this sunday, a nation divided. >> oh, my god, please don't tell me he's dead. >> a week that began with the shooting of two african-american men by police officers. >> i wanted everybody in the world to see what the police do. >> ends this way. with the killing of five police officers at a black lives matter rally in dallas. >> the suspect stated he wanted to kill white people, especially white officers. >> and sparks protests across the country. >> black lives matter! black lives matter! >> from policing to politics, the country seems increasingly divided. this sunday morning, i'll talk to the head of homeland security. two top cops tried to change the

way police do their job. and two top senators, a republican and a democrat, each a former mayor. plus a week of violence in the presidential campaign. how can either of our divisive candidates heal this divided nation? and joining me for insight and analysis are eugene robinson, columnist for "the washington post." michael eric dyson of georgetown university and an msnbc contributor. long time republican strategist mary mat alynn. and washington post columnist michael gerson. welcome to sunday and a special edition of "meet the press." >> announcer: from nbc news in washington, this is "meet the press" with chuck todd. >> good sunday morning. it's too early to start making comparisons to 1968, but surely we have just lived through one of those tumultuous weeks that will stand out in recent history. headlines in the country's newspapers tell the story of a nation divided and, at times, it feels as if we're at war with itself. the shooting of two african-american men by police

officers and the subsequent attack on police in dallas sparked protests in cities across the country this weekend. most of them peaceful. but there were some tense confrontations. last night in st. paul, minnesota, protesters clashed with police, injuring two of them as marchers pushed past state stroopers and ended up closing a freeway. all of it has exposed ashl divisions in the u.s. and it comes at a time of growing political polarization overall with americans coming more tribal, separated by region, by culture, and of course by race. all of this amid a campaign season featuring two candidates who themselves are divisive and who may be uniquely unsuited to heal the country's wounds. the images are burned into the consciousness of a nation already deeply polarized about race and policing. >> [ bleep ]. >> alton sterling killed by police officers while selling cds outside a baton rouge convenience store. philando castile, shot dead in his car by a police officer in minnesota. >> he's licensed. he's carrying --

>> the aftermath broadcast live to facebook by his fiancee. her 4-year-old daughter in the back seat. 12 police officers shot and five killed at a peaceful protest in dallas. some shot in the back. >> all i know is that this -- this must stop, this divisiveness between our police and our citizens. >> not since the summers of the '60s and violence in watts, detroit and chicago has the nation felt so hopelessly divided. searching for leadership and cynical about the answers its leaders can provide. >> as painful as this week has been, i firmly believe that america is not as divided as some have suggested. >> almost eight years after barack obama's election as the nation's first black president, more than four in ten african-americans are doubtful that the country will ever achieve racial equality. while some political leaders

call for unity -- >> we must learn to live together as brothers and sisters. if not, we will perish as fools. >> -- the blame game is also beginning. >> of all those protesters last night, they ran the other way expecting the men and women in blue to turn around and protect them. what hypocrites. >> and at a time of widening political divisions, instead of presenting solutions to the national hopelessness, the presidential campaign is intensifying it. the 2016 nominees both canceled political events on friday, struck quieter tones, and called for change. >> we know there is something wrong with our country. there is too much violence, too much hate, too much senseless killing. >> our children deserve a better future than what we're making them live through today. >> but can either of these candidates, among the least popular, least trusted, and most divisive in history, somehow

become the president that heals a nation desperately searching for unity? joining me now from new york city, homeland security chief jeh johnson and new york city police commissioner bill bratton. welcome back to "meet the press" to both of you. >> thanks for having us, chuck. >> secretary johnson, let me start with you. i want to start with a very broad question, and that is the concern many americans have about just the state of race relations in this country. i want to put up some survey data. essentially starting in march of '14, 17% said there was a great deal of worry about race relations. two years later, the number has doubled. there's definitely -- you can see a ferguson effect starting from there on this concern about race relations. se secretary johnson, how concerned are you? >> well, i am concerned, chuck. and i think at a time like this when tensions are high, in the wake of events in dallas, in baton rouge and minnesota and elsewhere, it's important to

remember that just as the shooter on thursday night was not reflective of the broader movement to bring about change in police practices, any police officer who engages in excessive force is not representative of the larger law enforcement community, which with increasing frequency reflects the community at large. and it's important to emphasize at a time like this -- and this is why we're together this morning -- that violence never solves anything. an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind, and at this point we need to stand with our law enforcement community, with our peace officers, because they're there to serve and protect the community. >> commissioner bratton, let me ask you to tackle this another way. a lot of blame game going around about dallas. we had a milwaukee county sheriff, david clark, said while the president didn't cause this, he believes he fueled the anger that was behind the shooting. and then i want to play you this comment from the executive director of the national association of police organizations. here it is, commissioner.

>> it's a war on cops, and the obama administration is the neville chamberlain of this war. >> commissioner bratton, what do you say to that? >> well, the two individuals you just referenced have been very outspoken with their opinions on this issue. as i look at it, policing has always had issues of concern relative to officer safety. it's something we've spent a lot of time on, attempting to equip them, train them, and also attempting to develop collaboration with the community. policing in america, policing in a democracy, is a shared responsibility where we have to see each other, hear each other, and learn from each other. and moving forward, as we've attempted to do here in new york since the murder of our two officers back in december 2014 is to try to increase the dialogue, to bridge the gap, close the gap. everybody's opinion, everybody's voice needs to be heard. but having done that ask doing that, we need to try to find common ground.

the secretary and i are committed at the national level and certainly here in america's largest city, trying to find common ground so we can all get on to the same set of issues and same understandings and move forward. >> do you agree, secretary johnson, with what governor dayton of minnesota said that if philando castile had been white, he'd be alive today? >> i'm not -- i'm not in a position to comment on that. that matter is under investigation. very often situations like this are pretty complicated, and so i want to resist labels like that that may be premature. i think we ought to let the investigation play itself out. there ought to be something that's fairly swift, transparent, and if necessary, accountability. >> commissioner bratton, i want to play something for you that former mayor rudy giuliani said about the black lives matter movement and get your reaction on the other side. here it is. >> i think the reason that there's a target on police

officers' backs is because of groups like black lives matter that make it seem like all police are against blacks. they're not. they're the ones saving black lives. black lives matter is not saving any black lives. it's the police officers that are doing it. >> i want you both to tackle this question. rudy giuliani is a well respected voice on the right. black lives matter has become an important voice to many african-americans in this country. and is there any way of bridging that divide in that view? obviously mayor giuliani has a hardened view about this. commissioner bratton, you first. >> the reality of the black lives matter movement, it is significantly focused, primarily focused on police and their efforts to portray police and the police profession in a very negative way, which is unfortunate. there is no denying within the police profession, 800,000 of us, that we have racists, we

have brutal people, we have criminals, cops who shouldn't be here. but they do not represent the vast majority of american police who every day, as exhibited in dallas the other evening, put their lives on the line for blacks, for whites, for everybody. so in terms of some of the comments made by the mayor are appropriate in the sense of the intent and goal of black lives matter. every life matters to american police, and the issue of race issues in this country, it's historic. it's the wound that has not yet healed, and hopefully through all these challenges we're now facing, we will find ways to not only heal but move forward. >> chuck, i know rudy giuliani well. he hired me as a federal prosecutor in 1988. i think it's time that we -- we dial back the overheated rhetoric and we come together, which is why commissioner bratton and i are here this morning. we come together to mourn the loss of these police officers in dallas, these brave heroes, to heal, to build bridges, and

let's all dial back the overheated political rhetoric and work on building and rebuilding our community and public safety. >> commissioner bratton, can you clear up this donald trump situation from friday? he asked you to address the roll call. what was the actual request? >> very specifically, one of his security personnel, former nypd personnel, reached out to our department about the potential for mr. trump to address a roll call. we turned down that request, that we don't allow the department to be politicized. and inasmuch as he is engaged in a political campaign, that would be a politicizing of the department. i had a conversation with mr. trump as well as with mrs. clinton later in the day that day, at their request. both of them called me to discuss new york's specifically as well as the dallas situation. very productive conversations. but it's been overplayed in some respects in the media. >> okay.

>> we don't allow the department to be used if you will as a backdrop for those types of campaigns. >> secretary johnson, i know you have a son. have you ever had the talk that many african-american fathers say they have to have with their sons? >> yes, and i think i'll leave it there. yes. >> fair enough. >> i don't have to leave it there. i've had conversations with my son, who is now 45, about as a police officer, about the importance of compliance. the wonderful article today in new york post about the difficulty being a black officer and a black father, and about the idea of compliance. whether white or black, when a police officer confronts you, compliance is the best way to deal with that situation. the shared responsibility, the officer enforcing the law, the citizen responding to the officer in appropriate fashion. >> all right. mr. bratton, secretary johnson, i'll leave it there.

tough week. thanks for coming on. >> thanks, chuck. >> thank you. well, in 2014, in the wake of ferguson and the killing of michael brown, president obama created a task force on community policing with the goal of improving how police interact with their communities. the co-chair of that task force is charles ramsey, who joins me now. chief ramsey, welcome back to "meet the press." >> thank you. >> let me start with the task force you are heading up in the wake of what we saw in baton rouge and in st. paul. a lot of people are wondering have we made any progress? is this a case of two steps forward, one step back, or two steps back and no steps forward? >> well, i mean, it just seems like sometimes it is two steps forward and one back. but we have to continue to move forward. has there been progress? yeah, absolutely. i think the report is a good road map for the future. but we cannot expect that there won't be some stumbling blocks

along the way. we're going to have issues that arise but we have to keep pushing forward if we want to see the kind of change we need to bring these two sides together. >> you know, statistically "the washington post" did a big expo say on where we are this year when it comes to police and interactions and deaths caused by police officers and deaths of police officers. essentially more people have been shot and killed by police this year, so far, than last year at this same point in time. and more police officers have been killed in the line of duty this year than last year at this point in time. so it feels as if -- this feels a bit overwhelming, i think, to people. >> well, yeah. but i think you have to keep everything in context. we do have some rising crime rates, and let's face it. we have on average about 13,000 murders in the united states every year. these are not shootings by police. these are people killing people. there's a disproportionate a of it going on in many of our more challenged communities. who do you think goes after the people responsible for these crimes? it's the cops, and we encounter

a lot of very dangerous people out there on the street. so we can look at numbers in a variety of ways, but i think we need to keep it in context that police officers have a very challenging and often dangerous job. now, that's not to say that we should not be mindful of the fact that we have some officers that use excessive force, that shoot people when it's not totally justified. we've got to really address that and hold them accountable. but it is not a reflection of the department and policing at large. >> you know, director comey, james comey of the fbi, who obviously was in the news for other reasons earlier this week, he has said a couple of times that he is concerned that there has been an impact on police officers, that they're somehow more hesitant. he says he has no data to prove t but he is worried that there's an impact, that the rise in the homicide rate this year is somehow related. are you at all concerned about that? >> yeah, i'm concerned about it. i mean i don't know and there is no data right now as the director said to really show it. but police officers are human beings, and i mean when you're being attacked like that or at

least you're perceived of being attacked, it does create some issues and some problems. but i think that we all need to recognize that there are some changes that need to be made. i mean we can't look at it from a defensive poszture. how do we move forward? how do we create an environment where we're on the same page? there's only one issue, and that is creating safe neighborhoods, but also those neighborhoods where the people in it have a sense and feeling of justice and fairness as the law is being applied. and i think that's what really people are asking for. so does it have an impact? yeah, i think it does. but we've got to move forward from it. >> is there a different challenge here, by the way, between what we're seeing in the way big city police departments, i think, have been a little more proactive in making the changes necessary, but suburban police departments, where frankly we've seen a lot of these negative interactions between police and african-americans have actually taken place in smaller suburban departments. is there a -- is there a

discrepancy between training? is there a discrepancy between resources here between smaller police departments and larger ones? >> well, i mean you raise a great issue. there are approximately 18,000 departments in the united states. in my opinion, far too many. we need to look at a long-term goal of more regionalization, better training, consistency in policy and procedures. in your larger cities where you have a lot of diversity, obviously you have officers that are very accustomed to dealing with a variety of people. we still have parts in our country where that's not the case. we need to bring people together, but we need more consistency in terms of the training that's provided, the selection and hiring of individuals, all those kinds of things need to happen. but in my opinion, we have too many police departments. i would try to cut the number in half maybe in the next ten years or so because you're always going to have these kinds of issues as long as you have this many departments with different

policies, procedures, training, and the like. >> in an earlier interview this week, you said the issue of the fact that all of this now gets many people videotaped, these interactions. you called it a powder keg, that we're sitting on a powder keg. explain. >> well, we are sitting on a powder keg. i mean it's -- you can call it a powder keg. you can say that we're handling nitroglycerine. but obviously when you just look at what's going on, we're in a very, very critical point in the history of this country, and i think you've got two conventions coming up that are going to be very, very challenging to handle. and i don't think they're going to go without some incident taking place. it's unfortunate, but that's what i personally think. i hope that's not the case, but you've got too many people that are now with this extreme rhetoric, and that is just not good for anybody. we need to come together. we need thoughtful people to sit down and engage in dialogue but actually come up with solutions, not just finger-pointing and playing the blame game. that's not helpful to anybody at

all. but it is a very, very volatile time that we're in right now. >> chief ramsey, appreciate you coming on. it's been a tough week. >> thank you. >> so i appreciate you sharing your views. on friday, president obama ordered flags to be lowered to half staff to honor the victims in dallas. this is the 67th time that president obama has made such an order. it's more than any other president in history. we'll be right back. you focus on making great burgers, or building the best houses in town. or becoming the next highly-unlikely dotcom superstar. and us, we'll be right there with you, helping with the questions you need answered to get your brand new business started. we're legalzoom and we've already partnered with over a million new business owners to do just that. check us out today to see how you can become one of them. legalzoom. legal help is here. that reminds me... anyone have occasional constipation, diarrhea...

...gas, bloating? yes! one phillips' colon health probiotic cap each day helps defend against occasional digestive issues. with three types of good bacteria. live the regular life. phillips'. burning of diabetic nerve pain, these feet learned the horn from my dad and played gigs from new york to miami. but i couldn't bear my diabetic nerve pain any longer. so i talked to my doctor and he prescribed lyrica. lyrica may cause serious allergic reactions or suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worsening depression, or unusual changes in mood or behavior. or swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling or blurry vision. common side effects are dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs, and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who have had a drug or alcohol problem may be more likely to misuse lyrica.

>> no justice, no peace! >> welcome back. our panel is here. we give the better introductions, michael gerson, washington post columnist. michael eric dyson of georgetown university. long time republican strategist mary matalin, a former adviser to vice president cheney. and eugene robinson. michael, let me start with you. you perhaps wrote the most provocative piece of the week of everybody at this table, not to say everybody here isn't provocative in their own ways. and yours was addressed to the white community as a whole. >> mm-hmm. >> about this week. explain. >> well, my point is this, look, and i understand white brothers and sisters will say, hey, you can't characterize all of it. look, it's a trope. it's an approach. imagine what we feel when we're addressed as black and america. i was pleading with white brothers and sisters to

understand, the difficulties that we face. the repudiation of any sense of civility when it comes to the interactions between police forces which most african-american people regard with respect and authority but whose authority has spilled over into terrorizing impulses and impacts upon african-american culture. and i wanted to talk about the vulnerability we feel. even when you were interviewing chief bratton, a remarkable man to be sure, but he wanted to draw a false equivalence between talking to his son and jeh johnson speaking to his son. jeh johnson unfortunately hesitant to weigh in, and i understand. chief bratton more than happy to do so. there's not an equivalence between chief bratton speaking to his son because his son is not most likely to be brutelized by police authority, or the misapplication of the law to vulnerable populations. and i wanted to express myself to that very america that i teach every day at georgetown university. >> this was on redstate.

mind you, a news and opinion site. leon wolf writes this, the most important safety val to prevent violence like we saw in dallas last night is the belief that when officers do go off the rails, the lel spm will pun in them accordingly, if minute order communities and everyone else for that matter believe that, then the resort to reprisal killings would be non-existent or far less frequent. >> i saw that piece on redstate, and after my jaw came up off the floor, i was actually encouraged. i was encouraged by that. i was also encouraged by a somewhat luke warm statement that came out from the national rifle association about the minnesota shooting, which essentially questioned whether philando castile was killed for exercising his second amendment right to keep and bear arms. and it is encouraging if there are conservatives who are kind of getting it, who are -- who are understanding this idea of equal protection. but i have to say, as michael said, this is personal. i'm a father of two sons, right?

and they are often guilty of -- they're young black men. they're often guilty of driving while black, walking while black, standing while black. so this is a very personal concern. >> mary, you were -- >> you don't like to be lumped together. conservatives don't like to be lumped together. a lot of conservatives do get it, particularly conservatives that live in minority/majority cities. i'm all about leon wolf. he's my go-to guy. he's consistent in saying, if you read the whole column, the problem here is coming to the truth. it's not -- and the truth is not all cops are racist, and the truth is not all cops are always right. the truth is your former panelist said and the statistics show is somewhere in between. that's what leon is saying, and that's what people of good faith believe, and if you live in new orleans or any city like that, we have faced this, and we have reformed, and we have corrected it. but i want to go to your point too.

it is true that -- i'm, what, 63, okay? i'm older than all you guys. i was raised to respect police officers. black friends of mine, whose parents were raised in the same area, were taught to fear them because that was the legacy of police brutality and jim crow. >> absolutely. >> so we have to understand that, but then in turn -- and here's what we've done in new orleans -- black people, our african-american brothers and sisters understand that their first like of protection in those neighborhoods are the police. >> nobody understands that more than people who live in -- >> and look at -- exactly. look at philando castile. he's announcing. his girlfriend is announcing, look, i have a gun. let me tell you exactly what i have, as far as we know, and this is the case. and he still, by obeying the law, mary, lost his life. this is the very pulverizing and brutalizing vulnerability that we feel that we're trying to express to white americans who

love and appreciate justice. do you understand how difficult that is? >> i understand the fear. i understand the legacy. but do you honestly believe out of the 3 million interactions of police with people of all colors, there's one cop for every -- that every one of these instances, that police go out and say i'm going to brutalize a black man? >> of course not. it's the consequence. you're making my point for me even better. >> thank you. >> it is an unconscious, if you will, inclination to see that black person differently, through a different prism, to have greater fear. the police, the cop on the front line, feels a kind of intensity that he does not feel. let me give you an example. on the internet right now is a white guy going ham, crazy, beating up, striking out with a machete, and the white police allow him to leave the door of the establishment, and people say, bolt the doors. these are two cops who could have killed him. do you think that an african-american person wielding a machete would have been

granted that -- >> michael, come in here. >> i think we're discovering more broadly that our biggest need at this moment is empathy across our deepest divisions. that's what allows a diverse country, a multiethnic country to be peaceful and unified. and empathy is most powerful, most effective, when you apply it to your own. when you apply it to your own community. so it's powerful when black lives matters empathizes with the role of police officers. it's powerful when people in the white community understand that minorities experience our justice system different than we do and in ways that we would not tolerate. so i think that's the biggest need right now. >> i was just going to say -- >> and the cruellest irony of what happened last week is that sort of empathy was happening in dallas, right? >> it was. >> david brown has done a fabulous job in dallas. complaints of excessive violence on the part of officers are down by two-thirds since he took over

in 2010. >> right. >> police shootings went down from 23 in 2012 to one. one this year. so it can be done, and you saw the ease with which the protesters, the black lives matter protesters and the police, coexisted until this lunatic went off. >> and they were defending the right of those african-american people. i spoke for the black police league down in dallas with complete us judge and willy ford and jackie lee, and those people are remarkable but let me tell you something you don't want to hear. as black police, they say too, when i'm out of uniform, i have fear. when i am not involved directly and people can't identify me as a cop, i too have fear. look at the woman, the woman who made the facebook posting. this is a real thing we have to confront. >> professor, we got that point. i want to -- i know. i got it. empathy with justice, but starts with empathy. and justice is more frequently done than we're discussing. let's talk about the aftermath of baton rouge. both my daughters are there. my husband's entire family is

there. that city came together, black and white, holding vigils, praying and singing and not erupting. that's where the rhetoric departs from the empathy has lived on the ground. >> i want to pause the conversation. we'll continue it. we have more time to continue it but let me pause it because i've got to sneak in a kmergsz break. when we come back, i'm going to talk to two senators, both former mayors, who have first hand experience in dealing with the issue of policing and race. your insurance company won't replace the full value of your totaled new car. the guy says, "you picked the wrong insurance plan." no, i picked the wrong insurance company. with new car replacement™, we'll replace the full value of your car plus depreciation. liberty mutual insurance.

words panera lives by. no artificial flavors, preservatives, sweeteners. no colors from artificial sources. 100% of our food will be clean by year's end. that's food as it should be. ♪ you only earn double miles when you buy stuff from that airline. wait...is this where you typically shop? you should be getting double miles on every purchase! switch...to the capital one venture card. with venture, you earn unlimited double miles on every purchase, everywhere, every day. not just ...(dismissively) airline purchases. seriously... double miles... everywhere. what's in your wallet?

>> take the capitol! >> welcome back. the country's divisions are reflected in where we live or where we worship and how we

vote. those are reflected right here in washington, where democrats and republicans find it increasingly difficult to agree on just about anything. joining me are two senators, both of whom were mayors, cory booker and republican senator bob corker of tennessee, who was once the mayor of chattanooga. i should point out that it's the first time in nearly two years that we here at "meet the press" have gotten a democratic and republican senator to agree to appear together. senator corker, senator booker, i'm not surprised you are the two to agree to do this. thank you to both of you on that front and welcome back. >> absolutely. >> senator corker, let me start with you. you tweeted this on friday. our country has been shaken by senseless violence this week, and i am horrified by the tragedy that unfolded overnight in dallas. obviously the sentiment a lot of people share. how much outrage needs to be expressed before we start feeling as if we can do something about this? >> well, look, we are doing something about it. i mean i thought the response in

dallas was the kind of response that needs to take place. this is mostly a local issue, and individual mayors and police chiefs and others respond in an appropriate way. as mayor, one of the things that i knew and i'm sure cory knew the same thing that when morale at a police department is low, when people don't feel supported in police departments, folks are being hurt unnecessarily. look, it's the number-one responsibility that we have is to keep our citizens safe and secure, to make sure that they are professionalized, but the fact is that it's a breakdown in society when things like what happened in dallas, where this moral depravity of this individual took the lives of people who were protecting folks who were demonstrating peacefully. that is something that all of us should cry out about and show support for these men and women in uniform that do what they do on a daily basis mostly supported, but in so many cases

feeling like they're under assault by the general public. and, again, when one of their officers, when someone acts out inappropriately, it hurts them too. they want to -- they want to make sure that the legal process works. wh when that breaks down. mostly these are selfless people who are protecting our citizens, causing kids to be able to go to school and people to be able to go to work. and that's what we ought to be talking about today. is there greatness -- there are flaws that exist. but their great ness, what they do on our half. >> you heard senator corker there. he also said this is a local issue. do you think -- is there a federal government role here? when you were mayor, did you -- look, you had a very challenging police department that had a challenging history to it in newark. what role -- ddid you want the federal government to play then, and what role should the federal government play now? >> first of all, we have 18,000 police departments in our

country, and many of them are significantly underresourced. there is few groups i've ever seen in america that show the daily courage, especially urban police officers where there's a lot of gun violence. we have officers dying every single year on duty, and we should be doing a lot more as a nation to support those officers. and programs that have come from the federal government in the past have supported our local officers. and now at a time when we know that there's ways not only to protect our officers, that we need to be doing more of and affirming the fact they are doing very dangerous jobs, that when officers leave their families, those families fear for their safety and pray for their return. we also know that there is a challenge with america where we have invested, unfortunately, is in a war on drugs, which has been profoundly painful to our nation with a 500% increase in incarceration in our country, disproportionately affecting poor and minorities.

african-americans have no difference in whites in using drugs or dealing drugs but are about 3.7 times more likely to be arrested. we now know local police officers with the right training could address issues like deescalation, can address issues like impolicity racial bias that even like the head of the fbi, director comey, talked passionate about the need for this country to address, implicit racial bias. we need to invest in our local departments, do a lot of things that progressive departments are doing, lowering policing involved shooting and -- >> let me go to the larger issue here that i'm concerned about, which is do we have a -- is this presidential campaign and are these two presidential candidates suited to meet the moment that's necessary? senator corker, you know the rhetoric on the campaign trail has been heated and has been divisive. the country believes both candidates are polarizing for various reasons and different reasons. i'm going to start with you. senator corker, what's your advice to -- how does donald trump make the case he can unify this country and heal these

wounds, and then i'll ask senator booker to make the case on the other side. >> look, i think both of the candidates, their challenge over the coming weeks is to show that they can do that. i think there's going to be a sincere effort within the trump campaign to do so. my guess is the same thing will be happening in the clinton campaign. there's no question. put this campaign aside. look, the conversation in america has been way divisional. it's not been appropriate. it's been that way for some time. and it adds to this. but let's get back to it again. you know, the mayor of a city is where most of this occurs, and i'm not in any way criticizing what happened in dallas, but it's those local efforts that actually bring people together. no doubt the discourse, no doubt the videos that people can see, no doubt those things affect things throughout our country. but, look, i hope that both of

these candidates candidly will rise to the occasion, and on this particular issue, bring people together. millennials. let's think about it. millennials in our country today probably are more embracing of diversity than any generation we've had. it's my hope again after this tremendous crisis that's occurred, this tragedy, that our country will focus more on unity and not division, and i hope both campaigns will take advantage of that. >> senator booker, let me ask you it this way about hillary clinton. how can -- can she be a president that helps with racial reconciliation in a better way than president obama? >> so let me just say this. we have to all understand we have a country with deep reservoirs of love. we are good people. we are well-intentioned people. when called upon, we rise to an occasion. this is such an occasion, and i'm going to be very blunt. i've watched in pain when i see a presidential candidate -- all of our words matter, whether you're a citizen or a presidential candidate. words matter.

this is a time where we need courageous empathy, where we need undeterred love. so when i hear a presidential candidate like donald trump gratuitously demeaning women, demeaning muslims, demeaning latinos at a time where our country needs reconciliation, we need people that bind our wounds and build bridges across our chasms. to see someone so callously stoking hate and fear and inflaming divide, this is not the person to be president of the united states, i believe, ever but definitely not at a time that we need a healer, a reconciler, and somebody to remind us as a nation our differences matter but our country matters more. >> senator booker, i understand you made the case against mr. trump, but how does hillary clinton, who is almost as polarizing and divisive, how does she make the case she's the candidate here for reconciliation? >> i -- i patently disagree with you on issues of race and religious diversity, that she is in any way polarizing. if anything, i've watched her in

black communities and white communities, and even after this tragedy put forth of the spirit of america, which is an understanding that as our founders said in the declaration of independent ebsence, this is the time we need to mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor. she has manifested that on issues of race, religion, gender diversity. she is someone that can build our bridges, far more than the alternative, someone who is injecting more dwisiveness through his rhetoric, through his affiliations and refusal to denounce patent racists. >> senator cooker, senator booker, i'm going to leave it there. i thank you both for coming on together. hopefully we can make this a habit again on "meet the press." appreciate it. coming up, how will this tumultuous week impact the presidential race? and by the way, is this the week we're going to learn who donald trump's running mate will be? we'll be right back.

using 60,000 points from my chase ink card i bought all the fruit... veggies... and herbs needed to create a pop-up pick-your-own juice bar in the middle of the city, so now everyone knows... we have some of the freshest juice in town. see what the power of points can do for your business. learn more at chase.com/ink with toothpastepower of points or plain water.an their dentures and even though their dentures look clean, in reality they're not. if a denture were to be put under a microscope, we can see all the bacteria that still exists on the denture, and that bacteria multiplies very rapidly. that's why dentists recommend cleaning with polident everyday. polident's unique micro clean formula works in just 3 minutes, killing 99.99% of odor causing bacteria. for a cleaner, fresher, brighter denture every day.

[ screaming ] rate suckers! [ bell dinging ] your car insurance goes up because of their bad driving. people try all sorts of ways to get rid of them. [ driver panting ] if you're sick of paying more than your fair share... [ screams ] get snapshot from progressive, and see just how much your good driving could save you.

welcome back. we noted that hillary clinton had this to stay on friday to my colleague lester holt after a grim week of racially-charged shootings. >> so here's what i believe. i believe we need a national conversation, and we start showing respect toward one another, seeing each other, walking in each other's shoes. >> we thought the call for a conversation about race sounded

familiar, so we looked at some old video and discovered democrats in particular have been talking about this idea for a long time. let's look back starting with president obama after ferguson. >> what we need is a sustained conversation in which in each region of the country, people are talking about this honestly and then can move -- move forward in a constructive fashion. >> in the coming year, i want to lead the american people in a great and unprecedented conversation about race. >> ask yourself. when was the last time you had a conversation about race with someone of a different race? >> that was probably the most provocative of all of them. there's been a lot of talk about talking. but a lot of us have been left to wonder why more hasn't been done. we're going to get to that when we come back. we'll talk about what all of this means for this 2016 campaign. ♪

♪ (vo) you can pass down a subaru forester. (dad) she's all yours. (vo) but you get to keep the memories. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. but can your multivitamin to be healthy. do more for your immune health? now one a day has the first multivitamin with probiotics to support the 70% of your immune system that's found in your digestive tract. new one a day with probiotics. your multi with more.

♪ americans are buying more and more of everything online. and so many businesses rely on the united states postal service to get it there. because when you ship with us, your business becomes our business. that's why we make more ecommerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country.

back now with the panel. i want to pivot the conversation, and michael gerson, i'm going to start with you because you had a very provocative column this week too. yours was lamenting the fact essentially we're in this moment, and we have two nominees that may be uniquely unfit to meet the moment. >> yeah, you'd think political parties would want to pick

popular candidates, and in fact they've chosen two deeply divisive candidates here. there are elements in our politics, not these two people necessarily, although maybe one -- elements in our politics that want to feed just enough anger, just enough resentment, but not over into violence. that is the most dangerous game you can possibly play in politics. we have a republican nominee who rose to prominence by criticizing the other, creating fear of the other. we have a conservative media in parts right now that has a white identity message, okay? and all of this is deeply destructive. it's not the kind of leadership we need. >> well, you know, i mean what he said about trump. but also, you know, the situation as you said is that half the country just tunes out when hillary clinton speaks. you know, the -- >> and the other half tunes out

when -- >> tunes out when donald trump speaks, maybe more than half. so that's not conducive to a national conversation about race although frankly, i have always maintained that this is how we have our national conversation about race. not the way we're sitting at this table, but something happens. we yell and scream. we argue. it's scratchy, but that's the way we do it. >> wait. stop, stop, stop. everything isn't about race, or everything is about the economy, which affects every race, every gender, every orientation the same. donald trump is -- did not come on the head of zeus, okay? the party created him by being unresponsive to the party's demands and the successive tsunami mid-terms which wanted to have some sort of form repeal of obamacare, wanted a more robust economic recovery, wanted the cessation of the intrusion into their life by all these

regulations. that's what's going on in every community out there, and donald trump is just riding that wave. >> let me say this. >> you're not wrong about there being -- but their rhetoric, both of them, is detached. that's not how people live. >> the whole political strategy of getting out the white vote is morally problem leatic and very dangerous for our country. and that's where our politics is headed. >> so it is about race. when you say it's not about race, of course it is. it's just not about blackness. it's about whiteness. whiteness is at stake. donald trump has, i think, in a beguiling way, seduced many working-class white people into believing that he will be their defender when, indeed, he is not. and on top of that, hillary clinton, when we get past the optics and cosmetics, has put forth consistently public policy recommendations that will speak to the vicious yunt current of racism in this country but also bring together various constituencies along the continuum of race in this country. i think that's what's important. >> but, gene, it goes back to --

see, i think it's what cory booker was trying to get at, which is, you know, he says, well she's doing all of these things. but the country is going to tune her out. half of the country -- the whole point of unity is can you get 10% of the other side to listen to you? >> frankly, we'll have to see. elections are choices, right? and so we're going to have presumably these two candidates unless something crazy happens in cleveland. we'll have hillary clinton and donald trump, and people will then be making choices and they will choose who to listen to. there will be occasions when people basically don't have a choice. they can turn off the tv, but the two will be standing there debating. i do believe that there's a very good chance that hillary clinton's message will, indeed, get through better than donald trump's. >> very quickly, michael eric dyson, president obama said he's going to go to dallas. >> yeah. >> is that the only place he should go this week? >> not at all. i think the president is doing a remarkable and good thing by going to dallas, but he's got to go to louisiana, and he's going to go to minnesota.

>> all three stops? >> you got to do all these stops because all three people are aggrieve the, hurt, pained, and he is the president of everybody. he does haven't to wait for a delta flight, thank god. he's on his own plain. i think he's up to, and i think he'll do it. >> we shall see. back in 45 seconds. we're going to talk a little bit about what this week will end up being about, which is one candidate naming their running mate. we'll be right back. >> announcer: coming up, "meet the press" end game. brought to you by boeing. building the future one century at a time. ♪ take on the unexpected with a car that could stop for you. nissan safety shield technologies, available in the altima, sentra and maxima. now get 0% apr for up to 72 months, plus $500 bonus cash. ♪

w...i was always searching for ways to manage my symptoms. i thought i had it covered. then i realized managing was all i was doing. when i finally told my doctor, he said humira was for people like me who have tried other medications,... but still experience the symptoms of moderate to severe crohn's disease. in clinical studies, the majority of patients on humira saw significant symptom relief... ...and many achieved remission. humira can lower your ability to fight infections... ...including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers,... including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions,... ...and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if you've had tb,... ...hepatitis b, are prone to infections, ...or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. if you're still just managing your symptoms, ask your gastroenterologist about humira. with humira, remission is possible.

spending the day with my niece. that make me smile. i don't use super poligrip for hold, because my dentures fit well. before those little pieces would get in between my dentures and my gum and it was uncomfortable. even well fitting dentures let in food particles. just a few dabs of super poligrip free is clinically proven to seal out more food particles so you're more comfortable and confident while you eat. so it's not about keeping my dentures in, it's about keeping the food particles out. try super poligrip free.

>> announcer: "meet the press" end game is brought to you by boeing. building the future one century at a time. back now with end game. we are going to have a running mate pick this week. it appears to be for donald trump down to mike pence, the governor of indiana, newt gingrich, former speaker of the house, maybe chris christie. michael gerson, do you have an opinion? >> i think it's an important choice for him. someone who is like flynn, who is an outsider and to reinforce his message that he's outside the boundaries of politics, or he can try to please cruz voteers that were real in the republican party, that conservative side. so, you know, that will determine the nature of his sprint down to the election. >> as a cruz voter, what would please us more is not a person but a pronouncement and a conviction to constitutional

principles. i like the idea of flynn. i like the whole outsider thing because the insiders are going to come ininside because they want to stay inside. i think newt would hate it. it's a gritty thankless job that's not his scene. and pence may or may not speak to the cruz voters, but it doesn't matter if the policies are not constitutional policies, which so far the donald has not been -- has not shown the courage of his convictions on the supreme court and issues like that that drive those voters. >> it's interesting on newt this week by the way. he did a facebook live with van jones. >> he was very sort of measured and -- >> he said something that you don't hear often from white politicians, which is, it's different to be black in america. >> it's different to be black in america. i mean newt gingrich is a very smart guy. >> it's important to say it. >> i tend to agree with mary that he would be just bored to tears. >> i don't think he would be bored. >> he could do all the civil war

paraphernalia and all that in his own office. >> he really does have a lot of ideas on how -- >> we have to accentuate the fact that he said something very brave and courageous in the midst of the heat of the battle and i think he should be acknowledged for that because it's an important point that only people who listen to newt gingrich will hear. that's a form of unity as well, to acknowledge a particular kind of privilege, a particular sort of perspective and say the only way we can come together is to acknowledge all of that. >> i only have a few seconds left, so i just want to thank you guys. it was spirited, and it was more importantly friendly, and that's a good moment. i think we -- >> hhow about that? >> i can kiss you but -- >> a little unthe republican na convention, a week from tomorrow, the republican convention begins in cleveland. so if it's sunday and it's the convention, it's "meet the press."

♪ he was definitely charismatic. he lived every single day. he knew that it was dangerous, but no one ever knew that someone would die over it. >> he was the new kid in town, super popular. all about adventure. >> this kid was like, awesome. >> he just jumped right into the culture. >> kind of liked to show off a little bit to the girls. >> they were neighbors just down the block. a family in fear.