thomas massie joins me. welcome to "meet the press," sir. >> thanks for having me onto talk about some serious solutions to these problems. >> let me ask you this. you heard senator toomey, he wants to expand that background check system for all gun purchases. what's wrong with that? >> listen, my heart is breaking for the families in florida. i have kids that go to public school. we had a school shooting here in kentucky. i am a legislator in a position to do something. but if i came home after proposing some of these things that are so unserious and disingenuous that some of my colleagues are proposing as solutions to school shootings, i couldn't face my wife or my children. but i've not been in that situation of a school shooting. so this week, i talked to two survivors of columbine, and one of them, evan todd, related to me his story of being in the library when the two shooters came in. he was the first one shot. he hid under a desk. they found him and he pleaded for his life. then he escaped from the l

joining me now, kentucky congressman thomas massie. you have put forward legislation to dismantle those gun-free zones that were targeted in 1990. tell me about your approach to the debate. >> all my colleagues have disingenuous proposals for stopping school shootings. they know their solutions won't work. i have got a solution i have been proposing for five years. i introduced it every congress. it's called the safe schools act. it would repeal the gun-free zone act of 1990. 98% of mass public shootings happen in a gun-free zone. don't we want our children in the 2% safe area? kennedy: you do, but i think the worry for a lot of people -- forcing -- of course you want kids to be safe. and we have to take a real look at how you harden these soft targets which are magnets for psychotic school shooters. but the worry is if you force teachers to arm themselves, you could actually be putting more people at risk. in a situation when somebody is not properly armed and becomes confused and panicked and disoriented, the worry is if they shoot a

kennedy: congressman thomas massie weighs in tonight on the gun debate.emocrats memo. is it clear the commander-in-chief. one republican says the two party system is dying. turn on the oven. it's time to bring the heat. the sheriff in broward county, florida seems to be knitting his own noose as he commits political suicide.

joining me now, thomas massie, welcome back to the show. i was almost shocked to realize that we have never had one of these fisa warrant applications released. do you think that will finally snap >> i think so. even the process for getting a fisa warrant. until the food 50s these memos was secret to us, even members of congress. i think the great thing about the escalating fight between democrats and republicans, as a result we are getting more transparency. kennedy: those who lean towards the side of liberty from sitting back watching the pies fly and say this is what we haveor year. this sort of overreach you and your colleagues are documenting on capitol hill, but both sides are doing their best to keep prying eyes away from the dirty truth. >> there is a scandal very few people are recognizing. the intel committee, people responsible for the oversight of the fisa process sat on this information until we reauthorized the 702 part of the fisa question. what did they know and when did they not. they knew the fisa process was rife for abus

representative thomas massy from kentucky said that if you raise the age to buy a handgun at 21, you have extinguished constitutionally the guaranteed right of a 20-year-old mother, for example, to bear arms. it's not just the nra and membership. some is other leadership looking out for the second amendment. >> sure. they're starting to lose that argument a bit. just listening to lawmakers saying that the age thing may be something that they can go to. because more to the fact is the background checks tied to mental health or other red flags in someone's history. i think that that and shoring up the background checks are going to prevent that is more of a possibility. you heard this president again and again come to the number of 39 times that law enforcement down there and we should point out also the fbi a number of times didn't stop this kid when the red flags and the flares were there. >> it's interesting. some of the talk was about temporary restraining orders for people that show the signs of the things that you're talking about. they had something called a baker act in florida

kentucky congressman thomas massie didn't take long to tweet back at the president. quote, why should a 20-year-old single mom be denied the right to defend herself and her kids? we should lower the age to buy a handgun to 18 instead of raising the age to buy an ar-15. sad, all caps. a little tweak at the president's use of that word. congressman, welcome to "meet the press," sir. >> thanks for having me on to talk about some serious solutions to these problems. >> let me ask you this. you heard senator toomey. he wants to expand the background check system for all gun purchases. what's wrong with that? >> listen, my heart is breaking for the families in florida. i have kids that go to public school. we had a school shooting here in kentucky, and i'm a legislator who's in a position to do something. but if i came home after proposing some of these things that are so unserious and disingenuous that some of my colleagues are proposing as solutions to these school shootings, i could not face my wife or my children. but i have not been in a situation of a school shooting

thompson in conversation will be the distinguished and beloved writer thomas massie coats. his book was not only a number one bestseller but a winner of the 2015 national book award. -- coates serves colonel serves currently as a senior correspondent for "the atlantic" and we are in it to have him here at roosevelt house. [applause] before we start, a bit of housekeeping. our guests will engage in a conversation of about 45 minutes, following which they will take questions from the audience. s.ere are cards on your seat sorry if you have a question after the proceedings get underway, please write it down and pass it to the far i'll send -- pass itave aids down to the far aisles and we es collect them. at the and you are invited to the four freedoms room where we will celebrate heather thompson at a reception and book signing. the history, the bookkeeping and everything. please join the president and me coates in tamahasi conversation with heather thompson. [applause] coates: i'm try to find something that would actually keep it from ringing, which is very annoying. nobody's

this is reckless at a time and yet there are a handful of tea partyish people left quick story, thomas massyarty guy talked about, he thought back in the day, it was great. all these people like limited government and he tried to campaign for rand paul and iowa and discovered they all love donald trump. they thought we were the craziest people in the room. >> we have to remember that part of the reason we'll have a trillion dollars deficit this year is also because of tax cuts. it's not only on the spending side. it's also on the tax side where we're being fiscally reckless. republicans care about deficits only when there's a democrat in the white house. an important thing to remember, by the way, is not only should we dare about the thakt that we'll have a trillion dollars deficit right now and probably $2 trillion down the line, we shouldn't care about it only because its hypocritical. it's also supremely ill timed. it's just doesn't make sense. what you want to do is you want to have greater government spending during the great recession, during when you're on the brink of falling into th