Washington Journal Open Phones features callers debating Project Freedom's defensive scope, the Jan. 6 immunity ruling, and Marco Rubio's upcoming Rome meeting with Pope Leo XIV. While guests criticize judicial apologies and Supreme Court decisions regarding abortion pills, they also discuss Article 5 amendment difficulties and Ohio primary races involving Vivek Ramaswamy and Sherrod Brown. Ultimately, the chaotic call-in session highlights deep partisan divides over national security, constitutional interpretation, and electoral integrity during a period of intense political polarization. [Automatically generated summary]
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Trump's America First Vision00:01:54
On his view of American interest in America first.
And we're grateful that Israelis have been very capable partners at many steps of this, and they may have some objectives at times that are slightly different than ours.
But there's only one hand on the wheel ultimately directing this, whether it's Project Freedom or previously Operation Epic Fury, and it's President Trump.
So we're grateful for their input, their insights, the existential nature of the threat they face from an Iranian bomb, the capabilities that they can bring to that.
But ultimately, the coordination will happen with the leadership of President Trump.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate it.
This morning, Republican South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, who serves as Senate Banking Committee Chair, discusses the U.S. economy and ways to keep American innovation at the forefront of global competition.
From the Milken Institute, watch live at 11:30 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN.
C-SPAN now, our free mobile app, and online at c-span.org.
We are standing by to go live to the White House, where President Trump is expected to sign a proclamation in the Oval Office.
We'll have live coverage when that gets underway here on C-SPAN.
In the meantime, a segment from this morning's Washington Journal.
The Wall Street Journal posting a story from the press conference.
You just heard this is the headline saying the Defense Secretary is saying that U.S. operations to unblock the Strait of Hormuz separate, according to his estimation in that press conference from the Iran conflict overall, saying that the operations to free up commercial shipping are separate and distinct from Operation Epic Fury, the name of the conflict with Iran, according to the Defense Secretary, saying that Project Freedom is defensive in nature's focused in scope and temporary in duration,
with one mission: protecting innocent commercial shipping from Iranian aggression.
Lawyers Running Congress00:06:03
Again, a lot in those opening moments.
You can still see that on C-SPAN 2 and our app and our website.
Cheryl has been holding on well before Open Forum in Maryland Democrats line.
Cheryl, thank you for holding on.
Go ahead.
Good morning.
I just wanted to say that I hope that the Democrat, well, I'm a Democrat and I hope the Democrats get in.
However, I'm very displeased with both parties.
And I hope that whatever party gets in, that they're going to start putting checks and balances on this administration.
And I'm always baffled by Republicans who always think that the Republican Party is doing the best by the people because they, every time they get into office, the deficit seems to climb.
And yet they always purport that they are the party of fiscal responsibility.
And they create these situations where we wind up having to shoulder the burden of their irresponsibility and spending.
And I'm just so disappointed with this Congress where everyone is accepting money from APAT.
And that means that there's really no distinction among the parties.
And I hope they're doing something about that.
Okay.
Okay, Cheryl there in Maryland.
Let's hear from Thomas in Texas, Independent Line.
Good morning, America.
Listen, I want to pray for all the people who were hit by the tornadoes up there, man.
That was devastating.
And I like to tell the farmers to look out for JD Vance.
He's buying up a bunch of farmland there for unfortunates.
But the recent statements that your Department of War, I guess.
Listen, if you look at CNN, 16 bases in the Middle East have been hit by the Iranians.
16 American bases.
I don't know why you guys don't report it, but it's, you know, we're not really winning the war.
But another thing is, look, people, man, vote.
Vote to save yourself and your neighbors.
That's all.
You know, you know, you need health care.
You know, you need clean drinking water.
Come on, man.
You know, common sense is not common anymore.
Thank you guys.
Take care.
Patricia is next in Florida Democrats line.
Go ahead.
Yes, I have never heard so many different words for war.
Now it's low-level kinetics.
I mean, it's just, this is just these clowns.
I mean, how many can they fit in the Volkswagen?
You know what I mean?
It's just one lie after another, and one, you know, they just substitute words, you know, for what war is.
I mean, it's going on, you know, and it's going to go on for a long time.
And these gas prices aren't going to come down for a long time.
So, people, you better save your money to put in your gas tank or find, you know, some other way to get around.
You know, it's going to be cheaper than a car.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
Here from Chuck in Alabama, Independent Line.
Good morning.
I'll tell you what, I watched a lot of the May Day stuff that went on, and that is totally scary.
Those people are, I mean, that's who the Democrats are.
I wish you would show a lot of that Mayday stuff where the people are waving communist flags, communist slogans.
I mean, it's ridiculous.
They want to get rid of all, you know, muddy, all the cops, ICE.
They want to get, you know, they want to just destroy America.
You need to show a lot of that Mayday stuff, and maybe wake some of these people up that are crazy.
Let's go to Frank on this open forum.
Frank in Florida, Independent Line.
Good morning, Pedro.
I sort of look at this as an independent, very simple.
Our problem with Congress is most of them are lawyers, okay, so they are skilled in what they want.
So we put an independent in there, a businessman or something, and I don't think he has much power.
Congress is made up of lawyers.
And our problem is if we want change, if we don't agree with the lawyers, then we have a problem.
And that's our problem in the state of Florida.
It's called automobile insurance.
The advertising on TV is killing us, all right, because of lawyers.
We should regulate their fee.
They're getting 40%.
Number two, in the war, these people complaining about the gasoline prices, Biden gave that country money.
It didn't go anywhere.
We are doing good there for that part of the region, and the rest of the world is not helping Mr. Trump.
And number two, employment is down tremendously.
He's not a lawyer.
He's a bull in a China shop trying to make change, but it'll go back to its own way.
And some of the people calling in about the rich, which I am not, if we had all people that were on welfare, where would we be?
The rich pay an awful lot in taxes, but these people never look at the figures.
That's our problem.
Lawyers are running Congress.
We need real people in there.
Okay.
Frank there in Florida giving us his thoughts on this open forum.
You can do the same.
202-748-8,000 for Democrats, Republicans, 202-748-8001.
Independence, 202-748-8002 here in Washington, D.C.
Veterans Questioning The System00:07:18
It was yesterday afternoon a man was wounded.
This is according to local news outlet, WTOP.
A man was wounded in a shooting involving U.S. Secret Service officers after he allegedly shot them near the Washington Monument Monday afternoon, according to the agency's deputy director.
The shooting happened at 15th Street and Independence Avenue here in D.C.
It was near a building where the Forest Service is headquartered, and a child whose age isn't publicly known was also struck by a bullet during the exchange of gunfire.
According to Secret Service Deputy Director Matthew Quinn, he made comments at a news conference shortly after this incident.
Here's a portion from yesterday: Plainclothes officers and agents that consistently patrol the outer perimeter of the White House complex identified a suspicious individual that appeared to have a firearm.
They called in support from our marked uniformed Secret Service police to make contact with that individual.
Upon making contact, that individual fled briefly on foot, withdrew a firearm, and fired in the direction of our agents and officers.
They returned fire and engaged.
That individual was hit.
He's since been transported to the hospital.
I have no comments on his condition.
I can tell you that at least one, only one bystander was hit by the suspect.
That individual, it's a juvenile, did not sustain any life-threatening injuries, but he's also receiving treatment at the hospital.
I'll point out that not long before this shooting occurred, the Vice President's motorcade did transit through this area.
The investigation itself, in terms of the use of force in the shooting, will be conducted by Dutch Bomb Police Department.
A couple of follow-up stories this afternoon from the shooting that took place at the White House correspondents dinner.
This is video analysis done by the New York Times this morning saying that initial hotel security footage shared by the president on Truth Social was too grainy and fragmentary to reveal much.
But the higher quality version of the footage from inside the Washington Hilton Hotel that the FBI released helps firm up the sequencing.
The New York Times was able to also synchronize that footage, which did not have audio with audio captured by another camera from inside the dining room.
Together, the analysis indicates that the gunman fired first at a Secret Service officer.
There's more of that in that story.
Also, when it comes to the legal proceedings of Cole Thomas Thomas Allen, the Washington Times picks this up in a story by Kerry Pickett.
Judge apologizes to the alleged galla gunman for treatment in jail, saying that the judge promised Cole Thomas Allen that he would try to get him a cell with a window and a Bible.
Magistrate Judge Zia Farqui addressed Mr. Allen directly in a court hearing, telling him, Mr. Allen, I'm sorry things have not been the way they are supposed to.
The jail is going to let me know by Tuesday about what's going on with your housing situation.
We should be able to get you into the medium portion of the jail with windows.
The judge told prosecutors during the hearing in U.S. District Court in Washington, quote, I can tell you I've never had a January 6th defendant who was put in a five-point restraint or a safe cell.
Again, there's more there from the Washington Times website if you want to read that.
Let's hear from Scott in Illinois Republican line.
Go ahead.
Thank you for taking my call.
Good morning, America and fellow veterans.
I just want to say something just a little off topic.
Here in Illinois, we send our older veterans, and I went to the honor flight last year.
And this year, today, we're sending 100 of our old-time veterans, Korea up to Vietnam guys, and they're going to land in D.C. today.
I please ask all D.C. residents and anybody that sees any of our veterans, thank them for what they've done.
And we're the fathers of the guys in battle now.
So I just want to say, please, D.C.'s been great.
They've opened arms for all of us old vets.
And just say hi to the guys.
They'll really appreciate it, okay?
Thank you so much.
What got you involved in that program in the first place?
Well, they've been after me for 10 years to go, and I went last year and I almost died.
And I won't get into it.
Tammy would remember it.
But the thing is, just the honor of God.
When we came back from Non, a lot of people know what happened to us.
But just a thank you for the guys and even the younger guys.
I talk to them all the time, and I go, thanks for, you know, not thank you for your service, but that's just something else on my mind.
But it's just, we're all girls, guys, families, everybody.
We're all in it together.
I did top secret computer work, but my best friend was a cook and the nurses.
This is what we are all in it together.
So let's get together as a country again and honor our veterans.
Don't fight them.
We're all together.
We're family.
We're Americans.
And on that note, God bless America.
Thank you.
Scott in Illinois there.
Let's hear from Mike in Kentucky, Republican line.
Good morning.
Good morning.
I'd just like to make one comment about this judge apologizing to a man who rushes a ballroom and shoots an agent and the judge apologizes because he doesn't have a window in his cell.
I mean, what is this country coming to?
I mean, I just, I mean, when you're in jail, you're in jail.
If you don't have a window, well, so be it.
Okay, thank you.
Almonzo is next up in Alaska.
I'm sorry, Alabama, Alabama, Independent Line.
Go ahead.
I can understand getting Alaska and Alabama mixed up sometimes, but I'd like to just say thank you to Scott, who just gave a good report for the veterans, from one veterans to another.
Scott, thank you.
And as an American, we need to continue to do that.
And I just want to represent Alabama that we all don't think like that person who spoke earlier from Alabama.
But with that being said, thank you for the opportunity to say thank you to Scott.
And God bless America and keep praying.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said to meet with Pope Leo XIV, a story in the USA Today saying the visit would be the first meeting between the Chicago-born pontiff and a senior member of the administration since the president sharply criticized the Pope last month.
An official Vatican calendar notice said the meeting was due for May 7th.
A spokesperson for the State Department confirmed Mr. Rubio's trip and said the visit to Rome would run from May 6th to the 8th.
The purpose of the visit is to, quote, to advance bilateral relations with Italy and the Vatican, according to the State Department spokesman, who went on to say that Mr. Rubio would meet with the Holy See leadership to discuss the situation in the Middle East and mutual interest in the Western Hemisphere.
Gary in Texas, Independent Line on this open forum.
Go ahead.
Good morning.
Here again, I'd like to tell Scott thanks again.
Also, as helping out our country as a veteran.
Amending The Constitution00:10:33
But my question is this.
On C-SPAN, you all do a great job of trying to be open to everybody.
My only concern is on the call-in numbers.
You don't have anything listing socialist or communist on there.
They have found a way to kind of weasel into the Democratic Party and hide themselves.
I think they need to be exposed when they call instead of on the Democratic line.
So I just wondered if you would consider that as part of your venue there.
Thank you.
Greg is next.
Greg in Fort Lauderdale, Democrats line.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Thank you for taking my call.
Just a couple of quick points.
You know, back in the 80s, the conservative movement was all about making sure that the Supreme Court did not legislate from the bench, as they used to say, you know, and that they're strict constructionists and their little interpretation of the Constitution, etc.
And then they come up, then now the Supreme Court has really stepped in it with regard to this voting rights decision that they made not too long ago.
And basically, they're just contradicting themselves and just outright betraying their own principles.
I don't understand how people can't see that the Supreme Court has now become a tool, basically, of the government, which was by design, by design of Donald Trump in the first place.
And speaking of Donald Trump, I don't understand why people cannot see that this man is an activist president.
Anything he feels like he has something to say about it, he'll stick his nose in it.
And without regard for the guardrails that were set up by the Constitution as far as the separation of church and state, I mean, it's really kind of getting to be.
I believe that the Democrats are correct.
Donald Trump is the biggest threat to the Constitution that we have ever seen in the whole history of this country.
And I just don't understand why the Republicans can't see that over the past 20 years or so, they have really run this country into the ground, starting with creating the economic crisis in 2008.
And Barack Obama had to come in and the Democrats to save the country.
And then the same thing happened with Joe Biden had to come in and save the country with the COVID crisis.
And every time the Republicans get involved in something, they run the country into the ground.
They basically trample on the Constitution.
And then the Democrats have to come in and fix it up and try to rectify the situation.
Okay.
Greg, M. Fort Lauderdale, he mentioned the Supreme Court, Justice Samuel Alito acting as his part of the court.
And when it comes to the abortion pill, Mifipristone saying that the justice Monday temporarily restored full access to the abortion pill, suspending for now a lower court ruling that barred doctors from sending the drug through the mail without first seeing a patient in person.
Alito's action, which came in a pair of brief orders known as administrative stays, puts the lower court's ruling on hold for one week and gives the Supreme Court time to consider emergency appeals from drug companies that manufacture Mifipristone.
It is the latest development in a case that has put abortion back on before the justices in an election year.
That's more there from the Wall Street Journal if you're interested in reading it there.
Let's hear from Mike in Illinois, Independent Line.
Yeah.
Good morning, Pedro.
This line, the president's rule for Iran for the war to end seems to be a line that's too far to meet.
By him saying he wants Iran to have no nuclear ambitions is kind of vague when just a thought can be an ambition.
Let me finish this out, please, Pedro.
The ambition could be a thought.
So in other words, a never-ending war.
So Trump is basically painting a target on the backs of American citizens and our military, similar what Bibi Nania did in Israel with the genocide war, painting a target on the backs of all Israelis, because the Palestinian genocide seems to be the flavor of the day with the blockade in Iran and the blockade in Cuba.
Is telling me that the land is more valuable than the people that are on it.
And here's a few reasons why there's danger for our military and our country.
Pete, there's no quarters.
We don't want any survivors that were fighting, which tells our enemies that we're basically wanting everybody to die.
Also, Pete Hagside hired his lawyer and made him a general without any background checks.
And this guy sits through all the hearings or all the meetings, firing generals and whatnot.
And also, the 103rd was parachuted on Carg Island with no cover.
We lost six heroes and many more wounded.
Gerald R. Ford's been at sea for over 316 days, which is record-breaking.
The whole group of people got it.
Gotcha, Mike.
Gotcha.
Let's go to Eric.
Eric in Minnesota, Democrats line.
You're next up.
I just want the country to take a deep breath and read through its own history.
Learning from history is how you advance safely into the future.
If we go into this history, we see that there was a rebellion.
There was a rebellion.
Somebody broke into our capital and desecrated it and tried to change an election.
I think normally in our country's history, that would have been a rebellion that would have been put down.
And rebellions like Shea's Rebellion in the 18th century, they were put down forcibly so it couldn't cause rot.
Well, in this instance, it went on to our top judicial body, the Supreme Court, and instead of putting down a situation that was out of control, they gave the leader of that rebellion immunity.
Okay, so you've created a situation which is not political.
This was a kind of illegal rebellion.
And so who do they ask for help?
They asked the Democrats.
This is not a political situation.
This was a rebellion.
And it now has been allowed to fester on into the future.
And we're looking for easy answers.
Good luck.
How are you going to put down a rebellion that's now stuck its spider web way out into the hinterlands of our leadership?
Okay.
Eric there in Minnesota, the Pulitzer Prizes were offered for various works of nonfiction.
One of those recipients, We the People, a History of the U.S. Constitution by Jill Lapore, the Harvard historian and New York staff, New Yorker staff writer, offers a lively account of Americans' long frustrated efforts to change the country's chief governing document, drawing on the stories of mostly unknown figures and making a case for what present-day Americans can learn from their efforts.
She had a chance during a book fair last year to talk with her own Peter Slent about the book and the findings in it.
Here's a portion of that interview.
You opened this book on the history of the U.S. Constitution with a quote.
It was intended to be amended.
Who am I quoting?
By the great American philosopher Bugs Bunny.
And what does that mean?
You know, during the bicentennial of the Constitution in 1986-7, CBS did these bicentennial minutes with Looney Tunes.
They're hilarious.
I encourage everyone to go to YouTube and look up Bugs Bunny's ode to the amendments.
He sings to Daffy Duck and just makes a case that the Constitution was intended to be amended, which indeed it was.
And my book is really inspired by that idea, right?
We've kind of forgotten that a foundational principle of constitutionalism is repair.
Well, you write that Article 5 is a sleeping giant.
What is Article 5, and why do you call it a sleeping giant?
Yeah, so Article 5 is the amendment provision of the Constitution.
It's kind of the least used part of the Constitution.
It's a sleeping giant because although the Constitution was written with the idea that, look, if you're going to write down fundamental law, which is a great thing to do, because then it's transparent, we can inspect it and say, is our government abiding by these rules that we set, we the people set out.
You also have to have a mechanism to fix it, to improve things, to fix something that goes wrong.
And yet, the way they set up the mechanism for amendment turned out to not work especially well.
Why?
The requirement is a sort of a double supermajority.
To amend the Constitution, you have to pass, a proposal has to pass by a two-thirds supermajority at both houses, and then it goes to the states and has to be ratified by three-quarters of the states.
At the time, they came up with that.
You know, it's a math problem.
And this was their good math solution, their best solution.
There were no political parties when the Constitution was written.
And it turns out that once you have parties, that math doesn't work very well.
And when you have polarized parties the way we have today, I mean, you know, Congress is a very hard time passing a law, meeting, you know, challenging a filibuster.
It's just, it's become very difficult to amend the Constitution.
And it has really always been so.
So it's a sleeping giant in the sense that we tend to have long periods where Article 5 is just asleep.
Like no one even remembers that you can amend the Constitution.
And then suddenly the giant wakes, and then we tend to have bam, bam, bam, a number of amendments all at once.
If you want to see more of that interview, by the way, go to our the book TV website, which you can find on the main C-SPAN website.
You can type her name in the box at the top there, too, if you want to find it.
One more call.
Ohio Governor Policy Debate00:04:41
This will be from Georgia Republican line.
We'll hear from Ulysses.
Go ahead.
Good morning, sorry.
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak.
I want to say I'm so happy I'm living in the world's great.
The world's great.
People wake up and say, you retired kids.
Have a better society to live in again.
God bless you to everywhere in Americans.
Thank you.
Ulysses in Georgia, finishing off this round of open forum.
Thanks, all of you who participate.
We are standing by to go live to the White House, where President Trump is expected to sign a proclamation in the Oval Office.
We'll have live coverage when that gets underway here on C-SPAN.
In the meantime, a segment from this morning's Washington Journal.
And joining us to talk about the Ohio primary and what to consider there, Karen Cassler of State House News Bureau.
She's their bureau chief.
Good morning, Ms. Cassler.
Thanks for giving us your time.
Good morning.
If people are not in Ohio and they're looking towards the state, what are they looking at?
What takes place today?
Well, there are two major races here that are happening on the primary.
And of course, these are the ones that will predict what will happen in the general election.
We've got a race for governor, the first time that that seat has been opened since 2018 with Republican Governor Mike DeWine, term limited out.
And so we also have a U.S. Senate race going on where you have a rare situation, a former U.S. Senator who actually lost his seat in Sherrod Brown, the Democrat, trying to regain his seat and defeat an incumbent Republican who was just appointed to that position two years ago.
That's U.S. Senator John Houston.
So this is an interesting combination here because on the governor's side, we have two potential candidates in Vivek Ramaswamy, who is the leading frontrunner for the Republicans, and Democrat Amy Acton, who's the only candidate for the Democrats going at it this fall, who neither one of them have held elected office before.
Neither one of them have appeared on the ballot.
Whereas in the Senate race, you have two candidates who are very experienced at government, though one may have a little bit more name recognition than the other.
When it comes to that governor's race, talk a little bit then about Ohio and how it's politically made up and who does it favor at this stage.
Well, Ohio has been dominated by Republicans since the 90s.
I mean, since 1994, 82% of statewide races have been won by Republicans.
Donald Trump won by eight points in 2016 and 2020, won by 11 points in 2024.
So obviously, Republicans have had the edge here.
But there are certainly some indications that Democrats are gaining strength here.
And that could bring potentially the first Democratic governor in Ohio since in several years.
And again, the idea that this is two unknown candidates in Bivek Ramaswamy, who a lot of people might remember him from the Department of Government Efficiency.
He was appointed with Elon Musk and actually left before he could really do anything on that so he could run for Ohio governor.
And he does have some opponents in this election, but he's raised $50 million.
He's said that he's going to spend $30 million of his own money.
So he seems likely to be the one that will move on.
And then again, Amy Acton, who was Governor Mike DeWine's Ohio Department of Health director and got a lot of praise at the beginning of the pandemic, but then Republicans started pushing back on her for closing on essential businesses, closing schools.
Now they've been running a campaign against her already, calling her Dr. Lockdown, which is interesting because Ramaswamy also has some COVID connections as well with some of the things that his biotech company did.
What's the main message that both Mr. Warmaswamy and Ms. Acton are delivering at this stage?
I think both candidates are talking about affordability, and that's the issue that we keep hearing about, but they have very different ideas of how to resolve it.
Ramaswamy's talked a lot about cutting the state income tax, in fact, eliminating it, and cutting property taxes, rolling them back to pre-COVID levels, but he hasn't been very specific on how he would pay for that.
Acton's talked about tax cuts for working families, subsidies for child care, also taking on medical debt.
But she's also said very little about how she would pay for it.
So we're hearing a lot about that and the whole question about affordability and whether the economy is really as bad as people are perceiving it to be.
That's kind of Ramaswamy's view.
Whereas Acton has done a lot more in the area of people are suffering.
We need to do something.
You talked about the Senate race.
You talked about Sherrod Brown, who previously served.
Give us more context of where he stands this day and who's challenging him.
Funding Affordable Care Plans00:00:28
Well, John Houston is the former lieutenant governor who was appointed to JD Vance's old seat.
And live now to the White House, where President Trump is set to sign a proclamation in the Oval Office.
This is live coverage on C-SPAN.
I've been in the house in the Oval Office on this magnificent spring day, and it is indeed a beautiful day to celebrate America's athletic traditions and champions and physical fitness and all of those things that I work so hard at on a personal basis.