eaton looks back at the 1921 tulsa riots that led to the killing of hundreds of african-americans. we will also take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" is next. ♪ good morning, and welcome to "washington journal." as we celebrate the beginning of summer, our thoughts turn to sport as college and professional leagues gear up for a possible fall season. some of the same issues are still being talked about with sports, including whether athletes should be allowed to protest before a major sporting events. many professional and college leagues are staking out their , t-shirts,n kneeling banners, and other forms of activism. we want to know what you think.

should athletes be allowed to protest at games. if your answer is yes you want -- we want to hear for you. call 202-748-8000. if your answer is no, athletes should not be allowed to protest, call 202-748-8001. keep in mind, you can always text us your answer at and, we are always reading on social media on panwj andnd -- @cs facebook.com/c-span. many leagues are gearing up for a shortened or a additional season later on this year because of the coronavirus pandemic. but once again some of the same conversations about activism have cropped up. in fact, president trump brought this up when he was asked, and he was his response. pres. trump: if he has the

playing ability. he started out great and did not end out great in terms of a player. he was terrific in his rookie year and was terrific in his second year and then something happened. his playing was not up to snuff. the answer is absolutely i would, as far as kneeling, i would like to see him get another shot. if he cannot play well i think it would be unfair. kneeling, i do not want to kneel, i do not want to see people kneel for the national anthem, for the american flag. you stand, be proud, put your hand on your heart, salute if you would like to do that, you would like to show respect, there are plenty of things to protest. i was very disappointed in the nfl, and i was disappointed in u.s. soccer. we support u.s. soccer and now they say you can do whatever you want. we have to show respect for our flag and national anthem. [end video clip] host: that was president trump.

the first part of the question he had answered was about the fate of former nfl cordon nap colin capper nick -- quarterback colin capper nick who has not been in it -- in the nfl after beginning the kneeling movement. he was addressing whether he should get another shot at the nfl. once again, many of the organizations have had different positions on what their players can and cannot do. thisct, as we go through hour, we will talk about the different positions from the different professional organizations on protesting during games. but you know what, let us hear from you, let us see what people are thinking about this issue of whether athletes should be able to protest at games. let us start with len from -- lynn from arizona. good morning. caller: good morning, and thank

you for taking my call. i am so offended at my president. both of my parents are buried at arlington national cemetery. his way toietnam, on vietnam when martin luther king was shot. the fact that this president, who dodged the draft claiming he had bone spurs, is weighing in and making this about the flag, colin kaepernick was not trying to disrespect the flag. even asked a veteran the appropriate way to protest a serious issue, which is police brutality, which has been going on for years. i thank god, almost, that he is gone. because, if he were here today, as a veteran and a colonel in the u.s. army, he would be so devastated with desperate -- with what this president is doing to this country, the division he is causing. , forwhole flag narrative

african-americans, maybe the american flag has been bittersweet. it may be has not always been that great. fromw we come at it different perspectives, but you have to walk in the shoes of others to understand. if you continue to cause this rhetoric and division this country will not get anywhere. we need to stop all of this division and rhetoric. if the players want to kneel to bring up a worthy clause that is -- because that is clearly a problem, then they need to be allowed to do that. it is their first amendment right. host: don from houston, texas. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. caller: can you hear me? host: go ahead. caller: happy father's day to all the fathers, stepfathers and all of them in the role. fathers play a significant role, and we talk about the fathers of this country. businesss it is, the

of sports, we look at the professional athletes like there is some type of way of life that they should ignore. -- unfortunately, many of the black american athletes come from lack of resource areas, and they make it out, and perform well. thed, we failed to realize -- but we failed to realize that the change that they lead and follow. there are almost one million youth players and football. grassroots, or even sneaker sponsored sports i nike, by nike, under armour, and adidas.

sports plays a prevalent role not for the sport of it, but the business of it. many people have been made comfortable off of the black american calf relate. -- athlete. eyes colder?e's yes because the black man has made him comfortable. of look at the contribution a gentleman named frederick mckinley jones. and hadman out of ohio many significant adventures, and the military benefited from in world war one and two. so, the contributions of the black man in sports is -- has been relegated to a performer. but the black man as an american and has not been recognized as an inventor and the economy. they were not an industry or a sector of the economy, they were

the whole economy of this country in the very beginning. from let us go to william jacksonville, florida. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? host: fine, go ahead. caller: i think the thing is that we are trying to level out professional athletes to activism as where the country stands in america. i think that human beings mean more than a sports award. ok. ignorance,s type of in racism going on going -- our country and people being killed for no particular reason, i think we should all take a stand. not just colin kaepernick. because it is just truly wrong. it is indicative of a bigger issue that we have to struggle and wrestle with.

let us go to doug from san jose, california. in morning. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. everybody iswhat saying about protest, everybody has a right to protest. but, if i am at work, i do not have a right to protest on somebody else's dime or time. that does not mean that athletes cannot speak up and protest on their own time, i think that they should. i think racism is obviously an issue that the country still has to deal with. but, i think it becomes a distraction when you are protesting at an athletic event. from the it distracts seriousness of the issue. host: let us make a quick differentiation between athletes

protesting during the game and athletes protesting for the game. of course, they are not competing during the national anthem, no one has said that they are going to stop during the game and protest, everyone is talking about events that happened before the competition starts. does that make a difference to you? work,: if you are at because if you are an athlete who is playing whatever sport, you are at work. and, the national anthem is part of the job, and you knew that going in. work,fore you arrive at or after you leave work, whatever your job might be, you absolutely have the right to speak your mind, to protest, to go -- to stand in the streets.

two, wave a sign around. -- to waive a sign around. once you are at work, your employer has the right to say, look, you need to do what you need to do while you are here, once you are not at work, do what you need to do. speak your mind. host: if their employers are fine with that, which some leagues have said they are fine with it, does that make it ok? caller: if the employer says go ahead, i am fine with that too. host: let us go to dave, from georgia. good morning. caller: good morning. i more or less have the idea that someone before me was talking about. the only thing i would say is that the fellow on his knee, if he wants to do that, and if it is also in the rules of the league, you should observe the rules of your workplace.

but also, if that man gets on the knee, or the athlete gets on their knee and does that, and i disagree or do not want to see it for whatever reason, and if i shut it off or do not support that, i am also voicing my opinion and i have a right to do that. an audience like they are trying to do, it seems like they are demanding that i have to watch that. and i think they are going to find that it will be sad when people tune them out for that very reason. usat: here is a story from " today," that talks about the issue. i will read a little bit from that to find out what the nfl's current stance is. "the protest movement is expected to be more prevalent than ever at college and professional sports in the wake of worldwide protests against racial injustice and police --

police. recent criticism and led torage many players saying they would protest when the nfl season began. as of now, the nfl officially prohibits player protests during the national anthem. in response to kaepernick, the nfl changed its anthem policy in 2018 to require that all team and league personnel shall stand and shall reflect for the fact in the anthem. teamolicy states that the will be fine if its personnel are not standing for the anthem. if the policy remains unchanged we could see a lot of fines this fall." let us go back to our phone lines and talk to michael from florida. good morning. caller: no. flag,eed to respect our and stand. they have too many other ways to

protest. good morning. host: we can hear you, go ahead. caller: you can hear me, alright. they need to stand for the flag. to flag should not be used denigrate our country for principles that they think are right, and probably are right. but there are so many other platforms that can be used to get out there point. host: there have been some in the military who have said that they think kneeling during the national anthem is just fine. whose opinion should we listen to? caller: nine. you go in -- mine. you go in knowing that you are protecting their right to free speech, but i find it disgusting. these people who are protesting using the flag to protest, how many days have they spent in the

military? probably not one. had, what it be ok if they there are some nfl veteran -- players who are veterans. caller: i am not saying that there are different forms of patriotism, maybe i am. the point is our flag stands for the symbol of this country, and we have had problems since we were born in 1776 or around there. the flag has survived, and now they are using it and protest. they have before, but we have looked to the other way. and, felt discussed. -- disgust. richard fromgo to lynchburg, virginia. if they want to kneel, let them kneel. we have been mistreated. i will tell them something. would hate teaching american

history. we have been treated badly. host: let us go to tom from harrisburg, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: thank. what kills me, is here in pennsylvania, we had to vote on whether we wanted our tax dollars to go to playgrounds and we voted it down, but the politicians filled to the stadiums anyhow. now we have stadiums that we paid for and we have these millionaire athletes going into for these games that we cannot afford to go to. i cannot, i cannot get a ticket. they are disrespecting the flag and they think that is ok, and i think it will accomplish something. i think it is stupid. america enables you, that flag

and anthem enables you to make the changes you need to make. one the one caller said, go and do something meaningful, do not say look at me and the tv is on, so i will take a knee colin kaepernick did. host: let us take money out of this discussion, there are the same discussions going on at the high school level around the country. let us take the millionaire athletes out of the country -- the question and talk about teenagers. would you say the same thing for teenagers at high school, public and private? caller: i would tell my child that you can do what you want, that in my opinion, america gives you that song giving you the opportunity to make the changes that you need to make. do not be mad at the song, be mad at the politicians that ruined the country. i would let them do whatever they wanted to do. but for professional athletes,

where they are performing, i paid for that stadium and it sickens me that i cannot see -- i cannot own a ticket. host: when it comes to public sports, you pay for high school stadiums as well. caller: exactly, but i can afford to go to the high school games. i cannot afford a professional game. host: let us go to linda from ohio. good morning. caller: good morning. just have a couple of things to say. my dad was killed in korea, and i have always felt that my dad died for liberty and freedom. iselieve that taking a knee not a bad thing. i think it calls attention to serious problems that we have in thinkountry, and i cannot of the next thing i wanted to say. but i do not think it is a bad thing. , think it is a perfect right

especially in this climate that we have now, that is all i have to say. thank you. host: let us see what some of our social media follows -- followers think about this question. one's a tweet from bill twitter that says, "your right to protest does not end at the workplace door, protests are part of our first amendment rights. if they annoy president trump, his rallies and speeches annoy us." here's a text from virginia. "1000 times yes, athletes are not slaves, and someone from a military family, anyone who is willing to stand or kneel to fight social justice has my utmost respect. as for those who say that player should take a knee on their own time, since they are doing it before the game starts, they are on their own time as far as i'm concerned." here's another text that says, " obviously, nobody was whining

about tim protesting abortion. we have a right to peacefully protest." athletestext that says " have the right to kneel as part of the national anthem. the supreme court ruled in 1989 that flag burning is part of free speech. trump needs to start reading the constitution and not rewriting it." one more, this tweet says " sports has always been political. are because boomers uncomfortable by police brutality protests does not make it different from the 1960 eight olympics that we look back on with pride. again, if you think athletes should be allowed to protest at games we want to hear from you. 202-748-8000. if your answer is no, 202-748-8001. back to our phone lines and talk to lily calling from still -- silver spring,

maryland. caller: good morning. know,, if you have been taught respect, and i am sure lots of people have learned that lesson. respect, and you know that it is disrespectful. there is a place to protest. you cannot mix words with other things, you are working. , and you professional are performing your duties. you are not protesting and doing other things. it looks like they are saying these players have been made in of u.s. and have millions dollars. they should be grateful. i would like to add something else. hispanic people are always causing problems and, why do they not give them their own land or part of the u.s. into black and brown and let

them rule themselves. this is never going to end. host: let us go to john from illinois. good morning. stand withsonally, i my flag and put my hand over my heart. the flag for which i stand and i place my hand over my heart, the flag in which i swore an oath to defend as a marine in vietnam is the symbol for other people's right to protest. if they kneel to express dissatisfaction with her failure to live up -- failure to live up to their promise, i stand with the flag. if they wear it upside down, i stand with that too. and yes, though it offends me greatly if they burn it, i will grit my teeth and declare that my flag stands for that too. that is written by donald from

evanston and in the tribune the past sunday. anybody that disagrees with that should join one of the services so they can get a handle on what , andans to be an american stand up with the rifle and defend this land. merybody that disagrees with godld do that very thing, bless you jesse, and most of you guys in the morning are asking too many questions from the callers. thank you. host: let us go to vincent from tulsa, oklahoma. good morning. caller: how are you doing? host: just fine. caller: i think they should stand up, if i was attending classes to them, i would make the motion that they ought to be praying to the flag. i do not think i want to pay the

guys that neil, like some guys that i know from ou. susan callingo to from hartsdale, new york. in morning. thank youod morning, for taking my call. i totally feel that everyone should protest in whatever way they want. kneeling is harmless. everyone talks about respecting the flag, those are symbols. right now, i have no respect for those symbols because of who is in charge of our government. we have a president who is going to tulsa today and does not give a darn about the fact that he is spreading infections because he will not give up his rallies. people complain about that they want their freedom of expression to not wear a mask if they do not want to, and that will cause other people to be sick.

when someone kneels, they are not harming anybody. if they do not respect the flag and the anthem at this moment, they should be able to express themselves anyway they want. football, not football, any sport, any occupation. host: as susan brought up, president trump is holding a campaign rally tonight and told psy, oklahoma. sincehis first event march 2. after his rallies were curbed due to the coronavirus pandemic. keep in mind you can watch the rally live at 8:00 p.m. eastern c-span.org,nline at or listen live on the c-span radio app. let us go back to social media and see what they are saying about kneeling and activism during sports. here is a text from michael in portland, oregon that says "

protest at games go way back before mexico 1968 and before the germany olympics of the 40's. it is an old and venerable american tradition predating even our flag salute and pledge of allegiance. colin did a service by bringing it to our times." here is another text that says, "it is at the discretion of their employer. if it is ok with their employer, it is fine with me." another text says, "everyone who talks about the national anthem needs to read the origin of the song. isove the country, but that a racist song. read the entire poem." is the national anthem played at sporting events? dates back to world war ii, enough already." i read to you part of the nfl policy that date back -- dates back to 2018 against kneeling

and -- against the national anthem. here's a story from npr earlier this week that talked about roger goodell is saying now. "nfl commissioner roger goodell said friday the nfl admits that we were wrong for not listening to players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. the statement made in a video over twitter comes a day after nearly 20 players called on the nfl to take a stronger stance amid a nationwide protest of police brutality against black people. andthe nfl condemn racism the systematic oppression of black people. we, the nfl, admit that we were long for not listening to nfl players earlier and encourage all to speak out earlier and peacefully protest. we, the nfl, believe that black lives matter. the statement made no reference to colin kaepernick who has been

the most visitor per -- visible protester in the nfl against police brutality and racial inequality in the united states. kaepernick began kneeling during the national anthem before games in 2016. the peaceful protest was intended to focus attention on police violence against minorities and social inequality. as kaepernick's protest gained momentum it drew the ire of president trump and others. it eventually ended the super bowl quarterback's career next season. the issue was thrust into the public spotlight again, this week after one of the nfl's most high-profile players, drew brees' spoke up saying that he did not support players kneeling during the national anthem." and we have video of what true breeze said that i will show you. [video clip] >> i will never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the united states of america, or our country.

let me just tell you what i see or what i feel when the national anthem is played and when i look at the flag of the united states. i envision my two grandfathers, who fought for this country during world war ii, one in the army and marine corps, both risking their lives to protect our country and try to make our country and this world a better place. so, every time i stand with my hand over my heart, looking at that flag and singing the national anthem, that is what i think about. in many cases, it brings me to tears, thinking about all that has been sacrificed. not just about the military, but those in the civil rights movements in the 60's, and all that has been endured by sony people up until this point. -- by so many people up until this point. is everything right? no. what we do by standing there and

showing respect is that it shows unity and that we are in this together. [end video clip] breesnow, that was drew original statement. after that statement became public, several of his teammates and colleagues in the nfl went out a and brees put second statement, which i want you to see right now. [video clip] want you to see how sorry i am for the comments that i made yesterday. i know that it hurt many people, especially friends, teammates, former teammates, loved ones, people that i care and respect deeply. that was never my intention. i wish i would have laid out what was on my heart in regards to the george floyd murder, ahmaud arbery, the years and

years of social injustice, police brutality, and the need for so much reform and change in regards to legislation and so many other things to bring equality to our black communities. i am sorry, and i will do better, and i will be a part of the solution. i am your ally. i know no words will do it justice. [end video clip] spending we have been a lot of time talking about the nfl, but i also want to bring you up-to-date on what the other professional leagues are saying. for example, the national hockey league and major league baseball have no official guidelines on player behavior during the national anthem. ba, theirba and bun wnba, therea --

national anthem policy says " players and trailer -- trainers must line up in a dignified the playing of the national anthem." happenstion is what will during the seasons this fall. let us go back to the phone lanes. let us go back to david from connecticut. am i getting that right question -- am i getting that right? want tofirst of all, i say that either colin kaepernick or drew brees has a better chance of becoming the 46th president of the united states that is man -- then the man occupying the white house right now. seconds of all, the caller from , expressedohn completely my viewpoint on whether the athlete has the opportunity to protest or not. i do not want to take up any more time. thank you. host: let us go to kurt from

michigan. good morning. caller: good morning, thank you. host: go ahead. thatr: i disagree, i think from the time they put the uniform on that they are bound by the rules of the organization. i think that they are undignified and expressing their personal opinions during our national anthem, or salute of a flag. it is curious that they picked those times to do their protest. i disagree strongly and i think that the organizations should not allow it. if i did something like that at work, i would be written up. i think they should be written up. if they continue to do it, they should be fired. host: let us go to keith from richmond, virginia. good morning. caller: good morning.

i just want to say to you that my heart is full this morning, just coming off of june 19, and i have to say that for some reason, mainly because i am a 65-year-old black man and have seen a lot of changes that have taken place in the world. i want to be brief, but just let me say that, in a city where i live where we have a statue of robert e lee that is very contentious right now, i want to say that i think that people who have to understand one thing, that i just want to share. i respect the american flag. in and on hanging up my residence. what i do want people to understand is that i do not worship the american flag. i respected, i do not -- i respect it.

i do not worship it, the only one i worship is jesus christ. so, as someone who goes into politics, you must of course express an allegiance to the flag, and that should be a part of your job. as someone in entertainment like colin kaepernick or someone who works in a grocery store stocking shelves, if my boss told me that i needed to respect the flag every day before i came into work, or when i was at work, that would be a little tough. especially knowing the inhumanity that has been taking place in this world. i think that is what colin brought out and that is what we are seeing now. that is why drew brees took his comment back. because, after thinking about it, the injustice to people of

color is a reality. until we wake up and realize the truth of it we will always worship the flag and put the flag before god. keithlet us go to another calling from warren, massachusetts. good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? host: fine, go ahead. caller: i want to say that i agree with the protesters 1000%. it is a terrible thing what happened to mr. floyd. the one thing i think about the sports is, on tv this state -- these days we have no place to get away from the news, negativity, and protests, and anything anymore. after the pandemic, which is still going on. it seems like if sports go back, you should be able to shut the baloney down and watch a game without having to have that be consumed by the news and media also. i agree with their point, i saw

mr. floyd get killed and that was terrible. but, we have to have some kind of outlet where we can shut off this outside influence of everything once in a while, and at least have a little bit of sanity in our lives. thank you. have been again we talking about professional and college athletics, but once again, we may end up seeing this on our high school fields as well later on this summer, in fact, here a story from cnn that says that an entire high school baseball team notes during the national anthem. this is out of iowa. "as iowa became the first date to resume high school sports, one baseball team took a standby kneeling. the entire roosevelt high school varsity baseball team took a knee as the national anthem played at the season opener on monday night. team members say they did it to support the ongoing protests for

social justice and racial equality. floyd, taylor, george and rayshard brooks are just three of the victims of police brutality this year, and protests in their honor continued. as ports resume this summer, people are watching now -- watching how athletes react to the national outcry when they go out to the field. athletes have been tend -- have to protest a knee against police brutality since colin kaepernick began the movement in 2016. we will go back to our phone lines and see what you think about whether athletes should be allowed to protest at games. let us go to kim from cedar park, texas. good morning. caller: i am going to make it quick, three points, yes we should have protests because the very protest that kaepernick did is what we are having a conversation about right now.

so we needls people, protests. the fact that president trump has taken everybody to the stadium in a pandemic is the fact that he is an evil leader because good people do not do evil stuff. does not lead his sheep to death, and that is what he is doing. i hope my sisters in oklahoma do not attend as they have been republicans and gop are in their heads, they do not read the bible and have shunned me for 60 years because i am gay. this is what silence stops. thank you. host: let us go to greg calling from california. i am pretty sure i mangled the name of your town. caller: good morning. it is visalia. host: like the onion? close enough right? caller: close enough. a visalia,so

kentucky, i will go up -- i will do a shout out to my brother there. protests asfavor of long as they are nonviolent. i think we see some problems with that in the antifa and black lives matter inspired protests that have gotten out of hand and destruction of public -- public property. protesting atto your plate -- place of work, my contention is that your employer has every right to put parameters around that. you have the first amendment right to burn a flag or taking the, or -- take a knee, or do whatever on your job as a school teacher, custodian, bus driver, a member of fire personnel,

the employer has the rights to fire you because you are not doing your job. i think that is a big issue. , if the nfl ist carving out an area before the games where people can make a public protest, and let us keep in mind that taking a knee is a virtue signaling, it is a political position, i can see players having many trump rallies -- many trump trump rallies before a game, i can see evangelicals with collections being taken up before a game. are we comfortable with those going on as well? host: i want to remind everyone that right after the program today at 10:00 a.m., here on c-span, you can watch a virtual

rally organized by the poor people's campaign called the mask poor people's assembly and moral march on washington. it is said to be the largest digital gathering of dispossessed and impacted people, faith leaders, and people of conscience on june 20, 20 20. keep in mind, live and directly after the show, the mass poor people's assembly and moral march on washington. you can see it on c-span, online at c-span.org, and always listen on the c-span radio app. let us go to donna from henderson, nevada. good morning. caller: in morning. the i have never understood obsession with the american flag, and i have never understood why the national anthem needs to be played at a sports event. to get rid of the problem, let

us get rid of the problem. play it at this -- do not play it at the sports event. there was a confederate army that stood against the american flag all of those years ago, and what offends me is that confederate flag. that is what i have to say. caller brings up the confederate flag so it seems like this is a good time to talk about some of the other issues going on in the country. ndc, we sawcally, this event happen where protesters tore down and burned a statue of a confederate general ndc. -- in d.c.. it comes from "the hill." arotesters toppled and burned statue of albert pike on the 150 fifth anniversary of juneteenth, a holiday commemorating the end of slavery.

approximately 80 to 100 people gathered around the statue at 11:00 p.m. friday, and toppled it 15 minutes later. protesters lit the statue on fire. shortly after, president trump knocked the police department for allowing the incident to happen and called for the immediate arrest of the persons involved. ddc police are not doing their job as they watch a statue be ripped down and burned. they should be immediately real -- arrested, a disgrace in our country, tagging the democratic mayor." that story came out of "the hill." stories, these two confederate flag and sports we have the story out of espn about the southern -- southeastern football conference. commissioner threatened not --sec commissioner threatened

not to host championships in as a sippy until the state changes its flag. mississippi is the only state that still has the confederate symbol, a blue cross with 13 stars. it is past time -- past time for change to be made. our students deserve an opportunity to learn and compete in environments that are inclusive and welcoming to all. in the event that there is no change, there will be consideration of precluding southeastern championship events from being conducted in the state of mississippi before -- until the flag is change. they last ran a championship event in mississippi in may, 2016 when mississippi state hosted the softball tournament in starkville. any ofa already banned its predetermined postseason events from being held in mississippi because of the flag. mississippians voted to keep the current flag, but this

week, in the wake of nationwide protests, mississippi legislature proposed a bill that will remove the confederate symbol from the flag. several state universities including mississippi state and ole miss stopped flying the flag in 2016." one more bit of news, more national news before we get back into talking about sports. this just happened overnight. "the u.s. attorney into inquiries about trump allies refuses to resign despite barr's announcement." and here is a story out of "the guardian." "u.s. attorney general william barr announced the resignation of an influential attorney who oversaw keep prosecutions of allies of donald trump in an investigation into rudy giuliani. it appears that the attorney in question had other ideas. i have not resigned and have no is tension -- intention of

resigning, adding that he learned of his departure of attorney for the southern district from new york from a justice department press release. on al step down presidentially appointed nominee is confirmed by the senate. until then, or investing stations -- our investigations will move forward without delay or interruptions. i cherish every day work with the men and women of this office to pursue justice without fear or favor, and intend to ensure that this office's important cases continue unimpeded. chuck schumer said this late friday night dismissal reeks of the potential corruption in the legal process. what is angering president trump? a previous action by the u.s. attorney or one that is ongoing? this comes amid accusations that barr politicize the justice department and acted more like

trump's personal attorney than the chief law enforcement officer. saids press relief, barr that trump intends to number eight -- intends to nominate jay clayton, chairman of the securities and change diminish withon -- commission, virtually no experience as a federal prosecutor, to the position." we are talking to you about whether athletes should be allowed to protest at games. let us get back to the phones and talk to john calling from lake worth, florida. good morning. caller: yes, good morning. it does not matter to me because i have not watched the nfl in a few years. i got so sick of these grown men who act like children. baseball,ou watch hockey, or basketball? caller: none of it. when i used to play sports, we would take a knee in the end

zone after we scored a touchdown and handed it to the referee. we did not do sun dance and pound on art -- some dance and pound on our chest. we use to act like we were professionals. we tried to act like the green being -- the green bay packers. vince lombardi used to say act like you have been there before. those packers in the 60's, i used to love them. this is never going to end, i mean come on. the cop was fired, arrested, and charged with murder. how did it go from police brutality, which is a serious subject, to go to everything is racism? the definite is him -- the definition of racism means i believe that my group of people are mentally and physically superior to your group of people. as a white man, i know colin powell is a lot smarter than me

and i cannot do anything on the basketball court that michael jordan can do. i do not know anyone in this day and age who could be a racist. that is like a dinosaur. from let us go to lenny riverside, california. good morning. caller: good morning, how are you doing? host: fine. go ahead. caller: if you look at the world it means to-- kneel show respect and reverence. when you pray you kneel, and when you go into a church you kneel. if you would look at old videos of dr. king and the protesters, they were kneeling quietly. so this argument that the athletes do not love their country and are disrespecting their flag, a lot of them love their country and they are not disrespecting the flag. this is simply a way of showing aspect at the same time

bringing attention to a matter. so yes, they should be able to kneel because they are not disrespecting anyone. host: let us talk to violet from vermont. good morning. caller: good morning. that they should at play the national anthem sporting events, because it is just used as another instrument to divide us. in this day and age we should be praying to god and uniting each other, and forgiving each other for the past. i do not understand. god tells us to forgive, and people do not forgive each other know more, and i think -- no more, and i think that is sad. i pray to god that we get a president in the office to make this country what it is supposed

to be, a nation of god. host: let us talk to leonard from oxford, north carolina. good morning. caller: good morning. i want to say straight up that --testing by kneeling is not does not disrespecting the flag. the flag and the anthem are symbols. we are disrespecting our future when we do not stand up for what is right, inclusion, and accepting other people's belief is what we need to do. my opinion does not matter. people have too many opinions. the veterans have a strong opinion, i understand that. we are not disrespecting the flag. colin kaepernick is another john lewis, he does it with class. everything he has done with -- has -- everything he has done is right. roger goodell, how about

donating your salary to colin kaepernick for the last three years? inclusion, we are all children of god, and we have got to realize that none of oath is -- none of us is in syria -- superior to another. host: let us talk to mike from houston, texas. good morning. caller: good morning. i think the way to resolve this is to ask the person who seems to have every answer during this entire year, and that is dr. tony fauci. he would be the one with the solution, at least it seems that way based on the media fawning on him. the second point, where do we go to listen to the national anthem? to grocery store? two the mechanics shop? where do you go. we have to have -- where could it be more unifying than the

flag? if you cannot rally around that, there is a common unity. these sporting events is an excellent place to happen. it has been a unifying factor since. we do not live in a perfect country. there is universal agreement that what happened in minneapolis is wrong and justice should play out, but there is only one place that has perfect justice and perfect peace, and that is in heaven. we are trying to get there and make ourselves a more perfect union, and that takes work and the wheels of justice are sometimes slow. but, the fact that kaepernick did it in a classy way, i'm were note pig socks classy. it is disruptive to the team, and the consumers will find it disruptive if they do it again this fall. it is disruptive and i do not want to see people kneeling during the national anthem. host: let us talk to elizabeth

calling from washington, d.c.. good morning. are you there? caller: yes. can you hear me? host: yes, go ahead. to -- firstesponse off i will say that i do not believe that kneeling is a form of disrespect to the flag. i believe that people who feel that way are losing the vision of what it stands for. what they want to do is show you in a perfect time when there is this perfect moment when the entire united states is supposed to be together before having this game that has two different cities competing for one goal, i think that is the perfect time for people to see the injustices, and there are also a lot of people saying that these are millionaire people. the millionaire people are the ones you are ok with. andare physically

emotionally secure with a rich lack person standing next to you but not a random black person that you do not know. what i am saying is that the people who are having a problem with the millionaires kneeling for the flag, what they also need to understand is that the symbolism in what is happening. they are kneeling because they are trying to raise awareness to people who look like them but do not have the same economic social status. host: let us talk to tim from baltic, ohio. good morning. caller: good morning. veteran, i amd missing the front of my left foot, my right foot broke and they cannot fix it. i am missing a piece of my spine. basically, i am looking at this as you have a right to protest as you want. but, this is a disrespectful

thing. on theht as well stand sideline with your finger up in the air pointing at me, and i do not think that is right. it is not that you do not have a right to do it, but i do not think that is right. and then drew brees makes his statement and is forced into an apology. he respected his grandfathers, and for you to disrespect him for respecting his father's is wrong. host: who do you think forced brees tores to make -- make an apology? caller: his teammates. he had a right to make his statement. host: you do not believe that he believed what he said in his apology, that he only made it because someone else told him to? caller: yes. i believe he was forced into making a statement to make his ispect for his fathers, it wrong for them to force them to make a separate statement.

that welincoln said were to create a more perfect union. abraham lincoln knew that this was not a perfect union, but it is to be better. if you will stand there with your finger up in the air at me watching television, you are not doing anything to make it a more perfect union. james froms talk to walden, new york. good morning. caller: yes, i agree. brees wasee -- drew forced. should the athletes kneel, absolutely not. it is disrespectful. what made me call in was that when i saw the high school kids kneeling, that really paste me off -- pissed me off. because the school system are teaching these things -- these kids one political side of liberalism. if i am going to pay taxes to teach kids to be liberals, then

i should not have to pay taxes. go towardshould not an institution that is teaching one political side. why not teach the conservative side? you cannot just teach these kids liberalism. host: you think protesting is only a liberal position, not a conservative position? caller: yes. host: ok. caller: thank you. host: we would like to thank all of our callers and viewers for paying attention to our first segment. next, former military infectious disease expert dr. michael lewis will be here to discuss the spread of covid-19 and how it -- compares to outbreaks like sars. later on we will be joined by professor eaton for a look back at the 1921 tulsa race massacre.

we will be right back. ♪ , influence and image on "american history tv," examines the private lives and public roles of the nation's first ladies with interviews with top historians. monday night, we look at julia hayes.nd lucy julia grant was a staunch defender of women's rights and refused to allow jokes at women's expense to be told in her company. lucy hayes was the first first lady to have a college degree. eight :00 p.m. eastern on "american history tv" on c-span3. next week, watch house on policing reform and d.c. state her legislation. thursday, live on c-span. the house will debate and vote on the democrats policing reform

bill, the george floyd justice in policing act. on friday, the house will vote on legislation to designate the district of columbia as a state. watch next week live thursday and friday on c-span, online or listen live on the free c-span radio app. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back, and joining us is dr. michael lewis, who is here to discuss with us the spread of covid-19 and how it compares to previous outbreaks like stars. -- sars. good morning. guest: how are you doing today? host: i am doing just fine. first of all, tell us what you do now, and then, describe for our audience about your work tracking sars and bird flu in

asia. guest: i am a practicing physician. private practice right outside of washington, d.c. i focus on helping people recover brain health after concussions. is inof times, that coordination with infectious diseases. sometimes there is a lot of things that cause people to lose their function of brain health, including just aging. it really plays on what i used to do in the army. i did an entire career in the army. i was trained as a public health physician in preventative medicine. i was trained with a focus on infectious diseases. while i was there, i created a system called the essence system, an early warning system that is a data mining system looking at dod's data to look for trends that might be out of

the ordinary, such as unexplained fever or respiratory complaints in emergency rooms as a red flag to give us an early warning that, pick up the phone and find out why the emergency room is seeing more people with flu, for example. that, my reward was to be able to go overseas to bangkok, thailand, where i established the presence of of, at the time, back in the late 90's, something called the department of defense global emerging system. it was to use these overseas platforms that we have in the army and navy, these great, incredible resources, these research labs. i was assigned to the one in bangkok. my job literally for years was to run around asia looking for partners to develop systems like

i had developed at the institute of research, and to look for new and interesting diseases. basically, i was a disease hunter in southeast asia. it just happened to be when sars and bird flu happened in the early 2000's. host: what was the most important lesson you learned while hunting those diseases, including sars and bird flu? what was the most important lesson you learned about viral outbreaks? guest: the most important thing, and the reason i was tasked with using dod money to work with partners in southeast asia, and i'm not talking about other military. i worked with militaries, governments, nongovernmental organizations. openness. the only way that we can be on top of diseases is if we know they exist and we know they are coming. ability to raise the flag

and say hey, we have got something going on here, this new type of outbreak of respiratory illness that is killing people. thatwas really important some unsung heroes from back in was ay -- one man physician in illinois that raised the big flag saying there is something crazy going on here. you have got to look into this. that kind of openness, transparency, is what we really lacked this time around. host: when you say that type of open seat -- openness, transparency, are you talking about from foreign governments, the united states government? who are you talking about when you say that? that: let me just say viruses have existed long before mankind. they will exist long after we are gone. we have to learn how to coexist

with viruses. the only way you can do that was with openness and transparency. the reason why we knew much more about sars is because it came out of hong kong. hong kong had just turned over from the british, a very western oriented society back then. the transparency was there. this current coronavirus came out of wuhan, in the heart of china, the republic of china. the transparency wasn't there. we still don't really know when this current coronavirus kind of started. there has been some talk about, maybe it was in december, november, october, maybe even it was around months before that. we don't have that transparency with the chinese government. oft: so, what was the result

bird flu and sars? how many people died of bird flu, how many people died of sars during those outbreaks that you were working there, and how does it compare to what is going on with covid-19 right now? it reallyh bird flu, kind of started off in 2004 and 2005, 2006. -- years.iod of about influence is also a concern. each year, it makes incremental differences, and that is why we have to have an annual flu vaccine because we are trying to catch up to it and trying to match up with what might be the influenza. occasionally, it takes a big leap. with sars, we were able to get

it under better control. it wasn't as transmissible as influenza, so it was very much limited in outbreaks. we did good contact tracing. we were able to keep it under control, and hundreds of people died, not hundreds of thousands. host: let's let our viewers take part in this conversation. regionaling to open up lines for this talk about covid-19 and previous outbreaks. that means that if you are in the eastern or central time zone, you have a telephone number. if you are in the mountain and pacific time zones, you have a telephone number. we are going to open up a special line for other medical professionals. if you have a question you would like to ask and you are a medical professional, you have a line. mind, you can always text us.

and we are always reading on social media, on twitter and facebook. lewis, tell us about the essence program. what was the program and what was its role in monitoring outbreaks around the world? when i created the essence program, it was really looking at the concept that people don't go to the emergency room or to the hospital or to a clinic with a diagnosis. they go with symptoms. you go to the emergency room because you have a fever and a sore throat, for example. my idea was to capture that data and look at it historically, and is it out of the norm for that week of the year, that day of the week, for example, on mondays, people tend to go to clinics and emergency rooms a little more on mondays because they don't go on the weekends,

or clinics aren't open on the weekends. we look historically at that. looked it up on the first of december 1999, it was basically tapping into dod's data looking at that type of data on a daily basis, an hourly basis, and comparing it historically. within a couple of weeks, we saw a big spike in unexplained fever. we picked up the phone and called the local emergency room. sure enough, they were seeing an increase of influenza at that time. the reason why that is important, we pick that up in about a day or two. cdc'ss, at the time, the influenza system was taking six to eight weeks to recognize an outbreak of influenza. we were able to detect it in about two days. host: so, what similarity do you

see between the sars outbreak and the covid-19 outbreak? are there any similarities, are there any differences? how can we compare the two? guest: they are obviously both coronavirus as. they cause -- coronaviruses. the biggest differences are how widespread this has become. if you don't catch these diseases early on and kind of put them back in the bag, if you will, and they escape out of the thelike the coronavirus, covid-19 has, you are really jumping through hoops trying to play catch-up. that is really difficult. unfortunately, covid-19 appears to be sort of the worst combination of sars and influenza, where it is easily transmitted like influenza, but has the morbidity and mortality

of the sars virus. that is a horrible combination, as we have seen, where we have hundreds of thousands of deaths around the world. host: a lot of us follow the john hopkins covid-19 phase where they keep account of the numbers of confirmed cases and deaths. i am looking at it this morning and it says that the united states has more than 2 million confirmed cases, and more than 119 deaths due to the covid-19. they also have lists of other countries and their deaths and infection rates. how accurate are the numbers from these other countries? our other countries being forthright and open about how the covid-19 coronavirus is spreading through their country? guest: you would have to look at it on country -- a country by

country basis. i really couldn't speak to that because i don't know. on top ofopefully is this and looking at it country by country. the cdc certainly is our national public health system. i am sure they are very much involved with it. the cdc has people, trained people in a lot of different countries helping these countries out. so, it really varies. part of it is very political, of course. i have certainly seen this in my time in southeast asia and so on. there are some diseases that we have never heard about because the economic impact if that had gotten out throughout the world, would have devastated that local economy. countries always have a reason to either underplay or overplay how many cases that are going. it really gets to be a political

question, unfortunately, when they really should be a medical question. host: let's talk specifically about china because i'm going to read a little about from a story about what the bbc is saying is a second outbreak in china. an area in beijing has been put under strict lockdown measures as the city's first coronavirus cases in more than 50 days. the outbreak has been linked to the city's largest wholesale market. of 517 of 45 people out people at the market tested positive for covid-19. none was displaying system -- symptoms. lockdowns have been imposed on 11 nearby neighborhoods while 10,000 market staff will be tested. the authorities want to test anyone who has had recent contact with the markets as well as those living in the districts surrounding it. these are the first new confirmed cases in beijing for more than 50 days. china,thright has specifically been on outbreak

information? guest: i wish i could answer that a lot more specifically. i can't really give you a good answer on that, unfortunately. access that our top leaders in government have, the cdc has and someone. think that china putting out that information is a good thing. is, i reallyit can't speak to that because nobody knows unless you are there on the ground. host: let's talk about in the past with sars and bird flu. were they with releasing information with these previous outbreaks? they were actually much better. part of the reason, like i mentioned before, sars really kind of came out of hong kong, for the most part.

being the special territory that it has been, was much more open and transparent, especially back when it was only a few years from the handover of the british. the other thing that you have to take into account today is, as opposed to back in 2003, social media. we didn't have facebook and twitter and instagram and all of these ways of instantly communicating around the world, for better or for worse. certainly, politically, china keeps a hold of a lot of things as far as being able to access these types of forms. back then, nobody had access. they didn't even exist. we didn't have this 24 hour news cycle. we didn't have johns hopkins is sitting there saying, there is another one, another one, another one. of which fed part

the hysteria about covid-19, has been just this 24 hour access to too much information, in my opinion. host: let's let our viewers join in this conversation. we will start with sig, who is calling from plainview, new york. did i pronounce your name anywhere close to correct? s -- cy. cy.aller: it has come to my attention that wuhan was the epicenter and the chinese communist government allowed flights out of wuhan knowing there were infected seededon board, and the planet with the coronavirus. for the original samples destroyed and why, and was the genetic sequence tampered with,

to your knowledge? thank you. knowledge, what you --d about a number of planes you have to remember, that the slide right into the winter holidays. there was a lot of travel, right before chinese new year, which is the biggest holidays in the chinese culture. people tend to travel back to family or around the world. you are absolutely right, there was a lot of air travel around the world, literally, all at the wrong time, unfortunately for us. as far as the genetic sequence, i just keep hearing varying things. i have no inside knowledge on this. belief, and this is just my personal opinion from what i have read and understand about and how they work,

the u.s. army infectious disease program, and knowing the systems, i don't believe this was a genetically modified virus. i do believe -- and again, this is my personal opinion -- it was a virus that came from nature that was being studies at the wuhan laboratory, and somehow, gotably, a laboratory error out of what we call the "hot zone," which is very difficult to believe that it would, but we also have to realize that not everybody has the level of training that infectious disease researchers have. host: let's go to richard calling from san diego, california. good morning. caller: good morning.

can you hear me? host: we can hear you, go ahead. lewis, he seems like a pretty smart guy there. i just got one question for him. you asked him at the very start of the show about how many sars killed and the bird flu killed. and he said, i don't really know numbers. how many did aids kill? a question, did we shut the whole world down for aids? i was 18 and 19 years old, in my prime. they didn't shutdown the world. you know they told me? wear a condom, sir. host: what is the difference between aids and the coronavirus as we have been talking about -- coronaviruses we have been talking about? hiv, ithe aids virus, really destroys a body's immune system.

that leads to opportunistic infections. of course, the way it is transmitted is quite different than sars and coronavirus. coronaviruses are transmitted principally through respiratory, whereas hiv is transmitted by close contact, such as blood to blood, through seaman, intercourse, that type of thing. what coronavirus does, it causes the immune system to react to it. particularly in the lungs, where we have a large amount of immune response capability. we get that response to the coronavirus, whereas the hiv virus, the aids virus, it causes destruction to the immune system. i don't want to say opposite affect, but very different effec ts on the immune system.

one is destroying it, and coronavirus is causing it to overreact. host: this seems to be a good point where i can ask you this question so you can explain to our audience. explain to us the usage of the term coronavirus versus covid-19. explain to us how we are supposed to be using this coronavirus, covid-19 is a coronavirus? explain the terminology. guest: the virus is the sars covid-2. thely, the disease, clinical symptoms that virus causes is considered the covid-19. host: perfect. let's go to joe, who is calling from gainesville, virginia. he is a medical professional. good morning. caller: morning.

this is jo. withted to share a thought your listeners there. nurse in work as a haiti for two years. before that, i worked in medical, surgical and on a cardiac unit also in virginia. when i was in haiti, i learned a sayabout, you might subtropical and tropical diseases. thats been occurring to me regarding the coronavirus, that it might be really a good idea if during the elementary school country, that our

basicen got some good, hygiene class, and that i believe it would help a lot in future times to avert some of the problems because i noticed when my children were in one of the nearby schools that sometimes the teacher would say, go on to the bathroom, and then go on to lunch. no one would check to see if the children were washing their hands after going to the bathroom. of basic hygiene choreoing the cleaning for the dirty chore and that sort of thing and then washing your hands rather than the dirty chore and then the clean chore. good,ld just be

particularly in the early school years, starting even in the kindergarten classes, preschool classes, and going through fifth that ingrained and for children to just have it. it wouldn't have to be thought out. so many adults don't seem to notice after practicing the wrong way for years. host: go ahead and respond, dr. lewis. guest: let me give you an example. when i first came into the military, into the army many if you are out on ,ield exercises, you just ate whether there was dirt in it or not. two in a generation or

military and army terms to the point where we always wash our hands before we eat. it was really emphasized. it does take time. you are absolutely right. if we get a little bit more coherent about teaching our children good hygiene, it may not catch on right away, but it will take dividends down the line. -- pay dividends down the line. there is one good thing that will come out of the current situation. we are paying a lot closer attention to hygiene now. will that carry-on? also, i always wonder what are the unintended consequences? if we are using a lot of antibacterial soap and a lot of hand sanitizer, are we creating more superbugs that are going to andesistant to antibiotics, are we actually going to hurt ourselves in the long run? i'm a big believer in the immune system, both to keep it healthy stimulated, if

you will. if we are constantly living in a bubble, we are not stimulating our immune system, so then when we do get exposed to something, we don't know how to react to it. the idea of getting kids outside to play, that is a huge thing for me, not just because it is helping the immune system getting the fresh air and exercise, but also, it is giving them exposure to different things that are going to stimulate the union system, so that as they become adults, they have been exposed to things and they are healthier. may face where we are so afraid of this virus right now that we are not allowing our children to be exposed to the typical viruses they see throughout childhood, and is not going to cause unintended consequences down the line as five or 10 years from now?

i don't think anybody is thinking five or 10 years from now. everybody is thinking five or 10 minutes from now. host: that brings up a question from one of our social media followers that i want to pose to you right now. says, are we weakening all of our immune systems with the indulgence in sanitation? i think that is exactly what you were just talking about. guest: it is, and there is a fine balance. i am not saying don't wash your hands and all of these other things that should, as the previous caller mentioned, as these are things we should be teaching our children. you go to the bathroom and you wash your hands. basic things, but yes, you are absolutely right. are we overdoing it? where is the fine line? it is a balance. doingk part of it is, good hand hygiene is really

important, but we also need to -- what i am trying to make a point is, you've got to let kids get outside and play. or sort of aook saying, let them eat dirt. thatiterally, but the idea it is through this outside play, this exposure, that our immune system gets exercise. it is almost like a muscle, if you don't exercise your immune system, it is not going to function when we need it the most. the other hand with a hygiene, i think we are not paying close enough attention to what are the things that we can do to make our immune system stronger in addition to getting outside and playing. eating healthy and exercise. example,een, for studies that showed early on that high dose vitamin c might be effective at certain stages in the covid disease.

codices. people with low vitamin d levels are at a higher risk of more severe disease. be a way toentation keep the immune system strong? it will not prevent people from getting the disease per se, but what it could potentially do is waste to keep our main system strong so if we are exposed to a virus, we have the innate ability to react to the virus, to then keep it in check. the concept of asymptomatic people who get severe disease, we are trying to understand why certain people get more severe disease. it may be genetic. mip environmental -- it might be environment. what is their nutritional status?

those are things we need to be looking into deeper. host: let's keep the focus squarely on the united states. i want to go back to the johns hopkins covid map. they are showing outbreaks in states across the union. box, the higher the outbreak numbers currently in that state. you can see a lot of the numbers are pink and becoming redder when we talk about western and southern states. is this second outbreak -- is this a second outbreak? or couldto be expected continuing social distancing have curbed some of these upticks in numbers? guest: what is the point, the objective of social distancing? host: hopefully to keep people from spreading the coronavirus to one another. guest: i disagree.

i think that is moving the goalpost. that is one of the problems. intentson why we were so on flatten the curve, if you will, through social distancing was of the medical system did not get overwhelmed. we are not going to control this virus. we have to coexist with the virus. we have to take the steps to keep our medical system from being overwhelmed. once we did that, we moved the goalpost. you had people like the mayor of los angeles saying i will not let people out of their houses until we have a cure. that's insanity. you are not going to cure this disease. get avaccine -- we might vaccine that could help with the herd immunity, but you will not cure it. we have a lot of smart people working on a lot of different things, vaccines,

pharmaceuticals, that i hope will make a big difference. but the point of social distancing is to slow the spread. you can't stop the spread but you can slow it. new zealand is a great example. they stopped the spread because they are an island nation and did not allow anybody in. once they let some people in with a special exception to attend a funeral, it turned out two travelers have the virus. now it has caught on a little again. we have to be careful. our national leadership, our medical leadership at the state level and someone keep moving the goalpost. keeping the medical system from overwhelming us, which we did phenomenally well. -- they and the navy

navy sent two massive ships that cost hundreds of millions of dollars to do. they put out these field hospitals in places like seattle and other places. patients,ot see any and they basically had to undo all that. the army hospital was closed down within a week. that is a great thing we can deploy like that. it is one of the things that makes our army so incredible, the ability to deploy as an emergency backup system for our nation. that is fantastic. we did that really well, but we did not need it because we were doing so well flatten the curve. host: let me make sure i understand. you are not saying social distancing should end, are you? guest: i think it needs to be adjusted and modified.

we need to open up our economy. peoplesionally hear trying to raise the alarm. what are we doing to our mental health and even our physical health by having our economy shut down? we know historically for every theentage of unemployment, amount of deaths over the next three to five years go up a certain number, on average by a couple of thousand excessive deaths. how many suicides are we seeing now? in my own area, which is one of the wealthier areas of the country, there have been three or four teenagers who have committed suicide. i don't know why. we never know why people take their lives. how many people are forgoing cancer checks, routine cancer

checks because they are afraid to go to the hospital where the hospitals were shut down? what are the consequences of social distancing? the idea of standing a little further apart and wearing masks and washing our hands, that is all well and good. the idea you can't go to and i do or swimming pool in my county -- that is forbidden. pools are notng allowed. are having protests, which brings up another political thing. where is the social distancing going on with the protests? it has become such a political thing. protests are ok but political rallies are not. i don't even want to go down that road. we have got to find a balance. that really takes leadership at the local level, state level, and the national level.

host: flushing, new york. good morning. caller: good morning. the virus goes on a long time. what is the strategy? , there areinese hide many health experts in china. to see things that alert people. not do with job -- its job? there.it starts from our health system to protect us from the dangerous virus, we don't have the manpower. i have no idea. if the next virus

is already on the way. nobody can tell us. there may be a virus coming. what should be the government's role? it's an international crisis now. guest: it is an international crisis. we need to get back to the basics, the transparency of government when these things happen. is young i hope we learn are trying to keep it from andming a political issue not admit it is a problem. did this.e who the government of china did this trying to keep it under wraps and hoping it will go away and unfortunately it didn't. it is not a good strategy when fighting infectious diseases. transparent,t more

a lot more aggressive. there is always going to be eight next virus, the next disease -- a next virus, the next disease. the viruses were here before mankind it will be here a long time after we are gone. we need a robust system to raise the red flag and take care of these things early on. put hundredst, you or thousands or millions of people on airplanes and fly them around the world carrying this virus, it is too late. the idea of testing and contact tracing works great when there are a few cases. when you have a massive amount of people, you have to go to his own defense. that is what -- a zone defense. that is what we did with shelter-in-place and quarantine. normally you quarantine people who are sick, isolate people who

are sick, people who have been exposed to the illness. we had to go about it in a bizarre opposite way. we quarantined healthy people to keep them healthy. i think that was the wrong objective. host: let's go to pamela from las vegas, nevada. good morning. caller: good morning, gentlemen. i have been following the numbers from johns hopkins religiously. we have managed to keep our numbers flat for about 11 weeks. in the last couple of weeks we opened for casinos in the numbers have gone up quite a bit. in.thefriends who work casinos it is not mandatory you wear a mask in nevada if you are working -- nevada. if you are working, yes, you are wearing masks. i am wondering what your opinion about that is.

should people all the wearing masks? right now the curve is going up. nevadapitalizations in -- our hospitals in nevada are not the greatest. that is in some ways i understand both sides of the argument. people want to argue about freedom and about, you know, doing your part. i think we see in asian countries, japan and south korea and other asian countries where wearing a mask is considered part of the public health solution. people do it as a collective. here in america we tend to emphasize individual freedom. it's a very conflicting thing. certainly -- one of the

reasons we are seeing numbers go up as much as we are is surveillance bias. we have more testing. i'm not familiar -- nobody seems to be publishing the numbers hospitalizations and icu beds. deaths are going up, but more importantly the infections are going up. how much of that is because we are getting out and about versus how much of it is we are testing? i think it is a little bit of both. really as far as masks, the biggest thing is when somebody is ill and they should not be going out and about, but number two is they should be wearing a mask. the idea is that we may have a couple of days -- with influenza you usually are sick within one or two days.

one of the issues with covid-19 is people generally are not sick for three to five days, maybe even longer. then there is a host of asymptomatic people who are capable of spreading the disease. if you look at the bigger public health position, masks are important. i think it is a touchy subject. i can argue both sides of it. i understand both sides of it. is irsonal philosophy don't wear a mask unless i'm going to be in a crowded place such as a grocery store. the idea of driving a car by myself or walking down the street for wearing a mask is absurd to me. it is really only about trying to have a barrier in a crowded

situation. host: let's see if we can squeeze in one more caller. daniel, can you give us a quick question here? a person who true is asymptomatic and carries the virus has 1000 times more of the virus in their mucus than a person who was sick with it? that is true, how long -- if that is true, how long does the person carry the virus for potentially spreading it to other people? guest: those are some really great questions. i wish i had answers for them. those questions are the kind of questions we need to find the answers to. i don't think we really know how long -- i will reiterate the question. somebody he was a some thematic, asymptomatic,o is

how long are they potentially transmitting that to somebody? i have not seen that type of science developed yet but it's a great question. we talk about quarantining for 14 days. how do you know to quarantine for 14 days if you don't know you are sick because you are asymptomatic? the biggest thing we need to focus on is we don't have all the answers. a lot of our political leadership, a lot of the medical leadership in the country and at the state level are trying to give you all kinds of answers when in many cases they don't really know and it seems like that is one of the most difficult things for us to say. we don't know. one of the hardest things for me to learn is to say i don't know. that atto be lacking many levels these days. host: we like to think dr. michael lewis who operates brain care in maryland but as a former public health inspectors disease expert with the u.s. army.

dr. lewis, thank you for a very informative discussion. guest: my pleasure and it's great to be with you today. host: coming up next, your telephone calls. we will talk about your top public policy issues. you see the numbers on your screen. we will be right back with their calls. ♪ >> live today at 10:00 a.m. eastern, the poor people's campaign rally. an online gathering of people from across the country speaking out against social injustice. speakers include cornell west, danny glover, wanda sykes, debra messing, al gore and his daughter, and jane fonda. live today at 10:00 p.m. eastern, the poor people's

campaign rally against social injustice on c-span, online at c-span.org, four listen live on the free c-span radio app. november, we are going to take back the house. we are going to hold the senate, and we are going to keep the white house. [cheers]s >> president trump returns to the campaign trail tonight for a rally in tulsa. watch live coverage starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, on demand at c-span.org, or listen on the go with the free c-span radio app. "washington journal" continues. host: we would love to hear from you on what your top public policy concerns are right now. we will open up the phone lines to all of you. these will be the regular lines. republicans, you can call at (202) 748-8001.

democrats, your number is (202) 748-8000. independents, your line will be (202) 748-8002. at (202)lways text 748-8003. we are always reading on social media, on twitter and on facebook. with ivan from shreveport on the democratic line. good morning. caller: i'm calling about the face masks. i watched a woman bring in a masks from- face boxes that say made in china. i thought that was ironic but they are sending china their face masks back to china. they knew they had the disease, the virus back then and they let it come to america. it could have been stopped.

it is so said china is doing this to us because they are a third world country. they want to become a second world country in america better wake up. he really matters. -- it really matters. it is so sad they knew about it. those chinese girls went around home depot and bought face masks. you could not get a face mask to do any work before the disease. i thought that was ironic, can, and -- man, and said. -- sad. host: charles, good morning. caller: we do have a lot of police in this country. i have noticed the police and sheriff's department, state troopers. we have atf and the dea, u.s. marshals. it is actually too many. we should be able to vote on whether or not we want more cops

or less tops and not for somebody to sell us out and get money from police unions and that sort of thing. we never have any voice. we should get an election to address this. host: just to be clear, is it your local police department controlled by the mayor, county counsel? is that the election to help make that decision? caller: i think we should have more -- get more involved. we elect these people and they sell us out. the cops are oppressive. they are not doing a good service to the people. they beat up a lot of folks obviously. this is not just -- we have no voice. we can't vote on anything. decision, we should have a say on that. we could have a vote and the decision be done.

we don't need to have our voice taken away. durham, northom carolina on the democratic line. good morning. caller: good morning. hello? host: you are on the air. that a my statement is lot of young people don't realize we have had a pandemic before in the late 1950's. it was called polio. all the world's leaders and the countries came together and try to work out a solution. polio was eradicated. i just don't understand why the leadership of this country cannot come together and provide for people of this country the things we need in order to confront the virus we are facing now. storylet's turn to a new

that has been a topic of discussion over the last couple of days. this is about john bolton's new book. a federal judge considering emergency requests to stop the distribution of john bolton's book questions the impact of such an order on friday given the book has been shipped around the world and details made public for press reports. barn,rse seems out of the u.s. district court roy lambert said. the justice department sued mr. bolton this week and set the book by the former national security advisor which is highly critical of president trump and 10 passages of classified information. what can i do about this bookseller of the country, judge lambert said. hundreds of thousands of books have already shipped in advance of the june 23 publication date. bookolton's 557-page

recounts his 70-month tenure in the trumpet administration and alleges the president consistently prioritized his reelection in his family's well-being ahead of the national interest when he made decisions. mr. trump dismissed the claims as exaggerations of a disgruntled ex-employee. he has accused mr. bolton of line end of including classified information in the book. lotsagain, another topic of people have been talking about over the last few days. buds go back to the phones and talk to keith from clearwater, florida on the independent line. caller: good morning to you. i don't know if it is true you have associated press background. i am an investigative journalist and one of my principles is never overlook the obvious. the obvious in news consumption these days is every institutional media source has a

for-profit business model. it is driven by an agenda to retract new consumers who want to hear what they already believe. that is one of the reasons why i don't trust any journalist who worked for an institutional, for-profit media resource like the new york times, fox news, you name it. i throw that out there to hopefully further my principal of never overlooking the obvious. keith isare glad watching on c-span. i can also tell you the associated press is a nonprofit news collector. they are not a for-profit organization. that's a whole other conversation. don from spokane, washington. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? host: find. go ahead -- fine. caller: bolton is a scammer.

who ambassador is the president's wife in china. that is probably a bad deal there. the policy think, i'm hoping if trump is paying attention, 2020 needs to legalize cannabis. they needed as patients. 80% of the population says it is the right time. they have been locking people up for years for no good damn reason. host: richard from albuquerque, and mexico on the independent line -- new mexico on the independent line. caller: i want to say this sadteenth, look, it is very that nobody could ever memorize the soldiers in the u norma who fought to bring freedom. that is the first fault. that is set. that is when you should lower

the flag. the second one is all these people, all these liberals taking that all these confederate statues and everything to do with the south, why don't you do a way with the democratic party -- away with the democratic party? they put the people into slavery. why don't you remove that? take that out of there and seal that feels? we don't need the democratic party. that is a symbol of slavery. that is a symbol of putting you guys into slavery. you guys want to pick and choose, take out statues, takedown portraits in the capital? take out the democratic party because that is where it came from. host: let's talk to jeffrey calling from auburn, new york on the democratic line. good morning. caller: happy father's day and happy belated juneteenth. first i would like to comment on that last guy. when lyndon johnson helped pass the civil rights act, the south

flipped from democrat to republican. all those democratic kkk members joined the republican party in 1964. there. the thing i want to talk about is, i'm not black but there's a lot of times i wish i could say i'm not white. i want to comment on the war on drugs. richard nixon declared the war on drugs. two generations. 50 years of the war on drugs. don't they think it is time to decriminalize and take the police brutality out of the war on drugs? their whole brutal war-like mentality is dedicated to the war on drugs. give it up. you are never going to change people's mental health reasons for self-medicating. self-medication is a mental health problem. it is not a criminal justice

problem. get these people out of prison, build rehabs. don't build more prisons. i come from the city, auburn, of seward whohome helped form the antislavery abrahamnist ideals in lincoln. also, harriet tell evan. we have statues -- harriet tubman. we have statues to them and are city. our they helped abolish slavery and form the opinion in avraham lincoln that slavery needed dealt with. host: james from little valley, new york on the republican line. good morning. caller: i am calling in regards to this race thing going on today. i'm part native american.

our country was stolen from us by everybody. we were enslaved, walked to death, tortured, burned,, massacred. they were just dancing and i'm so tired of people of color pillagingaping, cities and businesses because somebody got killed resisting arrest or not winning to talk to the police. they want the crime in their neighborhoods taking care of? turning the people that do the drive-bys. they never they are. they are probably relatives. they will protect them and whined about the police being frustrated, or a policeman shooting after being assaulted. i'm not a prejudiced man. all: we would like to thank of our callers and viewers for the quick comments on your public policy concerns. for the rest of the show we will turn our attention to the 1921

tulsa race massacre. will join us for this conversation. first, as president trump visits tulsa on the anniversary of the massacre, here is speech from c-span's cities tour on what happened in tulsa in 1921. >> the african-american community here in tulsa was started by a real estate person from arkansas. rley.ame was old w. gule acres in thislus , andin early 21st century he began to develop this area real estate to

individual blacks who wanted to the historicand greenwood area is the area where he bought this property. it became known as the black wall street because of the business developers and entrepreneurs that came to the greenwood area to start a business. there was a lot of promise here blacks were not allowed to work in the oil fields, there was a lot of opportunity for those people who worked for the wealthier people in the oil business, and so that

was a lot of promise. there was a lot of promise. and job, good paying jobs, the people took advantage of it. and in the greenwood area, you had doctors, lawyers, justacists, educators, anything that went into life forg a quality of a community could be found in the greenwood area. we are back with professor kalenda eaton of the university of oklahoma, who is here to help explain to us the 1921 race oklahoma.n tolleson, good morning. guest: good morning. host: president trump is coming to oklahoma today, specifically going tulsa. was the greenwood

neighborhood of tulsa and tulsa for african-americans prior to 1921? tell us the history. guest: tulsa represents this continued striving for upward thelity, black progress, in earlier part of the 20th century, it is the city bustling with activity. tulsa has the benefit of the oil boom, but you also have many african americans who are firmly planted, instead of rooted, within the professional class seeking opportunity outside of the south, and so they make their way to various areas that they called north were up north, even though we think of tulsa as being west of the south, and so you have this community that is filled with educated families. there is an opportunity to

prosper, even without higher education, even though many have gone to college. you have entrepreneurship that is common. you have grocers, clothing stores, restaurants, cafes, beauty shops, etc., so you have this emphasis on investment in the black community that we have in the greenwood section of tulsa. the wealth did not have to leave, and that was important, and that is how you have booker t. washington name it, at the time, the term was a negro league wall street. because you had this -- negro league wall street -- negro leaguwall street. host: set the scene for us. teenwood was a part of ulsa. how big was a greenwood neighborhood around 1921?

consecrated --s was segregated across railroad tracks, so you have the greenwood district covering several blocks, more than 20 or 30 blocks of north tulsa and then you have south tulsa and other parts of tulsa. so you have a very large area in terms of what the north looked like and then greenwood is kind of this economic center in that portion of the city. host: like you said, it was described as the negro wall street and call today the black wall street. what type of businesses were there? what was the neighborhood like when it came to businesses, schools, homes? 1921?as it like before guest: probably every business you can think of, tailors,

grocery stores, restaurants. many different doctors, offices, a hotel, clubs, social clubs, elementarys, middle, schools, churches, and you have multiple, so it isn't just one church, one grocer or one doctor's office. you have a bustling center. host: explain to us what happened on may 31, 1921. guest: well, so i think the muchn knows that pretty between may 31 and june 1, that the african-american sections of tulsa were destroyed by fire, aerial bombs, and hundreds of people were murdered. worstvent is called the race riot at the time in u.s.

history, and now that language has been amended to kind of term it what it was, which was a massacre. what happens is that a shoeshine goes into shoeshiner a building to use the restroom and he was in a segregated part of tulsa, so african-americans were not allowed to use the facilities, but there was an agreement made at the drexel building, so he goes into the building and enters the elevator. way, both, -- by the of these individuals, sarah page and nick brolin are teenagers. she is the elevator operator. the elevator, and the thinking is that when he walks off the elevator or leaves the elevator, he stumbles and grabs onto her arm or reaches out, and

she screams. is a siren call, where there is a man in the building, a white man in the building who is a manager, he him coming outes so he elevator and immediately calls the police. roland has been apprehended and brought in to the jail, and then there is this rumor going around e was accostedg in the elevator, and then it becomes something sort of exaggerated. then it turns to she was sexually assaulted in the elevator. mobhat point, a white

begins to form at the jail and they took roland out of the jail and lynching him for this presumed sexual assault on sarah paige even though she never identified it as such. host: how long did the burning, diluting and destruction of greenwood last? may 31 and june 1, but what are we talking about here? guest: i would say consistently, we have about 16 to 18 hours of nonstop, but you have this looting that takes place over a couple of days, so it doesn't kind of just at the 16th our stop altogether. you still have the remnants that follow. i think it is important to note that we are not just talking about a mob that is formed and

then goes and attacks a block or a of houses, but you have a mob of people who are going block by block by block, and not only firebombing homes and killing hundreds of residents, but they are looting first, so they are going into these homes, taking ,aluables, destroying furniture pocketing money, and then sitting homes on fire. host: how many people were killed during this race massacre? at thispproximately, point, people say approximately 300, but it is still an unknown number because there were so many people unaccounted for, and so much that is still uncovered. something you mentioned,

and i don't consider myself an expert on the tulsa race massacres at all, but i have heard of it, but this year was the first time i had heard this, this racentioned that massacre also included aerial bombing. articleo read from an because this was the first time i heard of this this year. the first firebombing of a city not take place during the second world war, but two decades earlier. it did not take place in some overseas conflict either. it took place in tulsa, oklahoma. it was the first and only aerial bombing of an american city in history and did not involve a war with a foreign power. rather, it pitted americans against americans. i thought i knew at least some information about the tulsa race massacre but this is the first time i found out that private aircrafts owned by clan members were used obama greenwood.

members were used to greenwood. guest: yes, and it tends to be unknown, and i use that term lightly because people who know the history, or even those former descendents or victims who were still living and their descendents know this history, thatt is usually omitted the aerial bomb, right, what we would call bombs, and so you have this assault that is not just on the ground, right? but you also have this assault from the air, and what can you do with that? how can you really combat what is coming ahead? i know that some accounts early oftry to gloss over the use

aerial or what we would think of itthe firepower and say, oh, is a mistake, and they were dropping water to put out the fire, and while there might have been an attempt to put out the fire in that way, there is no doubt from eyewitness account and historical research that there was this aerial assault. host: let me remind our viewers they can take part in the conversation. we will open up regional lines. if you live in the eastern or time zones, your telephone number will be (202)-748-8000. andou live in the mountain pacific time zones, your line will be (202)-748-8001. we are going to open up a special line for oklahoma residents. if you are a descendent of , if youwho was in tulsa

know of someone or you just want to talk about the tulsa race massacre and you are from oklahoma, your line is going to be (202)-748-8002. keep in mind, you can always wet that (202)-748-8003 and are always reading on social media on twitter at --@cspanwj, and on facebook at facebook.com/c-span. us howor, can you tell much wealth was lost in that tulsa community because of the destruction of greenwood? you ani cannot give exact number, but i can say it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of dollars were lost. that beforeemember that, the investment in the community was very large, and that was also a part of the huge

success with the greenwood district. dollar did not have to really leave, so you not only have the money that is circulating throughout the community, but then you have reinvestment into the community with businesses and also business owners helping others start their initiatives and endeavors, so we are thinking about a community that is fairly self-sufficient. arrested,anyone ever tried, or convicted for anything that happened in greenwood over those three days? guest: when you see anyone, yes, but not the perpetrators. so you have a reality that no white person was actually tried of whatcted for any

happened, whether it be diluting, the murder, the , but what youting do have is many african-american who are arrested and charged with inciting a riot. host: go ahead. guest: i was going to say this withen after they had been thousands of people not only locked their homes, but they are also placed in an internment camp and held in these spaces theseemed criminal, and are the victims of the massacre. host: i had the honor of speaking at the gilchrist museum in tulsa a few years ago, and i had a personal tour of greenwood. can you explain to our viewers who do not know what greenwood looks like today? is actually and

important and thriving area. there has been a lot of economic investment back into greenwood, so i will say that there is often a gap between the tulsa race massacre and what we think of as greenwood today. there is a large assumption across the nation that the community was destroyed and that was it. was a 40 year renaissance in the neighborhood, and one thing that the black community was determined to do was rebuild, and so i know personal stories just from my own family members and from others who say after the massacre and after people and realize assess

their insurance claims would not be paid, and that they basically were going to be left on their own, they said, well, we are not going to let this stop us. city,eople did leave the and it rebuild, so you have this thriving greenwood that follows the massacre, and is that way 1960's, wheree you have what is thought of as urban renewal, but in many cities ends up kind of being problematic for especially black communities. and you have a freeway that is built through the area and what have you, and some divestment. but then you have this reinvestment within the past 10 to 15 years, so you have a cultural center with historical andmarks that are pointing

there are universities that have campuses in the actual greenwood district and a stadium, and so it is actually kind of a space where all of tulsa gathers. host: i was going to say i remember seeing the plaques in the sidewalks, indicating where these african-american businesses were during my tour greenwood, but also disappointed to see there is a major highway that goes directly through that neighborhood. before we go to our callers, i understand you have a personal connection to tulsa with your grandmother moving there in 1922 and your grandmother's aunt living in tulsa during the riots. can you share those stories with us? guest: sure. my grandmother's aunt lived

there, and she owned a cafe in the greenwood section of tulsa, and my grandmother and her immediate family moved there to .oin her aunt my grandmother was six or seven years old when she moved there, so she attended elementary school through high school and her family lived there until her 1940. passed away in it is interesting because i have stories of what i was talking about before, the tulsa immediately after the massacre, and the kind of left-wing tulsa that existed, and then i also have the stories that my grandmother's aunt told her about what it was like during andactual massacre itself escape,was forced to and she was huddled with other

people in another part or the outskirts of the town, and then by providence, her house was saved, so she was able to come back to it but everything else was destroyed. before, mys i said grandmother and her immediate family moved there the next year. i was always fascinated by the fact that they would still go there the next year, but it speaks to that determination, that self-determination to say, this is not going to be the end of black progress, and we are going to continue on. host: let's let our viewers join in on the conversation. we will start with debbie, calling from philadelphia, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. ton,t of all, professor ea beautiful face. beautiful face. it is so interesting to hear these stories as a white woman. now we are hearing black lives

matter with looting and rai ding and then we had the same description in tulsa. just interesting. i am hearing some great, great things in this story that you are telling because all i ever heard was black wall street and the bombing and destruction, but i never heard the particulars. do they actually hang the young man, do you know? an thank you. guest: thank you. no, no they did not. , sorry, sarah page did not actually press charges. he was let go, dick rowland, and the story goes he immediately left town. he was never to be heard of again, and then the story goes that she actually left, as well. and that is an important

question because where you have this mob of people outside of the jail, you also have a counter group of armed african-americans, veterans, servicemen who have come back from world war i, and they go to the jail, and they are there to protect him, so they are not going to, you know, as the word gets back to their community, they decide we are not going to allow this young man to be hanged. i think it is also interesting to think of tulsa as a place that was segregated but did not have a long history of racialized violence as we associate with other spaces. have this determined group saying this is not going to happen in this town. i mean, this is not going to happen on our watch. so you have the men to credit

beingck rowland's life spared, and the sheriff did not allow rowland to be taken out, and, of course, he was found -- the charges were found to be false. host: we have a question from one of our social media followers who wants to know, "did congress or any agency of the federal government take any action after the tulsa massacre?" attempt, an was an unsuccessful attempt, to make all of this disappear, especially related to the white media. the papers, any mention of what happened, the papers would destroy, they would not allow any information to be printed. now, the black press on the other hand, new the story and picked up the story nationwide.

you had representatives from the naacp to assess the damage. there were many insurance claims that were filed and then denied. bc franklin representing the individuals and the losses and attempting to find some sort of way to compensate these victims, thousands of victims, but that is kind of where it stops. it is not go any higher because for a long time, there was a blind eye turned to this event. so the long answer, no. host: let's go to rick, calling from jacksonville, florida. good morning. caller: good morning. are a very you good-looking woman. about theyou said

moderator, sir, about the cities, and between the i have to say two quick things and good morning. they do that here in jacksonville. we had a black area, and i was raised in gaffney, south killeda, and when you the people, they had a saying in gaffney, the white people, that the black people don't know they place. in fact, they would tell you you don't know your place. community and how it prospered, and had to be some jealousy. there is always a rumor about a white woman or something to that. and i got kind of mad when i put it in perspective. we have always been told that black folks don't have nothing,

but you have never seen these type of massacres that i'm watching with you guys, they had another one in arkansas, when community tried to get themselves together, and then you turn around and you hear white folks say, well, you blacks and got nothing, or you are always begging, but they never put in the history books all the atrocities of how they have held us back. just like the black indians in oklahoma, fighting for their money, something about the oil or whatever. when obama was president, he would not even help them. you get tired and angry when you you know weolk say are always baking and stuff, and here they are, like the lion and

the lamb, just like the devil himself. at you,u -- they come and then in turn, they are the ones inflicting the damage that keeps their foot on your neck. host: go ahead and respond, professor eaton. isst: unfortunately, tulsa one of many examples of what the caller is alluding to there, and there are similar cities where the existence of wealthy, self-sufficient black citizens was deemed a threat to the white establishment. incidents inimilar indiana and ohio in 1906, illinois in 1908, nebraska or arkansas, as he mentioned, and the massacre of the workers who attempted to be unionized. 1919.nd tennessee in

1919 is known as the red summer as a result of the unrest happening across the nation with the massacres. you have oklahoma in 1921 and florida in 1923, just to think about a brief period. and this is the second kind of major stretch of time where you on blacke attacks citizens and black communities after what happened during the reconstruction period, we have thousands of black men and women lynched. so there are these periods within american history where black progress is met with white violence. so, yes, the caller is absolutely right. , a part ofssor eaton the reason we are talking of this is because president trump

is going to hold his campaign rally tonight in tulsa, oklahoma. it is the first of such events since march 2, after which rallies were curved due to the covid 19 pandemic.you can watch that live tonight , online at c-span.org, and on the free c-span radio app. professor eaton, what is the reaction in tulsa and around oklahoma to president holding his first post pandemic rally in tulsa, oklahoma? guest: i think the reaction is mixed. it is buried, and it depends on whom you are speaking to. you have a lot of supporters of the president and general and his administration who are excited about the fact that oklahoma was chosen. you have others who are very concerned about what this

means for the city, especially as it relates to the public health issue, and then you have those who are concerned about what this will mean as it relates to the racial tension that already exists and has been existing in the nation. news, forheard the example, i thought, why? why tulsa? why a rally? pandemic?ring a originally, when he made the announcement, why on juneteenth? of course, we know it has been moved, so the only conclusion to that it was an attempt capitalize on the national attention that was being given to greenwood and the tulsa race massacre on the 99th anniversary of the event, so instead of releasing a statement on social justice, equality, or racial relations, the administration

chose a rally during a troubling time. i think the public is concerned because there is really no evidence that these political events have ever been used by this administration to unite our entire country. i know early on there were talks about possibly turning this visit into an historical tour related to the massacre. i know i read this morning that the vice president is supposed to meet with some of the black people, a tulsa, but lot of people are expressing seet concern, and i don't how people could probably think about this any differently than being something very concerning. host: let's go to john, calling from pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? host: fine, go ahead. caller: i wish this lady would have followed bernie character yesterday when he was badmouthing the left-wing terrorists antifa or whatever.

the greatest menace in this country has been the angry white man with a redneck. 160 eighta city, people killed, and this thing with tulsa, it goes to show you -- and they were also riots in florida where people were killed in our history, so, this thing about the left-wing terrorists kind of annoyed me, and i'm glad she is on today. i just wanted to mention the greatest menace in this country is probably the angry white man with a redneck. host: so ahead and respond, professor eaton. you for yourank call and response, caller. i think it was ella baker who said in 1960 eight, it is not the responsibility of the members of the african-american community to help the nation get things right in terms of racism and stamp out racism, but it is the responsibility of the white

community and members of the white community, and i think that is a lot of what we are seeing now with the kind of renewed call for changes within this country, and the call for justice, and when you look at screen, on thehe television or pictures in the media, you see a widely diverse group, and so the responsibility is really on those who have historically had more power than others. host: humans rights watch put out a statement where they are calling for reparations for the descendents of the tulsa race massacre. i will read a little bit from the report. this is from the human rights watch. "state and local authorities in tulsa, oklahoma, should provide

reparations for the 1921 tulsa race massacre, when a white mob killed hundreds of black people and destroyed a prominent black neighborhood." they said today "they should probably develop and carry out a comprehensive reparations plan, in close consultation with the local community, to address the harm caused by the massacre and its lasting impact." the 66-page report, "the case for reparations in tulsa, oklahoma: a human rights argument," details the destruction of hundreds of people, most of them black, dead and than 1200 black-owned houses burned in tulsa's greenwood neighborhoods, then known as black wall street. human rights watch also describes some of the subsequent policies and structural racism that prevented ringwood and the broader north tulsa community from driving. they should also pass a bill that would begin to address the ongoing harm from slavery. professor eaton, do you think the descendents of the tulsa

race massacre is a reparations? guest: absolutely. and in the real world, not just on the television series or a comic series, like "the watch," where they imagine this fight has been successfully won, i do want to note that it is wonderful human rights watch put out that report, but the tulsa race right commission since 2001 has actually been asking for the same thing, and it is in over 200 page document that was , actuallyto the state detailing everything that thatned, and including in were the losses and the justification argument for reparation. so this has been an ongoing legal fight, even actually before that report was published in 2001.

hannibal johnson talked about it street,"ok "black wall and i think it was published in 1998. that many something of the survivors were asking for , many of the descendents of the survivors were asking for, so, absolutely, and tying it back to the reparations and the larger thement for reparations for formally enslaved. one of the kind of most important moments in american history, the massacre itself, but also the larger conversation about at what point is united states going to take for theirlity technically 200 some odd years,

but practically four hundred years of enslavement? host: let's talk to kathleen, calling from new york. good morning. caller: good morning. my heart is heavy listening to all of this. -uh.al bombings, uh my heart is heavy. i am tired of the white man turning a blind eye to the dehumanization of black lives in this world. i am tired of hearing people talk about a systemic racism and that long -- in law enforcement does not exist. that is a lie. that retired cop who killed aubrey, he did what he wanted to do that day, killed a black man. do people think that when he retired and hung up his uniform all of a sudden he started hating black people? no. he was in law enforcement for years and god only knows many black lives he took out this earth. i am tired of we the people not

getting credit. are good lawthere enforcement and that when they took the oath, you know, and serve,ore to protect and they upheld that oath. they serve and protect the community with dignity and respect. we know there are good cops in this world. this movement is not about the good. it is about the bad and the ugly because no matter who you are or where you go, or what you do in life, you will find the good, the bad and the ugly. and this movement is about the bad and the ugly. you know, the people that let that seed of hate growing to their heart, were that route grows into the depths of their heart, their mind and their soul. host: go ahead and respond, professor eaton. guest: i definitely understand the caller and where she is coming from in terms of being .ired

as someone who deals with this history on a daily basis, especially in the classroom, and is always very aware of this long historical timeline and seeing these events and assaults well as thebody, as policing, whether it be state sanctioned or in the case of the tulsa massacre, people were deputized to police black bodies. we see this over and over again with the historical timeline, andit is an ongoing fight an ongoing struggle that many people have to participate in, whether they want to or not, so it is very tiring and alsorating, and it is

surprising when, for example, now, you look around in the media, and you hear a lot of these companies and others who not recognizeid or realize what the problems were in this nation, let us now say something or address this there is not really a moment in american history where people were not aware of it or actively participating in these various different assaults, whether they be actively violent physical assaults, or psychological or emotional and those micro aggressions. attitude and the feeling of being tired of something that is real, there is a trauma associated with this and eight is always

present in the day today, and you have people out there now in another generation who kind of echo the words of sonja sanchez when she says in her poem, "am i blue? no, i am black and red." we see allies across racial lines are also ready to hopefully right the wrongs. ist: professor eaton, you and were talking earlier that president trump was originally going to hold his rally on juneteenth, which was yesterday, but it was moved to today. and there has been a lot of renewed interest in juneteenth around the country. can you talk about juneteenth and the importance of that holiday? juneteenth is 155

years old, a holiday that has been celebrated across the nation since at least 1866. you have more of a kind of local and regional focus in the earlier year coming out of texas, which was his last confederate stronghold and that is why we have the holiday when granger65 goes down to galveston and says, areknow, yes, the enslaved free, and you must release them, even though the emancipation proclamation in 1863 did some of this for some people in some states, you have then this celebration, a jubilee day, where people are saying now we have the opportunity to kind of the foot ofunder

this institution of slavery, so this is something that has been celebrated nationwide. many proclamations have been made. at this point, i think there are 46 states, if i remember correctly that recognize juneteenth as some sort of observance in some way, whether it be a state holiday or recognize its importance in this particular administration that has released proclamations each year for the past three years juneteenthizing that missedrtant, and we have openly in her 90's who has been campaigning for juneteenth to be a national holiday for over 40 when you think even

outside of a national holiday, why it isn't a federal holiday, it is probably the second most important date within colonial american history, and it would prove that not only the nation does understand and owednize the debt that is to its african-american citizens or the building of this nation, but also help solidify kind of this complete understanding and citizenry of the full . so, juneteenth, yes, there was a lot of attention on it now. there are people saying i did not even know it existed, but it is something -- i am laughing, and in every state i have ever

lived in, there are huge celebrations and unison polities, and they sign off on parades and permits or what have you, so people know about it. they celebrated. it is not just a block holiday but something that important -- that is as important to the united states as the fourth of july. host: one of the things i always find interesting about juneteenth is that that emancipation is celebrated on different days in different south. for example, in mississippi, may 8 is when the union troops told the slaves they were free. and here in the district of columbia, emancipation day is actually on april 16. when thewas in 1862, district of columbia predicts slaves. the interesting thing here -- freed slaves. the interesting thing is on that day, congress agreed to

reparations, but to the slave owners for every slave they had to release. website, aprilhe 16, 1862, the district of columbia emancipation act became henry rob ofd by massachusetts, the act freed slaves in the district of columbia and compensated slave up to $300 for each free person. we have known about the emancipation days since before the end of the civil war. is it amazing that juneteenth is getting this attention? guest: right, i definitely a compensation to the slaveowners, there was a strong compensation for their economic loss, and you see this also across the western hemisphere, as well and the colonies and other countries, where, of course, slavery existed all across the black

atlantic, as well. there is this compensation to the owners, and kind of the dismissal and disregard for the laborers and the victims. host: let's see if we can get a few more calls before the top of the hour. michael, good morning. good morning, jesse. thank you for this program. ands taught in the 1950's 1960's in oklahoma and i never heard a word about this. it was like 20 years ago. it was brought up and it peaked my curiosity on the news, and i went to the library and checked out a book to read about it. very interesting. and more amazing was that no one knew about it. i mean, it was just 20 years ago that this became a public information.

this oppression of it was incredible. i don't think the civil war is really over. a confederate in the white house and we are still fighting that white supremacist civil war in this country. guest: right, so i mean, this raceion of why the tulsa massacre was unheard of is one that comes up a lot. before, it is unheard of but heard of. it is kind of like an open secret. the history of suppression that it takes place immediately after the massacre, and there is also what i would of thea disregard

information that was actually printed within the black press. so that is also something to think about in terms of the ways in which our information is segregated, right. so you have historians and other scholars who are looking for information in specific places, so i have spoken to many people, my colleagues, who said i was looking for this information and i could not find anything until the 1990's or i cannot find anything into even the tulsa race massacre commission submitted the 2001.nt in there are historians elsewhere who talked about it in the 1980's, but even he said that it was limited information he was working with. on the other hand, you have first-hand accounts that are

after theimmediately massacre. the naacp covered it, the black it acrossered the nation. there have been other documents that were published and/or existed within the black leadership i guess i should say, and so, it goes back to this question of information and how news is distributed, what is suppressed, how it is suppressed, and to whom it is made available. host: let's see if we can squeeze in our last callers. we start with jim, calling from annapolis, maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. in my own? host: go ahead, jim, please. caller: ok, let me tell you, put you in the real world. in 1965, a small group of guys

got together and they went around the country, whether it d.c., etc.,hicago, etc., and they bought the worst sections of the land, and they financed, developed, and to this day, own and manage those in section eight projects. inre are about 4200 blacks the country today, about 30% are doing well, the obama's, oprah , and 70% are living in these hellhole section eight projects have gone nowhere. i do not want to hear about the one or two ben carson two got out. now, here is what is happening, the same group that owns those projects, and your guest does not have a clue who they are, or the 99%, they are now privatizing the prisons, so

these young black boys are going from the projects to the prisons. obama didhat barack for eight years about the situation? nothing, he did not do a thing. host: i will let you respond to that, professor eaton. the school to prison pipeline is something that is very real, and many people have -- campaigning for change and i cannot continue to do so. i cannot speak to the caller's statistics. i am not quite sure i agree with the numbers he mentioned, but aside from that, the reality is that we have a lot of serious issues within the united states that one particular administration is not going to be able to solve. could isthat one

pretty impossible. what is important though is we have forward thinking individuals who are concerned acrossiting our country racial lines, class lines, social lines, as it relates to kind of various different historical and very current issues, so that is where we are at this point. we are looking for and have been looking for and asking for, we meaning the american people, asking for real change that will affect how we progress as a nation. host: let's see if we can squeeze in one more caller. rick, calling from richmond, ohio. good morning. how are you doing, things for having me.

village nearittle richmond, ohio. we are part of the underground railroad. people who do not know what the underground railroad is, look it up. a lot of the slaves across the ohio river into kentucky and and the southern states richmond citizens, a lot of them went over to liberia out of the country, so we have all these calls for giving reparations to the slaves. i just don't agree with that. think anybody in my immediate family, like my mom, dad and grandparents, we ever owned slaves and we are from an antislavery area. i just do not agree with the reparations that we need to get everybody reparations. host: go ahead and respond, professor eaton. that membersnefit

as ae american citizenry result of enslavement i think is great. the argument that, well, this was not in my particular family situation or my particular community was not involved is one that is used often, and while one particular environment we not align with the ways in which we think about enslavement and kind of its history of enslavement, there is still a legacy that is very strong of a legacy that leads into the who haves that those been empowered have and continue , so i think it is not

really possible, unless maybe someone is speaking about their no, it is just not possible. to say that i think the benefits that one has gained as a result of being in this country and not being a person of color is kind of not real, right? they are real. we see them every day. we see them in terms of the economic advancements. you see them in terms of redlining. you see it in terms of education, so whether or not one's family was involved, one benefits greatly. host: professor eaton, steve will be the 100th commemoration of the tulsa race massacre's.

take?essons can we what lessons can we learn as a country, state and communities from the 1921 tulsa race massacre? guest: the first lesson that we this islearn is that not something that should be repeated. even though we see this on a daily basis and we are still grappling with these various different threats and very real power, unmatched power on a daily basis, it is not a history that we can continue to repeat over and over again. the reason why the massacre is weimportant today is because see these connections and this line that still connects us to

that time today. by the state of black and brown and indigenous people, so the first lesson is we cannot just keep doing this. it has to stop. the second i think is something that is more positive, and i want to point to what i said before, and it has to do with the resilience and the determination within the african-american community. african-americans in the country have always been fighting and always been attempting to test be, exist, -- attempting to adjust we, exist, and live, so this is an example of those who are doing what it was that they were supposed to be doing, and we need to understand that there is power in our existence and power in our story. host: let's see if we can squeeze in one more caller.

charlotte from houston, texas. caller: good morning. i want to ask, is it still possible for the descendents of those who are affected in greenwood to go back and sue those insurance companies who denied the claims that were filed? because i know about a railroad forany that will sue cat slaves, transporting and they were sued and had to pay how likely is it now? guest: that is a very good question. i don't know the answer now. i would think because there are documents and these were cases, a lot of them were brought to court, that there is the evidence there. i would think if these insurance companies still exist, some may not, that there would be a

possibility. i am not an expert on that. i will say right now it seems likely, but i am not 100% sure. host: we would like to thank professor kalenda eaton of the university of oklahoma for being with us this morning at explaining to us the history of the 1921 tulsa race massacre. professor eaton, thank you so much. i want to remind our viewers that starting directly after this show, it will be the mass poor people's assembly and moral march on washington. stick around for that. we want to thank all of our viewers. happy father's day to all the dads out there. see you soon. >> i cannot stand here and claim to be a follower of jesus christ and be silent about the moral outrage going on in our country. >> ♪ afraid ♪re not