regularlation of stablecoins or crypto currencies and on c-span 3, secretary of state marco rubio testifies on his budget request for the upcoming year. and wednesday, the a late live session. starting at 1:00 a.m. eastern. you can also watch live coverage on the c-span now app or online at c-span.org. c-span, democracy unfiltered. we're funded by these television companies and more, including comcast. >> you think this is just a community center? no, it's way more than that. >> comcast is partnering with 1,000 community centers to create wfi enabled lifts.

comcast supports c-span as a public service along with these other television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy host: virginia kase són joins us now. she serves as the president and ceo of common cause, an organization whose mission is what? guest: well, we hold power accountable. that is our role could we serve as a watchdog for governments. we also really support everyday individuals in making sure that their voices are heard in government across the country come both at the federal level, local, state, you name it. host: how do you hold power accountable, and how long have you been around? guest: we've been around for 19th -- since 1970. for 55 years now almost we been doing this work. the way we hold government accountable is working with state legislatures, working with the federal government, looking

at what the ethics rules are and what exists in the local, state, and federal legislatures, to make sure that they are abiding by these rules. in addition to that, we work very closely with people at the community level, to make sure that government leaders are not engage in any kind of drifting, right? we want to make sure that everyday people have trust in the elected officials they have come and one of the biggest challenges we have is people don't participate in government cynically if they don't trust the leadership elected. host: when of your positions is to block president trump from accepting that qatari luxury plane. why are you doing this, and what can congress do about it? guest: there are a lot of reasons, but first, there's a new plane being built. boeing has taken on the contract to do that. it is set up to all the specific specifications that would be required from a security standpoint.

so taking a new plane on, not only in addition to the fact that it just really looks bad from an optics standpoint, it is an ethical conflict, we believe, but the amount of money it would cost taxpayers to be able to get that plane up to speed, from a security standpoint, from our government, would cost about $1 billion, according to the most recent numbers we've seen. so free is not free. you get a free $400 million plane that would still basically need to be stripped down to the nuts and bolts of it to make sure it is safe for any elected leader. how was that saving money? that is not a gift, number one. number two, it just looks really bad. i mean, from an ethics standpoint, george bush could not take a dog when he was president without going through all kinds of ethics and compliance rules. this is a $400 plane. host: so what can congress do to stop this, if they want to? guest: because of the emoluments

clause, congress does not need to approve it. if they wanted to, they actually could say, we do not approve this, we will not allow this gift to be accepted. the concern right now is that congress is not doing anything, at least on the people who are in the majority who could hold him accountable. i would add that there was a review done by pam bondi, who is the attorney general, but she was getting $100,000 a month while in service of this government who is gifting this plane to president trump, prior to her becoming attorney general. so the conflicts and the optics on this are really terrible. host: in the constitution, article one, section nine, clause clause.e emoluments no per holding any office of prr tru under them shall t the consent of congress except any present, and

molly may come office, or title from any kind whatever from any king, prince, or otherwise. to vote, how does both the senate and house vote on, and what can they do it anyway? guest: so here is the thing, this is not a usual administration as far as adhering to laws and ethics. i want to name at first. what should be happening is, yes, it should go through congressional approval. will it actually happen, and will we see that at some point is another question, and that is why it so concerning right now, because we seen so many rules and guidelines and norms that have been bypassed. so i would say, yes, it should go through congressional. the concern is, are there loopholes for attending to just bypass these things?

and do it anyway? so, yes, there should be congressional approval, yes, it should be going through the house. they should be looking at this. the question is, will it happen? what we are concerned about is what is coming out of many elected leaders on the hill right now who are afraid to speak up. one recently said, "we are afraid to." so, rules are supposed to apply. does not feel like they this thoroughly are. host: treasury secretary scott bessent was on "state of the union" yesterday. here's what he had to say. [video clip] sec. bessent: nobody in the middle east or anywhere in the world just gives $400 million away. i don't know, the french gave us the statue of liberty. i'm not sure they asked for anything in advance. in the more important airplane deal, there was $100 billion of

orders that went from qatari airlines to boeing. the ceo of boeing was with us in the middle east. this is the biggest order in the country's -- the company's history. i think that plane deal is much more important than this other one. >> i will just say about the statue of liberty come it was authorized by congress commander belongs to the american people, not whoever was president at the time. sec. bessent: well, i think this plane belongs to the american government. host: virginia kase solomón, your response? guest: that's disconcerting. congress authorized the statue of liberty, which is still sitting in new york right now, to this day. it was a gift to the american people. it was not a gift to an american president. the president was not hold up on ellis island or, you know,

sitting in the statue of liberty. it is frustrating, because it is a twist, in my opinion, and in ethics watchdog opinions, that you could even conflate the two. we are talking about a jet that will be used for personal reasons when there's a perfectly good -- there's nothing wrong with air force one right now. maybe it's not as updated, it's a little bit older than he would like, but by all means, there's nothing wrong with it. and he has said that it will go to his presidential library afterwards. again, it is such a twist on reality. and at the end of the day, business is business, and i get, right? but it should not be a print quote quote -- quid pro quo situation that we are facing, where cutter says, we will get all of these contracts, but we will also give you a free plane

out of this gig. that is really wrong and it stinks. i will just say this, you know, there was so much conversation from this president and from the administration, many administration officials, about "draining the swamp," and i feel like we just dumped a bunch of alligators and crocodiles in the swamp and said hey, guess what, we drained it, but we've got new visitors here. it is just very nasty and mucky. host: virginia kase solomón is our guest, ceo of common cause. democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. independents, (202) 748-8002. about half an hour left in our program. get your calls in. what is your view on the donald trump meme coin? guest: again, this family has

enriched itself beyond memes. previous presidents have always had an ethics executive order. there was never one. there was an executive pledged that was signed to have an outside counsel review ethics. there you go once again, a total of $2.9 billion coming into office that we have seen, just an exorbitant amount of money. it's hard to put into words, because this is not the kind of thing that we've ever seen before? . i think what is concerning here is not only that the family of the president are making just ridiculous amounts of money, but it is at the cost of the american taxpayer. what i mean by that is, we are talking about, they were just getting ready to have legislation that would have

potentially started cryptocurrency, kind of a national reserve for cryptocurrency. that actually got pulled by republicans, because they were concerned that this was a bad look. the president himself is actually raising alarm bells, not only with democrats but with republicans in the house and the senate. and although they will not say it out loud, this is what we are hearing behind closed doors. but they are very concerned about what they are seeing. host: you mentioned you had some concerns in the previous administration. let me anticipate some callers' questions. why did common cause raise the red flag on in the previous administration? is there a way to make comparisons between what you are talking about? guest: yeah. before it was with his hotel, for example, the trump hotel on

pennsylvania avenue, and you would see businessmen coming in, and people would need to kind of kiss the ring in order to be able to get a meeting with the president or meet with administration officials. so a lot of people were put toward the hotel. now it goes to mar-a-lago, for example, you go to mar-a-lago, and you get a lot of direct access to trump and his family and other people who are in his ecosystem. and that is a direct line to the president that people will have. that's no different whether it is in florida or here. when it comes to some of his business practices, what we are seeing is direct benefit to donald trump and his family, and they may not pay immediate dividends. it might not all be happening right now, but after the fact, we saw jared kushner being able to receive really big gifts from the saudi government. we've seen his family now, with the qatari government, being able to make really strong business deals that will benefit

them into the future. these things have not changed. host: over the things that you raise the red flags about during the biden administration, and how to those compared to what you were just talking about? guest: so we did not have the same ethics concerns from the financial standpoint. we did have a lot of concerns about hunter biden and his interactions and what was happening with his financial dealings and really getting into trying to understand whether or not the president was actually involved. and what we found during that is as a father, yes, he was very involved in providing support to his son, emotional support. he was also not financially involved. so there was, you know, a president's whose son was making poor choices versus the situation now, but the president not being directly involved in his son's financial dealings, versus the whole family involved now. it is a whole different situation.

common cause has filed all kinds of ethics lawsuits and investigations. they in turn of ours discovered the hush money payment and conflict. these are the kinds of things we tend to focus on, but ultimately, what we are saying is, whether it is a democrat or a republican, it is not about right or left, it is about right and wrong, and the american people, they are feeling bad right now when they see all of this happening, and we talk about the cuts to medicaid. as we look at it, it is about not what is good for any political party or politician, it's what's good for the american people and what makes american people have trust in their government. host: commoncause.org, if you want to check out their work. plenty of caller are waiting to chat with you. this is deborah on the line for democrats. go ahead. caller: hello? well, my comments, i think

everything that the trump administration has been doing, i think back on the mccarthy era, and with the quote, and i'm reading it from, "until this moment, senator, i think i never gave your cruelty or your recklessness, have you no sense of decency, sir? at long last, have you no sense of decency?" that was what started to change things during that era when mccarthy had so much power. and the problem today, i believe, is that there are too many republicans who have no sense of decency. they are going after progressive values, and they seem to forget

what the united states, how we began i what we really stand for. so i agree with everything common cause is doing, and i appreciate that. host: virginia kase solomón? guest: thank you. i think that is the thing that is missing in all of this. our country, at its core, is, i think, comprised of really good people who want to be able to have good lives. we also went decency and kindness in our politics. and while politics are messy and it is nasty, and we should be able to have policy debates, what we are seeing right now has gone beyond any kind of norm. the attacks on american people, american values is what is really concerning, and we are seeing this play out through a lot of these ethics challenges with this administration. it cannot be, "what's good for me, as the president, cannot be good for you as the american people."

we cannot take a $400 million airplane but yet at the same time we are seeing a ridiculous amount of cuts to medicaid, for example, that will harm a lot of vulnerable people. so this is all, you know, again, going back to the idea of decency, have you no decency? host: to john in california. republican. good morning. thank you for waiting. caller: good morning. i do believe that we need a lot more watchdogs and like that. i love the way you watch the way you watch the biden administration and his sons, going of gathering around -- going around the world and gathering funds, i don't think there's any conclusion that joe biden did not profit from his son's corruption. i wonder what you think about the $2 billion that was given to this organization that was called together in 30 seconds by

stacey abrams that went out of the government? yeah. there will be cuts to medicaid. what they want to cut are the -- is the rampant corruption. you have had politico on this morning, you had the man, the has been manager of the office of management and budget that came on to do nothing but belittle trunk, and now you have this lady from common cause, which is a very left-wing organization. i don't want trump to take the darned airplane. i think it is bad optics. but by the same token, i want some equality when it comes to criticism. and joe biden, his health and mental problems, to what his son did and what other people in his administration did come and for you to sit there and say, oh,

this is outside the norms. the norms, 36 trillion dollars, almost $37 trillion in debt. what about the clintons and the clinton foundation? literally billions of dollars around the world when bill clinton was president. host: you bring up a lot of points, john. let's get virginia kase solomón a chance to respond. guest: yeah. what i would say is, again, going back to it is not about right and left, it's about right and wrong. common cause, we have not changed our value speed we were actually founded by republican in 1970. a lot of people don't know that. so what i would say is, when it has come to speaking out against whether it is a republican

administration, democratic administrations, common cause is actually done that. we have both sides of the aisle pretty angry with us all the time. when you talk about left-leaning, our values have not changed over the past 55 years. the political ecosystem has. so we always stand on behalf of voters. we are nonpartisan. we don't support or endorse candidates or political parties, but we do identify we we see wrongs, and we call it like we see it. if we are talking about specifically saying we are going back in history, and you can go back as far as you want. host: he brought up the clinton foundation. was common cause concerned about money taken in by the clinton foundation when hillary clinton was secretary of state? guest: i was not at common cause at that time, so i cannot speak specifically to the work that common cause did around that, but what i can say is this -- if there is a commitment from the

administration saying, moving forward, we are going to do x, we are going to drain the swamp, what will we say that moving forward, instead of saying, "well, they did it, too," let's turn over a new leaf. let's start on any page and say, moving forward, we will do what you want, because that is the promise to the american people. no different than joe biden, no different than the clintons, whoever you want to point back to. there is this constant turn in washington where there's finger-pointing going like this, with both sides pointing at each other, at some point, somebody has to be the adult in the room and say enough is enough. this has to stop. host: you mentioned the stormy daniels hush-money payments, that that was a common cause investigation. what are some other common cause investigations, ethics complaints you filed, that viewers words with no going back into history? guest: so common cause have been

working on ethics spending since watergate come honestly. there are tons of investigations that came out of watergate could we just celebrated the federal elections commission at 50, that turned 50 years old. that was actually born out of watergate, and that was one of the things common cause helped set up. going back to the iran-contra affair, you name it. there are many times when common cause has looked into these ethics investigations. host: how do you find common cause? how do you find the work you do? guest: we raise small dollars from donors across the country, with her five dollars, $10, $25. we also have money from foundations and philanthropy. we take a zero business dollars, we take zero federal money. the reason we do that is we want to make sure we can maintain that nonpartisanship.

we work with republicans and democrats. we are in all 50 states, in every congressional district. host: florida, independent, thank you for waiting. caller: you are very welcome, and thank you for letting me speak. i would like to ask her how she enjoys flying on airplanes that go all the way back to where they started? and i don't like it. i don't like the fact that all of our, even commercial planes, or so old, until my children are younger than that. host: so, barbara, bring it to the ethics issues we are talking about right now. caller: it's about the airplane that was given, and the arabs have given us more contracts for

arms and things over the years then you can probably name any other country. host: you are ok with the gift, barbara? you are ok with the gift of the plane? caller: i'm not. i'm very ok taking the plane, because it is for the united states of america, it is not for the president, no matter who he is. but i happen to like most of the things this one is doing. i happen to be 82 years old, and i've always listened to politics. and, frankly, he's doing a pretty freaking good job. i don't mean he's great, i don't mean he's terrible, he's neither one. he's doing the best he can to do what he can. host: barbara, let me take your point and allow virginia kase solomón to respond. guest: i would just say, going back to what i said earlier, a $400 million gift of an airplane

that will cost nearly $1 billion to bring it down, strip it down to the nuts and the boats, basically to make sure, from a security standpoint, that the president is safe to fly in that plane, number one. in number two, that our national security and national secrets would be protected while on that plane. the math is not mathing when it comes to that. why would you spend the additional amount of money? it is going to cost us more, it's going to cost taxpayers more coming a that is something that can be used, again, for medicaid or protecting social security. talking about aviation, right now now, the faa is broken. air traffic controllers are at the highest levels of stress. i'm more worried about getting on a plane, as most americans are, when we are hearing of all of the issues we are seeing with air traffic control than i'm

worried about the actual planes themselves. host: less than 15 minutes left this morning. on a different topic, i want to ask you your view on members of congress making stock market trades and managing their portfolios as they are making laws. guest: yeah. absolutely, we are 100% in support of bands on stock training for members of congress and their family members. it makes absolutely no sense. the rest of the world and the private sector in civil society have 401k's or 403 b's, right? they invest in portfolios like normal folks. you should not be able to have insider information about what is happening, potentially, run different stocks and then be able to go and trade those stocks accordingly. so we are very serious when it comes to that issue, and we are

100 percent in support of a stock trading ban. host: what are you doing about this? guest: we are lobbying on these issues, and we have been for a long time kid we are currently looking at the pelosi act that senator hawley has put into place. host: does that seem like a good solution? guest: well, the devils are always in the details. i do not necessarily like naming legislation after somebody unless it is honoring somebody come up personally, but i think the components of a come of the legislation itself, actually makes sense. what i will say is there are lots of pieces of legislation in introduced in the past that have not made it through. one of the things you need to be reminded of is that the lobby industry in this town is huge. there is still a disproportionate amount of influence that they have, and i think that is why we are seeing

some of these challenges, because they want their stocks to be able to be traded, they want to go in, whether it is big oil, big aggro, you name it, big pharma, crypto, you want to be able to go in and have that access. the people who will go in and vote on your behalf, there's a lot of influence. we always follow the money trail. host: it's interesting, your concerns about the lobbyist. you say you are lobbying on this issue. do you consider what you do a form of lobbying? guest: i think we do advocacy, and that is one of the things that is important. you have to register as a lobbyist in order to be with legislators on capitol hill. again, we are 5013 c, 501 c4 organization, so we are a tax exempt. we don't take in a big corporate money to get what we do on behalf of the american people, we consider our work advocacy. host: in new york, a democrat, good morning.

go ahead. caller: good morning, john. please let me elaborate on a few things. just because you cut me off over a month ago when i was about to talk about offshore accounts. host: just jump into it. just go for it. caller: ok. yeah. offshore accounts, but, so, ok, so, let me just make it very simple. i agree with the woman that you have on. i can't hear what you are saying because i muted my tv, so i agree with the woman, what she is saying. i want to make something very clear that is bothering me, and that is, i watch a lot of news, and a lot of good news -- pbs, your program, bbc -- i don't

watch fox. and i can always tell the people that are watching fox when they called in. host: get to the issue that you want to get to. caller: i want to say something about the airplane. the reason i brought up the news programs is because i don't see anybody talking about the fact that trump wants to fix this airplane. it's going to take a couple of years, and then it is his. i mean, it is clear as day that this plane is his gift. host: got your point. you are making the point earlier, the amount of money will it cost to fix this airplane. guest: the amount of money will cost the american taxpayers. and if we are talking about huge deficits, our credit rating has been recently downgraded here there's a lot of uncertainty around our economy. why would you take something like this on, knowing that it just looks horrible, horrible, not only to us, as taxpayers and

as people who live in this country, but to other countries. host: are you doing a risk count, as it were, on who has come out against this and whether it has the vote, if it went through congress, to get it approved? guest: our staffers are looking at it right now. i just got back from vacation, but i will tell you that they are looking at it. host: kim in michigan, a republican. you are next. caller:hi, good morning. yeah. it is quite interesting, how, for the last 58 years that i've been around, we have talked about the same stuff every day. things seem to never get better, but we always blame each other to whatever. the people out here in the actual real world they go to work and pay their bills, we are talking about billions and

trillions and all this stuff, every day, it is so funny that, it is not even make sense to us, because when we go eat or when we go buy a car that is not even worth -- i worked in the car plan for 30 years. i don't understand how we get this trillions of dollars. who cares about is you get the jet? and brings it back here and flies it around. he's going to do it anyway. he's going to do it as a businessman. host: that is 10 in michigan. speaking about president trump and what he said about this? the previous ethics concerns that have been brought up. he previously said, a president cannot have a conflict of interest. what is your view on that. can a president have a conflict of interest? guest: absolutely. anybody can have a conflict of

interest. i want to go back to what the previous caller said, you know, this has been happening for a very long time coming is 58 years of life, this is what he has seen. and that is what is concerning, we have normalized things that should not be normal. we have said these corrections are ok, these ethical concerns are ok, because everybody does it. that is what is concerning. that is not normal in a healthy, functioning government. issue not be ok if it's a democrat, it should not be ok if it is a republican. and i think what this president is doing is just raising the bar for people's tolerance to be able to accept corruption on ethical issues and say, well, i'm the president. he cannot have any ethical conflicts. and quite frankly, he's never been held accountable, so at the end of the day, people are going to be like, "eh." that is what is really concerning and sad at this

moment. host: charles in indiana, and independent. good morning. caller: good morning. to your guest, man, i cannot agree with you more. i'm retired military, and i thought for the constitution of this country. therefore, i can't agree with this president taking a gift of that plane. i won't repeat anything that you said about the cost to refit it, but to the caller in california, i'm independent. i cannot understand why we allow our jobs to go -- laws to go down in the ground, but if it is a "businessman," it's ok. corruption, his family benefiting from what he's doing, i mean, it should be the same. his sons benefited from it, the golf courses, his whole family

benefiting. nobody is talking about kushner and the last administration. kushner got millions or billions of dollars for him and his daughter. but that is ok, because he's a "businessman." according to some people, it is ok. well, it is not ok, and i do not serve this country and fight for this country for this to be ok. especially when medicare, my mom is on medicare, her social security and medicaid is being threatened, because he wants to cut it. they don't need medicare, they don't need social security, they've got money. but i guess the country does not care about that. host: i will give you the final minute here. guest: thanks, paul. i think one of the things we want to be reminded of is when we think about what our country means in this moment, we are looking for us to be able to

continue to have people thrive in this country, to be able to do simple things like go to work, make sure you know you can pay your rent, that you could buy food in the grocery store, that you can take care of your family, and know that when you retire, there will be a little something in place. people should not have to be distracted, and the legislator -- legislature should not have to be distracted about all of this outside noise. these are distractions, getting in the people's business demand we seen these types of ethical concerns, whether republicans or democrats. would you be ok with the previous president doing the same thing? or are you just ok because it is donald trump? if biden was in office, where are you ok with the things that he did because he was biden or because he was in the trunk? you have to go back to looking specifically at the issues and

apply everything fairly across-the-board, and there has to be a restart of this country at some point, or else we are going to continue along this partisan divide that does not help us drive our country forward. in fact, a further divide us. host: virginia kase solomón is presid ukraine war, israel and

former president biden's cancer diagnosis. >> hey, guys. how are you? good. let me just a couple words. first of all were thrilled to join the first papal mass