Farage: We don't just want words on terror, we want action
European Parliament member speaks out on 'Sunday Morning Futures'
This is a rush transcript from "Sunday Morning Futures," June 4, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MARIA BARTIROMO, HOST: Now, this Fox News Alert: For the third time in as many months, the U.K. is waking up in shadow of terror. Many streets in central London right now still cordoned off this morning where at least seven people have been killed, dozens others hurt in last night's rampage. It started with a van running down pedestrians on London Bridge followed by a knife attack -- several knife attacks in a nearby restaurant district. The three attackers shot and killed by police eight minutes later. And new this morning, we're learning that 12 people have now been arrested in Eastern London in connection with this attack. British Prime Minister Theresa May speaking earlier this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THERESA MAY, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: We believe we are experiencing a new trend in the threat we face as terrorism breeds terrorism and perpetrators are inspired to attack not only on the basis of carefully constructed plots after years of planning and training and not even as lone attackers radicalize online, but by copying one another and often using the crudest of means of attack.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: We will get reaction from Nigel Farage in just a moment in London but first let's go to London live where David Lee Miller is standing by with the very latest this morning. David Lee, good morning to you, what can you tell us?
DAVID LEE MILLER, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Maria. Eight minutes, eight minutes is how long this entire attack took to unfold. In that eight minutes, seven people were killed at least 48 people were wounded and the three attackers themselves were killed by police. It all happened not far from where I am now standing and as you can see over my shoulder, the street here is still closed off. The scene last night here was indeed very different. As you mentioned, a white van was moving at a fast rate of speed south across London Bridge, it plowed into pedestrians then it moved on to a nearby area where the attackers then exited the vehicle and went on a stabbing spree. What authorities say now is that the attackers have not yet been publicly identified but the survivors say they will never forget what they saw.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GERARD VOWLES, WITNESS: And then, I saw a guy come running and caught in (INAUDIBLE) run, run, run, they got blade, knives, they're going to stab me, they're terrorist, run. And then he turned, ran and then I just stabbed him multiple times as well. We went on the floor.
KAINE PIERE, WITNESS: It was quite scary because you know, don't know what happens. You can see a white van, people racing it, you think if something can explode, are far enough away, and the police had such an alike urgency in their voice that they were saying get out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MILLER: This morning the investigation has led police to East London, the neighborhood of Barking following a series of raids. There are now 12 people that have been taken into custody. This is an ongoing operation we are told and more people might be arrested. London's Mayor Sadiq Khan spoke just a short time ago for a grieving city.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SADIQ KHAN, LONDON MAYOR: There aren't words to describe the grief and anger that our city will be feeling today. I'm appalled and furious that these cowardly terrorists would deliberately target innocent Londoners and bystanders enjoying this Saturday night. There can be no justification for the acts of these terrorists and I am quite clear that we will never let them win nor we allow them to cower our city or Londoners.
MILLER: On Thursday, this country is expected to go the polls to vote for a Prime Minister. While the major parties have suspended campaigning today, the campaigning likely to resume tomorrow and as for the level of the terror threat that has not been upgraded. It was upgraded Maria, you might recall after the Manchester attack to critical, it was then lowered to severe and at this hour the terror level threat here in London remained severe but this is a community that is very much on guard.
BARTIROMO: Right. And we know that right after that Manchester attack, the level went to critical and Theresa May said, we are worried that there could be another attack imminently. And here we are a week later talking about the third attack in as many months. David Lee Miller, thank you very much. Want to bring in Nigel Farage right now, he's a member of the European Parliament, a former Leader of the U.K. Independence Party. It is good to see you Nigel Farage, obviously on horrible circumstances here.
NIGEL FARAGE, EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT MEMBER: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: What can you tell us about what's happening on the ground in London right now in terms of the sentiments of the people. How do you see it?
FARAGE: Well, it's jumpy in one way because I've been in London all morning and there are a lot of police cars around, a lot of police on the streets, quite a lot of sirens and I guess we now know there've been a lot of raids in East London and at least a dozen people have been detained. So London is very quiet this morning. There are fewer people out of the street that I would normally expect to see on a Sunday. I mean, generally, generally, people do in this city and don't forget we have the threat of IRA terrorism you know, long before this. People generally do respond incredibly well despite the horrors that have taken place but I do detect there is one slight change of attitude and that is that every time one of these things happen, you know, our leaders showed their regret, their sorrow, their astonishment and their shock and I think we're a little bit less shocked than we used to be. We're kind of getting used to this, which is very, very bad news indeed and I people are beginning to say what are our leaders actually going to do? Just expressing sorrow, just talking and using words like solidarity simply isn't enough. And Maria, I make this prediction. You know, Teresa May have spoken -- Theresa May have spoken outside the steps of Number 10 today and she's actually used the phrase, Islamic terrorism. Now, that in itself may well be a first because many of our politicians have been in denial as indeed Hillary was on this point. But unless people see some really concrete action is going to be taken, then I think the calls for interning thousands of suspects will grow louder and louder.
BARTIROMO: Well, let's talk about them. What kind of concrete action do you want to see Nigel, because you think about the fact we had the Westminster Bridge attack in March followed up by the Ariana Grande attack last week, the concert, now this? Three attacks in three months. What concrete action do you want to see that we are not seeing coming out of the U.K.?
FARAGE: I want to hear that in our state-run schools and prisons, you know, which we are in charge of, we are absolutely going to make sure the radicalization doesn't take place. I want to hear that in the Mosques in this country, we will actually be unafraid to kick out of this country people who go in there and preach hate because frankly, we've been too politically correct to do any of that. And I also want to hear, which I have a bit of from the Prime Minister that we do want to try if we possibly can to stop some of this stuff being there, you know, freely available on the internet. I mean, that is an absolute minimum. But what really angers people is I mean, for example, is you know, two or three years ago, you know, I was part of the campaign that said, if anybody left this country and forth in Syria for ISIS, they should be stopped from getting back into Britain. And you know something, 400 people have returned to Britain having been radicalized further and brutalized in Syria. 400 have been let back in and only one has been stopped. And that's why Maria I say, we don't want words. We don't just think the Prime Minister outside Number 10 Downing Street saying enough is enough. We want her to actually do something.
BARTIROMO: And let's not forget, this comes just the weekend before the general election in the U.K. and that gap between Teresa May and her competitor has been narrowing. Do you think this impacts the election on Thursday?
FARAGE: No, because her competitor which is Mr. Corbyn at least the Socialist Party - Labor Party that he himself is a very, very, you know, quite a hard less socialist. Corbyn himself is -- seem to be weak on terrorism and weak on terror. So just because Theresa May was home Secretary Charge of our Homeland Security for six years, you know, some may say she failed and didn't do enough, but it's very difficult to see the Labor Party, the socialists gaining any benefit from it. Many of these people and these incidents have proven that sometimes the attackers have been on watch lists. There are tens of thousands of people on watch lists in the U.K., even more so when the U.S. What do we need to do to get ahead of this knowing that we are already watching these perpetrators that are going on to commit real damage?
FARAGE: Well, we don't yet know who these three individuals are. And my guess is the authorities will not tell us who they are until they've completed the sweep of all those closely connected to them. But I would be very surprised if these were not known persons, very surprised if they haven't been investigated at some point. But I have to tell you, I was - even though I'd be one of those voices saying, there is a real problem here -
BARTIROMO: Right.
FARAGE: Even I was shocked - even I was shocked last week when I learned there are 23,000 people of interest to the authorities in this country in relation to Jihadi terrorism. So the problem that we've built for ourselves is huge. We've done absolutely nothing to deal with the segregation that exists within our cities.
BARTIROMO: Right.
FARAGE: And we haven't clamped on radicalization within state institutions, we'd be very weak frankly with our borders. So we do -- you know, we do face a massive problem and I can't see short of hugely increased resources for our security services. I can't say anything else we can do -- now we could -- we could take a 3,500 who were genuinely suspected terrorists themselves as opposed to being linked and associated. We could round them all up in then turn them in prison. That is an option.
BARTIROMO: Well all -- what you're saying is also one of the reasons that U.S. President Donald Trump has tweeted out saying look, we need this travel ban in place trying to push his policies on the heels of this horrifying situation in the U.K. I don't know if you think that's going to help sway minds in the U.S. real quick Nigel.
FARAGE: If I was American and I was looking at London, Paris, Brussels, Berlin and the increasing rate of terrorist atrocities, I would say, whether I like Donald J. Trump or not, he is absolutely right to be committed to attempting to make America safer and is absolutely wrong that judges and some on Capitol Hill are trying to stop him. He is trying to stop your country going down this route. He's right.
BARTIROMO: Yes. Nigel, thank you very much weighing in this morning.
FARAGE: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: Nigel Farage joining us in London. President pointing to the need for that travel ban in the aftermath of the London attacks. Should the U.S.re-examine it's counterterrorism strategies? We'll talk with former Attorney General Michael Mukasey next, right here on studio. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. President Trump making the case for his Travel Ban this morning following the deadly terrorist attacks in London. The President tweeted out this. "We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights. We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety. Joining us right now is former Attorney General Michael Mukasey joining us right now. Attorney General Mukasey, good to see you.
MICHAEL MUKASEY, U.S. FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: Good to be with you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much for joining us this morning. Was this the right tact that the President took? Tell us about the programs that we had in this country as we all await this Travel Ban to be executed.
MUKASEY: Sure. It's the right tact for him to take because it's what he is doing to try to make the country safer. Whether you agree with the strategy or not, to interpret an executive order as if it was simply the statement by an ordinary person is outrageous and that's -- and that's what the courts have done.
BARTIROMO: But isn't this interesting that the last eight years, we have been trying to be so politically correct. You made a point during a commercial break and I want you to talk to us about that. Mueller and Comey oversaw the FBI.
MUKASEY: At a time when their training materials for agents were being bleached to remove any reference to Islam and were being cleared with people who are associated with CARE and other organizations, the Council on American-Islamic Relations which is the Muslim brotherhood outfit and that program itself throughout the government is known as CVE, Countering Violent Extremism.
BARTIROMO: Violent extremism?
MUKASEY: Yes. And the point is that, to many of these communities, what we think of as extremism is actually mainstreamism, it's not extreme. And we have to start realizing that too many people, this is unacceptable set of -- set of beliefs. The sister of the guy who blew himself up at Manchester tweeted out a message congratulating him on entering -- on entering paradise. Now, that's not a crime, but what it does show is that he had a support system that there are many people in this community who agree with him. Mercifully, we don't have that kind of thing in the United States because people are born assimilated here. But there are significant numbers of people who may very well agree and we have to counter at the same way we did communism.
BARTIROMO: Well, that's the thing. I mean, when you look at London, when you look at Paris, there are areas that are no-go areas because there are sects of the Muslim faith. It not just faith but their extremism that they are not - they are not assimilating. They want to live their life following Sharia Law and they don't care that they're in the west.
MUKASEY: Right. And they're aspiration which is barely concealed knowingly that they live their lives under Sharia Law, but that you live your life under Sharia Law and that is something that's got to be put down.
BARTIROMO: Let me - let me ask you. We're going to continue covering what's happening on the ground in London on the heels of these attack but I want to get your take on the intelligence community and what's going on there as well before you go because on Thursday, Jim Comey is going to testify in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee and now we know that Lindsey Graham was also spied on. Listed to what Senator Graham told us on Fox News this past week. I've got to get your reaction, Michael Mukasey, listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C.: I have reason to believe that a conversation that I had was picked up with some foreign leader or some foreign person and somebody requested that my conversation be unmasked. I've been told that by people in the intelligence community.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: We have been trying to figure out who the other senator was who was spied on. Rand Paul came on this program told us, I know I was spied on and then I was unmasked. What's going on here? The Obama administration, were they spying on all of the candidates running against Hillary?
MUKASEY: Well, interestingly, about two weeks before he left office, President Obama sign an order that had the effect of pushing out to widespread 17 or more agencies that are within the intelligence community, raw intelligence --
BARTIROMO: That they could share the data.
MUKASEY: That they could share the data. What that means is that you increase the number of people who could leak data and you also make it correspondently more difficult to detect who would leak the data. When you marry that to the fact that you have people asking for names of Americans to be unmasked, that is to be disclosed, what you - what you have is that these unmasked names are then going to be pushed out to people who can leak the information. There are three people whose records are under subpoena, John Brennan, former Director of the CIA, Susan Rice, former National Security Adviser and Samantha Power. Now, first of all obviously Brennan was -- could as part of the intelligence community unmask names that was part of his -- part of his remix.
BARTIROMO: Right.
MUKASEY: Susan Rice is somewhat stranger because usually the National Security Advisor doesn't get involved at that level. But Samantha Power, that's totally unheard of. Although she may be considered in some formal sense a part of the intelligence community, there's no reason why she should have been evaluating intelligence -
BARTIROMO: They were doing work for the President?
MUKASEY: Who knows? I think it bears examination.
BARTIROMO: All right. We will be examining it in the weeks to come and certainly, the Thursday testimony will be important. Michael Mukasey, great to see you.
MUKASEY: Good to be with you.
BARTIROMO: Thank you very much for your insights as always.
Coming up next, we're getting back to London live. What do we know about the attackers? We're they part of a larger terrorist network. I'll talk to the man who oversaw the response to the Boston Marathon attack as we look ahead right here, right now on "Sunday Morning Futures." Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Now more on the aftermath of the London attacks. Investigators now are trying to figure out whether the man behind last night deadly terrorist attack had any help. Joining me right now is Daniel Linskey, he -- Linskey is the former Superintendent in Chief for the Boston Police Department. He led that department's response in the wake of the marathon bombings. He joins us right now. Sir, thank you very much for weighing in this morning. Tell me what took place after the attacks in Boston and how investigators right now are leading to or trying to find out the specifics behind the perpetrators here.
DANIEL LINSKEY, FORMER SUPERINTENDENT IN CHIEF OF BOSTON POLICE: Thanks, Maria. Well, what happened was we first got our victims out of the scene as quickly as possible, same thing that the London authorities did last night. We secure that scene, you go through it and process it looking for DNA, forensics, bomb making, any possible link to the individuals involved in anyone who may have helped him or provided logistical support. You get -- you coordinate responses together and you start running down tips and leads at the same time. While you're doing that, you got to deploy a large number of highly visible officers throughout the entire city so that you can get on with the day-to-day operations of the city at the same time focus on investigation that requires intense resources.
BARTIROMO: Now, we know that 12 people are being investigated right now in connection with the three - the three attackers who police shot and killed. Does it look to you, does it feel to you that this is a much broader network? We're still waiting on someone to take actual responsibility for this morning.
LINSKEY: Yes, Maria. We don't know whether these12 are associated with the individuals from last night. I remember when I was a chief of Boston, at one time we get three separate terrorist plots that are going on. So they might've been ongoing investigations that they've decided to move on now. That they have enough information to go forward. So they're definitely people that are engaged in terrorist activities may be associated with last night or maybe individual plots. The authorities are rounding up those individuals that they think can cause harm. And the rundown whoever's associated whether it's computer linked, forensics data, and signals monitoring as far as who they were talking to in the U.K. or outside U.K. and figure out what brought them together, how they were radicalized and whether they were supported.
BARTIROMO: Now, these individuals who were shot and killed last night by police, they were being watched initially anyway. I mean, we have tens of thousands of people right now on a watch list in the U.K. They're almost 30,000 people. Tell us how the best route to get ahead of this if you are already on the watch list. How is it possible that you're able to carry out this kind of attack?
LINSKEY: It's possible because law enforcement is overwhelmed. The number of people who are potentially talking about and thinking about and indicate they may want to cause harm clearly outwhelmes law enforcement resources. That's true in the U.K., it's true in Boston. To truly surveil somebody for 24 hours a day, it takes 40, 50, 60 individuals with electronic surveillance and other activities. It's a - it's a daunting task and we have to engage the public on the front end to start reporting these individuals when they see radical activity when they're talking about doing these things. We had it with the Boston police captain whose son, unfortunately, have mental health issues and started talking about doing Jihadist activities. The captain was brave enough to go to the FBI authorities and say I think you should be looking at my son and as a result, a school bombing and shooting attack was thwarted because of the courage of that father. We need other fathers, other mothers, aunts, uncles, religious community members to step up when individuals are indicating that they no longer be - want to be in polite society and that they intend to harm people.
BARTIROMO: There has been a movement to be more politically correct over the last ten years. We were just talking about this a moment ago. I was with Michael Mukasey, former Attorney General here and you know, there are groups of people whether be in the U.K., in France, that are not just assimilating with the west and they are following their Sharia Law and the leaders are allowing it. What do you want to see done? I mean, when you look at the fact that even under the Obama administration, we weren't even allowed to look at people's social media account. It was just wrong, it was targeting people. If we looked at what they were saying on social media, of course, have we done that, we would've seen that they were putting out hate.
LINSKEY: You know, we need to make sure we're protecting our country like we would a business that we protect. We need concentric circles of security, the first line of security obviously is our military forces. They need to go where if there are people who are telling us that they intend to harm us, our military forces need to go outside and in that other ring and deal with that threat. Then we need inner circles of security as we come into the United States and we need policies and procedures that are consistent with keeping people safe. But at the same time, we do want to make sure balancing the freedom and ability to have the lives the way they are here, the one thing we don't want to do with was throw the baby out with the bathwater where we go to a one side completely extreme and when you start taking away the rights that we've fight so valiantly for here. So, there's a way to do it. You can do it intelligently and you can do it methodically and we need to engage that to a whole communitywide process.
BARTIROMO: All right. We will leave it there. Daniel Linskey, thanks very much for weighing in this morning. We will keep following that and see you soon. Thank you, Sir.
British Prime Minister Theresa May meanwhile describing what she says is her country's tolerance to extremist. Is terrorism thriving because of political correctness? Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee will join me live next. We're looking ahead right now on "Sunday Morning Futures." Back in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: This Fox News alert with new development in the London terrorist attacks. Here we know right now this morning 12 people were arrested in connection to the rampage. The attack beginning last night when a van plowed through people on the London Bridge. The killers then drove to a busy entertainment district where they jumped out of the van and started stabbing people. In all, at least seven people were killed, 48 others were seriously hurt. Here's British Prime Minister Theresa May after a meeting of her emergency committee.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THERESA MAY, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Well, we have made significant progress in recent years, there is, to be frank far too much tolerance of extremism in our country, so we need to become far more robust in identifying it and stumping it out across the public sector and across society. That will require some difficult and often embarrassing conversations, but the whole of our country needs to come together to take on this extremism.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: I'm joined right now by Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and a Fox News contributor. Governor, good to see you, thank you for joining us this morning. A pretty extraordinary scenarios here. You know, Donald Trump, obviously tried to institute his travel ban when he first got in the White House, and he keeps getting push back, and we're just seeing more terrorism across the world.
MIKE HUCKABEE, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR AND FORMER ARKANSAS GOVERNOR: Well, Donald Trump has proven, Maria, that he was right and all of these people in the various liberal courts are wrong. When Theresa May made the comment today about we need to have some embarrassing conversations, what's embarrassing is that they've had open borders for so long, and now they act like they're shocked that people had come in through the open doors and windows and are killing them. You know, if you keep getting hurt by mosquito bites, at some point, you decide to start killing mosquitoes. And what happens across this world is that we recognize that when we are being destroyed and devoured by the mosquitoes, by this evil, at some point you have to just attack it head-on and quit dancing around the fact that it is Islamic terror carried out by religious fanatics.
BARTIROMO: But what do you want to see happen here? Obviously, Theresa May has an election next week. And I don't know if you think this is going to impact that. I guess we just discussed it with Nigel Farage that Corbyn is also very conservative when it comes to terrorism. But what's your take in terms of what takes place now in the U.K.?
HUCKABEE: I think it's going to be a real confusing time for the Brits because they're going to be looking. Jeremy Corbyn is certainly not one who has been overtly ready to start closing the borders and being more strict about who comes in, and Theresa May hasn't. So, you know, the sad thing is they don't have a really clear choice in this. We did have a choice last November in America, and we made the choice. And that's why Donald Trump, one of the reasons, for sure, that Donald Trump was elected.
Maria, at some point, you know, we can pretend that this is not real. And I watched the mayor this morning, and he came out in his statements saying we're one of the safest places in the world. Go tell that to the parents of teenage girls who were having to identify their daughter in the morgue with a toe tag. I'm sorry, but, you know, that isn't working for the people who are now afraid for their kids to go to a ball game or a concert, or just to be walking about the streets with their friends for fear of something that is a random, yet targeted attack on the totally innocent victims that we're seeing in these terrorist attacks.
BARTIROMO: Yes. I think you made a great point. I did see Sadiq Khan's comments, the Mayor of London there, and they -- you know, they really coincide with the comment from Prime Minister Theresa May who says, the attack on the London Bridge shows that there is far too much tolerance of Islamist extremism in Britain today. Do you think that suggests things will change in the coming weeks?
HUCKABEE: I don't know if the politicians are capable of making change. They live behind locked doors surrounded by armed guards. They're carefully protected. But the average citizen is not, and they seem to be the living in these bubbles, and they'll make statements after a terrorist attack. But then, there's still this irrational approach to try and to believe that it's OK to leave your doors unlocked and not expect people to come in and raid your house.
Look, most everybody, Maria, that you and I know have doors locked at night, they have alarm and security systems, and why do they do that? It's not because they're paranoid. It's because they're taking care of their family's safety. But when you don't protect your own country's borders, then you're not acting even rationally as a leader of your country in the same way that you would act in your own home. That doesn't make sense.
BARTIROMO: Right. And that is what is going on here in the U.S. as well. I mean, all of this politicization of all of our agencies: the FBI, the CIA, the NSA. You know, we were talking earlier with Michael Mukasey that the Obama administration spied on so many people. They spied on Lindsey Graham, they spied on Rand Paul. We know this now. The Intelligence Community told Lindsey Graham. He's out there saying he was also unmasked; why were they wanting him to be unmasked? All of this as Donald Trump is trying to push through, you know, his policies like the travel ban and getting constant resistance from the left, Governor.
HUCKABEE: Yes. I'm not really afraid of Lindsey Graham or Rand Paul, but I am afraid at people who come to this country with the intent to do harm. America's a melting pot, that's what we've always been, but we've got people who come, and they're not willing to melt. They don't want to become part of us, they want us to change into them. And we can't do that, we're not going to do that. And we need to have a screening process, and that's what President Trump has said from the beginning.
BARTIROMO: Right.
HUCKABEE: It's not a complete ban. It's a screening process to find out: do you want to come and be a part of a melting pot? Do you want to be an American? If you do, we've room for you. But if you want to come and radicalize America, if you want to come, and you know, Islam-ify America, no, we just don't have room for that right now.
BARTIROMO: And that's what's going on in a number of places in corners of the U.K., corners of France, where there are groups that are not assimilating and going by their own law, Sharia law, which of course we know what that means. Governor, thank you for weighing in this morning. An important day to hear from you. We appreciate it very much. Governor Mike Huckabee, joining us there.
HUCKABEE: Thank you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: U.S. lawmakers are now weighing in on last night's deadly attack in London. What impact will it have on the security in the U.S.? Congressman Ron DeSantis is with me, he's from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He will join me live as we look ahead right now on SUNDAYS MORNING FUTURES. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Members of Congress reacting to this morning's - this morning to last night's London terrorist attack. House Homeland Security Committee Member, Pete King, offering this statement: "I commend British Prime Minister Theresa May for her strong statement calling out Islamist extremism and promising tough action both militarily and domestically. No apologies, no political correctness." I'm joined right now by Republican Congressman, Ron DeSantis, he's a member of the House of Foreign Affairs Committee. Congressman, good to have you on the program this morning, thanks very much for weighing in.
REP. RON DESANTIS, R-FLA., HOUSE OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE MEMBER: Good morning.
BARTIROMO: We've heard from Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, we've heard from Theresa May. Give us your assessment of what you're hearing from the leadership in reaction to this?
DESANTIS: Well, I'll tell you, Maria. This is something that is, unfortunately, somewhat predictable in the sense that you have some of these simmering insular communities in places like great Britain, and France, and Belgium that we've seen over the last month and even years. And these attacks are becoming more and more regular. I think that there is a different approach that probably needs to be taken. Maybe Prime Minister May has finally recognized that. Although, I will say, she said they've shown far too much tolerance for extremism. My question would be, "Why would you show any tolerance for Islamic extremism?" Tolerance of evil is a crime and, so I think they need to view this much more toughly than they have been so far.
For our part in the Congress, we do have a President that's taken a different approach, both in terms of being forward pressing against ISIS abroad but also concerned about our borders here at home. And I would say one thing we can do in the congress is to understand that terrorism is a big problem but it's part of a larger problem of this ideology of militant Islam, and that's nurtured by groups like the Muslim brotherhood, and we've been working in Congress to try to designate them as a terrorist organization because I think that would really go to solving the root of this problem, which is at its heart in ideological problem.
BARTIROMO: Yes, I'm really glad you brought this up because the Muslim brotherhood is a group that, to me, seems to have infiltrated the U.S. government. I mean, for some reason, the Muslim brotherhood keeps coming up because they are very involved in certain decision-making. I mean, do you believe the Muslim brotherhood is a terrorist organization?
DESANTIS: Oh, without question. If you look at what they do, they're dedicated to promoting Islamic supremacism, they support societies based on Sharia law, you look at some of the radical clerics in places like Egypt and throughout the Middle East, they have deep roots with the Muslim brotherhood. And so, the brotherhood really provide, I think, the ideological framework that obviously does provide financial support and support of terrorism as well. But I would say that is kind of the foundation from which groups like ISIS are able to really wreak havoc.
BARTIROMO: Well, if you're so sure of this, why didn't President Obama ever called them a terrorist organization? Should President Trump becoming and calling out, "The Muslim brotherhood is a terrorist organization." And what are the implications of that, Congressman?
DESANTIS: Well, we - I mean, we went round and round with the Obama administration. If you remember when the Muslim brotherhood government took over Egypt, the Obama administration backed the brotherhood. And when President Morsi government was deposed and President el-Sisi took over, Sisi is very much opposed to radical Islam. Many of us in Congress thought that Obama's administration should work with Sisi, but yet they really preferred to work with the brotherhood. And so, that, I think, is something I've never really understood. We in Congress can do legislation to designate the brotherhood. I do think that there is the ability of the executive to take some unilateral action, so I would definitely tell the President that that would be a good thing to do. I think it would be very clarifying.
BARTIROMO: All right. So you want him to deem them as a terrorist organization, bottom line. Let me ask you this, being on the Foreign Affairs Committee, what kind of interaction or participation will the U.S. have with the U.K. in terms of combating terrorism?
DESANTIS: Well, I think we obviously -- they're a strong ally. We have to provide them with support. We do intelligence, logistics, military support. But one thing we do have to look at is there's a lot of focus, say, on the travel ban from the six countries, places like Somalia, which are obviously a high risk of terrorism. I think the issue, though, with this is we're seeing is there's a lot of homegrown terrorism in countries that are strong allies of ours. Great Britain, Belgium, France, some of these European countries. And so, a lot of times, those people can come into our country without even getting a Visa because they have a Visa waiver. So that's just something that we have to come to terms with and realize that this is a threat that's emanating from many places throughout the world.
BARTIROMO: Yes. Congressman, thank you. Thank you for weighing in this morning. We appreciate it.
DESANTIS: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: We'll keep watching it, Congressman Ron DeSantis. Up next, our panel on deck, Ed Rollins, Jessica Tarlov reacting to the situation in London. And the response from the U.K. and President Trump. Stay with us. We're looking ahead right now, right here, back in a minute.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back. We are covering the latest out of London. We want to bring in our panel right now. Ed Rollins is a former campaign manager for Ronald Reagan in 1984. Jessica Tarlov is a democratic strategist and Fox News Contributor, and we are happy to see you both.
JESSICA TARLOV, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR AND DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Good morning.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much for joining us this morning. Your reaction today on the terrorist --
ED ROLLINS: Shocked, disappointment. I mean, again, this is - this is just an ongoing occurrence here, and I think the American public has to understand that Donald Trump was right about these things, and we have to basically be very restrictive and we have to basically make sure that we have great diligence and support our law enforcement people and intelligence people because it's going to come here.
BARTIROMO: It's pretty extraordinary, Jessica, when you look at what Donald Trump has been talking about. It seems like everything he says is actually happening from the terrorism part of it to the intelligence part of it with all of these guys getting spied on.
TARLOV: Well, it -- I think that it's complicated. I mean, we know that his travel ban, and he called it again, a travel ban, a ban in his tweet this morning which the ACLU picked up on, so it's officially a ban. I wouldn't have covered anyone certainly coming from the U.K. And I understand the need to be vigilant. Of course, it's actually because it looks like we could have more and more domestic homegrown terrorism, which is what happened in Manchester and we know for all the rest. We're not sure who all these people are right now. I am concerned though by the rhetoric already of what's coming out about this. We don't have all the answers. I think Teresa May struck exactly the right tone, as did the Mayor of London who Donald Trump then went and attacked on Twitter. But needlessly --
BARTIROMO: Yes, but what -- but what did -- what did the Mayor of London's assistant say about Donald Trump's tweet?
TARLOV: Then his spokesman came out and said that the Mayor of London doesn't have time to respond to Donald Trump's ill-informed tweet because what the President did is took one bit of what Sadiq Khan said and ignored the rest of it, which was we have -- you know, we're (INAUDIBLE) we have vast emergency people, and then he said at the end to -- no reason to be alarmed to keep his people calm. And that's all that Donald Trump ceased on, to scare people, to scare us here at home, and I think that's unfortunate. I -
ROLLINS: How could you not be alarmed? We've just had these numerous occasions here in London, which every week we come here expecting to talk about something in the political system, and then all of a sudden we have these terrorist acts that are taking place. I mean, as a parent, I'd be scared to death to send my children out to a nightclub, and sooner or later, terrorism is exactly that. It creates terror. It makes people fearful. It's not about the numbers, it is certainly the numbers of those who were killed and wounded last night, that it creates a mindset, a the mindset is these people can basically disrupt the political process here in this country and elsewhere.
BARTIROMO: Right. I think -- look, I think when you look at what he said. I mean, I was also struck by it, hearing Sadiq Khan say London is the safest city in the world or one of the safest cities in the world. Look, we just had three attacks in three months. How do you make that statement?
TARLOV: Absolutely. I think - listen, I'm not sure what I would do if I was in that position. I - you know, being the mayor or in government office and these times is obviously difficult. You want to make sure that people feel as comfortable as possible but also to tell them, "Hey, you can't just maybe walk around like you used to. And there is a dangerous threat out there." You know, and they just felt with this in Manchester as well, but I don't think that the right tactic is for the President of the United States, first of all, to attack another foreign leader which is what Sadiq Khan is - I mean, imagine if the day after 9/11, someone from another country went after the way that Giuliani was managing Bloomberg with - you know, eventually Bloomberg with managing the situation here. I don't think it's appropriate. I think that it sends the wrong message and I don't know why on a day like today, we need to be making more enemies than friends. I think the right tone was obviously Donald Trump's second tweet, which is we stand with you, we're here to support you in any way. But his first inclination was to prop up his travel ban. And the travel ban would have made no difference.
ROLLINS: At the - at the end of the day here, I mean, we're going to go through this process ourselves. Ever since 9/11, we had basically had greater security in this country, and we have made this city a very safe city, New York, but the country has to be prepared for these kinds of activities coming here. That's what terrorists is about. London is an open city today, Britain is an open city, they're a great democracy like we are, they believe in the same kinds of rights like we do, and we basically have to have due diligence, we have to be supportive of the President -
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TARLOV: And that's a thoughtful way to say it. I just - I wish that more people would speak like that instead of to speaking kind of, you know, aggressive (INAUDIBLE)
BARTIROMO: Quick break. What do we need to watch for in the week ahead? That's next from our panel. Stay with us. "Sunday Morning Futures" continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: We are back with our panel right now. We want to look what we're watching ahead. We know we're going to be watching terrorism this week. We want to watch the aftermath of London. What else are you watching?
ROLLINS: The Comey testimony on Thursday is critical and how the White House reacts to all of that.
TARLOV: I agree and add I'm also curious as to whether we're going to be moving forward with any big piece of legislation. What's going on in the budget negotiations, health care bills, you know, is Congress going to get anything done?
ROLLINS: To that note, does the President get any mileage out of the infrastructure speech to Iowa on Wednesday?
TARLOV: Yes, absolutely. And will democrats deal, because there's room for us to deal here?
BARTIROMO: All right. Lots to cover in the week ahead. Thank you very much, Ed Rollins, Jessica Tarlov.
ROLLINS: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: That will do it for "Sunday Morning Features." Stay with Fox News. I'm Maria Bartiromo. See you tomorrow on the Fox Business Network. Stay right here. Continuing coverage.
Content and Programming Copyright 2017 Fox News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2017 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox