for your time this morning. guest: thank you for having me. host: that is it for our program today. we appreciate everyone who called in and all of our guests who joined us as well. we will be back tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. eastern. enjoy the rest of your sunday and happy mother's day to all of the moms out there. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

war. "washington journal" starts now. ♪ host: "washington journal" this is -- this is "washington journal" for sunday, may 12. the social security trust fund is expected to be exhausted in 2035, one year later than previous the projected. after that, the program will not be able to pay full benefits if lawmakers do not act to address the pending shortfalls. what changes to social security would you support? if you are under 40, (202) 748-8000. 40 to 65, (202) 748-8001. if you are over 65, (202) 748-8002. if you would like to text us, you can do so at (202) 748-8003. be sure to include your name and

city. you can also post a question or comment on facebook at facebook.com/cspan or on x at @cspanwj. we are going to get your calls and comments in a few minutes, but first joining us to tell us more about the report is personal finance reporter lori cornish. thanks for joining us. why don't you start by telling us about the -- that seems to be making a lot news this week. guest: the funds -- the combined trust funds for the program are expected to now run out in 2035, one year later than previously projected. we have low unemployment, strong labor growth, and wage growth as well. those are factors that contribute to people being able to work.

when they are working, they are paying into the program, which helps it. host: the depletion date seems to be a moving target. it was pushed back this year. how likely is it to continue happening or even slide backwards? guest: it can slide backwards. that is one thing to watch. so it is not necessarily unexpected that it would be in this range. the key thing to watch is that we are getting closer to this depletion date, which means inevitably something needs to happen or we will face these and if it cuts. host: as of now, if something is not done, what will the cuts look like? guest: if nothing is done, there will be an across-the-board benefit cut that will include all beneficiaries.

it will not be something you can choose who is the neediest or who can sacrifice some of the income they are receiving. it is imperative that lawmakers look at this beforehand and try to address it so that people do not face income shortfalls. host: what are some of the most probable changes to the program? what is being looked at? guest: there are a lot of changes being talked about. some of the most popular are raising the maximum taxable earnings, so currently around $168,000 is taxed for social security. unless your earnings are above that, they no longer fall under the purview of social security. maybe higher earners could be paying more into the system. there is the idea that we could raise the retirement age. some people are working longer.

could they hold off on claiming social security benefits? there could be ways of changing the cost-of-living adjustments every year. could they be more generous or less generous? these are the kinds of questions lawmakers will look to answer. host: we are nine years out from the projected depletion date. why is it better that congress act sooner rather than later? guest: the longer they wait, the more dramatic the cuts will have to be. a former social security administration official was saying under barack obama you could have eliminated the taxable maximum earnings at that time and assault of the problem. now, that is not enough to take care of the shortfall. there has to be a combination of changes. the longer we wait, the more dramatic they may have to be. people might see changes sooner

than they might have liked. host: you mentioned some of the possible changes and ideas being floated. what are the biggest challenges to those being lamented -- implemented? guest: the biggest challenge is getting people to plan their retirement according to the changes. we do not know what will happen. can you plan to work longer? can you plan to pay more taxes? these are things people would want to know about beforehand. it is a challenge for lawmakers to address some of these topics. these would wrinkle -- would require tax increases and maybe benefit cuts and there is not a lot of political appetite to make those kinds of changes. host: thank you for your time this morning. on the house floor this week, a

democrat of connecticut, ranking member of the ways and means social security subcommittee, here's what he said about changes to social security. [video clip] >> i rise today to address the body and discuss the nation's number one anti-poverty program for the elderly and the number one anti-property program -- antipoverty program for children, social security. i know you know this, but can you imagine that congress has not made an adjustment to social security and more than 53 years? richard nixon was president of the united states the last time that congress enhanced benefits for the country. imagine, mr. speaker.

i'm sure for people in our audience that 10,000 baby boomers a day become eligible for social security and, as you know, the fund is about to be cut by 20%. in two ways. if congress does nothing by 20:34, according to the latest report, it will be cut 20%, so basically the nation's number one anti-poverty program for the elderly will be cut by 20% if congress does nothing, and it has not done anything in more than 50 years. host: we are taking your calls on what changes to social security you would support. the phone lines are (202)

748-8000 if you are under 40. (202) 748-8001 for 40 to 65. if you are over 65, (202) 748-8002. we will go to greg in new york on the under 40 line. good morning. do we have greg? caller: vice presidential candidate for the trump campaign due to censorship and establishment issues. let's touch upon social security, a great concept that has helped so many americans get over the finish line into their golden years, but so many americans have worked so hard they have not been able to collect social security. how do we find balance between people that never achieved that

type of status and people that do? we can look at the border wall. if we look at the border wall and say, quite a few miles of border wall there, we could put solar panels on the border wall and then all of a sudden we have new revenue coming into the government. we end migratory issues with respect to mexico and now the barrier to entry for latin american citizens and american citizens to participate in the economy, not only the north american economy but the south american economy, has now been increased in such a way that now people have the same opportunity . so isolate opportunity exists between latin america and north america, then you create the type of dynamic that were assuaged with the trump campaign

and worked over through the trump campaign and put america in a better position. it is how we utilize solutions that have been overlooked. when i say value censorship, i mean warren buffett, fusion gps. host: we will go to dorothy in virginia on the over 65 line. caller: good morning. i'm calling about the social security problem that could be solved very easily. you take the cap off of social security. the wealthy that have achieved so much in this country off the back of the working poor. if you remove that cap, that will secure social security into

the next millennium and further. i have worked since i was 14 years old. i am 78 now. my father signed for me to work after school when i was in high school. i worked until i was 69 years old and only stopped working because of health issues, which i still have and made it impossible for me to work. i'm living on just social security. i never had a 401(k). they did not exist when i started working. there are thousands of people in this country barely existing on social security alone. it is a crime to me that the wealthy in this country are not paying their fair share.

if we think the older people in this country now that are hurting, if trump gets into office and they do -- the republicans do cut our social security, we are going -- we will die because we will not even be able to eat. host: dorothy mentioning removing income tax cap's. according to the american academy of actuaries, some of the proposals to changes to social security under tax increases, eliminating taxable minimum so all earnings are taxed got tax all earnings above 400,000 dollars or make 90% of all earnings subject to the payroll tax, increase the payroll tax rate by 25%, and tax investment income.

and gifts and earnings such as interest. also under their proposal our benefit cuts and reduced benefits for high income individuals who have not yet claimed full retirement age and reduce the annual cost-of-living adjustment. we are talking about what changes you would support to social security. we will go to joseph in virginia beach on the 40 to 65 line. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i think we have a problem in our country. people do not really understand what is going on. with republicans and trump just offering billionaires all these promises that he is probably going to give them where they do

not have to pay the taxes that they deserve to. they have to take care of our country too. i pay taxes. i am also retired, but i work part time. disabled somewhat. i like to -- host: what would you like to see done? what changes would you like to see to social security? caller: i would like to see the billionaires pay their taxes and that would put a lot more money in our coffers to take care of social security. host: marianne in ohio. caller: i want -- i went and heard mathew desmond speak last

tuesday night. he is the pulitzer prize-winning novelist for the book evicted. he talked about poverty in america. one of the things he said is that, first, we do not have to raise taxes on anybody. he said what we need to do is just get the wealthy to pay their fair share. that would solve the poverty problem in this country. another thing he pointed out was we have one of the highest rates of poverty in all western countries. if you go to europe their taxes are higher and it shows because they do not have the poverty problems we have. another thing is i am also -- i was a government employee so i do not have social security. i have a government pension and i do not understand -- my

government pension is very good and what i make per month on that benefit is higher than people make on social security. i do not understand why people cannot have what i have. host: amy in new york on the 40 to 65 line. caller: i have always said we should tax all earnings. every year, they look at what i make and add a few thousand more and make that the limit, so i'm saying why am i paying the same amount to social security as people making a huge amount? when i hear the politicians, they talk about raising the retirement age or means testing. i think that is wrong because everybody has put money in. everybody should be able to get that benefit out. the other point is my husband passed away at 66.

he was still working and he paid into social security his whole life. i was given a $100 death benefit and told i could collect social security when i turned a certain age for a few years so everything he put in is now in the coffers for everyone else. definitely taxing all earnings i think would be the fair thing to do. host: phil in north carolina. caller: i am in favor of eliminating the wage cap. to heck with increasing the amount. all income should be taxable, especially on so many billionaires out there, especially professional athletes. there is no reason why they should not pay the same for all their income at the same rate

that we all have to pay. i am 76 now. if i live to 20 35, that will be a crusher. we should eliminate any effort by the government to siphon money out of the fund to support other programs and i am also in favor of eliminating any contributions to welfare programs that do not affect income. there are so many programs out there that are siphoning money off the retirement benefit that was originally planned for. that is all i have to say. host: in march on the program, the national committee to preserve social security joined us and explained the process and what happens to money paid into

the program. >> i think the answer to shore up the program is to bring more revenue to it. let me explain something. right now, if you pay -- if your income is 168 thousand $600 a year, you are paying 6.2% of your income toward social security. let's say your income is above that. let's say you are a wealthy ceo there's a good chance you are paying a smaller percentage of your income toward retirement, probably stopping paying your payroll taxes in january or february because of that, so that is important. in terms of the program, the program has never been rated. that notion comes from the way it is financed. it is a pay-as-you-go system the way it is financed. workers are paying for tyree's. the way that is done is when you make your contribution with your

taxes toward social security, that money goes to the government. the government takes that money and buys a u.s. treasury security that earns interest and when it is time to pay benefits that treasury security is redeemed for cash. then it goes to pay methods, but in that transaction in which they take your money and use it to buy treasury security, that goes to every function that the government pays for, paying for fighters, submarines, meals on wheels. eventually, that money comes back to the people who put it in. host: let's hear from vanessa on the 40 to 65 line. caller: thank you for taking my call. my opinion on it is i agree with what most of the people are saying.

social security should not be cap to because i want -- before i retired, i wanted to make six figures. did not make it. i had other employees that were making more than that and they stopped paying social security taxes. why? then the thing that really bothered me was they tax me, they take my social security on money i make, and when i got it they tax it again. that is ridiculous. i have been working for 45 years before i retired. now, when i finally got my social security, now i find out it is taxable? i think social security should be taxed on every dollar that you make. i do not care whether it is $100,000 or $1 million. everyone should pay into social security and they should not take anything out of it because we paid for it with the expectation that we will get the

money back when we retire and now you're going to change the rules? i do not think that is fair. we have billions of dollars to buy bombs to kill people in other countries but we do not have enough money to pay people that shipped into social security for all these years? that is my opinion. we should not have a cap on social security. host: james in new york city on the over 65 line. good morning. caller: they have in about this for years, and stilling this fear. paul ryan, the republicans -- i hate to make it political, but that is all they want to do. they want to get rid of social security. rick scott wants to get rid of social security and sunset it. johnson from wisconsin.

that is all they want to do. it goes back to fdr. i will make it simple. i have worked a lot of jobs. i started working when i was eight years old as an actor. i still have the original social security card. when you pay into the system, guess what? when you reach of age you get paid. i know lots of people. i have had many different jobs because as an actor you had to work. sometimes i would work, sometimes i would not. there were people working off the books. i know one guy who was working cleaning houses, very wealthy, but everything was off the books. once he became of age, he was getting 800 dollars a month from social security. you know why? he did not pay into the system. i get 1900 per month.

i paid into the system. if you are not getting enough, those people are being paid off the books. host: what would you support? caller: first, the money put into the system should not be touched. the government has no problem with spending about a trillion dollars every year for the pentagon and military-industrial complex. keep it and leave it alone. the republicans have been touching it. they want to get rid of it. they want to get rid of medicare and medicaid and social security, so i know my late uncle, who had a regular job, and he just put his money into it and by the time he was about 68 he was a millionaire.

only taking 10% to 20% out of his check. that is what the government needs to do with the people that pay. host: we will go to paul in nevada on the over 65 line. >> thanks for taking my call. when the national debt went over $30 trillion, the media reported the government borrow $6.5 trillion from itself. that is what they borrow over the last 40 years or so out of social security and medicaid. what i would like to know is, if the federal government paid that back into the fund, how it would impact the expiration date. that is my only question. thank you for taking my call. host: john in kansas on the 40

to 65 line. caller: i think social security should be means tested. they say they baby boomers are the richest generation ever, so some people do not need it. in regards to paying taxes on your income, basically you should pay it all the way through. host: are you retired? caller: i retired seven or eight years ago. host: are you expecting social security? caller: i started taking it at 62 years of age. you had a person say a person is working off the books -- it was not that i was working out the books. it is just the way the tax system works, i can invest money in different things.

i pay what i'm supposed to pay. there is nothing wrong with that. the other side of that coin is, at the same time, most people, at least 50% of the people do not even have money in the stock market. host: he will go to gym in florida on the over 65 line. good morning. caller: please stop blaming the rich. the difference between us and you, we prepared. we worked hard. so i say for the younger generation, let's get rid of social security completely. it is not fair to the younger generation. it is growing -- going broke in

2031. for my democrat friends, your migrants coming in already in the system. host: he will go to john in california on the 40 to 65 line. caller: good morning. i became disabled as of no fault of my own and i had been paying into the system for 27 years and i believe anybody that has been paying in deserves to have that benefit when the time comes, but myself, i am trying to find

someplace i can afford to get the care that i need as well as keep a roof over my head and it is becoming increasingly more difficult every year and i just believe there should be some type of adjustment to help people like myself who cannot work to make some extra money to be able to feed yourself and have a place to live. host: we will go to mary in nevada on the over 65 line. caller: that last gentleman is just heartbreaking, that someone in the united states where there is so much money, somebody who is disabled, has to worry about being able to put a roof over his head. and you have these politicians

that -- we have a congress that has been the most ineffective congress since the civil war. you have trump out there saying he wants to cut social security and medicare p they do not want to cut it. they want to eliminate it. they want to get rid of it. they want to throw grandma off the train. they want to get rid of the affordable care act. there is money out there. they can find it. it is an insurance policy and the dividend comes when you retire. so i do not know. people better wake up because the republican party has been co-opted by donald trump. they have an authoritarian agenda and i wish c-span would address donald trump's interview in time magazine and the 2025 project. you can see the structural

changes that they are going to make. we are not going to look like the u.s.. we are going to look like russia. host: mary talking about benefits that people receive. according to the social security administration, an average of 68 million americans per month receive a social security benefit. $1907 is the average monthly benefit for retired workers. disabled workers receive $1537 per month. let's go to william in oklahoma on the 40 to 65 line. caller: good morning. i am pretty young. i am 41. but i collect social security. i will tell you why. i was to -- i was diagnosed at 38 with terminal brain cancer and lung cancer, so it put me on disability.

so i collect social security. i paid in. i was a technician for most of my life and turns that career into a machinist and paid a lot of money into social security. so my check rate right now is $1800, but after all my medical, i pay blue cross blue shield and medicare as well, so it takes it down to $1500. but my children -- i have two children. they each receive $460 apiece. all of that together is a little higher than what it is rated, but life is hard but you have to realize if you are not out there working every day and you're collecting money from social security that you have paid in, it is time for a life change and we have to try to live within our means. right now, i have a roommate,

not something that i'm used to. food is difficult to buy, especially now with prices going so high. but i try not to focus it all on one particular individual like the president. i know there is a whole process in play. we have three branches of government. as far as changes that could be made to social security, it will be nice if they would give the people that paid in the amount they paid in as a percentage and if you do not pay into social security all your life and try to come onto the system, that is just the way it should be. as far as the donald trump comments, with these tax cuts i made $11,000 more cash per year every year he was in office and it allowed our family to finally hit $60,000 a year. we have struggled through the

bush, clinton euros. that was my entire life, bush, clinton. $11,000 more to bring home per year with that tax-cut for a lower middle-class family -- it is really good. with social security you have to take the money. you have to budget it. you might have to change your lifestyle. if you are used to being -- making $120,000 a year and driving a nice car and having a nice home and now you find yourself in a position where you have brain cancer and it is a terminal disease, life changes. so you have to adapt and re-budget what you have. host: thank you for your call. we hope you are doing better and appreciate your comments. we will go to roger in north

carolina on the over 65 line. caller: good morning. i'm not going to talk about social security if it is ok. host: that is our topic. you can call back at about 9:00 if you have a comment on another issue. caller: i will talk about social security. the problem we have with our government is it is a united states corporation, not a republic. it is all written on paper. you can look it up on the internet. it will surprise a lot of people. it will shock people. money is what runs washington, d.c. mandate is corrupt. that is the sad thing. and when i was in germany, why do you think so many veterans stay in germany? there are hundreds of them. it is because they get a better deal, a better life. it is sad, so i throw that in.

what else? host: what changes would you support to social security? are you retired? >> i am retired. i would say the rich have to pay. they are going to have to contribute. it is part of the law. it is part of being an american. the way they are in germany, i'm going to throw that in. the veterans -- another thing is everybody up there, all the senators and the house and senate, they are all -- i hate to say this, but when you live in germany you see it. they are all money grubber's. it is not allowed in germany. host: we will hear from tom in

illinois on the over 65 line. caller: i agree with the last caller. our congress -- the cia and fbi, everybody is grabbing money and they went and grabbed our social security money. i am 65. i have been putting in. but just to refute -- i do not know where you think the republicans are going to revamp social security. trump was already president. he was not authoritarian. he was the president before he even got in they were spying on him trying to get rid of him. host: do you have something you would like to see changed about social security or a change you would support? caller: the change i would support him if they quit taking the money and leave it alone. host: we will go to damien in georgia on the over 65 line.

caller: this is my first time talking to you. i wanted to welcome you to the c-span family. great. hope everything goes well for you. listen, under reagan and then bush, they stole all that money from social security and had the nerve to call it now entitlement, which is a slap in the face to everybody. what george bush senior did was all those under his cronies, they took all the money out of social security, anything that had a large fund to it, they stole all of that. that last guy that called the rich guy and said you poor people need to stop blooming the rich, he said the same thing that is the problem with america, that those who have looked down on those who have not. those who have not, it is your

fault that you are poor. that is a problem that we have that we need to change along with social security and everything else in this country. >> in the washington post this morning, this column from the caller money columnist the headline is, it is time to retire these five common myths about social security. here are the five she lists. social security is or will be bankrupt. young adults will not benefit from social security. a shortfall makes collecting early a wiser move. number four, the federal government has rated the social security trust fund. number five, members of congress do not pay social security taxes. we will go to jack in florida on the over 65 line. caller: good morning. i call in every once in a while

so i am probably a little bit nervous but i am on social security. i understand it is going to run out when i will be 99 years old. so i might be here and i might not be. anyway, i depend on social security. i get just a little under what the average payment is per month, but it helps me do what i have to do to stay in an apartment. i live in an apartment. i was living in a retirement home and it went up. i got a raise this year -- last year. and they took the rays that i got and they increased the rent that much, so 8%. and i was going to move anyway

because i could not stay there much longer. i stayed probably too long, but to me social security is vital in my well-being, per se. so i -- what they should do is make everybody, when they start paying in social security, everybody, they should be 100% everybody pay mac -- pay from january 1 to december 31 and they would not have an issue with social security other than having officials pay into the fund every once in a while, like the other caller said they had maybe five since i have been

paying in social security and that is wrong. they should not put a limit on the amount that people pay. i have relatives that pay maybe one month in social security and the rest of the year is an increase in their pay and that is true. everybody should pay and have the federal government and politicians keep their hands off of that. it is a fund, not an entitlement. host: we will go to andrew in long island on the 40 to 65 line. caller: i have a couple issues on social security. i'm a veteran and i do get social security and i do pay and. first, we have the republicans who want cut no matter what happens to the regular person,

they want you to lose every dime you have ever accumulated because they do not want you getting generational wealth. they want to take warehouse and everything for every little thing. if you get sick, any little thing. then you have joe biden, who does not have a problem giving away every dime to anybody, whether they are a citizen or not. i can do a few things. i can do a little bit of work. can joe biden come up with a way to not let people work? he tells able-bodied body to 20-year-olds that they do not have to work and they can collect welfare and he tells people like me who can do a few hours a week that i'm not allowed to work. what is the work that can happen? this is ridiculous. host: we will go to johnny in alabama on the over 65 line.

are you there? johnny in alabama, one more time. we will move onto christina in florida on the 40 to 65 line. caller: good morning. show me exactly what billionaire social security kickback for government is. that is what i want to see. the billionaires make oodles of money can't yet they do not have enough in their savings? show me what joe biden's social security check is, please. host: tim in washington, 40 to 65 line. go ahead. caller: i was just washing or show and i heard talking about different things. in my opinion, they should just take the cap off or raise it

quite a bit and reinvest into the entire social security disability system as well as the other department that support it and i think it is just crazy the way they run it and i think it could be fixed if they had the political will to do it instead of treating it like a football similar to the border. i think it would be good if people that came across the border that wanted to work got the ability to work and pay into the tax system and social security system until they become legal citizens. that is if they come across legally, not if they just run across and do not turn themselves in and get background checks, so it is all a common nation of things that politicians tend to use as a football during elections.

if we tell the politicians they cannot play football anymore until they are office, maybe they will get on the field and get each other beat up a little. i digress. but that is mine. host: during a senate special agent committee hearing, florida senator rick scott asked the social security administration or about the financial future of the program. here is what he said. >> we just got president biden's fourth budget and there was nothing in the budget that actually protects social security from the standpoint of it did not reduce when it was going to go bankrupt. there has been nothing, which surprised me so i cannot imagine if you had come as governor, what your pension plan was -- so

are you surprised that there is nothing in the budget to deal with the issue of social security? >> when i was elected governor, the pension system was very challenged, facing unsustainable and immediate unsustainable future and we had to fix that. people were not happy about it, but we fixed it. the depletion of that, as the actuaries call it contradistinction from bankruptcy, that is now estimated to be happening in 2034. that would be the point if men and women of our congress do not act as your predecessors did about a month before the last depletion event in 1982, if you do not act it is true that social security would only have 77% of the dollars that it needs to meet full benefits.

i am not terribly surprised because i also know, in terms of a formal proposal from the president, i know he has been clear about his policy decision and i also know he has consistently stated his desire to see those that earn more than $400,000 to start to pay into social security again. i also know from having gone through the confirmation process and met with many of you that there are a lot of ideas out there. there are some who told me we should try to do this right now. there are others who said there is no way in the political dynamics of an election year that this can get solved right now. and we need to do it after the next election. fortunately, i no longer have a political job, so those

calculations are not mind to make. they are yours to make. we have great actuaries. anyway we can be of help as you think about this, we will be very responsive and able to do so. host: we have about 10 minutes left in this discussion about what changes to social security you would support. we will go next to rory in georgia on the over 65 line. >> i have two questions. first, i do receive social security and i pay my premium each month. if i go to the doctor, medicare puts in a claim against my social security, but if i do not go to the doctor i assume that money remains in social security itself into the trust fund. what i would change is the medicare supplement because

there are people paying for medicare supplement each month, whether they go to the doctor or not. that money is going into private insurance companies out of social security, so the insurance company is going to profit but social security -- medicare is operating at a deficit. it is the same thing, so if i made some changes, i might take things away for medicare advanced -- advantage can't take some things for medicare advantage and add it to social security but there is so much money going to private insurance companies every month, even when a person does not go to the doctor. that is the first thing. then educate the public. people need to be educated about medicare and medicaid because people on medicaid need to know

if you go on medicaid everything you own goes to the government. your house cut your money, your savings. they take everything. the only thing your left is $2500. if you have a car, it is gone. if you have a house, it is gone. i would stop that money from going to private insurance companies and let everybody go on medicare and make the appropriate changes to include those benefits. host: we will go to kevin in georgia on the 40 to 65 line. caller: i was calling to say the caller before must have warms in his brain too so it is obvious he does not know what he is talking about. i don't want nobody touching my social security. that money belongs to me. it is mine. i earned it.

i am entitled to it. i want to keep it that way. i want to grow old with it with my husband and i want the government to leave my money alone. host: are there changes to the program you would support? caller: i just -- i get my money every week -- every year my increase doubles and i want to keep it that way. host: we will go to chris in pittsburgh on the over 65 line. caller: i am 69. i guess i'm one of the bad baby boomers who caused all the problems. earlier, i heard that -- on

program, that around 10,000 baby boomers are going into the program every day, so i just used my search and it shows that , according to the u.s. census bureau, 2.6 baby boomers die each year went which is more than 7000 funerals per day, so 10,000 are coming in, 7000 are going out. over a time, this big bump of baby boomers is going to dissipate, but being that social security is the third rail and you cannot make any adjustments or even talk about it in politics, the problem keeps going on. if they would just do a little bit of everything, maybe bump it up to 63 and may people pay in a little more than what they are paying in and then extend the cap a little bit country a little bit of everything, my guess is we would get through this bump of all these baby

boomers that happened right after world war two and everybody came home and wanted to make a new life and things will dissipate over time. i'm sure the actuarial's are showing this but nobody talks about it. i would be interested to talk about the aspect of the problem. host: in illinois on the 40 to 65 line. caller: here's the thing i think should change. i lost my husband during covid and i have a railroad pension. what i did not know what would happen is that -- let's say if i even had social security, what they do is they do not give you two social security whatever. you take what you do even though you have been married for 35, 40 years, they give you one

benefit. they do not give you two benefits, so when he died they gave me $225 to bury him, which is ridiculous, and immediately cut off his social security so i was left with just my pension to survive on. that made it so difficult with trying to help out with the grandchildren and whatnot or just myself to survive. what i think needs to change is, especially being married and stuff, is why would they cut out your husband who works for 70 years -- why would they not give me his benefits were if i had died why would he not receive my benefits? that is one of the things i would like to see changed. most people i talked to when i tell them this story, they say, i did not even know that. i had just assumed.

so they go home and they check it out and i get calls back and they say i was not aware of that until you told me that, so that is one of the things i would like to see change. host: we will go to dave in minnesota on the 40 to 65 line. caller: what i would support as raising the rate. it has not been raised since 1990. it is 6.2% you pay cut the same as your employer. i think it is time to raise that and that will help because the population is not -- is inverting. we will have an upside down pyramid as the population keeps decreasing, so we will have to raise the rate to keep social security going on that is the only thing that will save it. host: are you collecting social security yet? caller: host: i am not. how many years before you do? caller: i will wait until the

maximum age. host: let's go to sandy in ohio on the over 65 line. caller: if social security is in such bad shape, wide did they give us -- you made a few bucks more and then it changes were health care. you are making $10 too much now. so you were taking away this benefit because you make too much, so i do not think that is right. also, wanting to raise the retirement age -- if you have a desk job cut you might be able to work until you are into her 80's, maybe, or like the senate. but if you are doing a labor job your body wears out. you cannot do it to much longer, so that is my comment. i know many elderly people and they all say -- i'm almost 80

myself. that is what they said. i wish they would have left it alone because it changed so many things now. with the few dollars they give us. thank you so much. host: brian in new york, 40 to 65 line. caller: my biggest point on this, i am 54 years old. i have been working since i was 14. i spent 23 years plus as a union bricklayer and the previous lady's comments on my line of work and the toll it takes on the body -- my question is for the government. they foresaw this almost two decades ago. they knew we would run out of social security funds. and the rich get richer and the middle class like me stay where we are and are benefits get cut

and hurt by programs and i think i have already foreseen the fact that, by the time i retire -- if i can make it to 65 they want me to work until 67 as a mason. unfathomable. like the lady previously said, if you have a desk job that is fine. my line of work is extremely physical and demanding on the body and to try to push it and make me work longer for less benefits -- i have been paying in. that money should be deserved and available, but i think everybody pretty much knows the system is broke and going to be broke. host: our last call. we will go to john in falls church, virginia on the over 65 line. caller: i have done very well

during my life. i am 75 now. if you go social security system. i put in $67,000. for most of my working life i was at the top end, and usually in august or september, october, my social security contribution away -- went away. right now i'm making $44,000 per year in social security benefits. so all those people who say raise the rate, if my rate had been higher i would be making probably 55,000 dollars, $60,000 and i would be a whole lot happier. so just raising the rate is not going to help social security. it will help in the short term,

but in the long-term it would make it even worse. host: that is it for the first hour. we still have a couple more hours on washington journal. next we are going to be joined by christian science monitor and national political correspondent story hinkcley and andrew prokop where they will discuss campaign 2024 and political news of the day. we will be right back. announcer: this week on the c-span networks, the house and senate are in session. the house will take up a final version of a five-year faa reauthorization bill to extend its program past the deadline. they are also expected to consider several police-related enforce security filtering national police beat this week. wednesday, administrator of the faa -- their highway

administration jennifer holland he testified before the house transportation and infrastructure committee, investigating the collision of the container vessel at the francis scott key bridge in baltimore this past march. thursday, the fdic chairman testifies before the senate banking committee following a wall street journal investigation reporting that the agency fostered a culture of racism, sexism and abuse, prompting some lawmakers to call for his resignation. in the sec chairwoman appears before a house appropriations subcommittee on her agencies 2025 budget. watch this week live on the c-span networks or on c-span now, our free mobile video app also, head over to c-span.org for scheduling information or to watch a live and on-demand anytime. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. tonight on q&a, the book that

was awarded the 2024 pulitzer prize for biography. the journey of self emancipation in 1848. >> they are husband and wife enslaved in georgia and they decide they are going to freedom and they do this not with any underground railroad which doesn't reach all the way down to the south where they are. not by hiding and traveling by night, but they go out in the full light of day disguised as master and slave, with ellen posing as the pastor and william playing a bowl of the slave. so that story just gripped me from the beginning. >> tonight, on c-span's q&a. you can listen to q&a and all of our podcasts on our free c-span now app.

washington journal continues. host: joining us now to discuss campaign 2024 and political news of the day, national blue correspondent story hinkley and andrew prokop. welcome to the program. >> thanks for having us. host: why don't we talked a little bit about one of the day stories that we can seeing a lot in the headlines, and that of the campus protests. had we seen any impact politically on candidates or parties so far? >> i think the biggest impact has been in really putting the pressure on the biden administration. as many of the protesters intended. the administration is clearly feeling the heat over these issues. they would really like these protests to go away and they

want the larger war itself to go away because it is kind of a no-win issue for them. whatever they do will hurt them among some constituencies, so they've been working very hard to try to bring this thing to a close, to help negotiate a cease-fire, but haven't been able to do so yet. but i think the protests are just one factor among many that have made the administration pretty eager and desperate really to try to really get this war winding down, to not prolong it several more months, several months closer to the election. host: you recently had a piece looking at issues that were important to done voters. what did they have to say about what we are seeing in the middle east and israel? guest: as we've seen, it is a

voting issue for a lot of young people, but at the same time pulling has showed us that the middle east is not the to terminating -- be determined if voting for young people that headlines make it out to be. for voters between 18 and 29, only one third of them the right to the economy as their main voting issue, and the israel-gaza war was down to only 2% ranking as a priority. i've spoken with thousand that dozens of college students in my reporting and what i asked them, will you vote in what is your main voting concern, they talk about things like apartment rent. they are hoping to get a job when they graduate. it is these things that are really animating them, these students who were saying their

comments are just a few feet away from the protest and even mention the middle east despite his protest happening a few away. host: and going back to the cause of the campus protests and what we are seeing between israel and hamas, last week president biden was threatening to withhold military aid to israel if they did go into rafah. what has the reaction been to that? andrew? guest: i think the reaction shows that this is a very difficult issue politically for joe biden, in which there is really no winning option for him. because he got some measured praise from some of the left groups and protest groups that had been criticizing him and his policy so much, and that he has

gotten some intense criticism from the right from donald trump, from some pro-israel groups because this sets up the argument where biden is looking to pressure for political reasons and selling out israel. and now republicans can position themselves as the more stalwart supporters of israel. from a political perspective, there is no option that joe biden can do to really please everyone except issue were to somehow turn back the clock and

have the happened, because the latest such a divisive issue with such intense passions on both sides that he is going to continue to have a lot of people very angry at him regardless. host: is there anything that has stuck out to your reaction-wise about president biden's announcement? guest: i agree with andrew, i think that this is an example of the biden administration trying to thread an incredibly narrow needle. i think it is a very difficult issue to win in terms of his administration. i'll be watching the planned vote in congress next week, how they plan on breaking this hold that biden announced, and it is likely that some democrats will vote with republicans. we saw more than 20 of them write a note to biden at the end

of last week, so i think it is another example where we are going to see a divided caucus on the capital, and it will be really interesting to see which of those is able to make more headway with voters. host: we are talking with christian science monitor and national political respondent story hinckley and andrew, vox correspondent. if you have questions, you can start dialing in now. the (202) 748-8000 lines are democrats (202) 748-8000,. republican, (202) 748-8001. independent, (202) 748-8002. one of these stories that we are also watching as the trial for former president trump, his hush money case up in new york. stormy daniels testified this week. has there been any impact on

former president trump's campaign yet from what we've heard in terms of this hush money case? guest: as far as the campaign schedule, i don't really think it has affected him much. he's had a lighter rally schedule already before this trial started, they he had in previous years. he still managed to fit in some rallies, so i don't really think it has had so much a big difference in terms of him going out and campaigning. in terms of the polls, there was a moment where it looked like perhaps biden was doing a little better than he has been in the polls, but now that has reverted a bit to what we've seen on average, this continuing trump about one point lead when all the polls are averaged and in swing states, trump leads on

average in almost every swing state as well in polling. so it hasn't really had a polling effect or a campaign effect. of course, when everyone is waiting for his whether the verdict would have such an effect trump is found by a jury for the first time to have violated criminal law, which would make him a convicted felon. does that affect the campaign, does that change any minds, or are peoples' views of donald trump to baked in at this point further her to make much of a difference? host: have you heard from voters and their thoughts on not only the trial itself, but as andrew mentioned, what would happen when a verdict comes down? guest: so it's clear that both candidates have strong supporters, strong bases of support. but this election will likely be

decided by a of strategists that they like to refer to as double haters. they say they are not crazy about biden or trump and they're not sure who they are going to vote for or who is going to come down to come up to they can stomach more. i think that this case because hard and a lot of support people who already supported the former president, they see the case as another example of the u.s. legal system supporting the person they purport to be president. but i'm not sure that this case and the news and sort of details of the stormy daniels let there that was in the news this week, i'm not sure that is exactly what the double haters are really waiting for. i'm not sure that relief well

screen things one way or the other. host: and when it comes to the type of legal talent that former president trump is facing, he has two of the four other cases against and they have now been delayed, likely until after the election. a georgia case and a documents case, and in the federal interference case is also on hold. do you see that as a win for trump? guest: i think it has gone pretty much as well as he could have hoped for having been indicted four times last year, to have the one case set to go forward before the trial pretty universally agreed to be the least substantively important of these four issues. it is not about hoarding

classified documents or national security secrets, it is not about trying to steal the election. attack american democracy. it is a case about whether in reimbursing hush-money payments to cover up a sex scandal, improperly classified them as legal expenses on internal trump organization business records. prosecutors say that this case has, they are trying to argue that this case has massive stakes, that trump was in fact trying to interfere with the 2016 election, to not have this information from stormy daniels come out, but from defenders have said stormy daniels herself made the choice not to have the information come out. she went to trump for payoff and she got it, and then because the payoff wasn't properly done in the reimbursement phase, now

there is a prosecution around it. so yeah, i do think that if he ends up convicted, that is something that the biden campaign would love to have in all of their ads, convicted felon donald trump almost regardless of the specifics. but for him to have drawn what seems to be a very sympathetic judge in florida for the documents ace, who has proceeded at such a slow pace that is delaying it, the georgia case is extremely complex and that is the main reason that that has been delayed. i don't think anybody we expected that trial before november, and then the supreme court has been a holdout and the federal stealing the election case against trump, and they are trying to waive his challenge

with assertions that presidential immunity should protect him from certain aspects of these charges and the longer they take the decided, the more likely he will be that that case goes past november. and also if they decide the case in a kind of measured way, have a compromised ruling of some form, that could take some time to figure out and implement at the trial level, and that could push the trial back. so i do think that trump would have liked to have all four of the trials delayed ideally, but having the three most serious ones delayed is a pretty good outcome as far as he's concerned. host: if there anything you would like to add, what your perceptions are? guest: i agree with andrew, it benefits them completely to have these lawsuits delayed.

and while the ongoing details coming out of the stormy daniels case in new york may not be enough to really convince voters who are in the middle one way or the other, i do think that a conviction in any of these cases would be enough to persuade some swing voters that the more you can do to avoid any type of conviction benefits his team. i do think that it also beneficial to the former president and his team that is case in new york, the only one that we will likely see before election day is complicated to explain to average voters and by extension, jury. it is difficult to explain to the average voter in a sentence or two how we get to any legal -- an illegal situation. i think that is why when we hear from michael cohen this week it

will be really crucial for the prosecution. they need to establish that mr. trump knew about the hush money scheme and that he directed it. they are trying to draw a very long line for the jury and by extension, voters. host: let's hear from some of our viewers. first up, the democrat line, good morning. peace: good morning. i just wanted to say i don't think anybody who is pinning their hopes on trump losing because of legal issues, they shouldn't pin their hopes on that. it is obvious just talking to republican voters that they don't really see it as important or they see it as something other than legal issues. that is all i had to say.

just go out and vote in november. i think that is the best way to do this. host: andrew, do you have any response? guest: it's interesting how much things have changed since the days after january 6, 2021 where there was this more bipartisan outrage about what happened, and recognition that trump had reached several important norms of american democracy, that he tried to steal an election that the other guy rightfully one and that this effort eventually lead to actual violence at the capital. there with this bipartisan outrage and it has slowly faded. it has slowly become normalized, it's interesting that trump is being prosecuted in these four cases, and so what is seen to be

the really important and monumental issue of the 2020 election crisis becomes subsumed into this category of trump's legal issues. next to this hush-money payments for stormy daniels, with those two things that are not at all comparable in importance. whether actual swing voters would care about the 2020 election crisis and whether that would be the most important consideration for their vote in 2024 considering for years have passed, inflation, other issues, global crises going on, we can't say for sure. there were some signs in the 2022 election that when this issue of extremism over elections became really salient for certain candidates, really hard right election-denying

candidates, they often lost in key senate elections and governor elections and state elections across the country, so that is one piece of evidence that might end up mattering when voters are reminded of it more. it is more on the agenda, perhaps in november. but biden's problem is that he has all these other issues that have been branding compressed favorably in the eyes of many voters. host: something that you mentioned earlier in your reporting, the issue of the economy. president biden was on cnn earlier this week. he did an interview with them and responded to a question about the state of the economy. we will take a listen and come back and get your reaction. >> can you talk about the economy, of course it is the most important issue for voters. it is also true right now that voters by a wide margin trust

trump more on the economy. and part of the reason for that may be the. you are aware of the cost of buying a home in the united states, double what it was when you look at your monthly costs before the pandemic. real income when you account for inflation is actually down since you took office. economic growth last week fell short of expectations. consumer confidence is near a two-year low. with less than six months to go to election day, i do worry that you're running out of time to turn that around? president biden: for 65% of the american people, they think we are in good shape economically. they think the nation is not in good shape, but they are personal in good shape. the polling data has been wrong all along. when you guys to a pole at cnn, how many folks do you have to call to get one response? the idea that we are in a situation where things are so

bad. we've created more jobs, we've made a situation where people have access to good paying jobs, and last i saw, a combination of inflation, the cost of inflation , that worries people with good reason. that's why i'm working very hard to increase the number of homes that are available. let me say it this way. when i started this ministration, people were saying there is going to be a collapse in the economy. we are the strongest economy in the world. host: did what you heard president biden say their line up with what he said with voters when he talked to them? guest: i have to respectfully disagree with the president. i don't think that the polling showing economies near the top of the concern is incorrect. voters are still very concerned about the economy.

yes, unemployment is very low but at the same time, voters can't afford things that they were able to afford just a few years before. i think that that is why we see the president's polling numbers with young people are down. specifically they are down with a point where it could be very detrimental to the president. as we seen in his campaigning, he is really leaning on achievement of his first term, the infrastructure bill and the inflation reduction act. he has been campaigning around the country, and it is remarkable what is included in these bills. you have millions of dollars to expand broadband internet access to people who haven't had it before. money invested into new, green energy and preparing -- repairing old bridges that were broken down.

but at the same time, these projects can take a long time to get off the ground and time is not something that the president has on his side. i've spoken with a lot of voters in the political swing state of michigan, specifically in the even more critical for mr. biden city of detroit, and they say what bridge are you talking about? i haven't seen these new -- in my community. what i have seen is my grocery bill and it is exorbitantly high. i do think it is a difficult thing for that administration to really show these achievements that they were able to get across the finish line. but at the same time, it is not long enough with with voters are seeing in their real lives. host: andrew, do you want to weigh in? guest: i think that all makes

sense, but i do want to say that president biden's comments on the merits, a lot of them are true about the economy, about how many metrics it is performing quite well. it performing certainly internationally much better than many of our peer countries and we avoided what was feared at this point, we avoided the serious recession that a lot of people expected would happen both during covid and as a result of trying to crush inflation. what has happened is number one, the inflation which is much lower than it was a couple years ago, those prices are still a whole lot higher than they were four years ago on many key parts

of the economy. then number two, the cost of cutting inflation and raising interest rates quite high. high interest rates are another thing that a lot of voters are trying to buy a home or car loans are really reacting against and really frustrated by. it is an interesting thing about it in that if there is a recession, at the height of the great recession, 2008, 2009, the unemployment rate was about 10%. only 10% of the workforce in the country was unemployed. but inflation is something that affects everyone. a lot of people's wages or salaries are also going up and that helps counteract the effects of inflation for a lot of people. but everyone is seeing the

higher prices at the grocery stores and sometimes at gas pumps and so on. there is a kind of odd aspect to it where what we would agree to be the worst outcome of a recession was avoided but a recession in a way we have heard fewer people more when inflationary avoidance of a recession hurts more people a little bit in the form of those higher prices. host: let's hear from zack in baltimore calling on the independent line. guest: -- caller: good morning. yeah, i am bit frustrated with the democrats running on the at least we are not trump platform. i think this trial this kind of nonsense and no one cares about it because yeah, i don't like

trump, but it is just kind of tacky crap. one now he is convicted so now he can't run for president. meanwhile, finds website literally doesn't have a platform on it at all. i would like to hear from positive news from biden instead of negative news that is just here is what we are going to prevent from happening to you. thank you. host: story? guest: i don't think you are alone. i think this is a sentiment that i heard from voters across the country. a message that may have helped biden cross the finish line in 2020. he is the incumbent. i think that they are going to have to do whatever they are doing, which is relying on what they've done and what they want to do if they want another term, but just saying i'm not the other guy has been proven to not

be enough. they are going to have to work really hard to convince voters like you that they can do more in four years. host: andrew, anything? guest: yeah. i think with the administration would say is that they've been very active on policy. they've been doing a lot of things. whether you agree that those are good things is another question, but they would point to things like the epa just had a band on asbestos. the ftc banned onto b clauses and organizations that prevented workers from getting a better salary elsewhere in the same field. there is a new round of student debt relief that was just announced. they rule out a lot of stuff and

that doesn't even get into big bills that he passed about infrastructure and so on. trying to revitalize the american industrial base. there is a question about effectiveness, whether any of this stuff is having a real impact on the ground. but they are definitely doing a lot. i think that the image of biden, the public image of him as the oldest president ever has assorted led to this false image that the administration itself is in active and not doing much. in reality, they are doing but it did. whether you think his ideas are good, it has been a very active administration. host: wade in ohio on the republican line. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call.

i just want to talk about, well, there are some issues that are really being tested right now. spending millions of dollars, and we have homeless veterinarians here in the united states, and then we have illegal immigrants coming over and they are getting their benefits right now. they're like 20 years old, they don't work, they can't speak english. and another thing that the student loan forgiveness. i'm totally against that. i have two children and they both went to college and my wife and i, you know, we did what we could to help them. they went four years and they think graduated over 15 years ago.

but they work hard to pay off that debt. my daughter, she delayed her wedding for two years so they both could not down their debt from these student loans, and they paid them off. and now that they have been paid off, they want to forgive billions of dollars of these two loan debts that they signed on the bottom line that this was an unforgiving repayment? you got to pay that payment. for biden, he's just trying to get young voters to vote for the democrats. host: let's get a response from the guests. guest: i think that again, i hear that sentiment a lot across the country. voters who have already paid off student loans, this can feel incredibly unfair. but there are some voters who say what president biden did for

me is life-changing. but i do think that his administration would likely have liked to have seen a larger bump in the polls among young people after passing such measures. but i still think that we see in polling that young people are still concerned about student debt even though the administration has talked so much forgiveness. i think he will be really interesting to see if that continues to be a major issue. host: andrew? guest: yeah, i do think that the student debt -- i just listed a bunch of policies at the biden administration have ruled out. i think the criticism about agenda is that this was an agenda that was really shape for progressive constituencies and interest groups, and not necessarily for the american people as a whole.

that's not true for everything, of course, like protecting people from asbestos helps all sorts of people who might otherwise be exposed to asbestos, but the student debt situation is kind of like the protests. but this is something that a bunch of politically mobilized, active interest groups are recognizing for representing the young people, a bunch of men who have a lot of debt. that is something they care about a lot, but the vast majority of young people do not have this enormous amount of college that, so they think that this would not help them very much and of course, is a very

targeted thing to a specific group of people, and that raises questions about why does this group of people get a bunch of their debt forgiven and not this other kind of debt from this other group of people? host: let's hear from fred in pennsylvania on the democrat line. good morning, fred. caller: good morning. i'm upset because people keep saying the price of gasoline is high because of joe biden. the price of gasoline is high because they raised a barrel of crude to $82.50 and it is going to going up because they cut production. that is an saudi arabia kid. we have increased production, and we keep increasing our production of oil and gas. also, the price of food. why is it so high? it's not the farmer, it is not the rancher, it is not the grocery store, it is the

distributor who is gouging, sticking the prices of so high you can hardly believe it. to the grocery store have to pay more for it. therefore the grocery store and raise prices. it is not the economy. the economy is booming. we have unemployment at an all-time low. everybody is working. good prices, more money made by the people working there, and yet we can turn on any speech by donald trump and the lies and lies and lies and lies and says he is going to do this and that and he doesn't do anything but write executive orders. 243 last time he was president. he didn't do any kind of bill passing except cutting income tax for the rich and they've got a trillion dollars debt we got stuck with because of this. host: i know story and andrew, you both address to the state of the economy a little bit. anything else you would like to add or respond to fred? guest: i would say -- you go.

go ahead. i was going to say that is one of the burdens of the president. even things that you don't have that much control over, you are still blamed for. i think that is just something that they are going to have to work on messaging. guest: i was going to say it is true that people point to inflation, blaming joe biden for patient. joe biden's policy decisions are responsible for a pretty small share of the inflation that we experience. nonzero, but a pretty small share because we can look at other countries that did not make the same policy decisions as joe biden and a lot of them also experienced a lot of inflation and it has more to do with emerging from covid and the

pandemic shutdowns and also with the ukraine-russia war began in 2022 that really wracked a lot of the global economy. because of that, we seen in international comparisons to a lot of other leaders in western democracies are pulling really poorly and it's not all because they are old or because they passed a bill they shouldn't have passed. it is because something about the post-covid inflationary environment really made leaders unpopular in a lot of places. but i do think it is important to clarify that this inflation happens everywhere, perhaps by intuitive activated more aggressively earlier where the fed could have acted.

a lot of it is up to the fed, but perhaps they were too slow to see the threat of inflation rising. you can second-guess a lot of what happened, but a lot of what happened was not because of his policy decisions, it was going to happen anyway and have been in a lot of other places. host: we have another fred, this one in massachusetts on the republican line. good morning, fred. guest: good morning. i just want to let you know that you were just mentioning the war ukraine was causing all kinds of inflation, but in a roundabout way, biden and -- for the ones who started all that by allowing ukraine into nato. when you see donald trump, he tells you to end the war in ukraine. but he doesn't tell you how. basically what he will do is he

will just tell putin that he will not let ukraine join nato. just wanted to mention that. host: anything on ukraine that you are hearing from voters or that you've noticed? guest: i do think that it makes sense in policy at the administration level that they understand that ukraine is just the first stop for putin, but i do think that it is a difficult pill to swallow when they are struggling regardless of how successful the economy looks on paper. it doesn't feel that way. when you are struggling and you hear that millions of dollars are going to help another country, i think that can be a tough pill for some voters to swallow. but the same time, if you think that many voters understand it is in the national security

interest of this country to make sure that ukraine can remain free and independent because it could be the first stop on a long strand. host: andrew? guest: i would say that i think blaming biden for encouraging ukraine to join nato is not accurate. i would trace it back to the george w. bush administration, bill clinton and george w. bush both expanded nato quite a bit and were envisioning and expanding further. barack obama then tried to come to more of a friendly relation with russia, and then putin began attacking ukraine back in 2014. and they've had this initial phase of the war that has gone on to spanned 2014 to 2022.

ukraine has said they would like to be in nato but the biden administration did not support that. they know it would mean world war. they don't want that. they do not want ukraine to be part of nato. they did support ukraine having more of an orientation with the west rather than russia, and many ukrainians supported that. but to say that suddenly putin became worried that ukraine was about to join nato and that is why he escalated this or have been going since 2014 to a full-blown invasion in 2022, i don't think that makes any sense at all. host: we have about 15 minutes left with story and andrew. let's hear next from romney in north carolina on the independent line. good morning, romney. caller: good morning. i'd just like to say i think the

economy has been good. i find that i think the corporations, we usually end up paying for them sort of things. also, i think the -- well, that's all i've got to say. thank you. host: barb in florida calling on the democrat line, good morning. caller: good morning. the reason i'm calling today is about the student loan issue. years ago, state and confederal money was given to different colleges and universities around the country that was just part of what states did. but then about 12, 15 years ago,

the states started pulling back the money that they were spending for these colleges and universities so the colleges and universities needed to increase their tuition, but then came all the building and everything else to the point where it was just horrible for these people not have to put themselves in debt probably for the rest of their lives with 8% interest on a loan that they cannot get out of. no bankruptcy. in fact, they were set up for this. any student that can get their loans forgiven by the government, i'm fine with that because tax money, people's tax money used to pay for a lot of the student loans. when i went to college it wasn't that big a problem. i had to save money. when my kids went to college they either got scholarships, we help a little bit, but basically they did it on their own. grandkids, it is another thing. i had one granddaughter they continued to stay-at-home, got a

job at a credit union, and she went to school full time to work in the health field. yes, she still has loans to pay off but they are not nearly what they were for some. largely because she stayed at home and she had a part-time job. so there's ways of doing that, but to begrudge these kids because their parents or the generation before them got through college, they need to remember that it was tax money that help them get through college without paying the exorbitant fees that are out there today. host: andrew, you talk a little bit about student loan forgiveness. anything you want to add to those comments? guest: i think there's a lot of truth to that. the only thing i would perhaps question is why the cost of college has increased so much and is that in part because it

has had the government subsidies of the past? a lot of these subsidies have caused colleges to cut back their expenses and perhaps to try to raise prices to make up for it. but in a sense, college and the college experience today and what we might call the business of college is much more bloated with administration expenses than it has been, then it was in previous decades. giving people more help with their debt, with their college debt doesn't solve the underlying problem of why is college getting so much more expensive in the first place? host: anything you like to add? guest: i will just add that i

think college across the country has gotten so exorbitantly expensive, and so competitive that i think a lot of young people have realized that there is another path for them after high school graduation that might not include college. i think that this is something that both presidential candidates of tried to message which is we have a lot of openings in the country for jobs that don't require college degrees. i think that that is something that those candidates are trying to actively do. i think it will be interesting to see college attendance rates in the next few years if these costs continue. host: let's hear from john in orlando, florida on the republican line. caller: thank you very much, i'll make it quick. you had a couple of callers

talking about donald trump lying and the economy was not so bad. this is all opinion, it is all bs. this economy is horrible and everything joe biden has done since he has been in office has hurt america plain and simple. as far as lies, there hasn't been a president who has live to the american people more than joe biden. the back of his head has been more visible than anything else about this man. it is a shame that we don't have more platforms like yours. just like the liberal media where we could call them out for their lives. thank you very much, and your guest is phenomenal. i'm listening to them and i agree with a lot of what he says. host: andrew, do you want to respond? guest: no thanks. host: story, anything? guest: it is evident there is a lot of passion on both sides. host: let's hear from arkansas, democrat line. caller: yes, i have two

comments. one is i think donald trump should stand trial before the election on january 6. we've all seen on tv as plain as day. i don't want to hear it is too close to the election, because old mcdonald pushed amy coney barrett had asked for two weeks to the election. and as far as anything else going around here, to have our three bridges have been fixed. air airport is being redone. it is booming here in arkansas. it is booming. i'd like a comment please, thank you. host: story, anything? guest: i'm sure that the biden administration would be thrilled to hear that news and death for some of these projects have gotten off the ground. i don't want to discredit that but i do think the vast majority of what has been funded has not gotten off the ground and it is only because these things take a

lot of time. with any infrastructure package, for example, some money can't even be doled out for years. we are going to see more examples like yours in coming years, it is just a matter of when that is going to happen and if it will be too late to benefit the president. host: andrew, does infrastructure and projects have any impact on the candidates? guest: i mean, we will see. it varies in a lot of different places depending on what people see around them and whether they get president biden and congress credit for that or not. i did want to mention on the point about january 6 trial before the election, it is a novel prosecution because it is

a novel situation. nothing like that has ever happened, like trump's attempt to overturn the election results with, you know. and the prosecution about it had to come up with sort of new legal theories explaining how that violated the law and then there are these presidential powers concerns. so in one sense, it makes sense to think that with conservatives dominating the supreme court, is doing donald trump a favor by delaying this trial probably until after the election. in another sense, actually are some relevant and important legal issues about presidential powers here. they could dodge those questions if they want, but it looks like they don't want to dodge them. i think it was foreseeable that

any prosecution of a president for doing something this unusual and extreme and unprecedented but also faced some unprecedented legal purview as well. host: we have time for one or two more calls. we will go next to ruben in austin, texas on the independent line. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. yes, donald trump should be facing a january 6 hearing but he needs to bring nancy pelosi in front of him and she should be question completely on why she denied those 10,000 national guardsmen. the media is not going anywhere in regards to nancy pelosi.

this 10,000 national guard that she refused, and another thing, joe biden has been in politics for 51 years. 51 years, and look what he's done to the whole world. everybody's at each other's throats and killing and everything. all those soldiers in ukraine and israel, they are leaving kids orphaned everywhere. everywhere you go, him and hunter biden leaving a trail of destruction. he is a master of destruction. host: let's get a response. do you have any response to ruben, story? guest: i don't think so. host: andrew, anything? guest: i would like to stay on the national guard point, i think this is something that

trump has twisted. the reason that pelosi was suspicious about the administration's offer to call in the national guard before hand because she feared, as many people feared, that donald trump is going to try to you the national guard and the military to illegally extend this power. it was because she did not trust trump to use the national guard. this is before the protesters storm the capital. but there were a lot of concerns in those days about what trump was going to do with the military, with the national guard. dick cheney and several other former secretaries of defense wrote in an open letter, unprecedented situation saying that the military must not interfere with the peaceful transfer of power. this was something that a lot of people were very scared of, and rightly so, i think, because

donald trump made it clear he wanted to illegally stay in power and project the will of the american voters. this is something that has been brett can't and excused and minimized, but it is absolutely something that he did and it shouldn't be forgotten and it should be probably discussed more as voters are preparing to make their choice in november. host: one more call, we will go to bob in connecticut on the republican line. good morning. caller: i want to comment on the tape played from cnn. he stopped it just before the question was presented to president biden, and the question was on inflation and he said well, when he took over the presidency inflation was at the rate of 9%. and indeed, it was 1.9%.

he also said that people had plenty of money to spend and so inflation wasn't as much of a concern as presented. people don't have money to left -- left over to spend. wages have not kept up with inflation rate and people are making decisions. second comment i'd like to make quickly is with respect to florida, that judge is not favored anyone. and i think that judge smelled the rat in the first instance when the case was taken for grand jury in washington, d.c., when 95% of the democratic voters. and then it got transferred to florida where they actually could hear the case. and the judge had an issue with that deal rate from the get go. and then recently, very recently

documents were found to be tampered with. documents were rearranged in the files that were there and documents were put on top to give the court the impression that everything in those files was top-secret, etc. host: we are running short on time. let's get a response. guest: the judicial system in the united states, the judicial branch was far more trusted than the other two branches of government and believed to be nonpartisan. what we have seen cups as an effective many of trump's cases that it has gone way down and we are seeing it become

increasingly partisan. i think it will continue to be a very big issue. host: andrew? andrew: i think the judge in florida first got the case before it was even prosecuted when trump brought a lawsuit over it. she rolled in such a strange way interim -- in trump's initial lawsuit that several judges on a higher court overturn her pretty harshly saying she was not following the law. either she was twisting things or did not know what she was doing. she's gotten reprimanded strongly already from higher courts about how she has handled this thing. i do not think it is clear she is totally honest doing it.

she is of course a trump appointee. i don't know. we will see how the rest of that case plays out. host: story hinckley, christian science monitor, national correspondent, and andrew prokop, thank you so much for joining us this morning. story: thank you. andrew: you for having me. host: later on middle eastern institute senior fellow's khaled elgindy will join us to discuss the latest in the israel-hamas war. next, we will hear from more of you during our open forum. you can start calling in now. ♪

>> weekends bring you book tv. they argue the american left has embraced a form of radical marxism that threatens the future of the united states in their book. later, the author of "magic pill" talks about the success and concerns around new weight loss drugs as well as his personal explains taking ozempic. watch book tv every weekend on c-span2. and find the full program or watch anytime online. >> c-span has been delivering unfiltered congressional coverage for 45 years. here is a highlight from a key moment. >> something else i saw firsthand was not a surprise to

me, but it was the outpouring of love from you, our colleagues, republican and democrat. right after the shooting, we were practicing on the republican side. the democrats were practicing, too. my colleague, friend, and sometimes archrival in baseball from back home, unfortunately the start of the game too many times -- [laughter] figure out what hospital i was sent to and was probably the first on the scene in his baseball uniform to check on me. so many of you reached out in ways i cannot express the gratitude and how much it means to me and our hope family -- to me, jennifer, and our whole family. it really does show the warm side of congress very few get to see. >> c-span, powered by cable. >> c-spanshop.org is c-span's

online store. browse through our latest collection of apparel, books, home decor, and accessories. there is something for every c-span fan. every purchase helps support our nonprofit organization. shop anytime at c-spanshop.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: for the next 15 minutes or so, we will be hearing from you on our open forum. the line for democrats, republicans, and independents. we will start with gene calling on the democrats line. caller: good morning. i love your show. i just listen to it. i am very concerned about the young kids today.

i am 78. i went to a community college. i think we need to teach the kids in school at the high school level more about civics and what went on in the world because the impression i am getting, and i know a lot of them, i have nieces and nephews, is that everything is so expensive and they do not understand basic economics and how much overseas contributes to our debt. i believe the conversation today was a great conversation and we need more open forums like this in the world to understand so that they can understand what we went through and that they have a better life because of the older generation. they are so down on the older generation getting their benefits now. but when they reach a certain age, i believe they will understand why.

we need to understand them a little bit more at the high school level about civics. thank you very much. i love your show. continue the good work. thank you. host: brad in texas calling on the republican line. caller: good morning to you. i would like to talk about social security and how, over the years, it has expanded to be the father of unwed mothers or the father of unwed mothers' children. then we decided to be the moneymaker for [indiscernible] and that is destroying social security. democrats have created all of those problems when they expanded it. then mr. biden, he lays the

taxes on social security to 85%. he also created a problem with the older generation. host: ron in henderson, nevada, on the independent line. caller: good morning. just to let you know, i love your show anyways. i am independent, and scared. i do not know who is who and what our world is going through today. but the basic thing is, is our economy and inflation is really, really bad. i'm talking about everybody struggling right now. but also, i heard what i say, i

don't care democrat, republican. we are hurting. and there is a lot of people that cannot afford our society today of what is going on. not only that, is now the border is out of control. we have these people competing -- coming in and we are paying for them! host: have you been impacted by inflation? have you changed your spending habits? caller: no! it is expensive now. i make good money but it is expensive. gas, food, going out, they raise their prices. there are a lot of places around where i live, they are closing. the café down the street from me just closed. they are closing a lot of

places. they are closing the dollar stores over here. there closing the target. there closing in walmart -- they are closing the target. they are closing the walmart. host: illinois on the democrats line, good morning. caller: my concern is the trials of donald trump. i do understand he is on trial now for the hush money payments to stormy daniels. my concern is january 6, the insurrection of january 6 and the documents he hid at mar-a-lago. i remember hearing him say this was april of 2020. he was in an interview and pretty much said i am not a good

loser, right? that december, he pretty much told his followers january 6. to me, he infiltrated that. to me, that his crimes against the united states government. the judge [indiscernible] to me, you had crimes against the united states and he is not being charged. for me, it is like he is a danger to this country in my understanding of them because i listened to him. this election, and i am a democrat, it is the lesser of two evils, it truly is.

a lot of people are upset with biden about garza, what is happening in gaza. i do understand that. if i had my pick, i would go with joe biden. i truly would. donald trump, i listen to the things he says. if you don't win in 24, it will be a bloodbath -- if he don't win in 2024, it will be a bloodbath. that is what he said. host: he has been in the courtroom for the hush money trial case. yesterday, he was in new jersey according to the story on fox news. he held a massive beachfront campaign rally yesterday. the estimates from the city of wildwood was between 80000 and 100 thousand people dumb -- 100,000 people at the rally.

here are some of the comments from trump yesterday. [video clip] >> all of this persecution is only happening because i am running for president. if i was not leading in the polls and running for president, they would not be after me. i would beat down in palm beach or traveling the world. the democrats rigged the presidential election in 2020. we are not going to allow them to rig the presidential election in 2024. not going to happen. [applause] every time the left and the fascists indict me, i consider it a badge of honor. i am being indicted for you pretty never forget our enemies want to take our freedom because i will never let them take away your freedom. they want to silence me because i will never let them silence you! in the end, they are not after me, they are after you. i just happen to be standing in their way. we are going to be in this together. we are all in this together.

we are bringing our country back. we are going to make our country better than before and it is going to go fast. host: let's hear from michael in new hampshire on the independent line. caller: good morning. i would like to explain how the united states played a minor role in the north atlantic slave trade. the first people to enslave africans were africans way back. more and tribes and nations -- warring tribes and nations. when the europeans made their way to africa, the africans wanted to trade with the europeans. they reduced their fellow africans to a trading commodity and traded with the europeans to get the goods and services they had available. about 12 million slaves came to the new world, i will use that term.

in the united states, about 2% to 3% of that came to the united states, some 310 thousand people. 5 million went to the caribbean. 5 million went to brazil. a couple of million went to mexico. only 310,000 came to the united states. that is not condoning or trivializing anything. i'm just putting it in a proper perspective. when the civil war ended, the african slave trade continued. the africans continued to trade their people to the east, to the ottoman empire. black people or african american people cannot wrap their head around that there african brethren played a major role in the north atlantic slave trade. thank you. host: let's hear from clog in

charlotte, north carolina, on the democrats line. good morning. caller: good morning. if you look as far as slavery is concerned, like the previous gentleman, this country has perfected slavery for african americans. and they will always -- we have to suffer from that because of what they'd done and everything. that is all i have to say. host: gary in orlando, florida, on the republican line. caller: i want to tell you i am really enjoying watching this segment.

, how passionate everyone is is pretty much regurgitating what is said. unless we come together, we will never move forward. thanks. host: we will go to deborah in north carolina on the democrat line. caller: hi. i think the folks telling the causes of our economy, gloating our economy to change -- wanting our economy to change, but i would like to know why the banks are requiring so much interest on credit cards. why are interest rates particularly related to credit

cards as they are? that is my question. host: carl in pennsylvania. good morning. caller: yeah, how we doing? a lot of people calling in about the slave trade and whatnot. there is decent evidence to say that is not how it all went down back in the day. i just wanted to point that out. i do appreciate the show you do, especially on mother's day. my mom is a diehard republican. we are definitely going to vote reagan this election. i just wanted to call and thank you. host: we will go to mike in stockton, california, on the independent line. caller: i just want to for once and all clarify the talk about africans selling for slavery. you guys always rewrite history.

there is only one place that has chattel slavery, usa. you did so many atrocious things to the slaves, as you call them, your medical advances, open-heart surgery, i cannot even begin to name the dirty stuff you guys did. instead of having a riot like you keep trying to push black people to doing and fighting against america, we are just saying you guys cheated us black keep comparing us with slavery to nothing. host: that is it for this morning's open forum.

next, we will be joined by middle east institute senior fellow director khaled elgindy to discuss the latest on the israel-hamas war. we will be right back. ♪ ♪ >> tonight on "q&a," she shares her book which was awarded the 2024 pulitzer prize for biography. it recounts the story of the slaves and their journey of self emancipation in 1848. >> the husband and wife enslaved in macon, georgia, cited they would sneak -- decided they

would sneak to freedom, not with the underground railroad, not by hiding and traveling by night. they just go out in the full light of day disguised as master and slave with ellen posing as the master and william as the slave. that story struck me from the beginning. >> her book "master, slave, husband, wife" tonight on "q&a." you can listen any with our free c-span now app. ♪ >> the house will be in order. >> this year, c-span celebrates 45 years of covering congress like no other. since 1979, we have been your primary source for capitol hill, taking you to where the policies

are are debated and decided with the help of america's cable companies. stay up-to-date with the latest in publishing with the booktv podcast about books with current, nonfiction book releases, plus bestseller lists, and trends through insider interviews. ♪ >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are joined by khaled elgindy with the middle east institute. he is a senior fellow and the director of the program on palestine and palestinian-israeli affairs. welcome. tell us about the institute, the mission and who you work with. guest: the middle east institute

is now about 77 years old. it is the oldest middle east-focused think tank in washington. our focus, as the name suggests, focuses on u.s. foreign policy and the geopolitics of the middle east more broadly, covering everything from morocco in the west to afghanistan in the east. host: the program you are director of, talk about that. guest: the palestine program. it was the first program in washington think tank dedicated to looking at palestinian politics, u.s.-palestinian relations, and palestinian affairs in general, as opposed to most think tanks in washington who look at palestinians largely through an israeli lens. host: it has been seven months

since the bahamas-led attack on israel. how would you characterize where both sides currently stand? guest: i would say we are at a bit of a stalemate in terms of the war itself. israel has not been able to achieve anything it could claim as a victory. this war has dragged on much longer than anyone anticipated, probably including israeli military leaders themselves. we are now in our eighth month of the war that has devastated the concert strip. there are still tens of thousands of people, that brought starvation to the gaza strip. the reality is there is not a military solution which is the only thing israel has been pursuing thus far.

that is why we are where we are at. there is not unattainable objective here -- there is not an attainable objective. host: this article talks about tens of thousands of people leaving the area on saturday, signaling an imminent push by israeli forces. president biden earlier this week talked about withholding weapons from israel if they were to do that. here are his comments. we will get your response after. [video clip] >> i know you have polished shipments of bombs to israel due to concerns they could be used in any offensive on rafah. have those powerful bombs been used to kill civilians in gaza? president biden: civilians have been killed in gaza as a consequence of those bombs and

other ways in which they go after population centers. if they go into rafah, they have not yet, if they go into rafah, i am not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with rafah, the cities, to deal with that problem. i will continue to make sure israel is secure and can respond to attacks like came out of the middle east recently. but it is just wrong. we are not going to supply the weapons and artillery shells used. >> artillery shells as well? pres. biden: yeah, artillery shells. >> just to understand, what they are doing now in rafah, is that not going into rafah? pres. biden: they have not gone into the population centers. what they did is right on the border. it is causing problems right now in terms of egypt, which i have

worked hard to make sure we have a relationship with, and helped. i have made it clear in the war cabinet they will not get our support if they go into these appalachian centers -- these population centers. >> it is not over your redline yet? pres. biden: not yet. host: your reaction to president biden withholding weapons to israel? guest: i think it was an important shift for this president to make. you have been pretty steadfast in refusing to take this step -- he has been pretty steadfast in refusing to take this step others happen calling for since last fall. these are precisely the weapons that have destroyed so much of gaza. most of gaza's infrastructure, 60% to 70% of all gaza homes have been destroyed. they do not really have a defensive purpose.

these are essentially bombs of mass destruction. for a lot of people, it is a little too late. i think it is also a welcome development in that the administration that has up until now been in lock sink with israeli leadership as far as the stated aims of the work, for him to now say such a bold phrase is significant but it needs to be followed up with action. host: they have said they are moving forward regardless. what impact will this have? guest: it may not have an immediate impact. first, we have to see if the weapons are actually held up, and what kind of weapons and for how long, and will they be

expanded? will the pause in shipping these weapons be expanded to other munitions? that remains to be seen. for now, it does not seem to be having an effect. the israelis have already gone into rafah and several hundred thousand have been evacuated from these very areas. they are operating. it is not the kind of mass operation we have seen in previous population centers like gaza city or the center of gaza. but it is a gaza ground operation nonetheless but it is happening in slow motion. i think it is designed to keep people guessing. is this the gaza operation? has the president indicated, as in the interview, have the israelis crossed the redline

yet? i think it is very hard to make that determination when they are moving in the kind of slow-motion method they are. host: in the interview, president biden did miss end a couple of specific types of military weapons president biden said they would not be willing to send but possibly they could continue to supply others. does that matter? guest: it matters because the second part of the president's message is we are not abandoning israel's defense and security but we cannot provide this specific set of weapons that have caused so much damage. i think the president needs to make that statement for the consistency of his policies so he does not look like he is abandoning israel or domestic politics. where the line is between those

defensive weapons and the offense of mass destruction weapons israel has been using will be much harder to ascertain going forward because the line is blurred. host: we are talking with khaled elgindy with the middle east institute about the israel-hamas war and the u.s. response. if you have a question or comment, you can start calling in now on the line for democrats, republicans, and independents. something else we have been seeing in the headlines is the ongoing talks about hostage release. where does that stand? guest: we are at a bit of a stalemate. last week, it looked like a deal might be eminent.

too many people's surprise, hamas accepted the outlines of a deal on the table with some minor adjustments from its standpoint. i think within the spirit of what had been proposed. people thought now that hamas has accepted, we are going to get a deal. we did not get a deal. the israeli side, prime minister netanyahu in particular, was not interested in a deal. i think the general thrust of the deal has been known for some time. six-week pause that could be sustained, maybe even indefinitely, in return for the state's release of israeli hostages being held in gaza. the problem is the calculation on the israeli side is, on the one hand, prime minister

netanyahu needs the were to continue, he needs the rafah operation to extend the war because as long as the war goes on, it is the surest way for him to insure his political survival because the moment the war ends, there will be a reckoning within israeli politics. he is already facing a trial for corruption and so forth. that is a key driver in the war. the other key driver is israeli public opinion that is still very much in support of continuing the war. there is an israeli political consensus. there is a lot of incentive to continue and not much to pull back, especially since israel has not achieved its ends. host: you mentioned a cease-fire. we have not seen one yet paid you have a background in negotiation. explain how it works.

who is involved in the negotiations customer what are we not seeing that may be happening behind the scenes? guest: there are always third-party negotiators. this one is a little different from past ones in that we have two or three mediators working simultaneously. the egyptians, the qataris, and the united states are all trying to deal with the parties. each have different relations with their respective combatants. the united states obviously very close to israel. the qataris are able to talk to hamas. they are a party they trust more than others. they each have their own kind of leverage they bring to the table in these negotiations.

they have different strengths and weaknesses as well as mediators. host: what would a cease-fire deal me? who ultimately signs off on it? guest: well, the two sides, principally. the israeli leadership, prime minister netanyahu, and the hamas leadership, particularly inside gaza. the hamas leader but also probably the mastermind behind october 7. these are the two main actors who are communicating through these various intermediaries. as far as the outline of a cease-fire deal, we have known for a few weeks we are talking about a six-week pause that

palestinians hope will be extended indefinitely. part of the holdup on the hamas site is they are looking for language that would indicate a permanent end to the war and not simply a pause and then israel picks up where they left off as with the pauses in november. that has been the major hold up on the hamas side. on the israeli side, the main holdup is the opposite. they did not want anything that would indicate that they -- that would commit them to ending the war. they want freedom to operate in gaza probably indefinitely. host: is there a difference in negotiations when their proxies involved -- when there are proxies involved? guest: yeah, because the parties cannot talk to each other directly. they do not recognize each other. they do not have direct relationships.

they need those outside parties that are trusted by each side. host: let's go to the phones. we will hear first from stephen in baltimore on the independent line. good morning. caller: listen, all you have to do to understand what is going on in that part of the world, in gaza, is to look back at what has happened in the united states and the american indians. the israelites, the people of israel have been stealing land from the palestinians for the last 75 years. it is still going on. they doing all kinds of settlements and taking that land. the indians fought back. remember little big horn and other massacres with the indians trying to keep hold of their land.

it is the same thing -- excuse me, i am a little nervous. it is the same thing the people of israel is doing to the palestinians today. they are going to take that land. eventually, they will kill enough palestinians and kick enough of them off of their land to make them not a threat anymore to israel. my last comment about this would be, look, it is sort of like, i'm sort of ashamed of america for sort of like going along with this israeli thing because it is sort of like, here come the white people, we have to lay down for whatever they want to take and do. just lay down. don't fight them. just let them do what they want to do. ok, thank you. host: any response to stephen? guest: i think the caller touched on a fear a lot of palestinians have of being

driven off their land, of being expelled, as part of their history. israel's creation came at their expense when two thirds of the arab population of palestine had been expelled or forced to flee over the course of israel's creation in 1948. that memory is seared into the collective minds of palestinians. when they look at what is happening in gaza, most of them by the way our refugees who came from areas now inside israel. this to a lot of palestinians feels like a repeat of that. there is a real fear they will be pushed out of gaza, if not in the immediate term then over the long-term, because essentially gaza has been rendered uninhabitable. all of the universities have been destroyed.

most of the hospitals, most of the civilian infrastructure. there are very few operating businesses in gaza. most homes have been destroyed. if there is nothing to go back to, the fear is that gaza will eventually be depopulated. i think that is how palestinians view the war, as they were designed to erase them -- as a war designed to erase them. it is hard to argue with that when you look at the realities on the ground. host: let's hear from catherine in ohio on the democrats line. caller: good morning. my question is, where is hamas? hamas is the one who attacked the israelis in october. they killed and mutilated women, they killed babies. they must have known when they attack israelis that the israelis would fight back.

host: anything for catherine? guest: i think that is an understandable view. obviously, the atrocities committed on october 7 were pretty horrifying for everyone but certainly for israelis, it was the deadliest day in israel's history. i think it is reasonable to expect israel would carry out some way to defend, to protect its citizens. that was not unreasonable. the question was how they would go about doing it. i and others have been saying committing atrocities by one side does not justify atrocities by the other side. what we have seen in gaza have been repeated atrocities and very well documented on a

massive scale, so much so that the international court of justice took up the issue and found there is a possible case for genocide. obviously, israel has to protect its civilians. the question is how it does it and at what cost. i do not think it is a reasonable response to kill upwards of 35,000 people including 15,000 children, to destroy entire societies, in response to the massacres that happened on october 7. there has to be some reasonable response. at the end of the day, this is a political problem. history did not begin on october 7. there is a long history of massacres. that is why it is accomplished. that is why you have a 100-year israel-palestine conflict.

i think the way out of this would have been to take immediate steps to bring the people who carried out the attacks to justice foot also to understand at the core of this issue is a political problem. that is the basic denial of palestinian rights and their inability to live free in their only end. if those are addressed, i think that would get at the root causes and prevent violence on a much more strategic level as opposed to simply dealing with the tactics. host: in this headline from the a.p., late last week, the yuan assembly -- you in assembly -- u.n. assembly revised the membership bid. what would that mean?

guest: it is a bit of a symbolic move. it will not change any reality on the ground. i think it is an important signal by the international community that they have not forgotten that the ultimate aim here is palestinian self-determination. the fact it passed overwhelmingly, was supported by countries in western europe and countries that are friends and allies of the united states and israel. the united states opposed it. i think it is designed to send a message. the point i was just making. there is only a political resolution. there is no military solution. that has to involve the freedom and self-determination for palestinians. ultimately, it does not change the reality on the ground. it is largely symbolic in that

sense. host: let's hear from terry in williamsburg, virginia, on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning, ma'am. mr. khaled, i have a question for you, sir. the civilian population of gaza, how do they feel? what are their feelings about the terrorists? these people who committed this massacre? i see them starving. it is a humanitarian crisis. i have never seen one of them say these horrible terrorists that created this mess, if i see one, i will turn him over, i will kill him. if you could honestly tell me, do they consider them heroes?

are they harboring them? i would love your honest opinion on that subject. thank you, sir. guest: good question and a hard one to answer. it is very hard to know what palestinians are thinking, particularly in gaza, because of what is happening. they are focused first and foremost on the survival of themselves and their families, trying to find a place where they will not be bombed, trying to find food, and some level of safety. all of which are extremely scarce. they are not particularly concerned at the moment with which political faction is the most popular at any given moment. i think a lot of people will be supportive of hamas' attack. it is a question of perspective. most palestinians do not see the attack as a terrorist attack. they saw it as an attack on

israel that delivered a shock to the israeli system after israel carried out and has been occupying and blockading palestinians for decades. that is not to justify it. but humans have an enormous capacity to rationalize. that is also true for palestinians. certainly, we see that happening on the israeli side where everything israel does is a matter of self-defense, even when it destroys hospitals and universities and uses starvation as a weapon. that same way, a lot of palestinians, probably most palestinians would look at what i'm on stood as an act of resistance that maybe got carried away, that went astray, that had elements of people who carried out terrible acts but at its core was an act

of resistance, legitimate. it is not unreasonable to imagine people will have different perspectives on the same activities, that the way we look at them is not necessarily the way everyone else looks at them. that said, i think there is probably also a growing sense of resentment among palestinians in gaza even if they do not express it publicly of this is what hamas' attack led to. i do not even think hamas anticipated this level of destruction. that would be inflicted on gaza. they clearly miscalculated on many levels. i think it is going to be a mixed bag of sorts. not unlike the position benjamin netanyahu and his leadership are in, maybe after the war finally

ends, there will be some kind of reckoning internally on the palestinian side for people to hold hamas accountable. there has to be some constraints. you cannot simply commit any act regardless of the fallout when the population as a whole pays the price. at this stage, it is really hard for palestinians to do anything but focus on staying alive and trying to end this nightmare. host: let's hear from tony in pennsylvania on the independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. i would take some objection to labeling this conflict as a war. i see the israeli-hamas war on the screen. one side has a military.

one side has tanks, airplanes, bombs, limitless guns. and one side does not. i think it is really important to break down the history of the conflict. america does a really bad job of educating its people about history. the creation of hamas was funded by israel. israel did not want to negotiate with yasser arafat and wanted a political opponent that would be easier to subdue and use violence with and get away with that violence. that is how hamas was created. this is very calculated. each step israel is taking now is very calculated. genocide has been used pretty war crimes have been used, all of that is accurate. they are literally going to starve the people out. the u.s. is completely complicit in this.

joe biden's responses are metaphoric, symbolic, they have little meaning. he stands behind israel. it is just rhetoric. israel will continue this violence. i did not object when a lady called in and said there were mass rapes and the beheading of babies. there is sort of this careful language, equivocating, but this is a very clear situation. there is a clear oppressive that is an apartheid, racist, genocidal state. there is an oppressed people. he is not painting that picture. u.s. media does not paint that picture. we have a population that is very ignorant. host: i take the caller's point.

guest: i cannot respond to each and every point everybody makes. i think there is a certain idea about october 7 that is not accurate. we know there were a lot of atrocities that happened and a lot that did not happen, the beheaded babies being one. i think it is important to stay focused on the bigger picture. i think the caller is right in the sense that it is hard to call this a war when it is so hugely lopsided, where one side has the most sophisticated weapons in the world and yet still could not prevent the attack of december 7 and still has been unable to defeat politically or militarily the group that carried out the attack. it underscores the point i have been trying to make that this is

a political issue. it is hard to call it a war when one side has an enormous army and nuclear arsenal and the backing of the united states and western powers, and the other side has much more limited types of weapons. but the fact that there have been casualties on both sides has to be recognized. the palestinians are disproportionately bearing the brunt of the death and destruction for sure. but palestinians also have agency and have the ability to inflict damage on the israeli side, as we have seen. i think it is important to keep that in perspective. it is why i think it was irresponsible of the united states and the western world to

lend such unequivocal support for israel knowing their history of overreacting and using disproportionate force. given the national trauma inflicted on israelis and the fact that israeli leadership worm speaking in apocalyptic and genocidal terms, those should have been red flags for folks in the international community. they should have hesitated. they should have placed conditions on their support for israel militarily. the fact they did not is largely why we are where we are where hundreds of thousands are in the midst of famine and more than one million are facing catastrophic hunger, where most of gaza has been destroyed, where 15,000 children have been killed. there is no question the asymmetry of this is quite

alarming. i keep coming back to this same point, it is why you need rational third party, its possible third-party actors, who understand there has to be a limit. that there are costs that are too high. i think we long ago reached that point in gaza where the cost is simply too high to allow this to continue. host: this recent piece from your organization, you are part of the byline on what is needed to end the war in gaza. guest: what is needed is an immediate cease-fire. obviously, that would entail release of hostages. it is not accurate people who say hamas releases the hostages, the war would end. israeli leadership have said they will continue until total

victory, until hamas is eliminated regardless of a cease-fire deal and regardless of the hostages. the only way hostages have been released has been in the course of diplomacy diplomacy. i think an immediate cease-fire is in everyone's interest. as part of that, there needs to be an immediate search in -- surege in humanitarian assistance into gaza. in the last six days, nothing has entered gaza. before that, there were 200 trucks entering gaza. now, there is nothing entering gaza. the situation is quite desperate. there needs to be an immediate,

permanent pipeline of humanitarian assistance that reaches the population. that will require some political will. it will mean the united states and other western powers have to tell israel point blank you cannot continue to use starvation as a weapon of war. that is not legitimate. the same way the president has laid down the line on rafah and disallowing the use of certain weapons, the administration also needs to make a strong statement on humanitarian assistance beyond israel needs to do more. actually, what israel needs to do is less, less obstruction of the eight coming -- the aid coming in. there needs to be a recognition that this is a political issue, it has a political solution that goes beyond hamas, and that requires self-determination for

palestinians. ending israel's occupation, allowing palestinians to live like any other people in the world as a free people. host: we have time for one more call. we will hear from joe in apple valley, california, on the democrats line. good morning. caller: well, good morning. host: go ahead, joe. caller: you know what? i condemn october 7. at the same time, these people are settlers who they are part of the idea. [indiscernible] 100,000 people. it is terrible. that is how i feel pick that is

all i have got to say -- that is how i feel. that is all i have got to say. host: anything for joe, the situation overall? i know you just talked about it. anything you would like to add? guest: it is a very difficult situation. it is hard to continue to watch the images coming out of gaza of babies being pulled out of rubble and families in their entirety, multi-generation families being destroyed, wiped off the earth. the point i would make, the point i have been making is that this has to end. it is madness to allow this to continue even for another day. israel cannot achieve its goals militarily. it has not achieved the goals printer is a recognition of that now even in washington. but much more needs to be done to send the signal that the war needs to end now.

otherwise, we are just going to continue to see more devastation, death, and suffering. host: khaled elgindy with the middle east institute, thank you for your time this morning. guest: thank you for having me. host: that is it for our program today. we appreciate everyone who called in and all of our guests who joined us as well. we will be back tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. eastern. enjoy the rest of your sunday and happy mother's day to all of the moms out there. ♪

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