get $450 off any new purchase of an eligible samsung device with xfinity mobile. or add a line to your plan today at xfinitymobile.com that's it for us tonight. "don lemon tonight" starts right now. >> so you know, i have friday off, right? >> me too. >> oh, you do? >> i was just going to say, let's see if you know. ♪ i'm so glad we had this time together ♪ >> carol burnett show. >> victor, yay, i like it. >> good night, everybody. >> see you quizzing me. quizzing me on live television. >> i thought you were going to sing it with me. >> no. >> anyways. >> all right. >> see you, vicky lawrence. talk to you later.

bye. victor blackwell, vicky lawrence. thank you, everyone for joining us. this is "don lemon tonight." president joe biden in a major prime time speech, did you see it? saying he is battling for the soul of america. that is the former president is battling america's institutions in court, and we just heard from president biden speaking in philadelphia in a fiery 24 minute speech calling out donald trump by name and warning that what he calls maga republicans are a threat to america, while making it clear that when he says maga republicans, he doesn't mean all republicans. >> too much of what's happening in our country today is not normal. donald trump and the maga republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic. now, i want to be very clear -- [ applause ] -- very clear upfront. not every republican, not even a majority of republicans are maga

republicans. not every republican embraces their extreme ideology. i know because i've been able to work with these mainstream republicans, but there's no question that the republican party today is dominated, driven, and intimidated by donald trump and the maga republicans, and that is a threat to this country. >> so also this is really important, the president going on to warn election deniers are gearing up for the next time. >> maga republicans do not respect the constitution. they do not believe in the rule of law. they do not recognize the will of the people. they refuse to accept the results of a free election, and they're working right now as i speak in state after state to give power to decide elections in america to partisans and cronies empowering election

deniers to undermine democracy itself. >> so obviously we have a lot more to come on all of this, but then there is team trump fighting the justice department in court today over the fbi over that search of mar-a-lago that netted 33 boxes of material including more than 100 classified documents. the judge hasn't ruled yet on trump's plea for a special master, though that could come at any time now. this line from the hearing was really stunning. one of the former president's lawyers actually comparing the battle over classified documents to a fight over, his words, an overdue library book. now, i just want you to think about that for a minute. just kind of the cynicism of that, the fbi found multiple documents marked top secret, some with markings indicating the material came from human sources like spice or informants, and he's comparing them to overdue library books. i don't know about you, but i have never heard of an overdue

library book putting our national security in danger or risking the lives of human sources. the cynicism. and by the way, when you compare those classified documents to overdue library books, aren't you admitting that he should have given them back? isn't that implied in that? but none of this comes close to answering the big question here. why did the former president go to so much trouble to take so many documents and keep them under wraps, and with his legal team doing battle, trump claims today that he's financially supporting some january 6th defendants. watch this. >> and financially supporting people that are incredible, and they were in my office actually two days ago. it's very much on my mind. it's a disgrace what they've done to them. >> amen. >> if i decide to run, and if i win, i will be looking very, very strongly at pardons. >> so he is saying it right out

loud, considering pardons, giving money to january 6th defendants. now, we don't know whether that is true. we don't know exactly who or how much money, but one thing we do know for sure is you can't call yourself the party of law and order if your leader says he's financially supporting people charged with participating in a riot at the seat of our government, right? and if he takes classified documents and he won't give them back. that's certainly not law, lawful, or orderly. now i want to bring in now cnn's chief white house correspondent kaitlan collins, political comme commentator scott jennings. good evening to both of you. kaitlan, let's start with you. you've been talking to your sources at the white house, how are you feeling about the president's speech tonight? >> i think the reaction coming out of it is an idea that this is a purely political speech. they're saying it's not political because he's making an argument about democracy, that he was drawing a distinction between the gop at large and republicans who have been stoked on by the former president and have become election deniers and

whatnot. and so they've been making that distinction in the aftermath of the speech. but when you look at the speech, it did have a political bend to it. he was making clear that he thinks that these republicans should in the be elected into office. he was talking about come november that he wants voters to go to the polls and reject these republicans, reject this extremism as he framed it. and one thing about this speech is they had been thinking about doing this for a while. this is something that we are told by sources president biden had wanted to do since earlier this summer. it's notable they picked this timing. they said it wasn't a speech about trump. he did name drop him a lot, which is notable for biden, someone who often tries not to name trump. we're not that far away from the midterm elections. we've got a few weeks to go. they wanted to make it a referendum in that sense, not just in the things that voters have been prioritizing but also what they believe is on the ballot, which is biden said tonight democracy. >> that is the timing. that's why now he's giving

this -- >> going back to the part about trump, you can't ignore the fact that trump is back in the headlines. trump's attorneys are in court talking about this investigation. these january 6th defendants are making multiple court appearances. >> do they feel they're being overshadowed or that their message is not getting through because of that? >> i think they think it helps fuel their message. they feel the political headwinds are in their favor right now with the legislative victories they've had. they're using this moment as well with the trump stuff because they've always felt like the dynamic, the contrast between trump and biden is the most effective. >> we're trying to get the former governor to join us hear, we're having some technical difficulties because a lot of this as you both know, pennsylvania is going to be very big come 2022 and 2024. we want to hear what ed mundell has to say. i want to play something else that biden said and get your reaction to it. >> maga forces are determined to take this country backwards,

backwards to an america where there is no right to choose, no right to privacy, no right to contra contraception, no right to marry who you love. they promote authoritarian leaders and they fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country. they look at the mob that stormed the united states capital on january 6th, brutally attacking law enforcement not as insurrectionists who placed a dagger at the throat of our democracy, but they look at them as patriots and they see their maga failure to stop a peaceful transfer of power after the 2020 election as preparation for the 2022 and 2024 elections. they tried everything last time to nullify the votes of 81

million people. >> yeah, scott, did i say the governor of pennsylvania or did i say philadelphia? i don't remember. >> i used to live in philadelphia, so it's always on the tip of my tongue. he made it clear he's talking about not all republicans but ma fwa republicans. what do you think members of your party heard? >> half of republicans consider themselves to be trump supporters and about half i think consider themselves to be party type republicans first. that's a lot of people. that's millions of people that he's talking about and has used pretty stark language about. you know, for him to say, you know, with all due respect to the white house staffers who call up and spin these things, for them to say it's not a political speech when he literally ended it by saying vote, vote, vote. >> he ended it by saying democracy. >> but he said vote, vote, vote, and then he said democracy. i just heard a lot of 2024 thematics here. we've had a number of polls that have come out in the last few weeks about his standing in the democratic party.

56% of democrats say they don't want him to run. cnn's poll this summer, 75%. i thought it was a convention speech. the only thing we were missing was a balloon drop. >> why is it bad if it was a political speech? >> it was billed as a non-political speech. >> the reason that became a thing is earlier at the brief, corrine gianpierre, the press secretary said it's not a political speech. it's an official speech. officials had not say -- they said he'd speak very directly to the american people, but she said it wasn't a political speech. >> i don't begrudge any politician giving a political speech but they went to great lengths to say it wasn't. it was clearly a campaign speech. he was flanked by the military, and his message to the republican ear is if you vote for republicans, we can't have a democracy anymore, and whether you consider yourself to be maga or whatever kind of republican, that's just going to sound ludicrous to you. that won't be persuasive. >> i think it's a weak argument to say that it was a political speech.

the president is a democrat. the president uses the bully pulpit. donald trump did the same thing. bill clinton did the same thing, barack obama did the same thing. they all use the bully pulpit and they talk about the things they want to talk about. i'm not saying it's right but that's the weakest argument to say it's a political speech. >> why do you let them off the hook when they say this isn't about politics. this is a presidential -- this is a speech -- >> i'm not letting anybody off the hook. >> you're saying i'm making a weak argument by holding them to account. >> you're making a weak argument because you're saying someone who is the president of united states who is elected because of politics that it's a political speech, that's the whole point of this. it's called politics, of course he's going to use everything in his arsenal to give a speech to try to do what he says it's a battle for the soul of democracy. in his estimation according to him, republicans, maga republicans are, what, hindering our democracy. you said -- i've heard you say today and i heard you say last

night. he didn't say vote for any republicans. well, which republican would he vote for? should he vote for the guy in pennsylvania who's saying that the election was stolen? should he vote for the people in georgia who are saying that? what republicans should he say? >> he tries to make a distinction in the speech between the maga republicans he hates and the republicans he claims he could work with, but the core point of the speech is you shouldn't be voting for any republicans. so how can you go out and say i want to work with some republicans and not others. >> did you hear him say don't vote for any republicans? z . >> i heard him say don't -- >> did he say don't vote for any republicans. >> i heard him say voting democrat is what you have to do to save the democracy. that's the point i took away from it. i'm telling you no republican is going to be persuaded by that. and i think having a uni party state doesn't sound like much of a democracy. >> i just think everything you just said applies to donald trump. i just -- anyways. so governor, you're in

philadelphia, you watched the president's speech live, very forceful calling out maga republicans over a dozen times c. was that the right tone? was he risking backlash here? >> a little bit, but it's an important message. first, it's an important message to our base. i've gotten about 25 emails and texts since the speech ended from people, democrats who are just energized by his speech. they said it was fantastic. said it was incredible. said he was on fire, so i think it's an important message to our base. but secondly, i think it's an important message to the american people. look, when you have a united states senator saying that if a decision goes against -- a legal decision goes against donald trump, there will be riots in the street and blood in the street, that's a message that ought to be dealt with by a president saying, no, we can't have a country like that. that's not what america stands for. joe biden delivered that speech

i thought brilliantly tonight. >> did you think it was a political speech? were you bothered by that? should he not have focused on politics in the way that he did? >> no, every president gives political speeches and they wrap it up in nice wrapping paper, but it's all a political message. the message behind it is we're the good guys, support us, we'll make things better. and i think there was an extra element to the speech tonight. it was a speech to the american people saying, look, we've got to cut this out. we can't keep threatening violence. we can't keep intimidating election officials. we can't keep doing that stuff. we're better than that. we're a better country than that whether you're a republican or democrat or independent. it's not the american way. >> so listen, scott and i are sitting here going back and forth about this about the argument about it being a political speech and he should not use the levers of government that all presidents do that, but tung in this particular moment if it is so important, the soul of our country or the soul of our democracy, do you think that

they should have taken extra effort not to make it political? >> you know, i think this is an argument that really has no substance because political speeches are delivered by presidents, but look, i think it was an important message at an important time for the american people. was it a message that cwill convince people to vote for democrats? maybe. the message is even more important than that. the message is if you're a good republican and you want to vote republicans make sure your name and the names of your party doesn't threaten the families of an election official. that's important. >> governor, our democracy is under assault, but you know, is that what motivates working class americans struggling with crippling inflation to get out and vote? >> americans are motivated by a myriad of things. i've run for office 12 times, if you can tell me what motivates voters exactly, i'd love to hear it. it's different.

some people will vote based on floo inflation. some people will vote based on the job rate. some people will vote based on the environment. some people will vote because democracy is threatened. you saw it in a recent poll where that's the second most important issue to most voters. >> governor, thank you very much. scott, kaitlan, i appreciate it. thank you so much. we are waiting for a ruling on team trump's plea for a special master to review mar-a-lago documents, a ruling that could come at any time. so what is going on behind the scenes? we'll discuss. ♪ does it get better than never getting lost? ♪ does it get better than not parallel parkiking yourself? ♪ alexa asask smartfeed to feed the dog. doeses it get better than feeding your dog from 50 miles away? yes... it does. at buick we see a future that's even better. because the life enhancing innovations you've never even dreamed of? buick is dreaming of them every day.

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the showdown in a florida courtroom over the former president's request for a special master ending today without a ruling from the judge. trump's lawyers repeatedly trying to down play the seriousness of what was found in the fbi search comparing more than 100 classified documents to an overdue library book. joining me now to discuss cnn contributor and former nixon white house counsel john dean as well as cnn counterintelligence analyst, phillip mud. gentlemen, thank you so much. good to see you. john dean, even after we have learned about how sensitive the documents were, trump's lawyers

comparing it to, quote, an overdue library book. we're talking about the nation's most highly guarded secrets. is anyone going to buy that? >> i don't think so. it's like comparing him to clarence darrow in his closing. it just doesn't -- it's not a good analogy. it's really distorted, and i don't think anybody thinks that a document that is above top secret that has human intelligence, signal intelligence so sensitive that very few people are even cleared to get it, that's not a library book, don. >> phil, even in that analogy, the library book analogy, aren't they admitting that they shouldn't have had them and they are at least library books you're supposed to return them. >> i think that's right. >> it's overdue. >> yeah. >> excuse me. >> yeah, go ahead, phil. >> i'm sorry, i find this really interesting. let me break some news for you,

don, my graduate degree in 1984 was not a national security. i have a masters degree in english literature, i got that because i love language, so let's spend 30 seconds looking at languagem. you just mentioned one piece of language. the president gets to take documents out of the oval office. those documents are just like a library book. of course he gets to take documents out of the oval office. he's the president, and he can take stuff away that was part of his personal property. we had language used early in the week where the president's referring to this stuff as sensitive material, sensitive material is a dodge. it it's a use of language. this isn't sensitive material, it's top secret material. sensitive material might be the president's legal documents. it's not a top secret intercept from the national security agency. let me cut to the chase, watch how the trump team tries to obscure the fact that they can

no longer escape because of the photograph we saw the other day with the words top secret on documents on the floor. they can no longer say there's an excuse for having top secret documents because we know they were there, and we know they're in the president's desk, so now there's a use of language to say it wasn't top secret. it was sensitive. it wasn't top secret. it was highlibrary books. they're switching language because there's no more excuses. >> they're running -- i said this last night. >> a shell game. >> i said this last night after trump's response to the doj response. they're running out of excuses. what is going to be the next thing that they throw against the wall and they hope sticks. it may stick in the court of public opinion. it may actually do that. now, in a legal court i'm not so sure about that. i'm not an attorney, but just -- john dean, you are. does any of this make sense to you legally? >> well, you know, i tried to get as much information from the

court proceedings today as possible. the tripletanscript isn't out. "the new york times" did a story on it. it's hard to tell what happened in that courtroom today, and what i sense and from what i have gathered, this judge isn't very well versed in executive privilege, and she doesn't really -- and that's not surprising. her court is likely never to deal with that again, and it's unique that it's even in her court. in fact, the presidential records are always sent to the d.c. courts, and that's where that litigation all occurs. so, but anyway, in listening to what her questions and her pressing the department of justice on whether or not a special master would confuse things or delay things, she had no real clear conception of what executive privilege is, and it doesn't apply here. you can't have one part of the government saying the other part of the government can't have access to the documents.

so it's just silly what trump is throwing out, but it's throwing confusion. he's very good at that. >> does it sound like -- since you brought up the judge issue, does it sound like she's trying to educate herself? usually attorneys through briefs and motions will try to educate the judge on their thinking and where they think this should go. do you think that by asking these questions she's admitting that this is not her particular cons expertise and she's trying to educate herself? >> i think she is and a very good amicus brief was filed by a group of former republican high level prosecutors and department of justice employees that deals exclusively with the workings of executive privilege, and why it doesn't apply here. and so hopefully she'll read that amicus brief and it will be a wonderful tutorial for her. >> oh, good, very smart. very smart. thank you for that. phil, listen, the judge says she's considering a carveout for the intelligence review of the

documents if she appoints a special master. how important is it to keep that process from being interrupted, phil? >> i'm going to say the wrong thing, i don't think it's that important. i know i'm not supposed to say that, but let me explain why. >> no, say whatever you want. >> the fbi has already gone through a triage process. i can tell you and you can see that in the photograph that appeared the other day, the triage process isn't that hard. here's a top secret document with an orange cover. how hard is that to discern from, for example, a photograph from a time magazine cover. not that hard. the justice department has to say we don't want this to happen because they can't say you shouldn't trust us. what does trump have to say? i can't trust the justice department. we have to appoint somebody independent. don, 30 seconds cut to the chase. let's say they appoint a special master who reviews the documents recovered by the fbi agents. guaranteed, what is that special master going to say? well, holy toledo, there's top secre

secret documents in here. those aren't presidential or executive privilege. the fbi and the department of justice should review them. i don't think the president wins this one in the end, and i don't think there's much of a chance he wins. >> all right, phillip mud, you can say whatever you want, not supposed to say -- >> oh, bring it, don. >> listen, we all have family members who say things and you're like i cannot believe you said that, and that's what we're trying to achieve here, that type of conversation. so say whatever you want. thank you. good to see you. >> see you. >> bye bye. so a tale of two speeches. president biden warning about the maga threat to democracy while kevin mccarthy is accusing the president of dividing americans. what does john kasich think about it all? that's someone who says whatever he thinks, whatever is on his mind, and you're going to hear it after the break.

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president biden delivering a fiery prime time speech tonight about the threats facing our democracy and how to save it calling out former president trump and what he calls maga republicans explicitly saying that they thrive on chaos and warning their attempts to undermine democracy coul couldy divolve into violence. >> you've heard it, more and more talk about violence as an acceptable political tool in this country. it's not. it can never be an acceptable tool, so i want to say this plain and simple. there is no place for political violence in america, period. none. ever. >> so joining me now is cnn's

senior commentator john kasich. john, you're one day off, it's not casual friday. today is thursday, but it's a holiday weekend so i'll give you a break. where's your tie, my man? >> thank you, don. thank you. >> here we go, we're starting. somebody told me tonight, i said i'm going to go on "don lemon" and she said to me, well, watching you and don lemon in these segments it's like two men going over niagara falls in a barrel, let's see how it goes tonight. >> i lover our conversations because you're honest. if you're not up for a good debate, don't come on this program. because that's what it's all about. >> exactly. >> so listen, mr. kasich biden brought up the fbi being attacked, election officials, poll workers threatened. he didn't say his name, but he commented on lindsey graham saying that there will be violence in the streetin s.

the gop frames itself as a party of law and order. can they really claim that anymore, especially making excuses for january 6th. >> there's no kpexcuse for peop making excuses for january 6th. the republican party has always been viewed as supporters of law enforcement. what lindsey said was terrible. was rep rerehensible he should never have said it. i think we have to separate those who are extreme in the republican party and those who are equally extreme in the democratic party, although republicans seem to have greater numbers at this point than the democrats do. but of course they've always been supporters of the police, but i'll say this, i'm glad to see that joe biden is talking about issues. i mean, i like to talk about issues of crime, policing, inflation, the economy. that's where we ought to be. but you know, when it comes to january 6th, there's no excuse for people looking the other way or saying somehow it never happened. >> yeah. so in contrast to biden, john, the former president was on the radio today saying that he's actually financially supporting insurrectionists, right? you just talked about january

6th. he's supporting insurrectionists who attacked the capitol, and if he wins he is looking at possible pardons for them. two totally different messages here and not the message that you're con vveying right here o this program. >> you know, don, the time is going to come when more republicans are going to have to be like liz cheney and put country over party and say it's not acceptable. you know, at the end of the day with everything that's going on in terms of the fbi search and everything else, i'm not really sure that donald trump will be the nominee. i must tell you this, before the mar-a-lago raid where people in party -- some people in the party got really energized and a lot of them it kind of fell off, he was fading, and i had told you that before. >> you've been saying that for a while. >> and now he's kind of been rejuvenated. >> yeah. but i don't know now what's going to happen because as more and more of this information comes out, you see more and more traditional republicans beginning to say, karl rove, you know, was attacking trump.

how does any president take those kind of documents. >> he said let's make it clear, those documents were not his to take. i'm paraphrasing, but go ahead. >> of course not. i'm just saying to you, don, that there are more and more republicans who are beginning to say this is not acceptable, and frankly, at some point the vast majority will get their voices. the vast majority don't support him. maga, those maga numbers are probably 20% of the party. however, a lot of those people control the party apparatus, and that's why you see some of those people getting elected who are really on the extreme. ext extremism doesn't work in anything. in anything. >> let's talk more, before we do that, i want to play this, this is joe biden talking about the election lies and what they're doing to our democracy. watch. >> democracy cannot survive when one side believes there are only two outcomes to an election, either they win or they were cheated, and that's where the maga republicans are today.

>> so there's a recent quinnipiac poll that found that 67% of americans think our democracy is in danger of collapse. if people aren't able to accept their political losses, john, for what they are, will we lose our democracy? aren't we in danger of that? >> no, i'm not willing to say that, don, because i think the vast majority of americans, i mean, they know that this -- that biden won this election, and when trump's continuing to say these kind of things out there that are so extreme and so far off base and full of baloney, americans don't like it. they don't support it. >> okay, john, i'll grant you that. i see where you're going with that. i agree that most americans don't support it, but what you just said about the small number of maga republicans -- >> yeah, there's some bad people out there. >> okay. but those people may be in control of the elections come 2022 and 2024 and get to decide, you know, who wins or what

happens next. that's a pretty scary thing if you have election deniers in those leadership roles and those decision-making roles. >> yeah, but here's the thing, don. the process for how we pick people cannot be determined by one person and one office. it's extremely complicated and it's comprehensive, and if you take a look at what happened here in this election where, you know, there was a big head of steam saying this was not a legitimate election, they never got anywhere because the system is built in such a way that one person can't tip it. they couldn't do it in pennsylvania. they couldn't do it in michigan. they couldn't do it in arizona, they couldn't do it in georgia because there's a pretty good system. but those people who are the deniers, i hope they all lose. i don't care what party they were in. we're talking republicans now, i hope they don't win, and i think what we're going to see is the reason why the united states senate is at risk in terms of republicans winning it or not winning it is because there have been so many bad candidates and trump is the person behind them. you know, i'm not sure they're

going to win in the fall, and i'm not for them if they're deniers like that. they're dangerous to this country. >> so john, we've had some rous on this thing. >> like on what thing? about everything. >> i mean on the tv, on this show. listen, let me say two things i think you'll like. >> we're still buddies, right? >> personal buddies. >> we fight like cats and dogs but i do that with my family too. so listen -- >> of course. >> two things, i like the look, the suit, younger, hipper. i like that, and this is from my former neighbor up in harlem, and she says -- her name is debbie she's watching. time for kasich to run again and i'm a very liberal democrat, so there you go. >> you know, don, i talked to liz cheney the other day and i encouraged her, i said all those democrats like you, but if you ever run you're not going to get their votes. i think i feel the same way about how democrats, they like me but i'm not sure they'd ever

vote for me. >> you don't know unless you try, nothing beats a failure but john kasich. >> how about a unity ticket, you and me. >> all right, i'll do it. >> and i'll take the second spot. >> i was going to say, who's going to be on the top of the ticket, there you go. >> i'll take the second spot, i'm a humble man. >> all right, get out of here. i'll see you. you owe me a boeer. texas governor greg abbott doubles down on his fight against critical race theory, and he is distorting the message of dr. king. we'll explain next. s carvana's r advocate caitlin p picking up his car at promptly 10am. hi, are you roger? berglund. with the honda accord? yes i am. it's right over there. will i be getting? and he loves that caitlin pays him on the spot. yep, rog. it's the little things that drive you happy. we'll drive you happy at carvana.

so texas governor greg abbott is at it again pushing to ban teaching of critical race theory in school. how is he doing that? by quoting a late civil rights leader, the reverend dr. martin luther king jr. listen. >> to teach students to view each other through the lens of

race, well, that's contrary to what martin luther king jr. taught us, is that we're not to be judged by the color of our skin. we're to be judged by the content of our character in the united states of america. >> here's the fact, the fact is that critical race theory not generally taught in grade school, and my next guess says abbott is warping dr. king's message. she's the founder of the center for the study of race and democracy. we're so happy you're here, he's also the author of the book "the third reconstruction: america's struggle for racial justice in the 21st century" it is available on september 6th. again, welcome, good evening, thank you. so you said that governor abbott is distorting the true meaning of dr. king's message with these comments. explain how, paneal. >> he's taking that phrase from the i have a dream speech from august 28th, 1963, and in that speech there's a point where king says he has a dream that

his four little children will be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. but when you listen to the full speech, right before he says that, he says that mississippi is a state sweltering with the heat of racial oppression. right after he says that, he talks about the need for protests to end structural racism and white supremacy in the country. so what he meant when he said not judged by the color of their skin but the content of their character, he wasn't asking us to subscribe to color blindness. he wasn't trying to tell us to pretend that i don't see that your skin color and you don't see my skin color. what he was saying is that we would no longer attribute any kind of negative connotations to that skin color. he was living in a time jim crow, united states 1963 where black women and men and children were profiled, were discriminated against because of their skin color. so he wasn't asking us to live

in some kind of color blind world. he was just saying that we couldn't be so color conscious that when we see people have difference we subscribe stereotypes or any kind of negative or discriminatory behavior towards them. and by the way, really since dr. king has made that speech and since we've had the mlk holiday starting in 1983, conservatives have used the content of our character phrase to push back against any kind of racial justice public policy from affirmative action to voting rights to desession gas station -- desegregation of public schools and neighborhoods. so they're utilizing dr. king who's really one of the co-architects of american democracy during the second reconstruction, they're utilizing his words to contravene the direct message he sent to all of us. >> listen, when someone uses that color blind phrase, it just

shows their ignorance and it's insulting to people of color, right? that you are color blind. i know what some people are trying to say, but it is insulting, so, you know, work on that. you point out that this type of anti-crt legislation goes precisely against what mlk was arguing for. i understand that, so let's -- i want to play something else that governor abbott said and let's talk about it. >> we will not use your taxpayer dollars to fund our schools, to teach our students to hate each other or to hate our country. we need to be educating our students exactly why and how the united states of america did become the greatest country in the history of the world. >> so why -- why would he have gotten -- we wouldn't have gotten where we are now as a country, right, today without the contributions of people of

color. why do you think he's trying so hard to stifle that part of history? >> well, because we're still locked in a narrative war between what i call reconstructionist to our supporters multiracial democracy and redemptionists who are advocates of white supremacy, and that narrative war is about the story we tell to each other about us and really this great but very tragic country. we can either spin a tale of mythology and say that we always got along or that we had problems and we completely -- or we can talk about the tragedy and the beauty of the story. langston hughes said that black people and all people were beautiful, but they were ugly too. and so part of what we have to do is tell a different story, and we've -- we're trying to tell that different story, don. the 1619 project is part of that different story, stories of asian american, pacific islander

history, latinx stories, queer stories, the black lives matter movement. i try to do this third reconstruction as well. we need to tell our kids a story that shows the tragedy but also the beauty of this country, that shows what it was like for racial slavery to end and how people who were enslaved became architects of american uphold the white people who have been abolitionists. and right now, are staunch anti racists -- and not just allies. more than that, they stand in solidarity with black people. we need to tell stories about our brown sisters and brothers who stand in solidarity with us, our asian american pacific islander sisters and brothers, our indigenous sisters and brothers who stand with us. that is the story that can build consensus and community. so, i reject governor abbott's notion that, if we tell a

critical version of american history, we somehow are not patriotic, we somehow do not love the country and do not believe in the country. if anything, those of us who strive, whether we are prisoners or politicians, preachers from the pulpit or poor people who are searching for welfare rights, and ending homelessness and housing insecurity -- that is the story of the united states of america. so, if we are going to be true of the creed of the country, we have to be honest about the flaws of the country and the shortcomings of the country, but also the ways in which our greatest ideals have pushes forward together to try to create that beloved community. so, they think, telling the truth makes us weaker. i would argue that telling the truth makes us unstoppable. so, if we can tell the truth about our country, we give all of ourselves a reason to fight for democracy. because we can be liberties surest guardian and we can be

that beacon, that shining city on a hill, but we have to admit, we have to not been that for all people. but the goal of america -- like dr. martin luther king junior, said, the goal of america's freedom, but dr. king also said america had a sickness, and the sickness was racism. and he was only the physician diagnosing the disease. he did not cause the disease. and he pushed back against [inaudible] who felt that his preaching and his political organizing was stirring things up. he said that what he was trying to do is build a beloved community. that required some truth telling in order to save the soul of america. >> peniel, a perfect way to sum it up. thank, you peniel. can we put up the book again up a game before we? go this's peniel's book. it's called the third reconstruction. it's outcome september. thank, you sir. -- >> thank you. >> we'll be right back.

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