garrisons in europe anymore? the conclusion was no. and so while the u.s. maintain many of its basis in europe, a significant number were either closed or consolidated, and the number of troops were brought down significantly. >> find c-span's the weekly we get your podcasts. >> joining us this morning is tm garret, founder and ceo of the organization change methods. tm garret is also a former neo-nazi and kkk leader. good morning, tm garret. thanks for being a "washington journal" this morning. >> guest: good morning. thank you for having me. >> host: before we get your journey andu how you became a former kkk leader tell us about your background, where you grew up, your early years. >> guest: well, i'm born and raised in germany, born in 1975, very conservative times. it was a lot different, born into arn very small town, very conservative hottest and vibrant

citizens. my parents had a drinking problem. it was a very dysfunctional family, one of the classic stories you hear from people in the white supremacist movement. but a lot of kids grew up like that, but if it has become an nazi or kkk leader. so the question is what happened in my life that made me go this way? it had a lot to do with identity could looking for a purpose, a sense of belonging. i was a very bullied kid. there were many, many reasons to bully me. i was a perfect victim to bully. it was actually in puberty when it started cracking inappropriate jokes, racist jokes and it was mostly boys doing that. it was when boys are trying to discover their masculinity and is also the time when we started learning about t hitler, the thd reich, the holocaust in school.

i would say growing up in germany, germany has done a great job making efforts alone holocaust and make sure it never happens again. but we at the time when looking for things to act up, all the boys picked it up. first it was just jokes against immigrants, and against the black people and all the sudden dip with the holocaust on the table with i think at that time not enough discourse about it that is change fortunately but here in the u.s. i think we have to do more. we can talk about it a little later. i would say it was anti-semitic what i did but i but i alt was unintentional anti-semitic as i didn't do it for the sake to hate jews because i didn't know anything about it. i didn't even know neo-nazis existed. i thought nazis died in 1946. after the war they were gone, the what was lost and germans are very clear about nazis brought nothing but destruction.

>> host: at how old were you when you're learning about in germany about the neo-nazi organizations? mentioned you were going through puberty. about how old are you now in terms of this happening? >> guest: this is when we talked about these jokes and everything, 12, 13, and it did not know anything about these organizations yet. the things the other boys -- the problem was i didn't have a normal to go back to. my normal would've been the boy, could push in ash corner, get pushed around, the police did and said nothing i would've back toto that. i ran with those jokes in the longer. the problem is with a certain call out culture, i was put in a box with the label nazi kid. i felt like nobody was looking in in a box anymore to see this human being in there. they all just lookas at the lab. that's right lived and i had a hard time getting out.

actually i didn't get out at all. the guys toou put me out of the box with the guys who was a swastikas. at the age of 14, 15 to get on the schoolyard gave me a cassette tape with hate music and music was one of the only things that played a very important role in my life until i was very little and i was hooked. because the message resonated with me. >> host: at this time when you think about your family life though were your parents kind of catching onto is going on with you? >> guest: my parents divorced when i was born so actually i hadn't. i grew up without a father figure. there was also a very important part where of course people have a father figure, then i made a role model a constant role model and your kids life. it's very, very, very important. my mom was fighting hell and demons. i did know at the time. i very often thought she just doesn't care.

she tried to figure it out and what she witnessed at you try to forget what the problems were but she didn't see the full extent of thet whole problem. because it's kids, the act up. you have seen it on tv, you know in the '70s, heavy metals and sevens and '80s, music, all of aa sudden here comes skinhead music of original skinheads originate in great britain in the 1960s were antiracist. they were actually radicalized inhe great britain in the 1970s through the white muslim movement and the national front. so the musical was first a litte more soft. it resonated. it was likee hey, you're a proud german, they call you a nazi but you're not. this is what i felt because it also made fun of adolf hitler. in the '80s you couldn't do that. it was like making fun of satan and the baptist church.

it's just a too serious topic, he'll do it. we did it. i said i making of hitler, i can't be a nazi. but i grew into the role. it was like a self fulfilling prophecy. with a hate music, it was easy with every cassette tapemu i received from then on, i got more radicalized and the music got more hateful. i got more hateful. i finally said, who are those groups? i want to know them, i want to get to know them and a seek out and found the group of skinheads at that a joint at the age of 15. >> host: your with this group and at some point you come to the united states or you become part of the kkk. when did that happen? >> guest: actually the other way around. so growing into that age 15, 817 i joined a far right party in germany, that's with ideology kicked in when they told me it's not about acting up, it's not about using the symbols for application which we did. it was just the the age of i

did know anything about it. but with a party explaining the ideology, i started picking up nationalism, and then i got to know more people and i became white nationalist. with the internet popping up in the late '90s, i got all these connections worldwide so i became actually is white our predicament and i became a what supremacist, and this is all in germany, not in the u.s., still in germany in 1998 when a group of kkk members as me if i wanted to join the kkk. that group existed ine germany since the 1920s many people don't know that. >> host: the kkk group existed in germany since the 1920s? >> guest: well, kkk groups existed in germany in the 1920s. they were ironically banned under hitler because hitler wanted to control everything and he didn't care about the ideology. it was just a secret society that he wanted to ban. american gis brought it back

to germany in the '60s. it died down again and then skinheads auto back in the '80s and '90s. and since you for five different kkk groups living in germany, small but they are there. what are these groups started following me around because i also became a well-known musician in the white supremacist movement. i wast playing concerts and we can. they followed me around and asked me iff i wanted to join. this is what i did, ending up about two years in the group and about two years later founding my ownye group with a couple of members encouraged by couple groups f in the u.s., until 2002 and this ishi where the changing point came in that i got out of the movement in 2002. >> host: let me stop you there and make sure that our viewers know they're welcome to call in. 202-748-8000, 202-748-8001 for republicans, 202-748-8002 are democrats. were talking with tm garret, he

has change, founder and ceo of change methods, a former neo-nazi and kkk member telling us his story and you mentioned 2002. tell us how long you live under this ideology, active in this ideology and what was the moment the incident that you had that sort of brought you, start to make you change? tell us about that. .. , many former white supremacists, you have moments where they start thinking. but their life is still in the wrong direction, and you may want to take action. this is a tricky part. these trigger these key moments exist and many peoples lives in these extremist groups and it takes a lot of courage to leave those groups

you also need to have the encouragement from the society and the big problem we have isur who will talk to a nazi and of course nobody but who likes the kkk? nobody.. would you go talk to somebody who you know that actually hates you and probably not so you stay longer like in an abusive relationship. you stayta because it's too hard to start over new. i was in this 15 years and this moment and i live and i read it and i live in this bubble and i excluded everything from my life, mainstream music, mainstream everything and certain companies because i thought they were led by the enemy and was also a holocaust denier and thought it was a conspiracy and they wanted to take over the world and it was nonsense but i was so caught in that, you know that i couldn't see anything else and it was a

cold and you wake up with it and it's pressure because you think the revolution cuts darts at any time or your enemy is taken over or the police are coming to kick in your door and we were in there and had this group in germany and when i was recruited i was like i don't want to be in the group that i wanted to get away from violence and they told me no, the violence is not true but that's what they told me but loving your own kind and you can do something and it's a civil rights group for white people but that is not true but they presented it to me like where thisho over powerful enemy who wants to destroys our people and i can be a superhero who can save my people and honestly which kid does not want to be a superhero? that is great so i could be the superhero and i wanted to do

that and we recruited influential people and had police officers the became a big scandal in germany nationwide many years later and of course the government didn't like that so they started investigating and we did do anything criminal but they did not like the idea of having police officers and they put pressure and convinced me at some point that i will be held responsible if any of my members back then would commit a violent crime and committing a violent crime we told the members that you must commit a crime and we claimed we weren't with violence but if we had been hippies and had flower power would not have been necessary to tell my numbers do not commit a crime but of course it was a hateful environment message and we had to tell the members all the time don't do it, don't do it and therefore you could be seen as wrong but i was so caught in that and so much under pressure and realized they cannot control these members and

i don't know what is happening and i the first action was stopped by that and it was fear and i did something that was safe in the movement and i retired and this is what i did first and i was still a full-blown there was one year after 911 and i was just struggling in my head with what i will do without the group but at the end i decided overseas that we have to move and we moved 100 miles away and here comes the interesting part it was two weeks before christmas, full of struggles, because i lot my income and was all connected to the movement and starting over completely after 15 years1l and back to normal but that was my normal.l. it was hard in the i looked up

the classifieds and i picked up the phone call in the number and cannot see the action, it was a turkish immigrant picking up the phone and i was like really, please so i started lying to myself let's take the apartment it's just temporary and we moved in with the house and the landlord and he lived on the first level and then the second level and then of course we i rn into each other and we shared the same hallway and i worked with having a lot of interactions. i was convinced, one year after 911, that all muslims are terrorists and convinced he was wearing a mask and i will wanted to unmask him in i will expose him as the turkish muslim terrorist that i thought he was but the problem was over six or seven months i tried so hard and was unsuccessful in many went into action and he always spoke with kindness and compassion to me and i did not unmask him

because he didn't wear a mask. i realized after many months that i was the guy wearing the mask literallyu and that made me really think like i was the dude with the t bad thoughts here and it wasn't him. >> we want to get to more of your story and that is the start of your interaction with your landlord there in the apartment in germany he of turkish descent obviously a follower of islam and this is 2002 and we want to find out more about your founding of change in memphis and want drove that but we have a number of calls tm so let's get to some of those. tm garret as our guest, we've heard him tell his story of being involved in a neo- nazi

and the kkk and his struggle with that and more to come as well so let's hear from you in first up is linda in arizona. linda, thank you for waiting and go ahead with your comments. >> caller: good morning. i would like to thank all of you at c-span and i find that you take a very neutral role in that allows the commentors and the listeners to engage in a better way then if you as the people working there were clearly showing your colors one way or the other. thank you for that neutrality and to the gentleman who is the guest also thank you to you and a couple questions if i might. one was when he first started to realize that maybe you were on the wrong path to when you felt like you were clear of that path and he wanted to get off how long a time was that for you? >> quite a long time.

it doesn't happen overnight. anyone who could just change overnight and realize this was wrong and i was wrong for two years, four years, eight years or 50 years and then i'm a peace activist, this is something i would not buy today if someone comes to meet with the story and i woulddy be leery of that. if someone tells me of still struggling with this topic after one year that's what i would rather believe because radicalization happens very slowly and it's just like a steady drop. the steady influence that you start to believe in that you only listen to and only listen to these this music and you are fading out everything else and everything else becomes like a conspiracy in the interesting part of the conspiracy is that if you believe in someone who t believes in the conspiracy

theory with the truth that will be part of the conspiracy so whatever belief in is obtained for the truth even if it was so visible and clear that you push it to the side like they are the ones to deceive you and they are the enemies and it's a positive conspiracy and they planted that in my head for 15 years, slowly telling up and took many years to get rid of everything and when i started working on certain things because of the muslim landlord of my islamaphobia so when that happened with the landlord andpe he unmasks to me. he ripped up that mask when i was sitting there obviously the hate i felt like crumbled and i had to decide what i would do with those crumbs and light it analyze them or put them back together to the hatred that i use to nurture. i realize that i'm a person who ithought let's, germany has a

rich muslim culture sof let's find out in the other muslims in germany are terrorists and either he was good at pretending or he was the exception and i don't know but i decided to do this and it just made sense. o i went out there and really tk to people in the muslimhe community and in the immigrant community rather than what we were fighting or the people we did not know what stuff i was listening to in the secret things they would do in their mosques and prepare and i found it was not true. i embrace them and wanted to know firsthand and this helped but it took many, many years and took roughly a year to get rid of all these stereotypes of all these things i've believed in. >> host: linda, you're still on the line, to have another question for tm garret? >> caller: i would like q to ask one more question. that is relating to the coup on the capital. it seems like many of the people therepl are believing in

stereotypes that they have been said which i observed to be many to be lies or twisted portions of facts and i've listened to a lot of the interviews of people that were part of that march and what they believed in and why they were there and most of them are quoting donald trump that he lost the election by a bunch of people stealing it so in the case of those people do see a path out of it for them since they still adore donald trump and thank you should be president? >> host: thank you for your question, linda. tm garret. >> guest: those people feel encouraged and this is a fact and some part it was not a president i wish we would've had back in may and the interesting problem we have here is a lot of people call these groups that

were groups that were supporting donald trump and like the proud boys and such and such and you have very many racists and white supremacists in this group but there is something else that holds them together and that classifies them with ultra chauvinism and then of course that attracts a lot of white supremacists because it's what they are attracted to. that part is tricky and you see these people who stormed the capital and you have a wide variety of different people that were there and you try to figure out how do they fit together because one person was arrested and another one had a holocaust t-shirt or holocaust denier and you wonder howle is it possible that the same group but it is

possible that people -- something like this try to overthrow the government here and how does this work but t the smallest common denominator here is alter ultra nationalism rather than anti-semitism or other things and of course,e, te question or the claim that the election was stolen and this is the key factor that brought them together and the smallest common denominator. ultra nationalism and it brings these people together always said that sometimes we incorporated with muslims and even though t if you had jew who denied the holocaust you would cooperate with them to because the enemy of my enemy is my friend and if it is only to date

maybe not tomorrow but for those people this day counted and i don't believe any of those people who went in there thought any longer or would happen tomorrow and they were driven by these hateful messages, endorsed by certain people especially in the message board forums and were pushed there and coached. >> host: let's get a comment call from barbara in massachusetts. good morning. >> caller: good morning. i just want to tell mr. garret that he is doing a fantastic job in this interview. he is so incredibly articulate and is changing a picture of such depth and breath that i just want to encourage him deeply, deeply to continue with whatever forum the group changes and we have not heard about that yet and i know we will but it brought to mind to me maybe we

need to create radicalization anonymous like alcohol anonymous or narcotics anonymous in order to give up another venue of belonging for these people who want you to move into and i'm sure that is what you are thinking aboutth, the tree you'e barking up and i just want to tell you that in pete buttigieg presidential campaign he talked about belonging as the key thing that is missing and was such a brilliant thing for him to do because really the first time a politician in a national campaign brought in a psychological domain and this is all about ideation meaning thinking and language and speaking to yourself and others. c-span production team i really want to ask you please, please, i beg you, start bringing in the behavioral psychologists. we need to get dialogue between people like tm and people who have understanding psychologically of what goes on

with human beings that are radicalized. >> host: appreciate that, barbara and thank you for leading us into getting information about what tm is up with two with his organization for change that she asked abouth >> guest: when i started change it was just 2015 when i started change and living in memphis with the african-american population of about 70% and you had a lot of protests about what happened when sterling got murdereded and a lot of people t was not a status like last year but there was a gap between black and white that seemed to be growing and i try to build bridges because when i moved to the u.s. i had a picture of the melting pot and the white cop in the black cop and they would go to each other's houses after work and then i moved here and it just did not happen but good to different cultures living right next to each other and sometimes they interacted and we

tried to build the bridge bridges s but when i told my sty and other people reach out to me i decided i can help people and so i started helping people get out of the environment and we also covered up racist tattoos for free to give people a second chance but now with this whole political radicalization were normal people, normal conservatives get radicalized this is a complete different dimension because it's not about a classic age group but regular people who get radicalized for certain things online and i've been there and i believed these things and i know how it goes and this is why what you said and this is what we're trying to do and to dialogue and the secret is walk across the cafeteria and be encouraged to

look him up. >> host: our viewers can get more information about that it change memphis .org. let's hear from beretta in cleveland, ohio. good morning. >> caller: good morning. good morning. my first question is the answer of his change of metamorphosis butmo i am more interested in wt he thanks the racist insurrection was on january 6 because it seems there are two big lies are being told. the first lie is that america don't belong to white people and the second my is that donald trump did not win the 2020 election. >> host: loretta, tm even just a little bit but any further

comments you wanthe to y make oe capital attack? >> guest: let me try to answer these two and i will try mineral quick but if we who does america belong to and let's say a nation of immigrants. this is what every white person on this continent is is immigrant and therefore it's a country of all immigrants. of course it belongs to white people just as a belongs to black people and as it belongs to bronk people in muslim people in hindu people and jewish people and christian people. it is a nation for people and for immigrants. this is how it was founded in the core principles of this country. the second thing you ask, i mean, we could fight about this all day long but i don't think this is how we can unite this country and how we can unite this country and this is what we were talking before as well. what do we identify as?

to identify as republicans or democrats and yes, i believe the election was stolen or no i don't and we are all americans and we have to heal as a nation so we beat a dead horse and i know the vast majority of people who believe the election was stolen and they were just talking about this one topic that will not lead us anywhere we have to find the humanity in each other again and stop calling each other or stop calling them a racist because no not all republicans are racist and not democrats are waking up in a killing babies so this is used by radical forces to get a regular american into dehumanization let me tell you one thing about dehumanization. i'm from germany and germany has in the past over patriotism and nationalism and national socialism and if you ask

yourself about the whole population support of genocide that whole population was not but americans are not evil or whatever but they were led into that and it was a big part of that taking the humanity away from the others in a certain group of the population. >> host: tm, what brought you to the united states? >> guest: i was a child and we dreamed of the rich uncle in america and it played a big role in germany because america, pardon my french, kicked germany's ass in world war ii but it was the core values and the principles of everything that the germanal presents today is what america made it. germans appreciate it that it played a big role in music, tv and it can make a dishwasher to a minivan and i just wanted to

live here since i was probably five and it was just a matter of time in 2012 and there were different things that played a role and it is a good time where i started a business with a friend and a music recording studio at the time and i just knew. >> host: let's hear from philip in arizona, republican line. >> caller: hello. nice to meet you and see what you are talking about. but i am worried about is everything you are saying, if everyone is saying that a trump supporter is a nazi here in america isn't that going to lead to the disarmament and taking over and put this in the camps that exterminated everybody to begin with and i'll take my answer off-line. >> guest: no, i did not say that all republicans are nazi. this is what the others says.

that is the same narrative that all democrats are baby killers and all democrats are communists and want to destroy the country. you hear those things from radical forces on both sides thates bring the regular americn against each other and take the humanity away because you don't see your neighbor as jack or jill anymore but you see a [inaudible] and these are the things people think nowadays and they don't think any more to orthese people have children, do they worry about their children the same way i do or do they worry about their income and do they love the country the way i do and when i moved here to the u.s.le in 2012 guess how many people talked about who they voted foror during the last election?as zero. it didn't matter. it mattered if you are a good person anded if your actions defined you as a good person, not who you voted for. it was completely unimportant.

this is something that changed during the last four, five, six years drastically and part of the dehumanization process. >> host: let me ask you on top of what philip asked on this comment from ross in texas who says tm, give us your outside take on the way democrats and republicans use the media to demonize each other. >> guest: this is what i am saying. demonizing and taking your humanity away. if you see how this builds up you have 30, 35% democrats, 35 our independence and the one that don't fit in that category then you have the people radical on each side and it's not the majority of americans that have all these radical ideas and the majority of americans even the means that i talked to that i talk to them person are as far as i do and i'm very careful of

course and i take this serious but these people are normal people and might be further left but still very moderate and reasonable people that have some of those ideas but can talk to those people in those social media and a lot of the media echo radical ideas and it almost looks like they only have radicals on the left or the both sides say the other is not good for america so why we have a really gross amount of americans who are moderate and still in the middle but we just don't see them because everyone is busy with facebook were busy with cnn or fox or whatever for the left or the right and it doesn't mattert even if it doesn't encourages

people to go out there and have mass meetings or meetings during the pandemic but even if you're on social media rather than going into that constant gratification of likes and people telling you you're right and you showed that person or whatever it is but rather have a direct conversation with one person and try to get to know each other and not beat a dead horse or talk only about topics that you know will lead nowhere because if you have a liberal and conservative you pick topics like during the midterms you had thee border wall and it would lead to nowhere because it was a dead horse. both sides are hardened in their views and it will lead nowhere at this point and try to find the commonality because i guarantee you g someone is. and you chose your spouse because of the things you agreed on and disagreed but you builthi the smallest bond and built it

on the commonality.mu you realize how much you have in common and then you cannot stop talking. >> host: minnesota, democrats line, sharon. >> caller: good morning. good morning mr. garret. forty-five negative below zero here in minnesota. oh boy. i want to thank you, mr. garret, for telling your story. i am serious and all with you this morning and i don't know if it's okay for me to say this but i'm extremely proud of you and most of my questions have beenit answered but i stuck on the line just one otherh one. argue with intelligent agencies, said the biggest risk to united states are these hate groups so me being way appear in minnesota nowhere like what can one simple little person do to make the change and to help with this

because just going into town yesterday we saw lots of people still wearing their trump masks and wearing their stopped the steal stuff and it is hard not to be angry but most of us are trying to move forward and just wondering if there is anything that the little people out here can do and thank you so much? >> host: thank you, sharon. >> guest: it's hard not to be angry and not classifying -- [audio difficulties] sometimes it's not even that important if you are wrong or right because of different truths. you have objective truth, political truths and personal truths. what you experienced for yourself as a personal truth. someone who wears a tribe mask experiences different things and has a different personal truth so somethings are are may beu true for you and for them and if

you sit down and you talk to somebody with the main mission to convert and convince somebody will not work. that's the smallest basic relationship can have in america for example and if he tried to convince your spouse that you are right and they are wrong what will that lead to and for the question itself, it will not work. it is the same thing. it is hard not to be angry. it's just hard not to be angry in general as a human being. that is the difference between when i talk about unconditional love and we should love all human beings despite their ideologies and you can dislike the ideology and this is the big difference, the difference between love and liking somebody but if your child comes home and you will still love your child and you may not like them but you will love your child and you will still sit down with her child and try to figure it out. here is the hard part, loving somebody that you don't like at the moment. this is the hard part.

these people with the trump masks expect they hate him and you hate them or just their ideology. sit down, as them and sit down and let's have a coffee and talk about the things in your life and not about dead horses necessarily will lead us nowhere but have a conversation and we need to's dark showing each other respect. we lost the art of civil discourse. this is what we need to do. sometimes listen. let the other person talk and also understanding and understanding does not mean you agree. somebody can put out an awful ideology that you will be able to understand because they explain where there are coming from and they will be like a while, and never thought about it from this point but i still do not agree and the other side will have a certain respect for

you and more likely listen to what you have to say then if you challenge each other because yelling has never changed anybody's mind, never. >> host: tm garret is our guest and he is the founder and ceo of change memphis and also a former neo nazi member of the kkk and could you hang with us another ten minutes or so. .> guest: absolutely >> host: let's go to terry in atlanta, georgia. good morning, terry. >> caller: hello, good morning. good morning mr. garret. how are you both? >> host: fine, thank you. >> caller: i called a month ago and it was right before we had our special election here in georgia and i don't know if you remember but i was complaining about the negative ads and being happy when we get past that and lo and behold look at what happened in a month. the very next day we have our

special election and there is nothing hardly about that on the news because everyone is talking about the people who stormed the capital and i think this whole stop the steal would go away if one man would just omit w that e lost the election and if he had missed that he had lost the election fairly and clearly i think that would take care but mr. garret, i don't know how much you have experienced more racism here in americasm and it does exist and i will tell you that and it has for 400 years yand i have to disagree with yu that the founders had in mind that everyoneat was decent. if you look at the documents that were written you get that idea but then you look at other amendments to it over the years and why do we have to pass amendments to say people can vote, why do we have to pass

amendments to say people can go to any school they choose or ride on a bus and why do you have to pass minutes for that if everything is fair and clear. we are tired of being called racist and stop acting like racists and if you are tired of being called racist think about the people who have to deal with the racism on a daily basis from the time their children -- i'm old enough to remember segregation and old enough to remember escalation and old enough to remember naacp being called a communist of the time so now we have these radical people saying they are communists and both in history in america we have good people on every level and every race andd we have people who want to think that they are superior because they have a certain privilege that they are white. that is not the america that we aspire to be and that is not the america that we need to be and

want to be. >> host: terry, good to hear from you but we have a couple other calls. couple good points there and we look forward to hearing from you again. tink and garret do you want to respond? >> guest: absolutely. i didn't say before but the nation was founded on ideals of equality. i said it was founded as a nation of immigrants. at the time, of course, we were talking mostly white immigrants because it was europeans coming here and we know the rest of history and we know why this country needed the amendments and yes, europe and all colonies were based on white supremacy at the time and it is what it is in the question we ask here and we live in the country and we live in white countries that are based on this mostly they were built on the back of nonwhite people and this is what it is and we benefitit from the white people and it is hard to admit

it again but my background from germany might bring in a different perspective like who wants to admit that in germany, for example, the grandparents may have been involved in the holocaust. this is something hard and painful to do and toar admit th. the white person in america it is sometimes hard for people especially in the south with my forefathers have done something awful and you're talking about your grand dad and your grandmom and it's a painful thing to do and this is where we just have to all be human to each other and not beat each other and say you are not responsible for them. don't feel guilty for being white and don't feel ashamed because white people were born with white privilege and it is what it is but rather than makeo people feel guilty and ashamed and make them responsible for things that have happened tell

people you have a responsibility for the future if you don't make it better and like you said this is not america we wanted and of course i think we are on a good way and if you all stay on this track is a good way and we have to fight for racial equality and this is what it is. i am an active naacp member because i think it's important but i've been called out for being a racist against white people which i don't understand. i don't hate everybody and this is somebody with unconditional love. >> host: question for you from twitter, please expand explain the difference between the kkk in germany and the -- who are they attacking correct jewish people, same as q1 and on today that we see jewish banks

creating lasers and propaganda. >> guest: that's a lot of anti-semitism and it is what drove anti-semitism in europe and in america in the early 20th century was propaganda came out from russia and i don't want to name the publication on national television and i don't want to do this or encourage people to read it and get the wrong idea but he put the idea out that jews wanted to take over the world and responsible for everything. germany had just came out of the war where w as they had an election coming up that their own government betrayed them. the piece of bursae that you had that betrayed them and things were taken from them and it's similar to the election and saying the election was stolen. it was similar in the 20s and of course it was old right groups are popping up and you had big communist movement in

the socialist movement they were feeding each other for a long time before the nazis took over and this is what happened in germany. it was also the media at the time and people felt like they had to take one of these sides. they felt like they had only one of these two radical sides to pick from and people did not want to do that but they didn't have a choice and this is what we have to make sure that people know this today in society, especially here in america that yes, you do have a choice and you do not have to pick the far right or the far left. you can but you don't have to. this is the nice thing if you have a choice. you can do whatever you want and just choose humanity.y. >> host: let's see if we get a couple more calls here. barbara in maryland, good morning. >> caller: good morning, c-span. thank you for having me on. i am a biracial female and i work in law enforcement and have

done a lot of research related to the holocaust as well as african-american history and the history and then i have learned that by watching the black and white movies of not real movies but actual documentaries of what happened in germany at the holocaust and it helped me grow as a person and i did that on my own and is not taught in school and nor was it taught in college but my question to your person is if you have the platform to talk with biden and kamala harris, what information with a provide in order for us as americans to stop this huge divide because if we don't stop

the huge divide, we will end up like germany, like the holocaust and we will end up like a lot of these other countries that dehumanize the human like they did with the jews where they cut off their hair and they basically had no value back then. >> host: okay, barbara. tm garret. >> guest: i would encourage them as i would encourage everybody on each side humanize each other, bring that message out and the problem is if biden says we have to move forward in unity and theny invites trump voterso join him and then they say you didn't want us for your ago and it's like a child in the sandbox, you still must off and i don't want to play with you. it's like a spiral and a vortex

that we can't get out of until both sides say we need to stop this and we need everybody in this country doing that and if only biden is saying that other people don't chime in then a lot of democrats to may say no, we don't want you and if you have people from the far right who started ton hear that it was to little, too late. i must say it's never too late and never too little, every step in the right direction should be welcome even if a white supremacist change just a little bit and tell them you welcome it and encourage them to change rather whether we push them even further. >> host: how many people like you have you met that have been former national neo- nazi or former kkk member? >> guest: thousands, hundreds. there ise' a whole network of formers who were former white

supremacists or former neo- nazi and organizations that do a great job helping to radicalize people that want to get out with great programs and there's a lot of them out there and you can have this with not only but i'm only one little wheel and a big machine that i'm just using my resource to collaborate with others if i don't have the right resource and that is a lot of them and often we just don't see them but people disengage and get out of the hate group or out of the conspiracy theory and i just don't know where to go because it is noto featured in people just don't know it in those groupse are there and you can reach out and then you can also get psychological help and that de-p radicalization. >> host: last call and tm garret, halifax, diana, good morning.

>> caller: yes, good morning. mr. garret, i appreciate you appearing on the program this morning but my question to you, growing up in germany i don't understand how you could not have recognized the fact that your country brought us into a world war because of radical, one radical h and a group of radicals. you seem to have blamed it on media and you blame it on the radicals here in america and on media and everyone has a responsibility to think and think for themselves and i grew up in southeastern united states and i saw bigotry firsthand

growing up and we had the history of slavery which i've never been able to wrap my brain around. let you diana, we will go there. tm garret, would respond to her question or comment? >> guest: first, when i started and i told the story with these inappropriate jokes i knew i was fully aware that the nazis were the bad guys and brought destruction and the war with europe. i was all aware and i was not cherishing it but it was inappropriate tough we did that i would classify it as a nazi and it was a hard time getting out. i was put in a box and the lid was closed and you put the label nazi on it and i lived in their and radicalized and then we need to stop and think for ourselves and this is true but if you just get in touch with the wrong people and then you start

thinking about the wrong ideas and over time you start believing these things because this is the only thing you see in the only thing you hear and then that becomes the truth for you, literally. this is the tricky part if we live in boxes and we can't break out and this is also, let's try to wrap this up and i don't blame it just on the media but the media is just one part but it often echoes certain messages from one side, from the left or right and depending on [inaudible] but anyway, whater a community i am working with muslim community or working with the black community or working with the jewish community and i'm working with a center in los angeles a lot and whenever these minority groups feel under attack and everybody feels

helpless and when something happens like with sterling or george floyd, church of christ and everyone feels helpless and they don't know what to do. i say look at smaller incidents and in memphis when a kid rotate racial slur on a school table and it was the and word and everyone wanted to kick the kids out of school and they expelled him and he's a racist so kick them out but nobody looked at this kid as a human being anymore but just as a racist. we don't even know that kid where he picked that word up and here is the beauty and the power we have. matter how disempowered we feel or helpless we all as a community, including minority communities have a great power looking where those people are

in their lives and open them and see them as a human being and decide if you can pull them out, put them back on the right track and accept them as a humande being, not the ideology and don't get me wrong but if you just leave them in those pockets and those guys pull them out and make them believers. we have to choose what happens to those people in the boxes. take action pretty walk across that cafeteria, embrace others and may think different than you, look different, pray a different, love different and most importantly vote different than you. embrace them. see them as human beings. >> host: tm garret is a founder and ceo of change memphis, the website is change memphis .org and it is been a pleasure to have you with us this morning, tm garret. thank you for being here. >> guest: thank you so much. thank you for having me. >> you are watching c-span2 her

unfiltered view of government. c-span2 was created by america's cable television companies and today we are brought to you by these television companies who provide them to viewers as a public service. >> the days immediately preceding the insurrection right after were some of the most scary times that we have ever experienced in aviation and this was a new safety and security threat that we have never experienced and typically when someone is acting out in an airport swearing at other people, refusing to comply with rules, acting belligerent and even delusional they are denied the freedom of flight. we were very clear that anyone who attacked our nation's capital and our democracy should be denied the freedom of flight and we were right because what we saw in the airports was not prepared to deal with this and this was a bit about mob

mentality mentality that took over and we are trained to ask other passengers to help us contain any problems if we are not able to easily diss escalate the problem when there are so many people acting out we did not have the training or the resources to deal with us on our planes and everyone was at risk. >> you can see the entire house transportation and for structure committee hearing tonight starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span2. your testimony on protecting transportation industry workers and passengers from covid-19. >> the president and ceo of the job creators networks, good morning to you, thanks for joining us tell us about your organization. could you explain what it is and how it's funded and the perspective you take particularly when it comes to small businesses. >> guest: yes, absolutely. we represent 30 billion small business owners that really employs 60 million hard-working americans or that was pre- covid of course a