Susan Ferrechio previews Trump’s State of the Union (Feb 6, 9 p.m.), with C-SPAN’s coverage starting at 7 p.m. Callers demand Epstein file answers, private school funding debates, and U.S.-Central Asia relations amid Russia tensions. Democrats accuse Israel of pushing Iran war claims, citing past WMD controversies, while Republicans defend Trump’s Black History Month focus and criticize media bias. Independents call for guest transparency and question partisan speech norms. Politico’s Ben Johansson notes Trump’s script may change post-Supreme Court ruling, despite swing-state travel plans, and highlights economic growth at 1.4% amid affordability concerns. A 10–15-day Iran strike window looms over Geneva talks, with election-year politics complicating policy clarity. [Automatically generated summary]
Members. of the United States Congress, thank you very much.
And to my fellow citizens, America is back.
Watch C-SPAN live Tuesday as President Donald Trump delivers the annual State of the Union Address before a joint session of Congress.
Our coverage begins at 7 p.m. Eastern with a preview of the evening from political reporters.
Then, at 9, the President's address, followed by the Democratic response given by Virginia Governor Abigail Spanbergs, will also take your calls and bring you reaction from lawmakers.
Over on C-SPAN 2, experience the moments leading up to the speech and the address itself as if you're there, uninterrupted.
No commentary with unfiltered sights and sounds.
The State of the Union Address live Tuesday with coverage beginning at 7 p.m. Eastern on the C-SPAN Networks.
C-SPAN, bringing you democracy unfiltered.
Discover the heartbeat of democracy with C-SPAN's voices as we hear from you ahead of President Trump's State of the Union address.
We're asking what would you like to hear from the President during his State of the Union speech.
My name is Julia.
We're from California.
We just got done with a tour of Congress.
So I think something that we all said we want the president to talk about or address are the Epstein files, especially we were informed that a victim of Epstein is going to be sitting in on that as a guest.
I'm Alan Kurtz from Noonan, Georgia.
What I'd like to hear the president talk about in the State of the Union is schooling, private schooling, what we could do to help America pay for it on a local basis, as opposed to having all our taxes go to regular schools.
My name is Aziz.
I'm from Kazakhstan.
So I want to hear about the international relationships, especially with my country, Kazakhstan.
We are playing a crucial role in Central Asia.
It's a very important region now, especially due to all the tension between Russia and other countries in this region.
I want to know what will be our relationship with the United States in the future.
C-SPAN's Voices, delivering democracy unfiltered.
Be part of the conversation.
It's open forum.
Any public policy, any political issue that you want to talk about, the phone lines are yours to do so.
Democrats, Republicans, and Independents will put those numbers up on the screen as we hear from Kathleen in the Buckeye State line for Democrats.
Go ahead.
Yeah, I have a, first of all, I so appreciate Washington Journal, but I'd like to make a request of Washington Journal.
Your guest, your previous guest, Susan, made a completely inaccurate statement about Iran and enrichment of uranium, which anybody who has followed this issue for decades knows that Iran signed the non-proliferation treaty, the International Atomic Energy Agency's Non-Proliferation Treaty, and have a right to enrich to a certain level for peaceful purposes.
And that P5 plus one deal that Obama made, you know, kind of assured that they would stay at that level.
And then we had Netanyahu, Israel, who have been pushing the U.S. for decades to go to war with an overt war with Iran.
We've done plenty of things behind the scenes with Israel and their killing of nuclear scientists.
And Israel, we know, has refused to sign the nonproliferation treaty for decades.
They have refused to open up to international inspections.
The last president to challenge them was John Kennedy.
He demanded that they open up Daimona, and they refuse to do it.
Yet Israel comes to the U.S., Netanyahu talks in front of Congress and tries to destroy the Iran deal.
Kathleen, what do you think happens in Iran here in the coming days and weeks with this enormous military buildup that we all know about that's happening over there?
What do you think happens?
Well, I will say my theory or thoughts from reading a lot about this circumstance is in many ways doesn't matter.
I'm requesting that you guys inform the public by having former CIA Middle East analyst Flint and Hillary Manlet on, Scott Ritter, who was a former head inspector in the Middle East.
Your job, I would hope, is to inform us and widen the public spectrum about the history of the nonproliferation treaty and have guests on that can widen people's scopes because Israel, again, has been pushing us to go to war with Iran for decades and past false intelligence in regard to Iraq.
The people that I mentioned are the ones who led us down the path, questioning the validity of the Bush administration's false WMD information, or I don't want to call it information, it was false information.
And those guys knew it was, and they told the public prior to.
You guys need to have guests on to widen the scope.
But I think Israel's going to have their way, and the U.S. is going to bomb the hell out of Iran.
And Israel just will fly by the seat, continue to just not abide by international agreements or sign the non-proliferation treaty.
I think we're going to bomb the hell out of Iran, and it's horrific.
That's Kathleen.
This is Joe in Dayton, Ohio, Republican.
Good morning.
Good morning, John, from a cold and snowy Dayton, Ohio.
John, you're my favorite host.
I love Washington Journal.
I've got just several things to tell you here.
But, John, I want to tell Washington Journal, thank you, and you, John, of course.
And last week, Donald Trump respected the wonderful black community with Black History Month at the White House.
And Washington Journal covered 100% of it.
It was fantastic.
Of course, CNN and MSNBC or MSNOW, whatever name they want to choose this month, does not cover it at all.
Donald Trump's life was threatened again.
And CNN, MSNOW, they don't cover it.
It's pathetic the amount of hatred for this man.
But in saying all that, John, the other thing I wanted to tell you is that I guarantee there's one guarantee I can make that you and I have never been on the Epstein Island or Epstein list, but it seems like everybody else has.
Joe, do you think that's a topic that in terms of coverage by the media, that universally, that it's, at least since the files have been released, has been covered well by the media?
Is this a story that the media has done its job and dug into and revealed things?
Or do you think they haven't handled it well?
I don't think the media has done well except for Washington Journal.
Okay.
I don't think the media has covered it well, and that goes for Fox, too, because if people want to call after me and say, oh, well, you know, he's a Fox guy, you know, whatever.
You've got to be fair and open and complete, okay?
Because why is it, as far as the Epstein files go, why is it that you don't want to hear about Huck Kim Jeffreys having dinner with Epstein and taking donations for Epstein?
You got Stacey Plaskett taking donations from Jeffrey Epstein and communicating with Jeffrey Epstein via text messages or on a House Oversight Committee.
So if we're going to target, and by the way, why don't we cover that Donald Trump did call the local authorities in Florida and had Jeffrey Epstein arrested?
So we're not telling the whole truth.
Okay.
Now, Washington Journal does.
Got your point.
That's Joe in Ohio.
This is Mike in New Jersey.
Independent, good morning.
Hi, good morning.
Mike from New Jersey.
We're suffering from this winter storm and it continues.
But I have a procedural question about Washington Journal.
First of all, I enjoy the coverage.
I think everybody who calls in has to designate where they lie in the political spectrum, Democrat, Republican, Independent, myself.
The politicians who get on, Democrat or Republican, the question I have is you have a guest on who associate with their organization.
I think in most cases, or in many cases, let's put it like this, they have a biased political view.
Whether it's right or left, I don't really care.
But it's kind of almost a hidden agenda when you have a guest on.
The question I have is, why can't you designate their political party, i.e., in the last presidential election, who they voted for, or whether they freely admit whether they're Democrat or Republican?
So the audience, me, knows exactly where they're coming from.
I think you impose this on everybody else, but for some of these guests, you do not.
And I think that would be important in terms of clarity of opinion.
I tell you, one thing we often do, Mike, is we say, you know, if you're from an organization, what's your mission?
How are you funded?
And that's often a question we ask those folks just to kind of give people a sense of transparency on who these people are.
But you want a specific, are you a Democrat, Republican, or Independent is the first question sort of out of the gate for each guy?
I mean, and they're going to walk on it because, you know, they're going to say essentially, well, you know, I can't really say blah, blah, blah.
But if you ask them a question like, who did you vote for in the last election?
I mean, that clearly will tell you where they stand.
Now, I don't really care where they stand.
I just want to know where they stand.
They can't come on with some air of objectivity when, in fact, they're a closet supporter of one party or the other.
That's the point I'm trying to make.
It would enhance the credibility of your guests and essentially the free flow of what I would call information and how it's tainted one way or the other.
Mike always appreciates suggestions to make this program run better.
This is John in Lynchburg, Virginia.
Democrat, good morning.
Hello.
My name's John Jonathan.
And I would just like to know how come there's so many Going on about everybody calling and all the trouble that they started.
But we've never had a president just stand before people and use the words he used, curse and swear.
Not his cabinet.
Also, when they call some call, I'm talking about some, they call people the bomb, they call them radic, they call them everything, sort of just saying this person did that.
And they never give credit.
But how come as a president called all these nasty words and no other president have ever done that?
Why can't they just call, no matter what the person done, they're still a human being?
So we're all God's here, and I'd like to know why that he used these dirty words, but they're so down on the Democrats when they use the word.
And I would just like somebody to explain why he can use those words like that and do everything that he wants to, send people out of the country that's not born here.
His wife wasn't born here.
His vice president, his wife wasn't born here.
So why don't they send their wives back to where they come from?
All right, that's John in Virginia.
This is Stephen Bloomington, Illinois, Independent.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Thanks for having me.
I just wanted to add a little bit to the comments made by your last guests.
She mentioned Republican, or excuse me, Democrat Congressman Al Greene standing up and I guess breaking decorum, you might say, in the State of the Union last year.
She did not mention that the first, to my knowledge, interruption of the State of the Union happened back in 2009 when Republican Congressman Joe Wilson shouted, you lie during Obama's 2009 State of the Union.
And then there was another instance in 2022.
Representative Lauren Boeber shouted during President Biden's State of the Union that I can't remember what she shouted, but she did shout, breaking decorum.
And in 2023 and 2024, State of the Unions by President Biden, Marjorie Taylor Greene, shouted out during Biden's State of the Union in 2023 and 2024.
Your point is that this goes back a ways now.
Do you find state of the unions to be important events?
Do you say the unions worth it for all the pomp and circumstance that they get, for all the attention that they get?
No, they have developed into basically a campaign speech, in particular with the current president.
But they have been like that in recent years.
But yeah, they really don't result in anything except trying to recruit the voters to come to their side.
State of the Unions: Divide and Conquer00:02:06
And with that in mind, I believe most of the voters in this country might consider themselves independent.
But this, What do I want to say?
This form of government that we had basically makes it easy for the politicians to divide and conquer, basically, because we only have two parties.
And most Americans are in between that.
And I guess it's a sales pitch to go one way or another.
But myself, I vote for the party that I see, in my opinion, that's going to help the country as a whole.
Life of Liberty and the pursuit of happiness is in the Declaration of Independence.
And I think I'm right on that.
That's the Declaration, yep.
Yeah, yes.
And, you know, the last how many years, you know, I voted for President Reagan twice.
And, you know, as I got older, as I, you know, learned more about our political structure and process, you know, it's just not, it's really not a democracy.
You know, it's divide and conquer, divide and conquer.
And, you know, the Republicans hate the Democrats, vice versa.
You know, that's, we have a government where we just have a forced choice between two options.
Steve, got your point.
This is Evan in Del Mar, California, Republican.
Evan, good morning.
Good morning.
Government Shutdown Strain00:07:03
I was, I just came back from Switzerland yesterday, and I was in, and I flew into LAX, and this DHS shutdown is horrible.
I had to stand in line for an hour because they shut down global entry.
Congress needs to get it together and stop these shutdowns.
There's been like two shutdowns in like the past couple months, and this is ridiculous.
The information yesterday from the Department of Homeland Security suspending global entry and may do the same for TSA's pre-check if the shutdown of the department continues.
The Washington Times story noting that the department initially announced that both fast-track airport security services be halted effective 6 a.m. yesterday, but later reversed course and on suspending specifically TSA pre-check.
The TSA said pre-check lines remained operational with no immediate change for the traveling public.
But again, we'll see what happens as this partial government shutdown continues.
More of your calls.
This is Michael San Diego, Democrat.
Go ahead.
Good morning, John.
I saw that you had on David Becker the other day, and I wish people would read the book that he and Major Garrett wrote about the 2020 election, how it was the most secure election ever in our history.
There was no cheating or anything like that.
And when Donald Trump talks about how he loves the uneducated, I saw a stat the other day that I understand how he was able to get elected.
130 million Americans, which is 54% of the people ages 16 to 74, read below a sixth grade level.
And out of that number, 45 million read below a fifth grade level.
And nationwide, there are 21% of our adults are functioning illiterates.
That's the problem.
There's too many uneducated Americans out there that believe the lies out of this liar's mouth.
On that book that you talk about, I just want to point out it's called The Big Truth.
Major Garrett and David Becker were actually on this program back in October of 2022, and they took questions.
They talked about the book.
A place viewers can go to find it, c-span.org.
Just type in David Becker or Major Garrett at the top of the page, and you'll be able to find what Michael is talking about.
Michael, thanks for the phone call.
It's just after 9 a.m. on the East Coast.
More phone calls in just a minute, but now we head to the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue for a look at the preparations for tomorrow's State of the Union address.
Ben Johansson is a White House reporter for Politico, joins us.
Ben Johansson, what do we know today about the speech that the president will give tomorrow night?
We know the president enjoys feeding on a crowd, but how does he feel about the unique crowd that is provided by a State of the Union address?
Yeah, thanks, John.
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, I mean, so the state of the Supreme Court decision on Friday, it really could not have come at a worse time for the White House.
I mean, we're calling people on Friday, people close to the White House, people within the administration, and they were quite animated.
You know, a former senior administration official said that Tuesday's game plan for the speech has been completely changed.
The speech will be completely changed now.
It's a completely different speech.
Obviously, State of the Union speeches get tinkered with until the last minute oftentimes.
But we know that over the weekend, the speechwriters were in the rooms and they were tinkering with the speech after arguably the most devastating loss of the last year for Trump.
And so it should be interesting.
I'm going to be watching personally.
This is going to be the first time the justices will be sitting front row, court said.
And will he go scorched earth?
Will he call them out by name?
Will he call on Congress to act?
But I think it'll be a really interesting moment for him as, you know, arguably the biggest, his favorite tool to, you know, enact tariffs on European allies has been taken away from him.
So it should be a really interesting speech tomorrow.
Traditionally, after a Stay of the Union, the President takes his message from Congress onto the road and goes out into the country to sell that message.
What do we know about the President's travel plans after Tuesday night?
What's he doing the rest of the week?
And is he going to be doing this, taking the message on the road?
Yeah, I mean, for the rest of the week, we don't see any domestic travel in his plan.
As we've heard from the White House, that's going to be in the next coming months, heading to November.
That's going to be a major point for Trump to get on the road, head to these swing states, head to these districts where the control of the House, the control of the Senate will be up to some of these districts.
It will be really tight.
But we don't see any travel this week so far planned for the president.
I'm sure that will change in the next coming weeks.
But it's interesting.
I mean, he's, like you said, this is going to be an opportunity for him to explain to voters how prices are down for them.
But at the same time, he's going into it with a lot of negative news.
I mean, the Commerce Department just released a report that said growth in the fourth quarter was only at 1.4%.
And polls are showing that Americans are not feeling, are having a tough time with their wallet.
And so it's going to be interesting to see how he decides to address these concerns.
He initially was calling affordability a hoax, and then a couple days ago, he was saying he won the issue of affordability.
So we'll see.
I mean, I'm sure he's going to be traveling.
We saw him in Georgia last week.
He's really trying to get out there, but he doesn't have any plans for the rest of the week in terms of domestic travel.
And I'm sure that will change, but we shall see.
And then finally, just the latest on Iran out of the White House.
What are you hearing heading into this week?
And what did you hear out over the weekend?
Yeah, I mean, we're really in crunch time.
Obviously, last week he said that maximum 10 to 15 days.
So we're looking at a week and a half window.
We have really not heard any clarity on the timeline on whether or not they're going to strike.
but U.S. officials will be heading to Geneva on Thursday for a new round of talks after talks did not go too well last week or the last time they spoke.
Looking Ahead: Window of Opportunity00:00:27
And so, I mean, we're looking at what will likely be unless there's some sort of...
You can continue watching this event if you go to our website, cspan.org.
We're going to leave this here for live coverage now of the U.S. House on C-SAM or votes objected to under clause 6 of Rule 20.
The House will resume proceedings on postponed questions at a later time.
For what purpose does the Texas from Gentleman seek recognition?