to rededicate ourselves to an idea we can all get behind and work on because we have real problems here.
		I mean, it is the affordability crisis, some of the big national challenges we have.
		These require us to be together as a nation in a way that you're right, we fundamentally are not right now.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's talk about the specifics of some of the planks that you're talking about in this strong floor, specifically when it comes to health care.
		You're right.
		Why do people say that your zip code is as important as your genetic code in health care?
		What do you think we should do differently there?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		An enormous amount.
		I'm so glad you started with healthcare, Kimberly.
		Healthcare is both the most expensive thing we do in this country.
		It's between 17 and 20 cents of every dollar in the American economy.
		And I don't know about you, but I don't think we are getting our money's worth.
		And we certainly are not for everyday Americans.
		You know, if you happen to have wealth and you live near a major teaching hospital and you can call a couple of the board members and get that private room, then you have access to the best health care in the world.
		For everybody else, it's a crapshoot.
		And that is something that is totally unacceptable.
		So what could we do about that?
		Well, let's use strong floor, no ceiling as a rubric.
		First of all, I think it's long time overdue that we have a single-payer healthcare system in America.
		It's something that works in virtually every other industrialized country.
		My family are doctors and scientists.
		I grew up around that.
		I worked the front desk at my mom's ultrasound office and I took insurance.
		And I wondered why it was that people paid wildly different sums and some of them couldn't pay.
		And it was just chaos.
		And even that early in my life, I was probably 14 or 15 when I was doing that, I thought to myself, this is broken.
		But on the flip side, we ought to also analyze what's wrong with parts of our system.
		We take care of people mostly when they are the sickest.
		We have, I think it's been called a sick care system in America.
		And that is also the most expensive moment.
		When you come to the hospital with a heart attack, you are not only in dire trouble for you and your family and your earning potential and your access to the American dream, you're also expensive.
		And so we ought to provide, for example, a tax credit for folks seeing their doctor every year, a preventative tax care program for America, a preventative health care program, I should say, for America that would help us control the costs of that single-payer system and make healthcare more affordable as an industry.
		And last but not least, we have to make sure that we maintain our leadership in biotechnology.
		And yes, that does mean a partnership with pharma companies to continue to innovate, but those pharma companies actually depend on government-funded science.
		If you think about GLP1s that so many people are on, that started with research into an obscure lizard's saliva.
		I promise you, as someone who invests in startups, that was not an idea that we were backing in the private sector until it had been long proven out with peer-reviewed research.
		So that partnership between the government-funded science, universities, and the private sector, we need to want to keep them shooting at those moonshots so that we get preventative care and we can pay for health care for everybody.
		That's just one example of how we apply strong floor, no ceiling to a major national problem.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Another major national problem that you address is the issues around immigration.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		How do you think that President Trump's mass deportations, as well as the immigration policy or sort of our lack of a cohesive immigration policy, affecting the ability to create this strong floor that you're advocating?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Look, I wouldn't be doing it the way that President Trump is doing it, although I believe that, let's start from first principles here.
		Immigration is one of America's greatest superpowers.
		It has been so since the beginning of our country.
		My family comes here as refugees from Nazi Germany in most cases at a time when many refugees were turned away.
		So I care a lot about immigration, and I think it's a strength for our country, a strength that we have badly messed up over the last several decades.
		And that, again, is something that is owned by both parties.
		There was a chance for bipartisan reform several times, and it failed every time.
		So what should we do?
		First of all, I don't think there's a real debate where a lot of people agree that if you commit crimes, you ought to stay in this country.
		And I think almost everybody in this country, if you ask them, believes that we should have, we should know who's in our country and what folks are up to.
		Equally, though, I think most of the people who are in this country, perhaps not legally, are just trying to make ends meet.
		They're trying to reach for something better.
		And that's something that is fundamentally American.
		So we need a moment in time where we try and reset this, where we do control our borders effectively, where there's good use of information and technology, where we give folks who are here honestly, who are paying their taxes and working in jobs, by the way, that are an enormous subsidy for our economy, give them a chance to participate legally, and also make sure that if folks are committing crimes, that they do go home, right?
		Because I think that's something that's a clear bargain between our government and its people that we keep folks safe.
		And so, no, I think right now what's going on, it seems rushed and chaotic and probably not the right pathway.
		But I do think we have a duty to our country to get this real problem right.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Wilgan, we're going to be taking your questions for Oliver Libby about his new book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling.
		If you want to call in, Democrats at 202-748-8000, Republicans at 202-748-8001.
		And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
		I do want to read you, though, first, some of the pushback against your ideas and also this idea that it could be messaging for Democrats more broadly.
		Paul Waldman, who's a liberal columnist and commentator, wrote that, thus the slogan Jeffries adopted, Hakeem Jeffries there, sounds like it was crafted to offend no one and communicate to the billionaire class, don't worry, we won't tax you too much, no ceiling.
		The slogan is emblematic of an approach the party's leadership always seems to take.
		They're so afraid they might offend someone, they decline to call out genuine villains.
		While they'll criticize Republican attempts to favor the wealthy at the expense of the rest of us, it often sounds like they're not that displeased with the status quo.
		They just don't want to make things worse, which, of course, says nothing about how they want to make things better.
		Nobody is going to proudly wear a strong floor, no ceiling hat.
		It will never be the equivalent of Donald Trump's Make America Great Again, one of the most effective slogans in American political history.
		Why does that phrase still resonate so powerfully for Trump supporters?
		Because in four words, it communicates the problem as conservatives see it: America isn't great anymore, and the solution, a revival of greatness.
		Why do you think that this idea might struggle potentially to respond to these things?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Any idea might struggle.
		My purpose here was to provide one, right?
		I think, you know, trying to do my best to share this idea, if it can be helpful, is what I set out to do.
		I don't know, Kimberly, if this idea is going to be on a hat or not.
		I didn't set out for it to be.
		But on the other hand, I actually believe that, again, when I talk to people, they do understand it.
		They understand it from the get-go.
		If I say in the context of America, strong floor, no ceiling, people understand that the floor is something that ought to give people a hand up and give them a chance to succeed and that we don't let people fall below it, but also they can stand on it to reach into opportunity.
		And they understand at a vista, they understand at their core that no ceiling means if you strive, that you ought to be able to achieve.
		So, you know, I don't know, first of all, one of the things in that article, actually, which I certainly read, is that there ought to be more meat on the bones of these policies.
		Well, there's 350 pages and 75,000 words of meat on the bones and strong floor, no ceiling.
		I invite anyone to read it.
		I hope everyone does.
		And I think there are really good, actionable ideas because the one thing you can't say about me is that I'm happy with the status quo.
		The whole purpose of this book is not because I felt like I needed to be an author desperately, but the fact that I think there's real problems in our society, deep problems, and in fact, that we have been incapable of handling them.
		And so we need to make an investment in our society.
		And as someone who invests for a living, an investment in a strong floor, in a society of people who aren't worried about making ends meet, who don't have only $400 in the bank to survive a challenge, who believe that if they work hard, that things might actually work for them.
Inspiring Great Things Again 00:15:21
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		That might just give us a chance to inspire our people to great things again.
		And you know what?
		We've done it before in the past.
		I mean, when you hear a phrase like the Great Society, was that destined to be one of the greatest programs of national renewal in history from the outset?
		If you heard that phrase without any traction or anything, would you say that's it?
		But in fact, there's a picture of all the pens that LBJ used to sign those bills, over 100 bills into law, in a decade where our leaders were being killed, where our streets were riotous, where we were in a war that most Americans hated, and yet we achieved great things.
		So I don't know if strong floor or no ceiling is it, but I'm trying to put it out there because I hope it is, because I think if we get people working hard again, we can do great things still.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Let's get to your calls.
		Delia is in Harlem, New York on our line for Democrats.
		Good morning, Delia.
unidentified		Oh, good morning, Kimberly, and thank you for taking my call.
		I love the name of your book, by the way.
		I just want to get that out there.
		It reminds me of First Lady Hillary Clinton when she ran in 2008 when she gave her speech, you know, running for the Democratic nomination.
		She said, you know, there was 18 million cracks in that glass ceiling for a woman to run for president.
		I don't know if you were giving a nod to that.
		I hope she runs again, but I just want to say I love the name of your book.
		The other thing is I wanted to ask, did you hear about the $2,000, and I live in Harlem, so I really want to know.
		There was a $2,000 dividend check from the tariffs that President Trump said he was going to give to America.
		Yeah, I see you nodding.
		Thank God.
		Okay, that he said that he was going to give to all Americans, you know, like he did in his first administration.
		The thing was, he gave the economic speech after that, I think, like a month ago, and I didn't hear him mention that.
		However, he did say that the checks, those checks went to the soldiers for $17.76 or something like that.
		And then the other night, or was it a couple of nights ago, I heard him in it, forgive me, dear, I can't, I wasn't in on the beginning part of what that conversation was about.
		I think he was saying something about economics, and he was saying that, you know, I don't know, you know, saying that Americans were upset, you know, about the, I guess, the cost of living or whatever.
		And again, I don't want to say that, and that's not what he said.
		That's what I thought he was saying.
		And he said, I think they think they're going to, you know, they want a check or something like that.
		And I said, oh, wait a minute.
		I hope he's not pulling back, you know, on what he said, because, oh, I'm sure you know, you know, having wrote this book and talking to everyone, you know, that we, you know, we really need that check.
		I know I do.
		So, you know, I don't know.
		And again, I don't want to cast aspersions on him.
		That's not what I'm trying to do.
		I just want to know if you heard something about it.
		Could you tell us, you know, are we going to get it?
		And please give me some information on that.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		All right, let's let him respond.
unidentified		Sure.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Well, first of all, got to shout out New York.
		Thank you for calling.
		And thanks for a great question.
		Look, I believe that there are a lot of ways in which we could help folks like you make ends meet.
		And the strong floor is all about that.
		And by the way, I would love for you to read the book.
		I think there's a lot of ideas you'll like.
		I don't have any information as to whether we're getting a tariff check from the president.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I'll just pause for a moment.
		The most recent information I could find is that asked about tariff, this is according to CNBC, asked about tariff rebates this week.
		A White House official told CNBC that President Trump's tariffs are raising historic revenue for the federal government, and the administration is committed to putting that money to good use for the American people.
		The White House has also said elsewhere in this article it points out that they're planning in theory to bring something to Congress in the new year this year that would allow this to happen.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Still in the works.
		Thanks for the check there.
		I think, but taking it back to basics here, right, writing a one-time check to you, while it could be really helpful, isn't investing in you.
		And if you think about the things that are in the strong floor part of my book, these are things like education, health care, certainly certain kinds of economic aid that would go a long way, not just to giving you a one-time boost, but to actually changing the circumstances of so many people in America.
		So look, again, I mean, the president did issue checks during COVID, and that was an effective policy to help us out of a really tough situation.
		I don't know whether these checks are coming from the tariffs or from healthcare, but I mean, the healthcare checks, for example, during the shutdown were such an interesting thing to offer because the $2,000 or something that were being mentioned, that's a fraction of what people need to spend on health care and a fraction of what folks are going to lose if the Obamacare rebates get pulled back.
		And so I just think we need to be honest about what we're talking about.
		And look, again, Strong Floor No Ceiling is about oftentimes tough love for our country.
		It's about speaking truth.
		And the truth is tariffs are taxes.
		And so if we think those are necessary, fine, as a society, we should perhaps have them or not.
		But at the end of the day, writing you a small check as a result of it isn't changing the economic impact of the tariffs.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Bob is in Texas on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Bob.
unidentified		Yes, Oliver.
unidentified		I wanted to ask, can we have a strong floor if we ignore the only written guarantee in our first book in America, which is our Constitution?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		No, I think the Constitution and the Strong Floor are compatible.
		I mean, the Constitution is an amazing document, and it is part of the contract that our country signs with all of us.
		I know it may seem out of touch to talk about things like the social contract, but they are important.
		We all agree in some way to be governed, and the Constitution is part of it.
		But part of that bargain is that the government does have some responsibility to us.
		And the thing that I'm interested in, Strong Floor, No Ceiling, is the responsibility that government has that I think is broadly popular to make sure that everyone doesn't have all the same things, but that everyone has enough so that we have a healthy society.
		And again, I think about this, Caller, as an investment.
		As someone who invests for a living, I think if our society is well-educated, is healthy, is consumer-oriented, wants to buy products, wants to engage civically, feels hope, not despair, if you think about the affordability crisis we're in now, that daily struggle turns into a lifetime of hopelessness.
		And if I go back to the Constitution, sir, I think the Constitution is part of a contract where we should try and keep our people from being filled with despair and instead fill them with hope, hope that they can alter their circumstances, but that the government is there in certain important ways to give them a shot to do that.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Howard is in Meadow Bridge, West Virginia on our line for Republicans.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Howard.
unidentified		Yes, thank you for taking my call.
		The speaker online this morning seems to be quite informed.
		And I have a question I've had most of my life.
		And I'm an old man, very old man.
		And I've noticed that political left despises the political right.
		And the political right doesn't despise the left, but they think they're just maybe a little misguided.
		And there's quite a difference in there.
		And I've seen the left even go to extremes.
		For instance, I'll say, trying to assassinate President Trump.
		And I'm not, I am from the right, but I, you know, I'm not a strong guy.
		I don't do crazy things.
		And I'm just wondering if you could just help me with that.
		It's Charlie Kirk, Tempsel President Trump.
		Just what is the difference?
		And please help me with that.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Well, sir, thank you for the question.
		And you have seen more than I have in your life.
		I would only say I wish that that were true.
		I think both sides right now despise each other.
		And one of the things, Kimberly, you asked me this question earlier.
		One of the things that I've heard about Strong Floor No Ceiling, this book, is that actually if politicians want to win today, they should just get angry and find a villain.
		And look, people are angry and they're angry for good reasons, sir.
		But at the end of the day, that's not enough.
		For you, for everybody in our country, we have to come up with solutions.
		We have to make government and our economy work for people again.
		And so, look, I think folks from the left, a lot of them hate folks on the right, and a lot of folks on the right hate a lot of folks on the left.
		At the end of the day, we should, and let me say this clearly, have a society where no one is getting shot for their political beliefs, not lawmakers in Minnesota, not Mr. Kirk, not the president.
		No one should lose their lives for having political views in our country.
		But at the end of the day, that's where we are today.
		And if we don't give people a reason to believe in our country again, then we will continue to go down this pathway.
		And this pathway has no solutions and no goodness at the end of it.
		So I really appreciate your question.
		I think you're getting to the heart of one of the things that makes solutions so hard in this country, which is so many of us hate each other just for what we believe.
		And one last thing that I'll share on this.
		There is a great book called The Big Sort, often confused with The Big Short.
		I recommend The Big Sort to people because it describes a sad story in our country's history, which is the fact that we have geographically chosen to live next to people who believe only the things that we believe.
		And by the way, we've done that digitally now too.
		We only live digitally with people who believe what we want to believe.
		I've spent my life living with, working with people who disagree with me.
		I think we should all try and do that more as a country.
		And I try and see the best in folks who believe different things.
		I sense you do too, sir.
		And I hope we can all do that because that's the only way out of all this.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I want to read a comment we received from X and then some data to back it up.
		MLB says, the strong floor to me is education.
		Education is the great equalizer, and the more we cut education, the weaker we will become as a nation and society.
		If you can hold that thought, there was some recent polling, and here it is reported in NBC News, that in a dramatic shift, Americans no longer see four-year college degrees as worth the cost.
		The latest NBC news poll shows two-thirds of registered voters are down on the value proposition of a degree.
		A majority said degrees were worth the cost a dozen years ago.
		And in this article, Democratic pollster Jeff Horwit says, it's just remarkable to see attitudes on any issue shift this dramatically and particularly on a central tenet of the American dream, which is a college degree.
		Americans used to view a college degree as aspirational.
		It provided an opportunity for a better life.
		And now that promise is really in doubt.
		And a lot of the reason for the doubt that people have about that college degree has to do with the debt associated with it for many people.
		42.5 million borrowers have federal student loan debt.
		The average federal student loan debt is about $39,000 per borrower.
		Outstanding private student loan debt totals about $145 billion.
		The average student borrows over $30,000 to pursue a bachelor's degree.
		And it may take borrowers close to 20 years to pay off their student loans, according to the Education Data Initiative.
		So just reading MLB's comment again that the strong floor is education and education being a great equalizer in society.
		Can you talk about what you say in your book about education and what you make of all of this data?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		First of all, I just have to say I really appreciate this program for the depth that you go into here.
		That is an incredibly great question.
		And by the way, the commentator on X is right.
		Education is one of the most important planks of the strong floor.
		There's no doubt about it.
		It's the second policy chapter in the book after healthcare because I believe if you have a healthy population, the next thing you have to do is have a well-educated population.
		And look, the comments that you read are right.
		We have actually broken the promise of higher education in this country, but it is so much more complicated.
		We need to rethink education in our country, especially in the era of AI, which is coming on like a freight train and is part of the reason why the college promise is broken now is for the first time ever, recent college grads are going jobless at crazy rates.
		And it is expensive to get that degree if you're not going to be able to do it.
		And if those entry-level jobs are now being done by AI, which sends that money instead to a handful of AI companies and not to people who have spent $100,000 plus dollars on education.
		So what a strong floor no sale have to say about this.
		Number one, education is a long-term investment in our society.
		You want to run great businesses, start great businesses, have inventors and entrepreneurs, you have to have education cranking in this country.
		And that starts with pre-K.
		College is, in some cases, unless you go undergraduate degrees for some few Americans, it's the end of the line of a long line.
		You got to start with pre-K.
		You have to make sure we've got programs to take care of kids as early as that and also to support their families because people are working so many jobs that their kids are just sitting at home watching a screen.
		Unacceptable.
		We need to have a national program for pre-K education.
		Also, we have to emphasize parts of the education system that have been so fundamentally left behind as to be ruined, right?
		The community college system in America, there ought to be an option to be able to go for free.
		That is, by the way, not a giveaway, that's an investment.
		If we have more people who come out with two-year degrees and know what they're doing, especially in the age of technology, that is something that we invest in for better workers and stronger ideas come out of our country.
		Also, apprenticeships and what I call jobs of national priority.
		There ought to be programs almost like West Points or service academies for all the major jobs that matter in our economy that are so underappreciated and underpaid.
		Think about it.
		In healthcare, we are dying for rural doctors, ER doctors, nurses, home health aides.
		These are jobs where you should get tax credits, support for your education, and that there should be stronger education focus early on in life.
		So maybe not a liberal arts degree, maybe you're focused on vocational education earlier.
		The same stands for the major trades in construction, for defense work.
		There are a number of jobs in the book, national priority jobs that ought to have.
		So as you can see, right, I'm brimming with ideas here.
		Education is fundamental, and we are doing a poor job of it here.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		You mentioned that it starts early on with pre-K, sometimes even daycare or something like this.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		In New York, the new, newly installed New York City Mayor, Zorhan Mamdani, made that a big part of his platform and is already trying to change the way that they handle early childhood education there.
Strong Floor, Cautious Ceiling 00:09:01
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		What do you think of some of his policies and how that relates to the, you know, no ceiling, but the strong floor concept?
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Well, look, first of all, I am a big believer whenever anyone starts a new administration to wish them the best and hope they do well.
		There are parts of Mayor Mamdani's policies that I find really interesting.
		The partnership with New York's governor, Governor Hochul, on early childhood education, I think is something that needs investment and needs support.
		I want New York to be great, and I hope that the mayor can deliver those things.
		My view of Mayor Mamdani is he's very strong on the strong floor side of things.
		I hope that he agrees that there should be no ceiling.
		I hope that he can work with, for example, the technology industry in New York, with the business community, because all the things that he wants to do, many of which would help people, are going to be costly.
		And so I think it's, again, that partnership between the strong floor and the no-ceiling.
		And I do hope that he looks at both of those things.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Joan is in Bridgewater, New Jersey, on our line for independence.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Good morning, Joan.
unidentified		Hi, good morning.
		Thank you for writing this book.
		I do plan on going out and buying this book because I like the idea of the strong floor.
		And I think if anything, we need something to combat MAGA because MAGA, we know, is a divide in the country.
		So my question is that the strong floor component, in order to have a strong floor, don't you also need to have a healthy ecosystem in terms of the country?
		And how do we even get to a strong floor where we're so divided right now and there's so much chaos?
		And I feel really bad for the media because the media just seems to be so overwhelmed.
		So how do you even get a message like that across when you see, for instance, like the president and Stephen Miller, like their talking points are complete Russian propaganda?
		Can we please educate the American people more about what Russian propaganda looks like and the talking points?
		Because every time the president opens his mouth, it's all Russian propaganda talking points.
		Are Americans even clear on what that is?
		Stephen Miller got up there this week and talked about the strong man and taking things from people.
		And we're just going to push everything down everybody's throat.
		My question on that is, Rome was strong once.
		Are we just going to look past our history?
		All those strong countries.
		Rome was strong and Rome crumbled.
		Italy at one point was strong and they crumbled.
		So that is, but that's a Russian talking point.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Joan.
		It sounds like I want to make sure that we're capturing your ideas accurately, that you want Mr. Libby to respond to this idea of having a strong American ecosystem.
		And I'm guessing you're referencing the economy as well to build that strong floor, but also layering on to this idea of strong, you're a bit cautious about the Trump administration's interpretation of a strong America from a foreign policy perspective.
		Is that right?
		Okay, I don't know if we still have Joan, but go ahead.
		Go ahead, Joan.
unidentified		The idea is great, but based on the chaos that we're in right now, how do you get these great ideas across?
		How do you push through to even get a slogan like strong floor, no ceiling?
		Okay.
		Because we need that guidance.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Joan, this is the most important question you can ask me about the book.
		And first of all, thank you for saying you're going to grab it.
		I would look forward to hearing your thoughts on it.
		At the end of the day, I was writing it for a long time, and every time I would write one of the policy chapters, it would occur to me that I would start to think of how are we going to do this, right?
		How are we going to do this in America today?
		How are we going to do these hard things?
		And so I did two things.
		In chapter two of the book, you'll find three ideas or groups of ideas that I think would make it more likely for us to succeed in doing this.
		The first is some sort of a shared experience for Americans as we leave high school, because it's something that happened after World War II.
		That generation mixed itself up, did something great together, and came home.
		And we saw not only the most economically successful decades in American history, but where we advanced civil rights and we moved forward social things in the great society that were really important.
		And I think fundamentally that's because we had this shared experience.
		The second thing is we would work to help get the information ecosystem back to a place where we're not at war with reality.
		And that goes, Kimberly, what you do for a living.
		I think the media and the free flow of good quality information is the lifeblood of democracy, and we're breaking that now.
		And we need some guardrails around social media.
		Not that it should go away, but there ought to be some level of responsibility for these platforms for some level of fact and credentials and credibility.
		Because otherwise, how are we as a society supposed to vote and make good decisions?
		And then last but not least, we do need to get into the operations of our democracy.
		Now, don't get me wrong, Joan.
		I think if people can't put food on the table, it's really hard for them to worry about money and politics and gerrymandering, but we're not going to get solutions if we don't get into those problems and solve them.
		And I think there's broad support for that.
		Let me just close on this, though.
		I worry about the same thing that you do.
		I worry we might not be able to do these great things.
		But I think the alternative is that we just don't try.
		And we have had success.
		I mentioned, you know, the Great Society during the 1960s that by any measure must have felt similar to what this feels like today.
		And I would add to that the New Deal, which is one of the most, we're still enjoying the infrastructure built by the New Deal at a time during the Great Depression when Nazism and fascism was growing all around the world, which must, again, have felt a lot like today.
		And yet we did great things because we kept trying.
		So let me share the last idea.
		We in America tend to think of this country as exceptional.
		And I would agree.
		I'm a patriot and no party has a monopoly on patriotism.
		But at the end of the day, what that means is it calls us to try.
		We have to continue to earn everything that people have given us, our American brethren over the years have given us, because this country has not always worked for everybody, and it has not always worked for every part of our society, but we have kept trying to make it better.
		So the answer to your question, Joan, is I don't know if this will all work, but I want to try.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		In the few minutes we have left, I want to take another question from X. Is our history of free market capitalism being replaced with state capitalism, where the president directs private investments and takes ownership and control over private industry?
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		I think this is particularly relevant because in the last week or so, we've seen the president give directions basically to the housing industry, to the defense industry, and this has happened even more in terms of how these industries should be managing their businesses.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
		Look, when we fought World War II as a society, we came out of it and we set up a global system.
		We wrote the rules.
		It's as if there was a game like Monopoly and we wrote all the rules.
		And those rules sometimes in the individual day might seem like they don't favor America, but at the end of the day, they do.
		And those rules are the rules of the free market economy with some boundaries because let's be real, the economy's not always been a perfect capitalist economy and shouldn't be, right?
		I actually believe, by the way, that there should be more legal framework for corporations in America to care about more than just shareholders.
		They should care about stakeholders as well.
		It shouldn't be just about your share price.
		And I think most CEOs would actually welcome that.
		But at the end of the day, we set up those rules and they work for us.
		It's our dollar that's the reserve currency.
		It's our norms, our way of thinking that for large parts has been the way the world is run.
		And what the president's doing right now is threatening to flip the board over.
		Now, I'm not wise enough to predict every part of the results of that, but that game has worked well for America for a long time.
		And the market economy is one of those things.
		I am someone who is a capitalist.
		I work in that economy.
		And I think that making it possible for that economy with society's health as one of its goals, allowing that to work freely, that is a goal for our country.
unidentified		All right.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		Well, that is all of the time that we have for today.
		Thank you so much, Oliver Libby, who is the co-founder and managing partner of HL Ventures.
		Most importantly, for today, the author of the book, Strong Floor, No Ceiling, Building a New Foundation for the American Dream.
		Thank you for coming on today.
oliver libby ▲ ● ▼		Thanks for having me, and thanks for the important work you all do here at C-SPAN.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		And thank you to everybody who called in with their comments and questions today.
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		We're going to be back with another edition of Washington Journal at 7 a.m. Eastern tomorrow.
Top Policy Issues Discussed 00:00:23
kimberly adams ▲ ● ▼		But coming up next, we have Ceasefire.
		This week, host Dasha Burns spoke to Scott Jennings, former special assistant to President George W. Bush, as well as Kate Beddingfield, a former Biden White House Communications Director.
		The three of them discussed the top domestic and foreign policy issues impacting the United States, including what's next for Venezuela.

Chapters

00:00:00 Cannot Understand Monroe's Divide
00:14:52 Supporting The President: A Military Perspective
00:15:26 Joanna On Globalization And Executive Power
00:30:27 We Won't Sit Idle
00:45:30 Ken and Beth's Perspective
00:57:20 Henry Olson Discusses Recent Events
01:00:42 Midterms And The Great Reinsurer
01:16:11 Approval Ratings Hold Steady
01:16:48 Suspect Oil Solutions
01:28:04 Legislative Branch Failures
01:42:30 Going Back to the 60s
01:46:40 Calls for Debate
01:53:31 Cash Economy Immigrants
01:58:29 Draft Dodger Debunked
02:05:45 Larry's Legal Analysis
02:14:43 Restore the Sabbath Day
02:17:08 C-SPAN Takes You Where Decisions Are Made
02:20:04 Strong Floor, No Ceiling
02:35:33 Inspiring Great Things Again
02:50:40 Strong Floor, Cautious Ceiling
02:59:26 Top Policy Issues Discussed