David Graham hosts strategists Joe Ciazzo and John Fury debating Campaign 2026, where Ciazzo blames Trump for economic failures while Fury defends the administration amid Iran war costs estimated at $11 billion. The discussion covers the Save America Act's voter ID requirements, term limits skepticism, and cybersecurity threats involving $100 million daily IP theft by China. Retired General Leslie Beavers explains how cyber warfare creates friction in conflicts like the accidental school strike killing 150 children, prompting Pentagon AI restrictions. Viewers argue over Real ID disenfranchisement, Operation Epic Fury's financial toll, and whether outdated intelligence caused the Iran missile error, highlighting deep partisan divides on governance and foreign policy accountability. [Automatically generated summary]
And I started to realize that this odd little old manuscript contained, you know, the seeds of one of the most extraordinary stories of survival and mayhem I had ever come across.
Watch America's Book Club with David Graham today at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific, only on C-SPAM.
Welcome back.
Joining me now for a discussion on Campaign 2026, as well as the political news of the week, is Joe Ciazzo.
He's a Democratic strategist at 1788 Media, where he's a partner.
And I'm also joined by Republican strategist John Fury of EFB Advocacy, where he's also a partner.
Welcome, gentlemen.
You.
So the midterms are just over seven months away.
Obviously, historically, the party that holds the White House loses seats in the House and Senate in the midterms.
Now, this year, we have the ongoing war in Iran, oil price anxiety, voter anger over inflation, and some over the ICE killings in Minneapolis, the Epstein investigation, and the president underwater in the polls.
I want to look at the generic midterm sort of run polling that we're seeing with the voting average near about 48% for Democrats and 43% for the GOP.
I want to start with you, John.
What do you make of these numbers and the issues at play in the prospects for Republicans?
Well, it's a long time before the election.
There's a lot of things that are going to happen.
We're going to either have this war continue or the war be concluded.
We're either going to have gas prices be sky high, the gas prices come back down.
We're going to have a bunch of refund checks going out to see if the economy comes back.
I mean, midterms are usually a sign of how people feel about the president.
And if they like the president, they usually say we want some sort of check on power.
But sometimes, you know, when I was working for the Speaker of the House, we were able to kind of make the elections about each campaign.
There's about 30 different races that really matter, according to Richard Hudson, who's the NRCC chairman.
These polling numbers aren't terrible for Republicans.
I've seen a lot worse.
But, you know, obviously high gas prices and the war is something that's really reshuffled this whole campaign.
And we'll see how it all plays out.
Joe, what do you think, given the distance between now and the midterms and some of the issues that are front and center right now?
Do you think those are going to matter come November?
Well, I certainly do agree with my co-panelists here.
We are a long way away from the fall, but I do think that the American people have overwhelmingly spoken and they believe that Donald Trump has failed, has failed on the economy, has failed addressing inflation, has failed with this war in Iran.
Every one of his policies have only served to make life more difficult for the working people of this country.
And, you know, between that and using history as our guideline, I would not want to be a Republican in a swing district going into November's election.
Let's talk a bit about the Iran war.
I mean, right now the New York Times polling shows that most Americans oppose the Iran attacks.
Support ranges from 27 percent in a Reuters Ipsos poll to 50 percent in a Fox News poll.
There's a lot of variation in public opinion on this.
But President Trump did campaign on ending forever wars.
And Speaker Johnson said last week that the U.S. shouldn't be involved in nation building after the president sort of has shifted his stance on that in many places.
Do you feel, John, that this is a risk for the president?
It's a big gamble.
There's no question about it.
And the fact of the matter is that reflexively, American people do not like going to war.
We've been in a lot of wars.
A lot of presidents get involved in conflicts.
The president did campaign on not forever war, so this better not be a forever war from a political perspective.
If I can pause you there, what do you think the American people would view as a forever war?
Like, how long would be too long on this?
Well, I would think if it passed the election, it would be not good for the White House.
You know, forever wars are wars that last 15, 20 years.
Vietnam was a forever war.
You know, the Iraq war was a forever war.
You know, if it's within three months or two months, like the president said, then I think that the American people will get over it.
But, you know, people don't like going to war, and that's just a fact of American life.
Joe, this is affecting, obviously, gas prices, which are very front and center for many Americans.
There have been American deaths in this war.
And the American people seem to feel like the president has not clearly explained even why we've gone to war in Iran.
There's a Washington Post polling saying that only 35% think the president has clearly explained the goals of Iran's military action.
65% say he has not.
Does this, and I hate to describe it in this way, but an opportunity for Democrats?
Look, I think we should start here.
Donald Trump is a liar.
He said he was going to tame inflation.
He said he was going to bring down gas prices.
He said no new wars.
Guess what?
All of those things have actually happened.
And we're engaged in this war in Iran as a distraction because, let's be clear, Donald Trump is in fact in the Epstein files.
And I think this is something that Donald Trump is terrified of because we all know that it is a lot worse than anybody can actually imagine.
And, you know, Donald Trump has essentially made a mockery of the United States on the national stage.
We saw him attend the ceremony where those troops unfortunately passed away in war.
He politicized that.
He stood there with his Donald Trump hat on.
That was a sign of incredible disrespect.
This is all nothing more than an act of political theater for Donald Trump.
There is nonstop chaos.
It is all an act to continue to go and distract all the American people from the things that are actually important.
And unfortunately, lives are lost in the process.
I want to switch to a different topic, John.
The Save America Act, which we were just discussing in the last hour.
Top priority for President Trump.
He says he's not going to sign anything else until this crosses his desk.
And yet it faces pretty steep prospects in the Senate.
What are your thoughts on this legislation and the President's stance?
Well, I think it's worth having a debate over.
I think it's worth having an extended debate over in the Senate.
It's already passed the House.
I mean, the American people, by and large, if you look at the polls, they like the idea that only American citizens can vote in American elections.
They also really like the idea that you should show voter ID before you vote to prove that you're an American citizen.
So, you know, let's have a debate on it.
You know, the Senate, the way it's constructed, it requires 60 votes to pass this legislation.
There's only 53 Republican senators, so that seems very unlikely that it could get passed unless they change the filibuster rules.
Is this worth changing the filibuster rules over?
I mean, there's a lot of other things that you could change the filibuster rules.
And I don't think John Thune has the votes to change the filibuster rules anyway.
But it's a very good debate to have, and I think you're going to have about a two-week debate on it.
And then, you know, this is at the same time, Joe, that we are still waiting on DHS funding.
TSA agents and others affected by that have missed a full paycheck now, and the president is still saying that he doesn't want to sign anything else.
What do you think the prospects are for anything else getting done in the meantime?
Let's go back to the SAVE Act.
If the Republicans, who control both chambers of Congress and the White House, were serious about this, they would do two things.
First, they would pass the bill that is proposed by Bernie Sanders and Roe Khanna to tax billionaires.
That would go and create billions of dollars of wealth for the federal government.
Then what they would do is take that money and they would pay for an actual photo ID for every U.S. citizen.
There is a real easy solution to this.
Here's the problem.
Republicans do not want to solve these problems.
They want to go and create these boogeymen and they want to fan the flames of hyper-partisan politics because they know that when the actual issues are gone and presented to the American people, they get a failing grade.
In terms of the TSA, those are working people across this country who are being used as a political football by the president.
Shame on you, Donald Trump.
These are men and women who go to work every day to go and earn so they can go and provide for their family.
Donald Trump is using politics as a way to make their life more difficult.
It is embarrassing.
We're going to be taking calls with your questions for our two guests here.
Democrats can call in at 202-748-8000.
Republicans at 202-748-8001.
And Independents at 202-748-8002.
Before we get to callers, I do want to ask you two about some races coming up in the midterms, a couple in particular.
Which races are you watching?
Which ones do you think are close or opportunities?
Well, boy, you can kind of throw it through me here.
There's a lot of good, good races out there.
I think that, you know, you have to look right now to see what happens in Texas with John Cornyn and Ken Paxson.
That's a very close primary.
Obviously, the president hasn't quite endorsed yet.
The Republican leadership would love to see John Cornyn come back.
He's just basically said he's going to support the SAVE Act and make sure that we get a fulsome debate on the SAVE Act.
So I'm watching that very, very closely to see, you know, how, and I'm also, you know, the fact that that Texas race with Tallarico winning over Jasmine Crockett, I mean, he is an interesting candidate.
I think the Republicans can, either Republican could beat him in Texas.
But Texas is a very interesting state to watch for elections.
Joe, which races are you watching?
Texas, North Carolina, Maine, and Ohio.
Look, Democrats have to do two things.
They have to hold on to all the seats that they currently have, which I'm confident that they will do.
And they have to pick up four seats to put us at 51.
All the polling that we've seen so far has put Democrats in an incredibly strong place in all four of those states.
The other thing that I'm really watching is, honestly, just the national zeitgeist.
Looking back at every midterm since 1950, so over about 75 years, the party in power, which is the party of Donald Trump, has lost on average 25 seats.
We have never seen a candidate, sorry, we have never seen a president more divisive than Donald Trump.
Look, look at all the issues across the board.
Between 55 to 65 percent of the people give Donald Trump and congressional Republicans a failing grade.
All right.
Well, if you have questions for our two panelists, Joe Cayazzo, a Democratic strategist, and John Feary, Republican strategist, you can call in now.
We're going to start with Carl in Norwich, New York on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Carl.
Go ahead, Carl.
What's your question?
19, which is represented by Josh Riley.
And I guess my question is, what are his prospects for winning reelection?
It's a, I believe it's a toss-up district.
And I'd like to know what each of the commentators thinks might be his strongest and weakest points in terms of the reelection.
Thank you very much.
Carl, just very quickly, I think we may have missed the very first thing that you said.
Can you tell us again where you are and which race you're talking about?
I'm talking, I'm from Norwich, New York.
It's in the 19th congressional district represented by Josh Riley.
And I was wondering, it's considered to be a toss-up district.
So I'm wondering which issues are going to play well for Josh and which issues are going to play against him.
And what do they think the outcome will be?
All right, Joe, do you want to take that one first?
Absolutely.
So, you know, I apologize.
I am not familiar with all the details of that race.
But I think generally speaking, it comes down to essentially two things, the economy and trust in government.
It is clear that, you know, congressional Republicans have been unable to get the economy back on track.
And it's clear that they cannot be trusted as they serve simply as a lapdog for Donald Trump.
Every single day, Americans pay more for nearly everything that they need to just get through life.
If I'm in a battleground district and I'm a Democrat, I'm focusing on the economy all day and every day.
Well, it's a close race.
It's a close district.
Well, you know, the Republicans lost every close race that they should have won in the last campaign in New York and with redistricting and things like that.
Really, it's not only just about Donald Trump.
It's also about Katie Hochul.
It's about what's happening in New York State.
It's about a wide variety of factors that influence a race like that.
So, you know, I think the Republican candidate is strong, and I think it's one of those 30 that should be a toss-up.
And, you know, I wouldn't say the Republicans are going to lose that, but I think it's going to be a tough race.
Rip is in Fredericksburg, Virginia on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Rip.
About our country, other than the fact that I think it's terribly confused.
I look at most things like a surgeon working on my daughter.
If my surgeon, if my daughter is truly healthy and takes after the surgeon, I think the surgeon's great.
If not, I think the surgeon's terrible.
And that's the way I look at the president, and that's the way I look at all politicians.
I don't think politicians actually represent us anymore.
I think it's all about money.
And yet they do at the same time.
But I'm ignorant to much of it because I've never been in a financially difficult situation in my life.
And that is that discludes, that takes away from my ability to get a bird's eye view instead of a worm's eye view.
But I think that if the Democrats win this time, it will be maybe a means for our country to go to, and I don't like to say war because I think you get cut off when you say war.
But I think that if we finally get to some place where we finish with all of this stuff, it's going to take that in order for us to wash out everything.
I do believe in the 90% tax once you've reached a certain amount of money.
90% of everything that you make profit-wise after that should go to the government, which was at one time in our country.
So I speak much from ignorance.
I speak only from a mid-view, but I don't like politicians.
Hyper-Partisanship and Voter Frustration00:15:26
And let me clarify that.
They're great at a party.
They're a lot of fun.
They know how to speak.
They're just a good time.
But as far as representing me, they actually do not.
It's like an old Jaguar SJE.
Rip, I'm going to stop you there and ask John to maybe respond to some of those comments that he made.
Well, I think there's a lot of people out there who feel that the political class doesn't represent their interests.
And I think there's a lot of frustration, which kind of has translated into a lot of hyper-partisanship.
And I think that at the end of the day, there's a lot of different opinions out there about a lot of different things.
Some are ill-informed, some are well-informed.
You know, for the president, the number one thing that he's got to get going after this war is concluded is he's got to focus on the economy like a laser beam.
Because if people feel very disconnected from the political asset and they have a hard time paying their bills, what the voters will take it out on Republicans.
And so, this is the number one priority for this White House.
It's not just about affordability, it's also economic growth.
And there's a lot of good things that the president could point to that's going to come, but first, you've got to get this war over with.
Greg is in Glen Allen, Virginia, on our line for independence.
Good morning, Greg.
Yeah, good morning.
So, here in Virginia, we're doing this early voting for the redistricting in the districts here in Virginia.
And I would say that this is coming across as sort of a naked grab for power from the Democrats.
And one of my questions I want to ask to the gentleman there is: if this goes through, if the Virginians end up voting in favor of this, is there any other way to stop it?
Because this is just going to be terrible for the state of Virginia.
And if this is happening in other states, it's going to be terrible also.
And Spanberger is turning out to be not what she says.
So, thank you.
Greg, before I let our guests respond, I just want to give everyone else a bit more information about what you're referencing specifically.
So, this is in Virginia.
This is a story from the Washington Post.
The April 21st referendum will determine if Virginia lawmakers can draw new districts that could add four Democratic seats to the state's congressional delegation.
There is a lot of drama around the referendum on whether to temporarily allow the General Assembly to draw new districts.
Early voting on the referendum is underway, and money is flowing as national political interests clash in Virginia ahead of this fall's congressional midterm elections, in which control of the House of Representatives is at stake.
Joe, do you want to talk first about this?
Yeah, look, you know, I think it's a shame that it has come to this, but let's not forget how it began.
Donald Trump and Republican governors like Governor Abbott down in Texas have made it abundantly clear that they will twist the rules any way they possibly can to go and make the seats much more favorable, sorry, to make the maps much more favorable to Republicans.
I think Democratic governors have been left in a position where they cannot just roll over and allow this to happen for the sake of the country.
Yeah, this referendum is a big deal.
And it's court backing.
They're trying to get rid of four Republicans and make this a totally blue state.
Spanberger, to the Gawler's point, has turned out to be very, very liberal.
She's campaigned as a centrist.
Now she's totally liberal.
And this could be a disaster.
And then the ad campaigns that they're doing, it's being temporary.
What does that mean?
The whole thing could be a complete disaster for the state of Virginia.
And I just moved to Virginia, so I find this really annoying that she wants to raise taxes, and now she wants to get rid of all the Republicans.
And I think it's going to be really bad for the state.
And what about this argument that the Republicans began this process and therefore all's fair in politics?
I'm not a big fan of mid-term redistricting.
I don't think it's a great idea.
And if you look at it's kind of been a wash so far.
So California did exactly what Texas did.
There's been a couple of other states that have moved forward.
Maryland's trying to go forward with getting rid of Andy Harris.
I think what tends to end up happening is the moderates in both caucuses tend to get sacrificed.
And the discourse in Congress becomes even more brittle.
So I'm not a big fan of it.
I don't think it really has worked well for the Republicans as well as they thought.
And ironically, in Texas, a lot of these seats, we will gain a couple seats, but we won't gain as many seats as we thought.
There's a question we received from David in Baltimore.
Can the guests please comment on the reliability of polling?
Most of us receive more junk phone calls every day than legitimate calls.
And I don't even answer if the number is not recognized.
Joe, your response first?
Yeah, look, you know, I don't think that any one poll in particular should be taken as gospel.
You know, polls are really helpful to, you know, to let you zoom out and see an actual trend over time.
I am not a poll star, but I do know that many pollsters around the country go and implement phone calls, emails, and text messages as a way to get a sample size.
So, you know, I think the big point here is not any one poll in particular should be used as the gold standard.
But, you know, over a series of time, polls will show you directionally where the public is on any given issue or candidate.
You know, there's a difference between public polls, which are mostly done to capture headlines or to kind of create a narrative.
Media does a lot of public polls, and they do it in a certain way, so it helps them write stories.
And then there's private polls used by actual campaign folks, and there's usually a wide divergence between the two.
The polling industry itself is under some duress because a lot of people don't answer phone calls anymore to this point.
And you can't really trust, I don't think, to the online polls.
I think they're always a little bit skewed.
To Joe's point, if you have a bunch of different polls, they tend to even out, but it's hard to know which polls are right and which ones are not.
For example, the poll you mentioned earlier, where 28% support the war versus 50%.
I mean, that's a pretty wide disparity.
So I take most of these polls with a grain of salt.
And I have my own polls, which I talk to my friends back home and my brothers and find out, you know, what do they think?
And then I get a good sense of what's the really, and I also, I have my mother rule.
What does my mom think?
I use that as a poll very, very often.
It's a good sample size there.
Let's hear from Ron in Canton, Michigan on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Ron.
Good morning and good morning, gentlemen, and thanks for taking our call.
My question for the two gentlemen is, and I want them to answer based on data, where is the data supporting this drive for the SAVE Act?
What data is being used to justify changing the process to vote?
And if there is no data, if you can't reference the data to prove that there's a requirement to change this, why are you doing this?
And thank you very much.
And I don't have a blessing order.
John, I'll let you go first.
Sure.
I mean, if you look at the public polls, and we talk about polling, you can believe them if you don't, don't believe them.
I understand that.
The public polls show that there's overwhelming support for an ID to vote.
People really want American citizens to vote in American elections.
And it's a very popular thing to push for for Republicans, which is why they're pushing for it.
Joe?
So most of the fraud that we've seen in these elections have come from actual Republicans.
I do think there is not an abundance of data to point to the fact that this is desperately needed.
This is, again, a political football by the Republicans.
Now, as I said at the top of the show, Republicans have the ability to go and implement a thoughtful and sound policy on this.
What they're choosing to do is use this hyperbolic, outlandish attempt to take over elections in states, and it's just not going to work.
I mean, you've seen Donald Trump publicly threaten and say he won't sign any other bills because he knows that his own members in the Senate are not going to support this bill because there is no data to support the need for it.
All right.
Kerry is in New Berlin, Wisconsin on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Kerry.
Good morning.
Just tuned in a little while ago, just in time, and I have a comment, not a question.
First thing I heard was Joe making the ridiculous comments that I've heard from the folks who I thought got it off the internet.
And that is that Donald Trump took us to this war to distract from the fact that he's in the Epstein files and there's something there and he's scared to death.
That truly is not helping.
I want this message to all Democrats out there.
If you truly believe that, and if Joe truly believes that, then you also believe that the Democrats are so stupid that while they were in power, and they thought there was something in the Epstein files on Donald Trump, that they didn't use it, that they just, for some reason, didn't bring it out, something that would be terribly damaging to Trump.
That is not helping the partisan divide, which has me ill.
I'm a very moderate Republican, but I would vote for a combination like, oh, are you smiling at me?
I would vote for like Joe Manchin and Chris, help me out host, if you will, from New Hampshire.
His dad had been governor before him.
Chris Sanu.
Sanu, thank you.
Those two would be a great combination for president and vice president, but with our ridiculous two-party system now that has gotten just horrible, horrible, horrible for our country.
And I hope everybody realizes that the divide in our country politically was not caused by Donald Trump the most divisive president.
China has been working for 40 years on other countries in dividing their country over the internet.
And Joe and Democrats, please understand.
Again, E.
I do want to let Joe actually respond to this point that you made.
Go ahead, Joe.
So I do appreciate the point.
There is more evidence to support the claim that Donald Trump was closely tied to Epstein than there is evidence to show that Iran had nuclear weapons.
So just going off the intelligence and what has been reported, it appears that this is, again, a major act of theater.
Additionally, there is no actual plan from the Trump administration about where we go from here.
It is one of the most inept public affairs, it is one of the most inept foreign policy groups we've ever seen in the country's history.
Between Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, and Donald Trump, it's completely unclear what the point of this exercise is.
And unfortunately, what's happening is lives are being lost across the board.
John, do you think the president has made a strong argument for the reasons behind our engagement with Iran?
Iran has been a malignant character in the region for 47 years, ever since they took the hostages, which toppled the Carter presidency.
They've killed thousands of American troops for 47 years.
They've intimidated the region.
They continually try to build nuclear weapons, which has been something that every administration has tried to deal with, including the Obama administration.
They've been bad characters.
And I think the other thing that helped convince Donald Trump that we need to do something was when they slaughtered 30,000 to 50,000 of their own citizens because they wanted freedom.
And, you know, I do think that the president probably needs to articulate the reasons exactly why we went in and the timing we went in and also when we're going to get out and what we try to achieve there.
That would be, I think, more helpful.
But I think amongst Republicans, getting rid of this regime is very popular with most.
The irony is it's kind of reuniting Republicans again.
The neoconservatives really support it, and the MAGA Republicans really like Donald Trump.
And so I think in many ways, people know that Iran's been a bad character, and he's taking decisive action to deal with that.
We'll see how long it lasts, and we'll see how popular it becomes.
Stella is in mutual affairs.
If I could weigh in one more point on that.
Go ahead.
So I think my panelist is absolutely right.
Donald Trump is doing this to appease his politics.
This is a base election for Donald Trump.
If he can keep his base united and have them go and turn out, then the severe losses won't be nearly as bad.
I think the reason why Donald Trump cannot articulate why we are engaged in a war in Iran is because it is just politics.
And that's all it boils down to with Donald Trump.
If there was a plan on any part of their policy, whether it be health care, whether it be transportation, whether it be this war in Iran, we would have heard it.
But there's simply just not one, and it's about politics.
All right, now let's hear from Stella in New Milford, New Jersey on our line for independence.
Good morning, Stella.
Hi, good morning.
We're discussing an upcoming congressional election.
Yet, a vast majority of people in this country see our current Senate and House of Representatives as completely impotent with regard to surrendering their legislative power to an executive branch.
Two of the most, I think we're looking at this in entirely the wrong way.
We have gerrymandering, we have mid-decade redistricting, we have all of this money in politics as a result of Citizen United.
It's just, and once again, now we're imposing on American people to be responsible with all this documentation.
And we've all been digitized.
All of these documents are now a part of a digital conglomerate that makes it even scarier about the fact that our physical presence as a human being no longer matters.
Which of those points do you want our guests to respond to?
Stella?
Yes.
Sorry, what was the respond to the fact that how our Congress is now being perceived as completely surrendering to an executive, I'd like them to address the issue of gerrymandering, which has gone on for generations, and money in politics.
So we're going to let.
I'm going to have John start first.
Gerrymandering, Money, and Executive Power00:05:53
So we're talking gerrymandering, money in politics, as well as sort of the Congress handing over a lot of its authority to the executive, which has been a pretty common complaint lately.
Well, listen, what happens when you have a Congress of the same party with the president of the same party?
They're by and large going to try to implement the president's agenda.
When you have a president of one party and a Congress of a different party, then they typically try to obstruct.
So the American people have to make a decision when they want to make progress or they want obstruction.
I think that's the big dividing point in this election.
Gerrymandering, obviously, is something that's been going on for a long time.
It's part of the process.
It has been.
It's not a very happy part of the process.
Some states, like California, before they decided to gerrymander, used to have an independent commission do it.
And I think that was healthy.
But redistricting is something that, you know, it does disconnect people with their congressmen.
They don't necessarily know who their congressman is anymore.
And so I think it's a problem.
Money and politics, I mean, both sides do it.
I mean, billionaires on both sides flood the elections.
And I think it has really alienated a lot of voters.
And I think, you know, the Democrats and Republicans, it's an arms race.
Whoever gets the most money, you know, at the end of the day, it's the voters who decide.
And it's the voters look at their own financial situation, and that's when they decide how they want to vote.
Joe?
Look, I agree with everything my co-panelists said relative to money and politics.
It has done a tremendous job in damaging our system and damaging our discourse.
Relative to the handing over of power, Mike Johnson has essentially laid down for Donald Trump.
The majority of the Republicans in the House of Representatives are also members of the Freedom Caucus.
It's abundantly clear that Donald Trump wields more power in the Republican caucus than the Speaker of the House.
Same is true over on the Senate side.
And at the end of the day, what we're seeing is Donald Trump and congressional Republicans peddle rhetoric, not policy, peddle rhetoric, that only serves to further divide us and make everyday life challenging for the working people of this country.
All right, let's hear from Doug in New York on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Doug.
Boy, these are all real important issues, and there's a lot of them, aren't there?
I'd like them to respond to this idea.
I think the election process should be changed.
I think that all elections should be a first-step process to approve or disapprove who runs for office.
And then after that, if the person is approved, someone can run against him, or the people can select who to run against each other.
Sorry, Doug.
How do you respond to that?
Just want to make sure I get some clarity from you, Doug.
When you say that somebody should be approved first to run, do you mean by voters or by somebody else, like a commissioner or something?
I think that voters should approve who's in office, what they did first, whether they say, yes, he should continue or no, he shouldn't.
And then after that, that he could, if he's approved, he could run or the people, whether they be parties or whatever, could decide who runs against each other and make their choice from that.
And all these issues could apply.
Okay.
I'm going to let John respond first.
Well, listen, I think what you need to do is simplify the election process.
This seems to me that this idea would complicate things.
You know, we already have an ability to approve or disapprove.
It's called the election.
You have primary elections where people have to face the voters in their own party, and then you have general election.
You know, there's a lot of different ideas out there.
I think we just need to get more people to vote and pay attention to the system we have, because I think the system we have works pretty well right now.
Joe?
So I appreciate the comments from the caller.
I think what it gets to is the immense frustration that voters across this country feel.
They feel like their leaders no longer have their best interest in mind, and they feel like their leaders are proactively making life a lot more challenging.
And they feel like, look, there's a different set of rules for the rich and powerful, whether it's, you know, election reform or it's, you know, pick your policy approach here.
I think it gets to the core that the American people are just incredibly frustrated, and we deserve better.
All right.
Andy is in Georgetown, Kentucky on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Andy.
Good morning.
So many issues, so many things to talk about.
Can never get to the end of the bottom of it.
The one question I'd like to ask the Democrat guy there is that all these shootings and terrorist acts going on in their country, did you not know that when you allowed your president the last term to come into office, let all these people in here, did you not know that this was going to happen?
Because Iran and the Arabias have always been in play forever.
We knew this was going to happen over there in the Middle East.
Just a matter of time.
And you don't allow these people to do this stuff.
But also, the other, and second question, if I may.
Why do you not believe in God or the Bible?
Thank you.
Joe, I'll let you respond.
Yeah, happy to, yeah.
No, I'll start here.
I do believe in God and the Bible.
I'm actually going to mass later this morning with my family.
I am a frequent flyer on the Sunday at 10.15 a.m. at St. Mary's in my hometown.
Term Limits and Government Trust00:12:43
Relative to Iran and relative to the Middle East, Donald Trump has worked to destabilize the geopolitical situation, whether it is fanning the flames in the Ukraine to let Russia go and expand, whether it's the desire to withdraw from big parts of NATO.
Donald Trump has not served to put this country first.
He has not served to go and stabilize and keep people safe.
This is all a strongman policy, which has in turn left us and left the rest of the world incredibly unsafe.
History tells us that strength through peace has actually worked.
We have a question from Sue in Whitey, New Jersey.
What do your guests think about President Trump's idea to lower standards for borrowers seeking to obtain a home loan?
Could it potentially lead to lenders making unsafe loans and another financial crisis?
Now, for a bit of context on this question, I want to read a bit from a PBS news article from March 13th that Trump signs executive orders aimed at home affordability ahead of the midterms.
President Donald Trump on Friday signed a pair of executive orders aimed at showing his commitment to improving home affordability, a key issue for many voters going into November's election for control of the House and Senate.
Under the first order, the federal government would reduce its own housing regulatory burdens and create incentives for best practices by state and local governments with the goal of making it easier for builders to construct more homes.
The second order would reduce the regulatory burdens tied to mortgages and make it easier for smaller community banks to provide home loans.
And once again, Sue's question was, what do you all think about those ideas and could they potentially lead to lenders making unsafe loans in another financial crisis?
John, your thoughts first?
Well, I think what the president's trying to get at is kind of the laws of supply and demand.
There's not enough housing out there.
We need more housing.
And, you know, if you're a young person, it's very difficult to buy a home.
It's very difficult to come up with the capital to buy a home.
You know, I think that if you put a lot of pressure on lenders to give bad loans like Bill Clinton did before the financial crisis, that's when you have something bad happening, which was the financial crisis.
I think that what Trump is trying to get at is the high cost of building housing.
And there's a lot of factors that go into that.
And a lot of it has to do with NIMBY regulations, but a lot of it also has to do with what the president's trying to get at.
We just need more supply, and that will bring hopefully prices down.
Joe?
I applaud that Donald Trump is actually talking about housing.
This is super important across the country.
It's super important for economic opportunity.
It's super important for economic growth.
I do think that there is a way to lend and lend responsibly while making sure that people have the opportunity to actually become homeowners.
That's such a big part of the American dream, and I'm confident that we can certainly get there.
All right, let's hear from Anthony in Gilderin, New York on our line for independence.
Good morning, Anthony.
Good morning.
My question is, since Donald Trump is not a serious player and his reality TV show, he would have probably, you know, the polling numbers they are given, he would have been canceled.
Why would I agree to having a national ID?
That's my question.
I'm guessing, Anthony, you're referencing the Save America Act there?
Yes.
Okay, John?
Well, it's not actually a national ID.
What it is is national standards that states have to implement.
We're already part of this.
The real ID passed well before, I think it passed when Trump was president, but last Trump.
And it's really kind of making sure that people can't fake documents.
And there's a lot of implications to this.
And people, they need to prove that they're Americans so they can get all kinds of benefits.
And the Real ID program, which is now in law, is part of that process.
And it's not a national ID.
It's an ID that the states implement, but it has national standards.
And specifically in this case, the bill would require those IDs that would be used to show citizenship on the IDs in addition to just your overall information.
Let's hear from Richard in Augusta, Georgia on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Richard.
Morning.
To both guests.
Don't you think if they reverse the tax cut for the rich permanently and give it to the low-income people, let's say $200,000, give them the permanent tax because they're not the billionaires.
And on the Epstein file, let's look at the 302 investigative form, two of them, that the young lady that was involved with Donald Trump when she was 13 years old, and that the 302 file on the Epstein file on Trump needs to be pushed harder by both Democrats and spineless Republicans in the House and the Senate.
Because that 302 file, that Washington...
The newspaper, the conspiracy newspaper, brought up.
That's the one that needs to be looked at very hard, the 302 file and, like I said, the tax cuts and on the nuclear problem with Iran.
Obama had them in check with the Europeans and verified with the United Nations.
That's three issues I can give to you two guys to address.
And Trump screwed everything up.
Their tax cut.
Make it permanent for the poor people and the people.
That makes it up to the people of payment.
Richard, before we let our guests respond, I do want to give folks some context to what you're referencing with the 302 files.
This is a story from Politico And from early March, the Justice Department posted a trio of FBI interviews with a woman who alleged President Donald Trump sexually assaulted her when she was a young teenager after she was introduced to him by Jeffrey Epstein.
The woman's central allegation, according to FBI summaries of her interviews with investigators known as FBI 302s, is that Trump hit her after she bit his penis while he attempted to force her to perform oral sex.
This is the specific files that our caller was referencing.
John?
I'm not familiar with that story.
You know, the billionaires tax is very popular politically, but it does have implications for growth.
And I'm not anyone who has any great sympathy for billionaires.
It would be nice for them to pay more in taxes.
I'm for that.
I would say about Obama with Iran, he ended up giving boatloads actual cash to the Iranian regime, which they used to fund their terrorist operations throughout the region.
So I think what Obama did with Iran was a complete disaster.
Before we go to you, Joe, I do want to read another bit of that politico article, which is important, that Trump has denied wrongdoing in relation to the Epstein and allegations, and he hasn't been charged with a crime in connection to them.
There is no evidence to support Trump took part in Epstein's sex trafficking operation, and many of the materials released by the Justice Department lack substantiation or context.
Joe, you can reference any of those other points the caller made as well.
Yeah.
So, I mean, look, you know, let's start with Epstein.
Why not just release all the files?
It's abundantly clear that the story is a lot worse for Donald Trump than anybody actually thinks it is.
It is very likely it is horrific.
That's why Trump is doing everything possible to stop the rest of those files from coming out.
Relative to taxes, it's abundantly clear that Donald Trump puts the interests of the rich and corporations ahead that of working families.
And it's clear in the tax code.
As the caller said, tax breaks expire for the working people of this country, but they don't for the corporations.
If Donald Trump actually cared about economic opportunity, economic growth, and doing the right thing, he would make the corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share.
All right.
Raymond is in New York on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Raymond.
Hi, good morning.
Thanks for having me on.
C-STAN.
I appreciate it.
And thank you, gentlemen, for taking my comments.
And so the first thing with me is I believe that term limits is a big factor with me.
I believe that people being in office for decades and decades and decades is way overdue because this is what the problem is.
They have a partial government shutdown now.
It's like I said, it's this Republican-Democrat thing.
And we have a war going on, too.
And I get to voting last.
I was trying to get through these two topics.
So I believe term limits is very, very important in this country today.
We need change.
We need to change Washington.
So I'm asking, how can we get term limits in place?
Why isn't anybody talking about term limits?
We're talking about all this stuff.
And now we have a war going on.
We've got service members being killed over there.
My heart goes out to their families.
And we also, as far as the voting is concerned, I believe that, you know, voting is voting.
I've never had a problem voting, but I believe that in the end, that I just want to see term limits.
If anybody can comment on term limits, how could term limits be signed into law for Congress, Senate, and Supreme Court justices?
Enough is enough being in office for decades because it's like going back and forth, back and forth.
It's not about the American people.
All right.
So let's start with Joe.
Go ahead.
So, you know, thank you for your call.
Personally, I do not support term limits, but I think the caller speaks to the broader point that nobody believes that our government is actually working for us anymore.
This call for term limits, this call to throw at all the bums, stems from the fact that nobody believes that the levers of government are being pulled to help the working people.
I think this frustration has only doubled down over the years.
Look, because our politics have become so incredibly divisive, we have driven good quality candidates from the field.
And I think that's something that we certainly have to consider going forward.
There was a period where public service was admirable in this country.
We've now gotten and created an atmosphere where it's toxic.
And, you know, the end result is policies put in place, the economy, it's simply not working for people.
Well, I hear the caller saying on term limits.
I've been dealing with this issue for 25 years.
It's not a new issue.
The fact is that Republicans do have term limits on committee chairmen.
And what that tends to do is it makes the, after a chairman gets his end of his term, they tend to retire.
If you look at what's happened in Congress over the last 15 years, we probably have the least experienced House of Representatives that we ever had.
I mean, there's members, you know, we have high turnover, much higher turnover than we did in the 80s or 90s or 2000s.
So I'm not sure, in my view, there's a term limit every two years in the Congress and then every six years in the Senate.
And if you don't like your senator or your congressman, you can find someone to run against that person and, you know, put the term limit to them.
So I'm not a big fan of term limits.
I'm not a, I mean, you know, we have two year, two term term limits on the president.
I don't think we need it for Congress.
All right.
Well, that is all the time that we have for this segment today.
Thank you so much to Republican strategist John Fury, who's at EFB Advisory.
Appreciate your time.
Advocacy, excuse me, I'm sorry, EFB advocacy.
Thank you very much.
And we also were joined by Joe Cayazzo, who is a Democratic strategist at 1788 Media.
Thank you both.
Thanks for having me.
Thanks.
All right.
Coming up next on our program, we're going to be joined by retired Brigadier General Leslie A. Beavers, former Pentagon Acting Chief Information Officer, who will discuss how the United States is using technology in the Iran conflict.
We'll be right back.
The Plot to Kill Trotsky00:02:58
Tonight on C-SPAN's Q&A, former Columbia University President Lee Bollinger on his book, University, A Reckoning, about the purpose and future of universities in the United States.
He also talks about protests and free speech on college campuses and the targeting of Columbia, Harvard, and other institutions of higher learning by the Trump administration.
You have to unpack what it is that is being said about universities.
Let me say again, none of it, in my view, even if credible, does not justify the authoritarian undermining of the autonomy and independence of thought within universities.
Author Lee Bollinger with his book, University, A Reckoning, tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN's Q ⁇ A. You can listen to Q ⁇ A and all of our podcasts on our free C-SPAN Now app or wherever you get your podcasts.
In a divided media world, one place brings Americans together.
According to a new MAGA research report, nearly 90 million Americans turn to C-SPAN, and they're almost perfectly balanced.
28% conservative, 27% liberal or progressive, 41% moderate.
Republicans watching Democrats, Democrats watching Republicans, moderates watching all sides.
Because C-SPAN viewers want the facts straight from the source.
No commentary, no agenda, just democracy.
Unfiltered every day on the C-SPAN networks.
On this episode of Book Notes Plus with our host, Brian Lamb.
London-based writer Josh Ireland is the author of three books and ghostwriter of five others.
His latest is titled The Death of Trotsky, the true story of the plot to kill Stalin's greatest enemy.
According to Josh Ireland, Trotsky led two revolutions and a civil war in Russia in the first half of the 20th century.
Leon Trotsky died on August the 21st, 1940.
The day before, in Trotsky's house near Mexico City, a man named Ramon Mercator sunk an ice axe into Trotsky's skull.
He lived for 26 hours.
Mercator, who had several names, was a Soviet agent and had befriended Trotsky.
This was all the work of Stalin, Trotsky's arch enemy.
Josh Ireland's first sentence of chapter one asks this question.
When did Joseph Stalin decide to crush or destroy or kill Leon Trotsky?
His book tells the complicated story.
A new interview with author Josh Ireland about his book, The Death of Trotsky, the True Story of the Plot to Kill Stalin's Greatest Enemy.
Book Notes Plus with our host Brian Lamb is available wherever you get your podcasts and on the C-SPAN Now app.
Modern Warfare and Cyber Friction00:14:43
Washington Journal continues.
Welcome back.
We're going to discuss the role of technology in the Iran conflict.
And to help us with that, I'm joined now by retired Brigadier General Leslie A. Beavers Beavers, who is the former acting chief information officer at the Department of Defense in the Trump administration.
Welcome to Washington Journal.
Thanks, Kimberly.
Good morning.
Good morning.
So I want to start with just sort of how you see the role of technology influencing the way that this conflict has played out so far.
So technology is at the heart of the way the conflict has played out because it is what enables us to have an accurate picture of where the enemy is and where the targets are and then how to defend ourselves against those targets.
So it is often the unsung hero I find in the Defense Department, although it is really in the Department of War, it's really starting to increase in folks' minds understanding how important it is.
So thank you for having me on today.
Well actually maybe you can help us understand that a bit better by describing your own work in the Pentagon.
You oversaw the Pentagon's technology implementation through December of last year.
Talk about your role and how you worked with the administration in this regard.
Yes, so I was the acting chief information officer and within the Department of War, that is, I think, slightly a misnomer because it is so much more than what you do as a chief information officer.
Yes, you have the networks, yes, you have software, but you also have all of the strategic communications, satellites, and you have the cybersecurity role, and then you also have the oversight of the cyber workforce.
So it's a vast portfolio, and thankfully we've got a lot of really great people working there to help out.
The cybersecurity side of this is so interesting because there have been quite a few cyber attacks linked to this conflict.
How would you describe the role of the cyber attacks in this conflict in particular and how cyber attacks are changing modern warfare?
So I am not privy to that information and I'm not representing the department.
But let me talk just a little bit in general about cyber and something that people need to really make sure that they understand is that geographic boundaries don't really exist in cyber.
And cyber is about getting inside your decision making process and changing information that you may be making decisions off of as well as maybe preventing you from actually carrying.
out the logistics that you're trying to do, because you're, you know, when the internet went down in my house the other day when I was getting something installed and they cut the cable, all of a sudden now I had no idea, well, what's the weather?
You know, what's the temperature?
So you lose a lot of visibility to information.
And so cyber's objective is to get in there and create fog and friction for the adversary.
Let's also talk about another type of technology that's been particularly prevalent in this conflict, which is drones.
And we've also seen drone warfare in the Ukraine-Russia war as well.
How are drones changing modern warfare?
Yeah, drones are, from everything I've been reading and the leaders that I've been talking to, they're really making an impact within modern warfare.
And they bring their own unique requirements to make drones work and then to defend against them because we traditionally within the United States haven't been focused on small, close-in kind of threats.
So our defense for those systems are, you know, we're learning a lot.
And it's, and then the technology piece of that is the communications to the drones and the questions around are they acting autonomously and are they hitting the right target?
Are they, you know, what activities are they doing?
So they have, they are changing the face of modern warfare and we're adapting.
You mentioned just a few moments ago about the role of intelligence and how our technology informs the intelligence that the United States is able to use in warfare.
And this has come up in relation to the Tomahawk missile strike that killed about 150 school children.
And Secretary of War Pete Hegseth was asked about that strike during a Friday briefing.
We want to listen to his response.
So I can report that CENTCOM has designated an investigating officer to complete a command investigation.
The command investigation will take as long as necessary to address all the matters surrounding this incident.
And the investigating officer is from outside CENTCOM and is a general officer.
But I will note to this group and to the world, there's only one entity in this conflict between us and Iran that never targets civilians.
Literally never targets civilians.
I look at the process that's used on dynamic strikes or on boat strikes and others.
We have a very high fidelity process in that case.
So we don't target.
Iran does.
We will investigate.
We'll get to the truth and we'll share it when we have it.
What's your response?
Well, thanks.
Well, of course, I'm not representing the department, but I am very proud of the U.S. in the fact that we don't target civilians and we do investigate, and that's what makes us different.
And unfortunately, mistakes get made, and this is not the first and probably won't be the last time.
But what makes us different is that we do do the investigations and we do go to extraordinary lengths to try and prevent something like this from happening again.
And that has been my experience during my entire career with the military, and therefore I was very proud to serve.
Some reports have said that outdated intelligence could have led to this strike.
And especially as you were talking about the role of technology in our intelligence gathering, how do you think, what lessons are there for us here?
Yeah, let's take a step back for a moment and think about what our military and our intelligence professionals are dealing with.
In the physical realm, you have air-to-air, air-to-ground, ground-to-ground, ground-to-air.
You have U.S., Iranian, other allies.
You have sensors.
You have non-combatants.
So it's an extraordinary volume of information to try and maintain.
And so that is a contributing factor to the challenge that you face.
And we go out of our way to make sure that we have good information.
But there is an enemy that is trying to change that as well.
So there's normal fog and friction, and then there's the fog and friction that gets created.
So it is a challenge.
But we are really, we really make an effort to be perfect.
Along that same idea, I want to read from an AP News article that Hegseth orders suspension of Pentagon's offensive cyber operations against Russia.
And this story is talking about that the Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has paused offensive cyber operations against Russia by U.S. Cyber Command, rolling back some efforts to contend with a key adversary, even as national security experts call for the U.S. to expand those capabilities.
A U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive operation on Monday confirmed the pause.
Hegset's decision does not affect cyber operations conducted by other agencies, but the Trump administration has also rolled back other efforts at the FBI and other agencies related to countering digital and cyber threats.
You've just laid out how important cyber intelligence and all of these things are for the United States and defense.
What do you think is behind this?
I wouldn't be able to comment on that.
I'm not familiar with it.
What I can say is that within the cyber realm, we are experiencing an extraordinary level of invasion from foreign adversaries within our networks.
And we hear about it on the news from time to time, referred to as SALT Typhoon and Vault Typhoon.
And so the norms of conducting operations within cyberspace are still new and being worked out.
But at the end of the day, within the United States, we are under attack, and we are taking steps to defend ourselves.
And the Department, I'm sure, is approaching it in the best way that they know.
We're going to be taking questions for the retired Brigadier General Leslie Beavers.
If you want to call in, our phone line for Democrats is 202-748-8000.
For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
But first we're going to take a question that we received via text from Adam in Maryland.
Have we really seen the full effect of technology in what could become an extended conflict with a very asymmetric attack potential?
Are we perhaps less prepared for this than we should be, especially on the public industry side?
So thank you very much for the question.
And he brings up an interesting point around being prepared on the public infrastructure and operational technology.
That is an area where cyber is a threat and we need to do more, I think, as a society to defend ourselves because it is a particular challenge because those are quite frequently old systems.
And when I say operational technology and why it's important, I'm talking about like trains, our infrastructure, energy, water treatment facilities, cranes, you know, the things that make our society move and work.
And there isn't really any tool out there anymore that's just equipment.
There's software and connectivity on everything.
And we haven't designed that security in, and a lot of times it's really old.
So we're having to, I think, adjust our approach to securing that technology.
All right, let's take a question from Edward in Spartansburg, South Carolina on our line for independence.
Good morning, Edward.
Good morning.
Thank you for your service, General.
My question is, if Iran and say Russia and China team up together to say cyber attack the United States medical, water, military systems, why are they downgrading everything?
By downgrading, are you referencing that Associated Press article that I was reading about the cuts to various cyber efforts there, Edward, or something else?
That is one of the points, yes.
Because it seems that a lot of these people are living in a different universe or a different world.
And the only thing they're addressing is what directly affects them.
So they have to wake up and treat these situations with reality.
All right.
Edward, thank you.
Yes, it's not privy to the details on that.
And of course, I don't speak for the administration.
But what I do know is that we are adjusting the way we are conducting cyber operations as a nation and within the Department of War.
And there's a big push to professionalize the cyber workforce, which will help close these gaps and create, because cyber is its own thing.
We really need to have a group of dedicated professionals that know how to handle this.
And we do, but we can do that better if we can create potentially a workforce that is dedicated to this on a full-time and that's their main career.
So it's a fun time out there in the cyber world.
That's all I have to.
It's a lot happening.
There's a lot happening and it is being taken seriously though.
And I would, I sleep okay at night, by the way.
And I know some of the worst of the worst.
And so have confidence in your leadership that they do understand and that they are taking steps.
Gina is in Mississippi on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Gina.
Thank you, General, for coming on and spreading some truth about our military.
And I would just like to say as an elderly retired person, The cyber industry, the electronic industry that we have to live in is very difficult and very frightening because you never know what's going to happen to either your bank account or any of your business.
And I just bought a new car and I thought I was going to have to get a tech person to come teach me how to drive it with everything on it.
National Defense Against Cyber Threats00:02:31
And I would also like to ask Washington Journal to please stop bringing up the 150 children in the school that was accidentally killed by our military and mistakes happen in war.
I mean, I don't believe for one second that anybody in our military did that intentionally.
And we're talking about a country who kills their people all the time and thinks nothing of it.
So Washington Journal, host, please stop, and producer, by the way, because I know it's a producer.
Please stop bringing that up every day because you're, you know, that's what the left wants you to do.
And as a Republican, I think that, you know, the Democrats, you know, stop putting our country down every day.
You live in this country and we're all Americans, whether you're left or right.
So Gina, I do want to allow the Brigadier General to respond to your point.
But on us at Washington Journal bringing up this strike that killed about 150 children, it is the largest casualty event in this conflict so far.
So we do think that's worthy of continued coverage.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Well, no, thank you, Gina, and thank you for bringing up the very important point of individual responsibility in the cyber world to defend yourself.
And I can commiserate with you on having to drive a new car.
I experienced the same challenge myself.
But it is absolutely incumbent upon each and every one of us to do our part to defend ourselves against the threat.
The threat is very real.
It's out there just like you lock your house, you need to lock down your cyber as well.
So thank you.
I do want to flag, following up on Gina's point, that as reported here in American Banker, Iran has named U.S. banks as targets, ratcheting up the cyber threat, saying that U.S. banks face a heightened operational risk from external hacktivist groups seeking retaliation for the SEPA bank strike.
Banks face a dual threat of operational disruptions in the Middle East and retaliatory cyber attacks on their vital tech infrastructure.
AI Debates with Tech Companies00:15:36
Do you want to speak a bit more about the risk to the financial system?
Yes, thank you very much.
And it's the risk to all of our intellectual property.
So the financial system, yes, it's one of those major areas we talked about.
And what I think we need to understand as a society is that we are under threat from nation states.
And our response needs to be at the national level to defend ourselves because I think it's unreasonable for us to expect small, medium, large companies, even large institutions like the banking industry.
And I was fortunate enough to get to spend a little bit of time on NASDAQ and with some of the senior leaders there in the banking industry to understand what they are doing to protect our financial our financial market from cyber attacks.
And it is extraordinary, and so I have a great deal of confidence in them.
But the reality is we are under a sustained, especially from China actually, a sustained, deliberate invasion within our networks to steal our information, to steal our money.
So in the Bitcoin, that's a big problem as well.
But I think the latest number that I had when I was in the Pentagon was $100 million a day of intellectual property was being stolen out of our networks here in the United States.
So that is a gap that we need to, I think, have a cooperation between a public and partner and a private partnership to really get after closing that gap.
That's such a huge number.
Wow.
It's a scary number.
And I think it's underappreciated.
And when you say a huge number like that, it's like, okay, well, that's like a lot of money.
But it's underappreciated the amount of advantage that stealing that information gives to the adversary.
If you think about what the Chinese have done over the last 10 or 15 years with their Navy and the modernization that has happened and their aircraft, a lot of that is from stealing, not even from the government, it's from stealing from those second and third order companies that are down in the supply chain, which is what led the department to drive the cybersecurity maturity model certification,
which is a requirement by companies that do business with the government or with the department in the Pentagon that use our kind of sensitive information to put in certain cybersecurity practices.
But we all need to be doing that.
Let's hear from Jerry in Schomburg, Illinois on our line for independence.
Good morning, Jerry.
Good morning.
Thanks for taking my call.
It's a really good topic.
And it segues into my question regarding China.
Because they are observing what's going on, we're the aggressor, we've attacked.
I'm just curious if the guests would have any thoughts regarding how China analyzes what we're doing in terms of technology, what kinds of systems we're using, and how they would combat that in an actual cyber war or an actual hot war.
So I'm just curious what her thoughts might be on China looking into that.
Thank you, Jerry.
Yes, I'm not, once again, I'm not privy to any inside information, but just speaking as a veteran and somebody who has been a part of a military for 30 some odd years, of course they are going to be watching what we're doing very closely and learning from that.
They are very good at watching, observing, and learning and taking away lessons and getting better faster.
So that's kind of the situation we're in, I'm afraid.
Yes, I have to imagine that in a conflict like this, any technology or tools that we deploy in the war with Iran is effectively broadcasting to the rest of the world what we can use, right?
Well, I think there is absolutely an aspect of that.
And then there's areas that we don't show as well.
And so it's a little bit of a dance.
We, thankfully, live in a free society.
And on the plus side, that gives us all individual freedoms and our companies can choose to work with our government or not.
On the reverse side, that means that our information is readily available and it is accessible by our adversaries.
Since you mentioned companies being able to choose to work with the government or not, I do want to talk about Anthropic AI and this debate that's been going on or the complications they've had with the Pentagon.
There's a CBS News article here that an internal Pentagon memo orders military commanders to remove anthropic AI technology from key systems.
The Defense Department has officially notified senior leadership figures throughout the U.S. military that they must remove Anthropic's artificial intelligence products from their systems within 180 days.
The memo was dated March 6th, a day after the Pentagon formally designated Anthropic a supply chain risk.
There are folks in the tech industry who have expressed a lot of concern about the government and its response to Anthropic and Anthropic not kind of going along with what the Pentagon was asking.
What are your thoughts on this whole process?
Yeah, so this isn't the first time that we've run into this since I've been in the department.
And it's certainly, I've got examples that at least go back to World War II and probably even before.
So I think what we're seeing play out here is a very important debate.
It's a debate around how we're going to do security within artificial intelligence.
And is artificial intelligence its own value-based entity that can override a human?
Or is artificial intelligence just another tool that we use kind of like our phone in our hand and it has to always respond to the human input?
And that's a in this particular case, I think it's important to let that debate play out because at the heart of it, you've got the question of how we're going to secure the artificial intelligence and how we're going to use it.
And personally, if I don't have confidence that my phone is going to turn on when I turn it on and it's going to work when I need it to work, I'm going to use something else.
So there needs to be a balance struck here.
And I'm optimistic that they will come to, that we will work this out.
But artificial intelligence and the way it is designed is what is driving this new need for understanding data rights, understanding when you're buying something, what are you buying, and then who ultimately is responsible for owning decisions that come out of it.
We have another question from Oklahoma saying, hi, General, how effective is our newly created cyber force?
And for the folks watching and listening, this is a press release here from the Department of War from back in November, but the Department of War establishes CyberCom 2.0 revised cyber force generation model.
Can you talk about the cyber force and how effective you think it is?
So we have the best in the world.
Our cyber experts are absolutely top-notch, and we have a long history of that.
With Cyberforce 2.0, we were looking at institutionalizing that expertise and creating a pipeline within our workforce so that you have a very you develop your talent and you keep them in and then they turn around and develop other talent.
And so that's one of the reasons why potentially having a separate cyber force altogether is being considered.
So it's just a matter of making it better.
I got to spend some time with those young folks and oh my goodness am I so impressed with our next generation and the teams that are coming up.
They're really top notch.
Russell is in Jerome, Idaho on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Russell.
Hello, I appreciate you taking my call.
I just have a quick comment and a question for your guests.
About your statement of unfortunate accidents that happen in war, I hope that works well for the 170 little girls and their families that were killed, and I hope that we can resolve that.
But I have another question about Elon Musk's change takeover of the Americans' personal information at the behest of Mr. Trump executive privileges.
What's the question about?
I'm getting on with that.
Pardon me?
Sorry, I didn't understand the question.
I understand that you're asking about Elon Musk and his role, I'm guessing, when he was with Doge and accessing different information within the government.
But what was your specific question for our guest?
That was it.
I haven't heard anything in recent days about what is going on with Elon Musk.
I mean, he just kind of disappeared off the chart.
And is the Pentagon really looking into how much information was stolen, our personal information?
Okay.
I have absolutely no knowledge of that.
So unfortunately, I'm not able to provide any useful information.
All right.
Next up is Kathy in Florida on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Kathy.
Yes.
Hi.
Good morning, everyone.
Thinking of Elon Musk, I mean, thank God for him.
They'd say when he bought the astronauts back and no one else did, and they were just left incognito.
I mean, they said, you go high, you know, they go low.
He can't go any higher than that.
Didn't think I was going to mention that.
But getting to the cyber security and the cyberspace, I used to actually go on the CISA.gov and take a lot of those three courses a lot.
I was looking, reflecting back when Nancy was our speaker of the House early spring of 2020.
She literally changed the Pentagon software to Microsoft.
Why?
In the middle of the elections and everything that was going on, I'm not sure if you're aware of that.
If you could elaborate when she changed the systems to Microsoft, anything goes wrong, I feel that we're going to have a huge corruption.
My question is too on the AI and the NSPEX.
We have a second language across prospectus in all the categories with Algorithms and artificial intelligence with the education, housing, and employment.
Stake with me for a moment, okay?
With my family friends, when they go to apply for a job, for an example, with this, if they do it in English, they don't get the job.
If they do it in Spanish, they'll get the job with the same company.
Why?
Algorithms, okay?
So we do have a huge problem.
There's a lot of jobs out there.
There's a lot of benefits here for the average American, but the corruption with the spam and the scam and people being, and this goes on both.
Can you help us understand about a party?
Which specific aspect of this you'd like the Brigadier General to respond to?
Both of them.
Is there any way we could break down the monopoly of Microsoft in the Pentagon?
So that's one.
And what was the other item?
The take.
If we could just make English the only language, don't have Spanish on my voters' association card.
I understand.
All right.
Yeah, so not speaking on behalf of the department, let me talk a little bit about my experience while I was there in the chief information office.
I got these kinds of questions very frequently about sole source and you're just using one company.
And what is commonly misunderstood is the department is so enormous, we use more than one tool, more than one company.
Now, Microsoft is a, you know, the office is a very common tool that is a kind of a standard that gets used a lot.
But there are other options and there are other tools that get used by the department.
So I would not characterize it as a monopoly.
I would characterize it as we're kind of using the best tool for the best job at each location.
And with respect to the AI and the algorithms that you are bringing up, that's why we at this juncture are kind of struggling because this is all new for everyone on how they work and how they get tuned and how we keep them neutral and as best as possible.
So it's, I think, part of the natural progression when you introduce a new technology into society, learning how to use it, fine-tuning it, and getting better at leveraging it.
And to her point about Spanish language in various settings.
I have nothing, I have nothing that I could add to that.
That is a policy decision, and I'll leave that to the professional policy and politicians.
I'm just a technologist.
We have a question from Jennifer in Oak Park, Illinois.
Please ask General Beavers what she thinks about Hegseth saying there is now, quote, no quarter, no mercy.
How does she feel about Hegseth using this language and his promotion of our troops committing war crimes?
Interoperability Vulnerabilities in Allies00:09:42
Once again, that's not something that is related to technology, and I really don't have the expertise to speak on that topic.
Arnold is in West Palm Beach, Florida, on our line for independence.
Good morning, Arnold.
Good morning.
Thank you for taking my call.
Brigadier General, thank you for being on C-SPAN.
You're evidently a very, very thoughtful person.
Can you share with the audience your expertise and background?
And I have an additional question, but please, if you can share with the audience your expertise and background.
Thank you.
Happy to.
I started out in the Air Force as an intelligence officer, went to the Air Force Academy, did 30 some odd years, most of it as a reservist, so I have quite a lot of time in the business world, and became a Lean Six Sigma business process person.
And that's what led me to working with information technology because it needs to be reliable.
And I came to the Pentagon at the end of my career to help do the interoperability.
So the soapbox that I love to get on is the importance of interoperability within our information networks to make them usable for the warfighter.
So that's why I was there.
And that's why I continue to try and help people understand the nuances that exist within that effort.
Because if it were easy, we'd snap our fingers and it'd be done.
But it takes a lot of work, a lot of cooperation on everybody's half to make technology work together.
That interoperability, that cooperation at the technical level is something that we all need to be a part of.
And you had another question, Arnold?
Yes, and very good point in regards to interoperability.
You know, the additional question actually is in regards to our allies and the use of interoperability.
And then the offshoot of that is what is the vulnerability, the greatest vulnerability that we have in regards to the lack of forbearance and competency in our military?
So let me talk first, Arnold, about the allies, because we have had tremendous allies, and we've made tremendous breakthroughs on the technology front in this last year as a result of cooperating with our allies, most particularly the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia.
And so we've been able to figure out how to design a network architecture that works securely with multiple vendors and multiple clouds.
So that's kind of a really exciting thing.
The UK on their HMS Prince of Wales put that prototype to C last year for nine months and we kicked the tires and learned a lot.
And then the second question I didn't quite understand on the vulnerability.
I think he was referencing sort of the skills available within our cybersecurity workforce at the federal level.
Yeah, well, I think like anything, you have to have a dedicated force and you have to work and learn.
And our cyber force, I would say, is very strong and that we have some of the best experts in the world.
And I'm not, the vulnerability for me with the United States is the everyday person not taking cyber security seriously.
And that just creates a fertile ground that makes it easy for criminals and adversaries alike.
Tom is in Lafayette, Louisiana on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Tom.
Oh, good morning.
I was wondering about the drone issue.
The war in Ukraine's been going on now for four years, and we know that Iran's been supplying Russia with drones.
We've been observing Ukraine using drones extensively.
And I get the impression that we're not as familiar with drone warfare as we should be, considering that we have the best technology and the best experts in the world.
And we should be pretty familiar with the fact that the nature of warfare has changed dramatically.
And we've had four years to see that in this particular theater.
I'd like to get your comments on that.
And I think it's really pushed that they've renamed the Department of Defense the Department of War.
Thank you.
Yes, so remember, I'm a technology person.
And yeah, the drone warfare, we've learned a lot, and there is always a lot to learn.
But I think it is from a technology perspective, we are, I guess, I would say, very advanced on understanding, using, and defending against drone warfare.
So I'm not sure on the vulnerability, it becomes more of a mass question than a technology question at that point, just the number and locations of systems and then having locations of systems to defend against the threat.
So that's my one thought on that.
So thanks.
All right.
Let's hear now from Dale in Moreland, Indiana, on our line for independence.
Good morning, Dale.
Yes, I got a question and comment.
Question is: We've got all this technology, but we can't detect on something we're fixing to bomb that has got a girls' school attached and we kill 10 some kids.
And what kind of what good is the technology if you can't detect something like a girls' school?
If you recon what you're going to bomb, how could you not know?
And the other thing was the lady that mentioned the C-SPAN and its producers not be mentioning that if that was a girls' school here, she'd have a different attitude.
It's like sweeping it under the rug.
But anyway, if you would comment on all this technology, what good is it if they can't detect something as simple as a girls' school?
Thank you.
And C-SPAN, do not do anything different than what you've been doing because coverage is important.
Thank you very much.
So let me just be very clear.
It is an absolute tragedy.
There's no two ways about it.
What makes us different is we do investigate and try and answer that question.
How did that happen?
And how can we prevent it from happening again?
The idea, though, that we do have so much technology, it does shock a lot of people that a mistake of this scale could potentially, I know the investigation is still ongoing, could have been made.
Is this an area of the wrong technology being deployed potentially?
Or what kinds of things do you think this investigation will look at to try to get to the bottom of this, especially on the tech side of things?
Right.
Well, I think it's a fair point to say, yes, they'll look at what types of technology were used, what was available.
I would want to get ahead of the investigation.
I will say that in general, we're not, much as we like to be omniscient, we do face situations where there is a lot of disinformation that is put into the system and then mistakes do get made.
So, in general, it is a very challenging environment.
Remember when I was talking about all the different, and you've got planes and you've got drones and you've got ships and you've got, you've got thousands of moving parts and keeping track of all of them, it can be very challenging.
And that's where AI can be helpful.
But that doesn't excuse it.
I'm not excusing.
I'm just saying that there it's a tragedy, and we are investigating.
Managing Complex Military Operations00:02:34
I am confident that the department will do everything in its power to make sure they don't make that kind of a mistake again.
Retired Brigadier General Leslie Beavers, thank you so much for joining us and for sharing your expertise.
And thank you to the callers.
Thank you to our callers as well.
And for our callers, we are going to be taking more of your calls coming up in open form after the break.
You can start calling in now.
Our phone line for Democrats is 202-748-8000.
For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
And Independents, 202-748-8002.
We'll be right back.
Tonight on C-SPAN's Q&A, former Columbia University President Lee Bollinger on his book, University, A Reckoning, about the purpose and future of universities in the United States.
He also talks about protests and free speech on college campuses and the targeting of Columbia, Harvard, and other institutions of higher learning by the Trump administration.
You have to unpack what it is that is being said about universities.
Let me say again: none of it, in my view, even if credible, does not justify the authoritarian undermining of the autonomy and independence of thought within universities.
Author Lee Bollinger with his book, University, A Reckoning, tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN's QA.
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Democracy Unfiltered on C-SPAN00:08:44
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Washington Journal continues.
Welcome back.
We're in open forum, ready to take your comments about public policy and news of the week.
Our phone lines again for Democrats 202-748-8000.
For Republicans, 202-748-8001.
And for Independents, 202-748-8002.
Some news that we are following this morning is here, as reported in the New York Times, that the FCC chair threatens to revoke broadcasters' licenses over war coverage.
The comment from Brendan Carr came on the heels of a social media message from President Trump criticizing the news media's coverage of the war with Iran.
Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, threatened on Saturday to revoke broadcasters' licenses over their coverage of the war with Iran, his latest move in a campaign to stomp out what he sees as liberal bias in broadcasts.
As the war entered its third week, Mr. Carr accused broadcasters of, quote, running hoaxes and news distortions in a social media post and warned them to, quote, correct course before their license renewals come up.
Quote, broadcasters must operate in the public interest and they will lose their licenses if they do not, he said.
All right, we are in open form and you can bring whatever news item you would like to discuss.
Daniel is in Tucson, Arizona on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Daniel.
Yes, hi.
My understanding is that Trump demanded that social security information be turned over to Doge and Elon Musk.
Further from that, that one of those Doge kids then stole untold number of Social Security numbers and personal information.
I'd like to understand a risk assessment in the current environment with Iran and their cyber threats.
And I'll hang up and listen to the response.
Well, unfortunately, our guest who was the expert in technology has already finished for now.
But was there another comment that you wanted to make on that?
No.
No.
Okay, but for folks who maybe aren't familiar with the story you referenced here, it is in the Washington Post.
That whistleblower claims ex-Doge member says he took social security data to his new job.
The Social Security Inspector General's office is investigating allegations that the former Doge engineer took sensitive data on a thumb drive in a major potential security breach, said people familiar with the process.
Ken is in Southington, Connecticut on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Ken.
Good morning.
How are you?
Fine, thank you.
How are you?
I'm fine.
And I would just like to talk about what the general was asked about the bombing of the girls' school in Iran.
This happens because the Iranian militia or the army, whoever is in running Iran now or trying to, basically they're just setting up their camp right next to schools, right next to hospitals.
It's the same thing they did in Palestine.
It's just a shame that they do this.
They don't care about their own people.
As we see, they've killed thousands, tens of thousands of their people.
This regime has been a pain in the you know for not only America and Israel, but the whole world.
And it's about time that this is taken care of.
I'm really sorry about the girls losing their lives.
If the case is, if it is true that it was our weapons that did it, as we see, some of their weapons have blown up as they're launching and killing a lot of their own people, also.
It's an evil regime, and it's about time that the world takes care of this, gets rid of them, and maybe we can have peace in the world and peace in the Middle East in the future.
And one other thing is about the lawsuits against the reporters or the news stations.
If you're not going to speak the truth, you shouldn't be speaking lies because the American people know.
You can say what you want, but we know the truth and we could see it.
One other thing is we need to get the political parties together and pass the funding bill so people can get paychecks and buy food and pay their bills for their families.
And basically, just stop reporting fake news because you don't like the other party.
That definitely has to stop.
But the American people can see that.
Thank you very much for taking my call.
Have a great day.
God bless you.
Jim is in Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, on our line for independence.
Good morning, Jim.
Good morning.
Thank you for taking my call.
Just from the last gentleman and the person before, you can see we're a house divided.
Everything, and until all of us wake up and understand, there's not that much of a difference between the Republicans and the Democrats, except on the extreme fringes.
I look at the Republicans not reining in this president and giving up all authority and letting him do what he wants.
I truly question his mental stability now to call in and let the allies come and put their warships and their people at risk in this war.
Also, the cost of this war, hundreds of billions.
I'm looking it up between that, the terrorists, and everything else.
And then, of course, even his little adding on to the ballroom and the cost of all this.
Truly, we have to really quit getting all upset on one small, little part of this, what's going on.
And also looking at it, it's not small, the war.
I don't want to get into that, but they throw out certain subjects and everybody gets all hopped up about it and they start getting mad at the person that doesn't think the way they do.
But let's also think, too, of future terrorists that we've done in Gaza and everywhere else that Israel is promoting.
And look what's happening in the United States just on a small scale.
We had better wake up and understand everybody, the people from the south of the border that's coming up, they want a better life instead of kicking them out.
We can't treat speak abortion.
We're against abortion.
You'd have these people killed through Gaza and Gaza has been pushed aside.
And look at all the poor people that are suffering there.
We can't be the bully pulpit and this man that changes his mind in a heartbeat now back and forth.
Again, I wish the Republicans in the government would go ahead and challenge his mental stability at this point.
Thank you for the call.
Jim was referencing the cost of the war with Iran.
The American Enterprise Institute has an estimate that as of March 13th, just a couple days ago, the estimated cost of Operation Epic Fury could be as high as $11 billion.
Mary is in Columbus, Ohio, on our line for Democrats.
Good morning, Mary.
Hi.
I just had a comment about the voting in Ohio.
Excuse me.
I took my 90-year-old mother to the DMV to get her ID because she's giving up her driver's license.
She was unable to get the real ID despite the fact that she's a daughter of the revolution.
She was born in America.
She's been voting her entire life.
She's always been driving.
She's had multiple passports.
And, you know, I really think this voting thing is just a total scam to disenfranchise people.
School Bombing Investigation Details00:05:15
So that's really all I needed to say.
Thank you very much.
Frank is in Bethany, Oklahoma, on our line for Republicans.
Good morning, Frank.
Thank you for accepting my call.
I, too, am a veteran of 30 years association with the military, both regular active duty and National Guard and Reserve Time, Reserve Special Forces Time, combat veteran.
What I have to say is reference this school bombing, whether it was hit by a bomb or a drone or what have you.
I saw an aerial photograph shown on one of the channels.
The aerial photograph shows three buildings in a row.
Two of the buildings are occupied by military or civil people from Iran.
The third building is the school building.
They were identical buildings.
They were adjacent to each other.
And that aerial photograph answered all my questions.
If it was, in fact, a U.S. weapon that hit or Israeli weapon that hit that building, it would have been by accident.
These things happen in war, as I can tell you.
But the fact that it was an identical building adjacent to the other two buildings, as shown by the aerial photograph, is a big explanation of why that building could possibly have been hit by accident.
Frank, if you don't mind staying with me for a moment, I'd like to read some reporting that aligns pretty closely with what you said.
Here's a story from NBC News.
It says, outdated intelligence likely led to a deadly missile strike on an elementary school in Iran, according to a U.S. official and three sources familiar with the preliminary findings.
The investigation found that an American munition was probably responsible for the strike, though the military is yet to formally conclude the United States is responsible.
I'm going to skip ahead here in this story.
It says, the ongoing investigation has so far found that the munition did not go off target, but rather hit the school because old intelligence showed it to be a military target, the foresaid.
Witnesses and an Iranian Education Ministry official said previously that the school was located on a compound that was a base for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps until about 15 years ago.
The two sources said the Defense Intelligence Agency was one of the agencies responsible for providing targeting information that could have led to the school strike, though other sources likely contributed to verifying the target, including intelligence from U.S. allies.
And Frank, I thought that you'd be interested to have that information as well.
It's reports from multiple news outlets.
Thank you, ma'am.
You didn't have the photographs that I was basing in on.
I saw what you put up.
But there was an aerial photograph that showed three almost identical buildings adjacent to each other.
The third one, the one furthest from the photographer, was in fact identified as the school building.
In other words, if you aimed a missile or artillery at one of those first two buildings, you could very well have a miss depending on wind, depending on distance, depending on angle, by accident anyway.
And any good artilleryman would tell you that.
These things happen.
I saw short rounds, what we call short rounds in NAM happen that resulted in casualties.
And it's a sad thing.
It's a part of war.
But it really bothers me that people that don't know what they're talking about don't have any expertise, I can understand it, that could look at those photographs and not understand that three identical buildings in a row shot at from many miles away.
So if I'm not mistaken, I do see some photos of the compound in this story and others.
And I do see the cluster of buildings that look very similar to each other on that.
But at least based on the reporting that I'm seeing, it was the broader compound that encompasses the school, not just those three buildings.
But obviously that investigation is ongoing, and we'll have to wait to hear more as that continues.
Voting Issues and ID Requirements00:02:33
Kendra is in Richmond, Virginia on our line for independence.
Good morning, Kendra.
Hi, good morning, Kimberly.
I'm calling in reference, I guess, to the voting issue that we keep talking about.
So I think that for those that think it's okay to vote without ID, do you also think it would be okay for someone to go to your bank and withdraw money from your bank account and the bank not have a policy to verify your ID?
Show an ID for voting should be mandatory.
And for those that do not have an ID, you have plenty of time to gather the required documents to get your ID.
The next presidential election is November 7, 2028.
So you have two and a half years worth of time to work on getting your ID if you wish to participate.
All right.
Well, thank you to all of our callers who called in for Washington Journal today.
We are going to be back with another edition of the show tomorrow morning, starting at 7 a.m. Eastern.
We hope you'll join us then.
Today, Representative Robin Kelly speaks to voters in Chicago ahead of Tuesday's Democratic primary election in Illinois to replace current Senator Dick Durbin, who's retiring.
Illinois Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton and Congressman Rajah Krishnamurthy are also running.
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And then CQ roll call reporter Mark Satter on the week ahead in Congress, including Senator Mark Wayne Mullen's confirmation hearing as Homeland Security Director.
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