She is such a dumb “NIE”. Arming the teachers makes them less safe. What a freaking genius.
On February 26, MSNBC Terror Analyst Malcolm Nance suggested that teachers are not ready to carry guns and that they would most likely be shot as police entered a building in the case of an attack.
Nance made these suggestions while being questioned by host Stephanie Ruhle.
Ruhle asked Nance what armed teachers would face. He responded by talking about military and police training, then shifted to teachers, saying, “It’s not like the movies. The movies have nothing to do with reality. You are putting yourself where you could be killed.”
Ruhle then asked what it would be like if an attacker brought an AR-15 and all the teacher had was a handgun.
Nance responded:
That’s really a matter of understanding and training. We have a lot of people who are going on what they think they see in the movies. If you’ve got a handgun and that’s all the tool you have, you have to be extremely well-trained to go out and engage someone who has a fully automatic or semiautomatic weapon … and to be quit honest, depending on the distance that you’re away, civilians don’t understand [that] in close quarters the first thing you are going to have to experience is the explosive sound of the weapon going off, not yours but the shooters.
He went on to say that it is only after all these first obstacles that a teacher will actually get into a gun fight.
Missing from Nance’s assessment is any acknowledgment that teachers are already hearing the sound of the attacker’s gun, but they are doing it in an unarmed, defenseless posture. In other words, they are hearing it while trying to hold the door closed, while hiding under the desk at the shooter’s feet, while throwing books and erasers at the attacker, or while selflessly charging him as did Sandy Hook principal Dawn Hochsprung.
Right now, they are hearing the “explosive sound” of the gun and then dying, being injured, or psychologically traumatized. Why not let them hear it while they are holding a gun and at least have a fighting chance?
Nance continued by claiming arming teachers is a “ludicrous idea.” He said it is “the worst idea” he has ever heard. He said that when SWAT enters a school building after a 911 shooting call, they are checking hands and they are going to shoot if they see a handgun in a teacher’s hand.
He did not mention that schools know which teachers are and are not armed, and that information can be provided to SWAT teams beforehand. Moreover, he overlooked the fact that, in our current scenario, SWAT teams that come into rooms where mass shooters have been are often stepping over a teacher’s body: the body of a teacher that had no means of self-defense.
It should be noted that President Donald Trump is not just calling for armed teachers, but for teachers who undergo training to carry and use a gun in reaction to an attack on a school. Such training can be extremely intense, as with the FASTER program that prepares armed teachers in what must be done should a horrific attack occur.
MSNBC: Teachers Not Ready to Carry Guns, Would Just Get Shot by Police
While speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) argued that if Republicans don’t do anything on DACA, the program ends, “and a lot of these young people start getting deported,” it would “destroy” the Republican Party. He further stated that doing nothing on DACA is not “even a viable option.”
This is Lindsey at swim lessons.
This Is Lindsey The Cat Man Getting A Butt Tattoo Of John mcCain.
This is Lindsey being thanked by John. Lindsey and John sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I_N-G
Graham said, “If we did nothing, and just ended DACA, and did nothing else and a lot of these young people start getting deported, then that would destroy the party. So, I don’t think that’s even a viable option. The options are to…punt it down the road, deal with it later. Or the president, engage again and see where the sweet spot’s at. And it’s pretty clear to me, that after those four votes, you know where the sweet spot’s at, which is border security for DACA.”
NEW YORK — Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee on Saturday released a purported rebuttal to a four-page House Republican memo from earlier this month that alleges abuse of surveillance authority on the part of Obama-era federal agencies.
The Democratic rebuttal contains misleading claims, omits key details, and, perhaps unintentionally, actually proves the FBI and Department of Justice utilized the infamous, largely discredited 35-page anti-Trump dossier to obtain a FISA court warrant to monitor an individual formerly associated with Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Here are seven key problems with the claims made inside the Democrats’ rebuttal memo.
1 – The House Democratic rebuttal opens with a seemingly deceptive statement that Steele’s dossier “did not inform” the FBI’s decision to start its investigation into Trump’s campaign in late July.
This is the first contention in the rebuttal, which relates it is trying to “correct the record.” However, the Republican memo did not assert that the dossier informed the FBI’s decision to launch its investigation in late July or anytime. Instead, the GOP memo documented that Steele’s dossier formed an “essential part” of the FISA court applications submitted by Obama-era federal agencies to monitor the communications of Carter Page, who briefly served as a volunteer foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
Meanwhile, even though House Democrats seem to be rebutting a contention that was not made in the Republican memo, there are possible issues with the rebuttal’s claim that the FBI’s investigative team only received Steele’s “reporting” in mid-September, ostensibly referring to the written dossier. The Democrats entirely ignore that last July, Steele reportedly traveled to Rome, where he met with an FBI contact to supply the agency with alleged information he found during the course of his anti-Trump work. The Washington Post reported that Steele met with the FBI on July 5, 2016. The Democratic memo reveals that the DOJ “accurately informed the court that that the FBI initiated its counterintelligence investigation on July 31, 2016.” That is 26 days after Steele met with the FBI in Rome.
2 – While perhaps not intending to, the Democratic memo actually confirms that the Obama Justice Department did use Steele’s largely discredited dossier for FISA court applications to monitor Page.
The memo contains a sentence stating that “as DOJ informed the court in subsequent renewals”; but the rest of that sentence is redacted. The next sentence states that “Steele’s reporting about Page’s Moscow meeting,” with the remainder of that sentence also redacted. The next sentence states that “DOJ’s applications did not otherwise rely on Steele’s reporting, including any ‘salacious’ allegations about Trump…” The word “otherwise” indicates that, according to the Democratic memo, DOJ did indeed rely on Steele’s dossier for something.
As a side note, interestingly, the Democrats only use the term “salacious” regarding the dossier, not fully quoting from former FBI Director James Comey’s famous remarks in which he testified that the anti-Trump dossier contained “salacious and unverified” material.
Meanwhile, the Democratic rebuttal goes on to cite specific instances of the FISA applications utilizing Steele’s dossier, with the applications citing Steele’s alleged sources reporting that Page took meetings in Russia.
In a clear attempt to minimize the importance of the dossier, the Democratic memo refers to a 2013 case in which Russian agents allegedly targeted Page for recruitment. In that case, Page was identified in court documents made public as “Male-1” in reference to a case involving three Russian men identified as Russian intelligence agents. The spy ring was accused of seeking information on U.S. sanctions as well as methods of developing alternate sources of energy. The FBI court filings describe “the attempted use of Male-1 as an intelligence source for Russia,” but Page was not accused of having been successfully recruited or spying. The court documents cite no evidence that “Male-1” knew he was talking with alleged Russian agents. That the Obama-era federal agencies needed to still use the dossier in light of that 2013 case may show that the 2013 episode was not enough to obtain a FISA warrant on Page. Steele’s dossier contains claims of updated meetings between Page and Russians that went into the year 2016.
The House Republican memo and a subsequent criminal referral authored by Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) both state that the FISA applications relied heavily on the dossier. Grassley and Graham both reviewed the original FISA applications.
The Grassley-Graham memo relates (emphasis added):
On March 17, 2017, the Chairman and Ranking Member were provided copies of the two relevant FISA applications, which requested authority to conduct surveillance on Carter Page. Both relied heavily on Mr. Steele’s dossier claims, and both applications were granted by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). In December of 2017, the Chairman, Ranking Member and Subcommittee Chairman Graham were allowed to review a total of four FISA applications relying on the dossier to seek surveillance of Mr. Carter Page, as well as numerous other documents relating to Mr. Steele.
3 – The rebuttal leaves out key information that may dispute the Democratic document’s claim that the FISA warrant was “not used to spy on Trump or his campaign.”
The rebuttal claims this is the case because Page “ended his affiliation with the campaign months before DOJ applied for a warrant.” This is misleading. The FISA warrant gives access to phone calls, email, web browsing history and other electronic records, meaning agents can retrieve any emails or recorded communications from the period Page was affiliated with the campaign and would be able to access any recorded communications with the campaign from that period. Also, according to reports, the FBI monitored Page while he spoke to then-Trump adviser Steve Bannon about Russia in January 2017.
4 – The rebuttal tries to give legitimacy to the possibly illicit surveillance of Page by noting that two of the presiding federal judges were appointed by President George W. Bush and one by President Ronald Reagan.
However, the Republicans’ issue has never been claims of partisanship on behalf of the judges, but rather the charge that key information was withheld from the judges, primarily the origins of the dossier, which was produced by the controversial Fusion GPS and paid for by Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee. Republicans also charge that the FISA court was not told about credibility issues related to Steele.
5 – The Democratic memo raises immediate questions about the possible use of a second dossier authored by Cody Shearer, a shadowy former tabloid journalist who has long been closely associated with various Clinton scandals.
The rebuttal states that the DOJ provided the FISA court with “additional information obtained through multiple independent sources that corroborate Steele’s reporting.” The rebuttal does not mention the names of the other “independent sources.”
Shearer reemerged in the news cycle last month when the Guardian newspaper reported that the FBI has been utilizing a second dossier authored by Shearer as part of its probe into Trump and alleged Russian collusion.
The Guardian reported the so-called Shearer memo was given to the FBI by Steele in October 2016 to back up some of his claims.
According to the Guardian report, the FBI is still assessing portions of the Shearer memo. The newspaper reported that, like Steele’s dossier, Shearer’s memo cites an “unnamed source within Russia’s FSB” alleging that Trump was compromised by Russian intelligence during a 2013 trip to Moscow in which the future president purportedly engaged in “lewd acts in a five-star hotel.”
Shearer’s name was reportedly associated with the Grassley-Graham criminal referral of Steele, which contains redacted information that Steele received information from someone in the State Department, who in turn had been in contact with a “foreign sub-source” who was in touch with a redacted name described as a “friend of the Clintons.”
Numerous media reports have since stated that the second dossier author mentioned in the Grassley-Graham memo was Shearer, an associate of longtime Clinton friend Sidney Blumenthal.
According to sources who spoke to CNN, Shearer’s information was passed from Blumenthal to Jonathan Winer, who at the time was a special State Department envoy for Libya working under then-Secretary of State John Kerry.
Citing the same source, CNN reported that Shearer’s dossier is “actually a set of notes based on conversations with reporters and other sources.” CNN reported that Shearer had “circulated those notes to assorted journalists, as well as to Blumenthal.”
National Review previously dubbed Shearer a “Creepy Clinton Confidante” and “The Strangest Character in Hillary’s Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy.”
6 – While trying to argue otherwise, the Democratic rebuttal actually confirms the key contention in the Republican memo that the FBI and DOJ failed to inform the FISA court that Steele’s dossier was funded by Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) via the Perkins Coie law firm.
In an attempt to rebut the Republican argument that the FISA court was not informed about the dossier’s specific origins, the Democratic memo quotes from an explanation to the court that Steele:
was approached by an identified U.S. person who indicated to Source #1 [Steele] that a U.S.-based law firm had hired the identified U.S. person to conduct research regarding Candidate #1’s ties to Russia. (The identified U.S. person and Source #1 have a long-standing business relationship.) The identified U.S. person hired Source #1 to conduct this research. The identified U.S. person never advised Source #1 as to the motivation behind the research into candidate #1’s ties to Russia. The FBI speculates that the identified U.S. person was likely looking for information that could be used to discredit Candidate #1’s campaign.
Contrary to the rebuttal’s characterization, this paragraph is a far cry from informing the court that the dossier utilized in the FISA warrant was paid for by Trump’s primary political opponents, namely Clinton and the DNC. Also, the general mention of “a U.S.-based law firm” does not identify to the FISA court the actual firm, Perkins Coie, which is known for its representation of Clinton and the DNC. Further, informing the FISA court about “an identified U.S. person” who hired Steele fails to actually identify that U.S. person as Glenn Simpson, founder of the controversial Fusion GPS.
The Democrats claim that the above-referenced paragraph proves the Obama-era agencies informed the FISA court about the “political” origins of the dossier. However, the Republican memo specifically and apparently correctly charged that “neither the initial application in October 2016, nor any of the renewals, disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign, or any party/campaign in funding Steele’s efforts.” The Democratic memo fails to dispute that charge.
7 – The Democratic rebuttal omitted key details about the FBI’s internal assessments of Steele and his reporting.
The Democratic memo claims that the Obama-era agencies “repeatedly affirmed to the Committee the reliability and credibility of Steele’s reporting, an assessment also reflected in the FBI’s underlying source documents.”
Actually, the House Republican memo documents that a “source validation report conducted by an independent unit within FBI assessed Steele’s reporting as only minimally corroborated.”
An associate of Arizona Sen. John McCain is invoking his Fifth Amendment rights in order to avoid revealing information to Congress about the Steele dossier.
David J. Kramer, a former State Department official, pleaded the fifth in response to a subpoena issued in December by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Fox News reported.
In a Dec. 19 interview with the committee, Kramer said that he had information about some of the sources of information in the dossier, which was written by former British spy Christopher Steele and financed by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
Kramer learned the information in Nov. 2016, after traveling to London to meet with Steele. Kramer and McCain, a Republican, first learned of the dossier earlier that month after meeting with an associate of Steele’s.
After the London meeting, Steele provided a copy of the dossier to Kramer with instructions to share it with McCain. The senator then provided a copy of the document to then-FBI Director James Comey during a Dec. 9, 2016, meeting.
The House Intelligence Committee issued a subpoena on Dec. 27 to compel Kramer to discuss the dossier’s sources.
Kramer, who was a director at the McCain Institute and now works for Florida International University, has avoided speaking publicly about his handling of the dossier. There has also been widespread speculation that he is BuzzFeed’s source for the document. The website published the dossier on Jan. 10, 2017.
In addition to his interview with the Intelligence Committee, Kramer was deposed in December as part of a lawsuit filed against BuzzFeed for publishing the dossier. Kramer’s lawyers have requested that his deposition in that case be sealed.
Steele, McCain and Fusion GPS, the firm that hired Steele to write the dossier, have all denied being BuzzFeed’s source. Kramer is the only person known to have handled the completed dossier who has not denied providing it to BuzzFeed.
Kramer and his attorney have not responded to numerous requests for comment.
McCain Associate Who Handled Dossier Asks Judge To Seal Deposition
An associate of Arizona Sen. John McCain’s who handled the dossier is asking a federal judge to block the release of a videotape and transcript of a deposition he recently gave in a lawsuit related to the salacious document.
David Kramer, a former State Department official and former director at the McCain Institute for International Leadership, filed a motion in federal court in Florida asking a judge for a protective order to block the public release of his deposition.
Kramer was deposed last month by lawyers for a Russian businessman suing BuzzFeed News for publishing the dossier. The lawyers for the businessman, Aleksej Gubarev, are interested in Kramer because he is one of just a few people known to have handled the dossier after it was completed by former British spy Christopher Steele and before its Jan. 10, 2017 publication.
Gubarev’s attorneys want to find out whether BuzzFeed’s source gave any warnings about the veracity of the dossier and whether it was verified or unverified.
Steele, McCain and Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that commissioned the dossier on behalf of Democrats, have all denied being BuzzFeed’s source.
Kramer has not commented publicly on the issue.
Kramer’s lawyer, Marcos Jiminez, argued in a motion to seal that the release of the deposition would jeopardize his personal safety, make him subject to hounding from the press, and conflict with congressional investigations looking into the dossier.
Kramer was interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee last month and has also met with the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“Mr. Kramer seeks to prevent the Plaintiffs from sharing his videotaped deposition and accompanying transcript beyond the instant litigation,” wrote Jiminez.
He asserted that Kramer’s deposition in the BuzzFeed lawsuit “would reveal the extent of the Congressional Committees’ knowledge regarding the information provided by Mr. Kramer in closed-door sessions.”
Jimenez also argues that should Kramer’s deposition be released to the public, he “will be hounded by the press.”
Kramer and McCain first learned of the dossier shortly after the 2016 election while attending the Halifax International Security Forum. On the sidelines of that event, Kramer and McCain had a conversation with Sir Andrew Wood, a former British ambassador to Russia and associate of Steele’s.
Kramer then traveled to London to meet with Steele. While there, the pair made arrangements for Kramer to obtain the dossier back in the U.S. and to provide a copy to McCain.
McCain shared an incomplete version of the dossier with then-FBI Director James Comey on Dec. 9, 2016. The Republican was unaware at the time that Comey and the FBI were already aware of Steele’s report. FBI agents met with the ex-spy multiple times prior to the election.
Steele published his final dossier memo on Dec. 13, 2016. It is that document which alleges that Gubarev used two of his web-hosting companies to hack into the Democratic National Committee’s computer systems prior to the election. The dossier also alleges that Gubarev was recruited under duress by Russia’s spy services. He denies all of the allegations. In addition to suing BuzzFeed, he is suing Steele in London, where the former spy is based.
In court filings there, Steele has acknowledged that the Dec. 13 memo contained unverified information.
As of the beginning of this month, Steele and Fusion GPS have dodged requests for depositions from Gubarev’s lawyers.
David Kramer Motion to Seal deposition in BuzzFeed lawsuit by Chuck Ross on Scribd
Billy Graham preached the bible and these evil demons hated that.
Former President Barack Obama sparked a liberal backlash by praising Rev. Billy Graham, who passed away on Wednesday at the age of 99.
“Billy Graham was a humble servant who prayed for so many – and who, with wisdom and grace, gave hope and guidance to generations of Americans,” Obama wrote on Twitter, shortly after news of Graham’s death became public.
Liberals lashed out at Obama for not trashing Graham after death for the preacher’s Christian beliefs about gay marriage. (Obama, it’s worth noting, also opposed gay marriage when he first ran for president in 2008.)
Why did Oprah not bring up all the corruption from the Obama Administration, and scandals from the black so-called savior Barack?
Last fall, Oprah Winfrey spoke with 14 Michigan voters, seven of whom voted for Donald Trump. Winfrey sat down with the voters again to get their thoughts on Trump’s first year in office.
One year into Donald Trump’s presidency, Americans remain divided, often unwilling to listen to what the other side has to say. It’s happening in families, among friends and at the workplace. We witnessed that schism first-hand last fall when we went to Grand Rapids, Michigan, and gathered 14 people – seven who voted for Mr. Trump, seven who did not – for a wide-ranging discussion about politics, policy and the president himself. To mark President Trump’s first year in office we decided to repeat the experiment. We never intended to go back to Grand Rapids. But then we learned that, after disagreeing on virtually everything, our group stayed in close touch. Members from opposite sides of the divide actually became friends, organizing outings and talking every day in a private facebook chat group. All of that made us want to go back.
Rose:Can we please come together and at least give this president a chance?
Oprah Winfrey leads another discussion with 14 Michigan voters
CBS NEWS
This was the group when we met them in downtown Grand Rapids six months ago. Fourteen passionately partisan strangers.
Now, they greet each other like old friends. Lauren Taylor, a liberal community organizer, and Tom Nemcek, a staunch libertarian and supporter of President Trump, couldn’t be farther apart politically. But they took the initiative to bring the group together. Tom, a gun rights advocate, took members of the group shooting. It made such an impression on Laura Ansara, she bought her own gun and joined the NRA.
Matt Wiedenhoeft – a Trump supporter who teaches economics and coaches a hockey team at Grand Valley State University – invited them to a Saturday night game.
And nearly the entire group turned out for what they call a team-building workout organized by Jennifer Allard, a lifelong Republican who says she couldn’t bring herself to vote for Donald Trump. Wesley Watson, a community health activist, was there. So was Daniel Skidmore, a conservative and first-time voter. And Maggie Ryan, a lawyer and self-described independent.
Oprah Winfrey: When we first met, there were some of you who had said, you know, you’d never been in conversations, certainly engagement, with members of the opposite side, political side. So has that changed for you now?
Jennifer: Yes. Because now I’m looking at them as people, not as you’re Trump or not Trump. This has been an incredible experience and an education for me.
“I feel like he cares more about me than the last president did.”
Frank Luntz: This never, ever happens.
A few weeks ago, we re-assembled the group— a cross-section of voters selected for us by conservative pollster Frank Luntz.
Frank Luntz: I was surprised that they stayed together because there was every reason, based on the conversation, that they would pull themselves apart.
Oprah Winfrey: Yeah.
Frank Luntz: But what I liked about it is that they came to respect each other, appreciate each other, and live each other’s lives to some degree so that they could empathize. That was a laboratory.
They may know each other a lot better now, but their political views have not changed, especially when it comes to President Trump.
Oprah Winfrey: How many people here voted for him? Just to remind everybody. And how many of you would vote for him again? You would vote for him again?
Laura: Yeah, my 401(k)’s up 35%. My house is up another $31,000, yes.
Since meeting each other last fall, the 14 partisan voters have kept in touch and become friends
CBS NEWS
Daniel: I feel like he cares more about me than the last president did. He cares about issues affecting my day-to-day life more. Like, the tax cuts. That’ll increase my bottom line.
Tim: Temporary.
Daniel: Better than nothing.
Oprah Winfrey: So the tax plan, do you feel, are you gonna personally benefit from that?
Daniel: Yes, I will. I calculated I’ll benefit from it.
Oprah Winfrey: Tom, you said the quote that was so memorable the last time, I love him more and more every day. Do you still feel that?
Tom: I do.
Oprah Winfrey: Do you still send a check every time he does something that you approve of?
Tom: When he fulfills a campaign promise, yes I do.
Oprah Winfrey: And Matt, you said something the last time like, he speaks for us or speaks like us.
Matt: He speaks like everybody else does. This guy’s straightforward. I’m bringin’ jobs back. I’m worried about America first. And that’s what I’m gonna do. And guess what? He’s kept every promise he startedbecause he said it.
Tom: What he means is he doesn’t speak like a politician.
Wesley: Over the last few weeks our president have made comments about Haitians and…
Maggie: S*ithole countries, I mean?
Tom: Were you guys in the room? Were you guys in the room? Were you in the room?
Kim: Oh my goodness.
Tom: Okay, because there’s three people who were in that room who said he never said this.
The room was the Oval Office, where in a meeting about immigration, the president reportedly used profanity to describe Haiti, El Salvador and African countries, while praising Norway.
Oprah Winfrey: Who here believes that he made the comment about, quote, “s*ithole countries?”
Tim: Absolutely.
Kim: Absolutely.
Oprah Winfrey: You think he made the comment?
Paul: Yeah, I think he made the comment. Yes. I think all presidents have made a comment behind closed doors that wasn’t reported–
Oprah Winfrey: You think all presidents have used the term s*ithole?
Paul: Yes, I do.
“I don’t agree that it is okay to tweet the way that he does, getting in a war with North Korea, ‘My button’s bigger than your button.'”
Tim: Okay, can I just say something? It’s not about the swearing. Okay? I expect every politician to say that. It’s the fact that he demeaned an entire race or a country. And if our president, who we – I respect the office, and I expect and demand better actions than that.
Maggie: My relatives came from Ireland and that was for a long time considered to be a s*ithole country. It’s, obviously Irish people aren’t discriminated against now, but, like, they were for a really long time. And you can’t say something about a country that then applies to all the people coming from it.
Oprah Winfrey: Okay?
Matt: I can see him using the language. But you guys at times you need to look at the man you’re talkin’ about. This man looks at one lens, through one lens and all. It’s an economic lens. He did not look at this as people in those countries, in my opinion.
Jennifer: And that’s unfortunate.
Matt: He did not say the Haitian people or the people of Africa.He said, “Those countries.”
Oprah Winfrey: Come on, Matt. If you’re talking about… Matt, if you’re talking about the country, you’re talking about the people in the country. When he’s talking about Norway or Norwegians, he’s talking about Norwegians.
Matt: Sometimes I think Trump, just met with Norway and that was the first thing he thought of, ’cause, he said some things that are weird.
Oprah Winfrey: Okay, so polls are showing that respect for the United States is eroding around the world. Do you care what the world thinks of the United States?
Jennifer: Absolutely.
MULTIPLE PEOPLE: Yes. Yes. Yes.
Matt: How many people believe China’s sittin’ at home right now and they’re like, “Man I wonder if I make this decision will it hurt the U.S? Will the U.S. people like this decision?” Do you think China asks that question? The only country in this world that asks that question is us.
Tim: I work with global students that wanna come to the United States. Well, ever since Trump got elected in 2016, the numbers of incoming global students have gone down. They do not feel safe. That’s a shame.
Laura: What are they afraid of?
Paul: Trump.
Kim: Yes.
Tim: They’re afraid of how they’re being, they’re gonna be treated.I mean look turn on the news.
Laura: I feel safer now than I ever did the last eight years of Obama. Oh my God.
Oprah Winfrey: How do you feel safer? Tell me how you feel safer?
Laura: Well, I feel like I can say Merry Christmas to anyone I want wherever I want.
Jennifer: You could anytime!
Tim: You could! Spare me the fake outrage!
Jennifer: Obama always said Merry Christmas.
Maggie: I don’t think Laura has fake outrage but like, I do think some of the things that you believe, I don’t think really make that much sense. Like, I don’t think Obama’s a Muslim.
Oprah Winfrey: Let her finish telling us why she feels safer.
Laura: Safer means that I’m not gonna have regulations after regulations after regulations that are gonna outdo my budget. I don’t make any money. I’m poor. So when I mean I don’t make, I probably make less than anyone at this table. You know, my heat bills go up. My electricity goes up. I guess it makes me feel economically safer that Trump’s in office.
Oprah Winfrey: There have been some members of Congress, including Republicans, questioning his stability and fitness for office. What do you think of that, and do you believe he has the temperament to be president?
Matt: We see one side of him outside of the office. We don’t see what happens in the office. And what we see coming out of the office is results. So his temperament and his intellect’s gotta be high enough to create results.
Lauren: Mmmm, what– what results?
Matt: What results? The economy, Supreme Court Justice, 90 plus regulations taken off.
Tom: ISIS.
Matt: ISIS being defeated.
Jennifer: I believe that he does not have the temperament. I do agree the economy is great, but I don’t agree that it is okay to tweet the way that he does, getting in a war with North Korea, “My button’s bigger than your button.”
Oprah Winfrey: Is that an incident that you think speaks to him not being fit to be president?
Jennifer: Yes. Yes. I think it’s a crazy game, it’s an ego game, and I just want a president who cares more about America than his own ego.
Tom: Trump is a counter puncher. Kim Jong Un came out with his, “Hey, I’ve got the nuclear button.” Trump is a counter puncher. He’s gonna say, “Guess what? Mine’s bigger than yours.” It’s just who he is.
Jennifer: I know but it is like playground antics of “My dad can beat up your dad.”
Oprah Winfrey: This is what’s really interesting to me. What I got from the group the last time and actually has helped me in listening to, you know, all reports in the media is that, you allactually hear things differently. That you are listening in a different way.
Lauren: We do hear things differently. We say things differently. We can hear it in different ways, but that doesn’t mean we’re gonna agree. I’m never going to agree that bullying, kicking a sleeping bear is a good idea. If that bear is gonna wake up and blow your country up if you threaten it, for God’s sake, find a better way.
Kailee: I just don’t know how you can read some of those tweets and see how far apart they are from each other, sometimes only minutes, and think that you’re dealing with someone who’s competent and rational and intelligent. To me, they’re just, they’re, all he does is bully people. That’s literally all he does–
Tom: But that’s because you hate him.
Kailee: I don’t hate him.
Tom: You do hate him.
Kailee: I don’t agree with his beliefs. That doesn’t mean that I hate him.
Tom: You passionately hate him.
Kailee: I’d argue that you hate liberals.
Tom: I do.
Kailee: Yeah
Oprah Winfrey: Why do you hate liberals?
Tom: I think that their tactics are divisive, and I think their tactics are destructive to this country.
Tom: Correct. We had a discussion online about the inheritance tax. And it was it was pretty interesting, that who thinks that all of the money that your parents saved all their lives should go to the government?
Jennifer: Yeah, I, and I agreed with you.
Tom: I know you did. I know, ’cause we saw our parents struggle and go from poverty to save and all the struggles, all the eating at home, not eating out, not going on vacations, not going to the movies, not doing any of those things so that they could save and have a nest egg. And then some people think it’s okay, “I want that money to go to the government because they can spend it better.”
Maggie: Just as a comment. The inheritance tax kicks in, used to kick in at $11 million, and so by the time that you get to that–
Tom: For a couple.
Maggie: OK. $5.5 million. By the time that you get to that amount of money.
Tom: What does the government do to deserve the money that your parents scraped together their whole lives and saved?
Lauren: Whoa, anger.
Tom: What did? What does the government do to deserve that?
Lauren: Do you feel bullied right now?
Maggie: Well, I think that Tom is aggressive in how he talks, butover time, in America, we have become more unequal. And one of the ways to make it so that we become more equal is to make sure that the richest people pay more in taxes when they die.
As heated as their arguments got in person. It was just as bad in their online forum. The issue that nearly broke up the group: the “Me Too” movement.
Jeff: There were some tense moments in that group. Let’s be honest there were some really tense things.
Jeff Vanderwerff is a fourth generation farmer and loyal Republican. We visited him this past fall. With 2,000 acres to oversee, he doesn’t have time to get together with the group, but is active in their facebook thread.
Jeff: You know what sometimes you just need to hit the mute button and walk away for a little while. You know, some days it seems like it’s really productive and we could actually discuss issues, discuss policy, ideas, how they impact us. And some days, it kind of descends into the family living room. But it is what it is.
Tom: I think that’s a reflection of the passion that all of us have.
Voice: Right it’s true.
Tom: We all have passion.
And it gets most heated when they are online. Unlike most Americans who use social media to connect with like-minded people and reinforce their opinions, this group uses it to hear each other out. At least that’s the idea, and one reason Matt Wiedenhoeft named it – somewhat optimistically – “America’s Hope.”
Matt: I named it ’cause the fact that it was still going and everybody was participating.My thought was that if we can legitimately get 14 people to discuss this, why can’t that grow to 28, to 56, and just continue to compile and compile?
Oprah Winfrey: Were there times, I’m addressing this to you, when you thought the group would break up. You wanted to quit. Is there one incident in particular or discussion that stands out?
Matt: Yeah, absolutely there was a time when I was gonna walk away and I thought the group would be done at this point.
Oprah Winfrey: Was this the debate about sexual harassment?
GROUP: Yes. Yes. Yes.
Wesley: I believe it was the comments when Trump made about the female senator. He basically said that she would do anything for endorsement.
GROUP: Yeah, Yes. Yes. Yes.
The spark – as is often the case — was a presidential tweet using language that left just enough room for interpretation.
Oprah Winfrey: The exact tweet was: “Senator Kirsten Gillibrand would come to my office quote ‘begging for campaign contributions not so long ago. And would do anything for them.'” How could that start the kind of debate that would make everyone want to leave the group?
Matt: It’s how, how you hear it and how you interpret it.
Oprah Winfrey: So you interpreted that comment from the president as meaning what?
Matt: She was willing to do anything at all costs to get the endorsement. Not sexually. Never considered that. That never even entered my mind.
Tom: Me either–
Oprah Winfrey: And it didn’t enter your mind?
Laura: No.
Jennifer: But I think it’s a male-female thing, though.
Matt: I asked my wife, my mom, my sister. None of them…
Rose: It didn’t enter my mind.
Oprah Winfrey: It didn’t enter your mind?
Rose: It didn’t.
Oprah Winfrey: Did it enter your mind?
Kim: It did not enter my mind.
Oprah Winfrey: It did not. That he was talking about…
Kim: That it was about sex.
Wesley: It entered my mind.
Tim: It did mine too.
Wesley: It entered my mind, ’cause he has a behavior of saying outlandish things like this. So-
Jennifer: And, and that’s the thing, if he had not spoken about women in the past that way, then I would have perceived it just like you did.
Matt: The problem I had wasn’t the comment or the way, the fact that you guys interpreted it differently. It’s the fact that you wanted me to denounce it or I felt the same way.
Jeff: Matt, I’ll, I’ll differ with you slightly, is I read it and I kinda went [chortle] because I, in my mind I knew exactly what he was saying.
Oprah Winfrey: Okay, I want you to clarify. You said…
Jeff: Unfortunately, I thought, “Okay, he’s probably making that in a sexual innuendo-type manner.”
Oprah Winfrey: You felt that?
Jeff: That was how I, that was how I read it. That’s my opinion.
In a tense online argument about that tweet – and the larger issue of sexual harassment— Lauren Taylor repeatedly challenged some of the conservative men to “condemn” the president’s “treatment of women.” It did not happen.
Jeff: It was similar to a later discussion about Roy Moore. And it was damned if you do and damned if you don’t, because you know, did I think the comment was appropriate? No, I didn’t think the comment was appropriate. Did I think the whole Roy Moore situation was appropriate? No, it was completely inappropriate. But the problem was I felt sitting in that group like the gun was pointed at me and it was “You will denounce,” as a Trump supporter “You will throw him under the bus and walk away or you condone everything he does.”
Matt: This is what I’m talkin’ about.
Jeff: And that was what made you say “This is what, what are we doin’ here?”
Oprah Winfrey: So, for those of you who are not Trump supporters, can you hear what Jeff just said? Can you hear that?
GROUP: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yeah.
Oprah Winfrey: You hear that? What Jeff and Matt have said?
Lauren: Can I respond to that? That was me, who needed to hear from you that you would side with women. I think that, the way it was heard by you was that I wanted you to denounce Trump. I don’t think you should have to denounce a person that you believe in, but I do need to know that men will take sexual assault and abusive language and the treatment of women really seriously. And when the women in the group are saying, “Please will you let us know that you understand this? Please will you stand up with us,” and get no answer, we were ready to walk away too.
Oprah Winfrey: But would you agree with his assessment and his assessment that you were requesting that they either denounce what he had said or—
Lauren: Yeah. I didn’t want you to denounce Trump. I’m so sick of trying to get people to denounce Trump. When women come out and say they’ve been sexually assaulted or Me Too, take us seriously. And when you say that you need proof, tell us what that means. What proof would be good enough for you to actually assure us that you care?
Matt: Then vice versa. You need to tell us what you mean by standing up, because I have a daughter. And if somebody ever touched her, I think you know what the outcome would be. If somebody, if sexually abused my mom, my sister, you, and I knew about it, you know what the outcome would be. I’m always standin’ there. So the assumptions that men don’t stand with women, we don’t know what more we can do. We don’t know. I mean tell us. You, I mean literally. I’m not necessarily gonna go march with ya.
Jennifer: Why not!
Wesley: I think we can lead by our actions.
Oprah Winfrey: I don’t think a lotta women are asking for you to march. They’re just asking to be heard.
Matt: And I’m willing to listen.
Jennifer: I think that for me, it wasn’t so much about Trump, as Lauren said. It’s the bigger issue. I’m a “Me Too” and so that is very hot button for me. Now, had you talked to me like you did right here, I would have said, “Okay, that makes sense.” But again, we’re on a thread that’s moving really, really quick. And things are being said, and people are, like, just looking at it misinterpreting. And that’s what keeps happening. Is we’re misinterpreting each other
Oprah Winfrey: One person who hasn’t been touched by the movement is the president himself. During the campaign, we are all aware that some 20 women accused him of inappropriate sexual behavior. There was the Access Hollywood tape of course. What do you all think about that?
Lauren: Makes me rage.
Wesley: It’s a reflection of the people.
Oprah Winfrey: Maggie?
Maggie: I think probably part of the reason that the Me Too Movement is happening is because we elected somebody who so many women said sexually assaulted him. There was a videotape. To me, it’s just, it’s horrible. I don’t think people who do that should be in power.
Lauren: It’s disgusting.
Jennifer: And it sends a message to everybody else. That’s the problem. It sends this message that it’s okay. And it’s not okay.
Oprah Winfrey: Do you think the president is held to a different standard when it comes to this issue of sexual harassment?
Daniel: The question is, are these accusations credible? There’s been multiple reports of foundations funding lawsuits. Like, they encourage women to take up lawsuits against President Trump.
Oprah Winfrey: Okay, I want to hear what Tom has to say about this.
Tom: I think they should. I think they should bring their case to court if they have evidence that he did this, bring it to court.
Frank Luntz: You are their voice. You will be heard.
Conservative pollster Frank Luntz, who first assembled the group for us, joined us for our second roundtable.
Oprah Winfrey: Is there anything that was said by the group that stood out to you? Any words or phrases that we should be listening for? Anything in particular?
Frank Luntz: The word that stood out was actually denounce. That you have to denounce a politician if they said something. You have to denounce. Sure, people should be held accountable. But denouncement is divisive. And denouncement is the kind of political correctness that so many people reject today.
Oprah Winfrey: Did the conversation that we hear, is it representative of conversations happening across America, because you’re all over…
Frank Luntz: There’s no difference around that table than what you would hear in any place of work, in people’s dining room tables, even in college campuses across the country. It’s the same kind of give and take, the same kind of frustration and anxiety, the difference is that the people in Michigan really want to listen to each other.
Oprah Winfrey: What do you all think you’ve accomplished with this group?
Lauren: I don’t have access to Trump voters outside of this group. In fact, during the election, I pretty much deleted everybody, who believed in the values that Trump espoused. So this group has helped me to understand perspectives that I would not have had access to. And so I’ve been able to take that out to my friends who don’t have access to Trumpers, and they come back and say, “Hey, I really learned a lot.” That’s huge. Because everybody wants to feel understood, but it’s quite a different thing to want to understand. And I think most of us have gotten that out of this.
Jennifer: Yeah, I agree.
Oprah Winfrey: What have you gotten out of it?
Matt: Heartache. (laughter) Dead phone batteries. This is a good group of people. You guys really are. And I understand everybody’s set in their ways. It’s, it’s, it’s not the 80% that we will never change that we’re just never gonna agree on 80%. So 20% we need to figure out a way to come together on.
Jeff: You know, I think if we really get down to it, those of us that are on the right side of the equation, we’re not always, what, we don’t always want to be defined by Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan. And the folks on the left, they don’t always want to be necessarily defined by Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi.
Jennifer: Not at all.
Jeff: Because there are positions that those groups hold that aren’t real congruent with what a lot of us think sometime.
Tom: Agreed. One hundred percent.
Lauren: That’s right.
Jeff: And you know, maybe that’s our fault for letting the parties go the way they have and the platforms that have been created. But ultimately it’s gonna be up to us if we want to fix it or not.
