Friend of Darren Wilson speaks out amid police shooting
Jeff Roorda says protesters want dead cops
This is a rush transcript from "The Kelly File," March 12, 2015. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MEGYN KELLY, HOST: And joining me now, Jeff Roorda, who's a friend of one of the officers who was shot last night and also friends with Officer Darren Wilson. He's also spokesman for both the St. Louis County and City Police Associations.
Jeff, thank you very much for being here. And so, we have.
JEFF ROORDA, ST. LOUIS COUNTY AND CITY POLICE ASSOCIATIONS, SPOKESMAN: Glad to be here, Megyn.
KELLY: -- we have commentators like Marc Morial who's coming on this program, CEO of National Urban League coming out today and explaining the reasons for these officers getting shot, including one of them in the face, as follows. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "MORNING JOE"/MSNBC)
MARC MORIAL, NATIONAL URBAN LEAGUE, CEO: Sometimes when officers hear shots, there -- there is a tendency to overreact and doesn't seem to be any overreaction. Having said that, it demonstrates that there's still tremendous need, demand for change in Ferguson, that people want further change.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: If there would just be change in Ferguson, cops wouldn't have gotten shot in the face.
ROORDA: Well, that sort of rationalization just makes me nauseous.
KELLY: I mean, the point he would probably make, and others make, you know, in support of him is there is clearly evidence that some of the city officials and some of the cops in Ferguson were racist, made terribly racist comments, terribly racist comments. And it's to the point where Eric Holder thinks the Police Department needs to be shut down. And people feel angry. And they feel targeted.
ROORDA: Well, Megyn, I -- let's -- let's not forget or lose sight of -- of the historical facts here. The protesters in the streets were not saying hands up don't write me a ticket. They were saying hands up don't shoot. That narrative has been rejected by the evidence that came before the grand jury and the evidence that came before the Justice Department.
And you know Eric Holder wanted to find wrongdoing on the part of Darren Wilson with every fiber in his body, and he was unable to do so. And he was unable to admit when they reached their findings that he was exonerated, that that was central finding.
KELLY: Yes.
ROORDA: Instead he pivoted to this report criticizing them for -- for -- for traffic tickets.
KELLY: In his defense, he says the facts are what the facts are. That he went in there and even though Officer Wilson, your friend, was totally exonerated, the Ferguson PD was not. And he had no -- no obligation to sugar coat racist emails to the American public.
ROORDA: Well, the racist emails were deplorable. The three employees were -- were either fired or -- or resigned on their own. But that doesn't demonstrate a racist police department, nor do the tickets given to black drivers at a lower rate than the state average, at a lower rate than the national average. I'm so tired of this -- this big but that comes in the middle of every sentence. Yeah, Michael Brown was trying to kill Darren Wilson, but they wrote a lot of tickets and somehow that justifies the violence we saw last night.
KELLY: I know you said this morning you believe that the protesters got what they wanted, dead cops. Really?
ROORDA: Certainly -- certainly some of them. Yeah, that's -- and let's not pretend either that this is an isolated incident. For months now, there have been orchestrated attempts to kill and injure police officers. Shots fired at police officers every night for two weeks in August. Dozens if not hundreds of shots fired at police officers the two nights after the grand jury decision and, again, last night they -- they finally succeeded. And -- and there'd be dead officers before now if it weren't for that so-called militarized equipment that saved police lives.
KELLY: Wow, let's be glad they did not die, these two targeted officers last night.
Jeff, thanks for being here.
ROORDA: Thank you, Megyn.
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