This is a rush transcript from "The Five," March 30, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
ERIC BOLLING, CO-HOST: Hello everyone, I'm Eric Bolling along with Lisa Boothe, Juan Williams, Dana Perino and Greg Gutfeld. It's 5:00 in New York City and this "The Five."
Well, there's a lot of breaking news this afternoon. First, at approximately 1:15 p.m., The New York Times named the two sources that House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes has said showed him the evidence that communications from the Trump transition team had been incidentally collected. Fox News has confirmed the sources independently. They are White House staffers at the National Security Council lawyer Michael Ellis and intel director Ezra Cohen-Watnick. That led to this flurry of activity at ranking member Adam Schiff's presser on Capitol Hill.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ADAM SCHIFF, D-CALIF.: If in fact the National Security Council staff that discovered these materials reportedly in the ordinary course of business are the same National Security staff that provided them to the chairman to be provided to the president, it raises a profound question of why they were not directly provided to the White House by the national security staff and instead were provided through a circuitous route involving the chairman.
If that was designed to hide the origin of the materials, that raises profound questions about just what the White House is doing. That need to be answered.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLLING: So, to unpack what we have, there are three investigations going on over two separate topics. First topic, whether or not there was any collusion with the Russians by team Trump during the election, and the second thing was there surveillance of team Trump by the intel department, and if so, who unmasked the names of those being surveilled? Also very important, was the very unmasking even legal? So much to talk about so let's jump right in and Dana, we'll start with you. What was the big information that we got today?
DANA PERINO, CO-HOST: I think there's two and we're going to get to it a little bit later about the senate hearing, which I thought was also interesting. In this case, this is another day yet another story which actually leads to more questions than answering them and I go back to the thing I really think the White House should appoint somebody who is the communications person that is just answering these questions because if not, they will not be able to talk about anything else.
You have a couple different threads here. I'll just point out two of them. Sean Spicer has not said at the podium who had actually cleared Representative Nunes into the White House and it looks like he -- I know how that goes like, you don't even want to ask to find out. People in the White House should actually try to protect him because he has to go out there and have to answer all these questions.
The other thing is that Nunes said in one of his interviews that he doesn't think that anybody in the West Wing even knows or had any idea that what he was doing when he was over there. How could that possibly be when one of the lawyers, Michael Ellis, who used to work for Nunes in the House Intelligence Committee was general counsel, is actually his title is special assistant to the president and maybe his office is actually in the old executive office building because there's not enough office space there in the West Wing, but he is part of the West Wing staff.
The other thing is that now the committee -- I'm sorry -- now the White House says well, the Democrats of the committee, now they are welcome to come to the White House to see the same information. They could have saved themselves all of this headache by doing that at the very beginning. I just think that they keep creating more problems for themselves by just trying to win a new cycle than just cooperating with the investigation and letting it run its course.
BOLLING: And we're still trying to figure out, now, General Flynn -- Michael Flynn was unmasked, right. Now we are trying to figure out, was he surveilled legally or was he unmasked legally? And maybe finally if we have both committees, Senate and House intel committees, coming to the White House to discuss all the information maybe we can get some answers to that one as well.
GREG GUTFELD, CO-HOST: But this is the story, the Batman sweater. You pull one string and it unravels and unravels and unravels and we're going to talk about it for the next four years. Obviously, you're right. It's not about the incidental collection but the dissemination. It's one thing for the pharmacist to know what pills you are taking. It's another thing for him to talk about it at a convention of pharmacists and their underground secret lair beneath Walgreens. So that's the problem.
But Nunes is somewhat faulted. He has to be faulted for going to the town square first before going to the sheriff. i.e. Sheriff Woody, Adam Schiff. They are dead ringers for each other. I've said it before. But if he had gone to Adam Schiff maybe before and then gone to the town square, I think it would make more sense. But that's just me, and what do I know? Very little.
BOLLING: No, you know a lot.
GUTFELD: I disagree.
BOLLING: I disagree with your disagreement. Team Trump, they've been surveilled, they've been unmasked, maybe illegally unmasked, they've been accused. Some people would say that they're victims in this.
JUAN WILLIAMS, CO-HOST: You know, I don't even know where to start with you some days, you know, but let me just say.
GUTFELD: How about I love you.
WILLIAMS: Illegal?
BOLLING: You can start with surveil or if you're going to unmask or a case.
WILLIAMS: Yes, let's do that. OK. Nobody -- Devin Nunes doesn't say it was illegal. It was illegal surveillance and in the course of legal surveillance they incidentally collected some information of people who were Americans, typically that's supposed to be (INAUDIBLE), but it's not a matter of legal or illegal.
PERINO: And actually one of the -- but one of them also -- one of the reports, of course I've not seen the document so I don't know --
GUTFELD: Really?
PERINO: -- finds out that basically it was Russians talking amongst themselves --
WILLIAMS: Correct.
PERINO: -- about how they were trying to get influence into the Trump team. So they are talking about people that worked for President Trump and they want access to him. That's how their names are in there. It's not like those people were talking to the Russians, according to that one report, which I think does -- I can understand why they would want Nunes to come and then go to try to protect them.
But I also feel like if they found that information, why not take it to the White House General Counsel's Office or to the press office and say, here, you take this instead of trying to like, really keystone cop sort of way of getting Nunes to come and try to do their dirty work for them.
WILLIAMS: Allow me just to ask one quick thing before Lisa jumps in which is that, I was surprised today when Paul Ryan was interviewed and Paul Ryan says, oh when Nunes came to see me -- Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House and so he's in this instance Nunes' boss -- so when Nunes comes to see me he says, "Nunes gives me the impression, oh, there were some whistleblowers. I got this information from whistleblowers." Well today we find out --
PERINO: The intel community.
WILLIAMS: What do you --
PERINO: We said that they worked for the intel community.
WILLIAMS: Well, he said they were whistleblowers. I didn't know that part, worked for the intel community. But he said that they were whistleblowers and now we find out basically it was the White House blowing smoke intentionally to obstruct and obscure the legitimate investigation of this case and to me, that's the headline.
BOLLING: I'm not sure that's the leap we're all willing to take, that the White House was trying to obstruct and obscure the --
WILLIAMS: Where did the information come from? We know it came from the White House.
BOLLING: We understand.
WILLIAM: No, we know it came from the White House at this point.
BOLLING: Well we don't exactly know what the information is Juan. We know that's who the sources are.
WILLIAM: -- what's the actual information is yet.
LISA BOOTHE, GUEST CO-HOST: But ultimately, it's all concerning. I mean it's concerning the fact that there's an FBI investigation. It's concerning the fact that there is the unmasking of names, that there's a legal leak of classified information, especially when you have people like Gowdy and the Russian hearing essentially trying to pin the blame at the Obama administration.
You also have that on the backdrop of the facts that President Obama changed the NSA rules for how information could be widely disseminated across the government. You also have The New York Times article that the Obama administration leaving breadcrumbs of intelligence information behind. That's all concerning.
So, all of these is concerning but in regards -- real quick -- in regards to Chairman Nunes, where he needs to be concerned and I do agree with Dana in the sense that there's so much that could've been done to avoid a lot of this backlash. And the problem he's going to face, if more Republicans like Representative Dent, like Walter Jones had stepped forward and asked for him to step down, that's when he's going to, you know, start to face real heat.
BOLLING: I want to turn to the next topic but before we go there, and it's something -- it's about what you just said, Lisa. Evelyn Farkas, I really want to bring this up. I think this is extremely important. Evelyn Farkas worked in the State Department. She was assistant deputy secretary to Russian affairs. She told the Obama right after she left -- she went back and told the Obama White House. She left in 2015 when President Trump was president-elect Trump, she told the Obama White House to put away some of the information that they were gathering, that the Obama White House was gathering on the Trump transition team.
How does a mid-level, not a high-level but a mid-level assistant deputy secretary to Russian affairs -- maybe Dana can answer this -- how does she have access to this information and why should she be advising the current White House, Obama White House on this?
PERINO: I don't know her at all. And I also know that those were -- I thought it was interesting because I looked into that yesterday. She made those remarks about six weeks ago.
BOLLING: Yes, March 6th.
PERINO: This is not new information.
BOLLING: March 6th.
PERINO: The only new information that we have today is that we actually know that the information, the sources for representing Nunes came from the White House. That's actually the new development today. Like all the other stuff, the unmasking of Flynn, are still the unanswered questions in so far the investigation. I don't know how to --
BOLLING: I will tell you -- I will tell you -- I'm sorry, Lisa. We want to get this next sound bit because it's on this topic. Hopefully they're going to call some of these witnesses. Boy guys, I just reviewed my first witness to find out what the heck she was involved with or her involvement was, and who else had access and who else was able to unmask.
Anyway, all right, the Senate intel committee held its first public hearing today on Russia's meddling in our election. The FBI is also investigating whether the Trump campaign in any way worked with the Russians. Is the president himself under investigation? Speaker Ryan doesn't think so.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL RYAN, R-WIS., SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I do not believe that that's the case.
NORAH O'DONNELL, CBS THIS MORNING SHOW HOST, CBS NEWS: So if we don't know that, do you think --
RYAN: Well, I don't -- I won't speak for the FBI but I've never seen any suggestion or any evidence that that's the case. I don't believe he is so I don't think he is under investigation. No one has suggested he is and not even in a vague way. I don't believe that he is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLLING: Our chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge just spoke to one of the president's campaign advisors wrapped up in the controversy, Carter Page, will be a witness at next week's Senate hearings. Here's a preview of what we can expect to hear.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CATHERINE HERRIDGE, FOX NEWS CHIEF INTELLIGENCE CORRESPONDENT: Did you work with the Russians to help the Trump campaign?
CARTER PAGE, FORMER TRUMP ADVISER: Absolutely not. I did nothing that could even be possibly viewed as helping them in anyway.
HERRIDGE: Did you work with the Russians to hurt the Clinton campaign?
PAGE: Absolutely not. In no way, shape, or form.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLLING: And there'll be more of that interview tonight on "Special Report" at 6:00 p.m. eastern. I'm sorry, Lisa. I cut you off before. Your thoughts on --
BOOTHE: Yes, I know.
BOLLING: -- yes, your thoughts on this.
BOOTHE: Well it's going to say ultimately I think all the conversations that we're having that makes the FBI investigation the most important here because hopefully that is one that is being done with politics aside. It also has the biggest consequences obviously, you know, could lead to legal ramifications. So that's what is ultimately I think the most important thing here.
But also I think what was important today in the Senate hearing as well is the conversation of the fact that the Russian meddling in our election is something that has been long happening and both U.S. and European elections, which is what came up today -- we also had Russia not that long ago hack into the Joint Chiefs of Staff. So, you know, this is important but this is something that we have long been dealing with.
WILLIAMS: You know what, it struck me too as Nunes said he'd never heard of Carter Page.
PERINO: Yes.
WILLIAM: Holy smokes. He never heard of Roger Stone? He never heard of Carter Page? I mean is that credible? I mean talk about sacrificing not only your credibility but the idea that you are a serious person in Washington. I mean we sit here, Eric. We know who Carter Page is. We know Roger Stone. And the guy who was supposed to be in charge of the House probe says, oh, I never heard of them. That's just, I mean it's beyond reasonable.
GUTFELD: You know what, what I find interesting with the hearings is the openness in which are the Democrats and Republicans both are so willing to dissect the chilling nature of an adversary, which is something they refused to do with Islamism. When I'm watching this and I see the interest in Russia and I understand Russian meddling in our election it's a bad thing. It's very bad. But it's an easy target to take because it doesn't with it the baggage of bigotry.
The baggage of bigotry that prevents our politicians from saying no, there is an existential threat that we should be having hearings about every day. It's called Islamism, but we won't do that. And then meanwhile, you see that the left, they're finally -- they're finally up in arms about Soviet and -- Soviet but now Russian aggression and intrusion after four decades in which tens of millions of people suffered and died off the hands of communism and here they are upset over spam bots.
WILLIAMS: No, no, but I'm not trying -- I don't think we need to weigh. I think that both the things you said, I mean I'd have tremendous fear for us in terms of terrorist, but let's be clear. There was testimony today, we'll get into in a moment Eric said, in this terms of the Senate and one person said it's very clear the Russians are trying to encourage a sense of disbelief and democracy --
GUTFELD: I've said on the show five times, Juan.
(CROSSTALK)
WILLIAMS: They're trying to take apart the European Union. They're trying to take apart NATO. These are --
BOLLING: For decades.
(CROSSTALK)
WILLIAMS: It intensified to the point that this very week, guess what, they're going after Paul Ryan. Well, wait a minute. They're just trying to foment dissent and discontinue and --
BOOTHE: We also do a pretty good job on our own undermining trust in institutions.
BOLLING: Let's stay in these hearings for a second. So Dana, on one hand it can be said that Devin Nunes may not have, I don't know, unveiled some of the information or handled this investigation properly or the way you would like it or we would like it, but Adam Schiff also made some accusations that he had to walk back about having direct evidence or circumstantial evidence.
PERINO: I just think -- I do think that there is such a stark difference between how the house chairman, both Senate and the Democrat have handled this and how the senators yesterday, Warner and Burr handled it. And I just -- I don't even -- I actually think I would end the house investigation. I would abandon it and I would let the senators do the investigation because it seems like that's the serious one that is not tainted. I don't think anybody is going to believe anything that comes out of the house. So let the Senate handle it. Let the FBI handle it and move on from there.
BOLLING: With the Senate (INAUDIBLE) you described it and I think we would all agree with you, does that eliminate the need for an independent investigator given that --
PERINO: If you are at the White House and you think that is in your best interest that you don't want a special prosecutor, then yes, I think it could.
WILLIAMS: I think more and more Republicans are coming to the conclusion we do need a special prosecutor. And I might add, Dick Cheney said, this comes back to what we were just discussing, Greg, that he considers what the Russians did an act of war.
GUTFELD: I'm not saying that what the Russians did was OK. I'm just saying they are hardwired to take advantage of our vulnerabilities. When our guard goes down, the bear wakes up. So the best outcome for us is to understand that and accept it and move on to the bigger issues which are terror. That is our existential threat. It's not Russia.
BOLLING: I wanted you to say that because we're going to talk more about this in the next block so you got to come up with more notes.
(LAUGHTER)
BOOTHE: Get your other info.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WILLIAMS: Over the last year, FBI Director Jim Comey has come under fire from both the left and the right. Republicans were upset when he cleared Hillary Clinton of criminal wrongdoing over her e-mails. Democrats upset with him when he announced another probe just days before the election, all, to ultimately clear her once again. Last night at a dinner in Virginia, Comey insisted he and his bureau are not in the business of playing politics.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: The last year, it's been almost a year now, has been both difficult and easier than you might think. And I tell you I've never been prouder of the FBI. What makes it easy is we're not in anybody's side ever. We're not considering whose acts will be gored by this action or that action. No, we're not fools. I know that when I make a hard decision, a storm is going to follow but honestly I don't care. If we ever start to think about who will be affected in what way by our decisions in a political sense, we're done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: Now, this was really difficult I think for Jim Comey. His reputation as I say has been taking shots from the left and right, but there's also the case that Jim Comey, according to stories out today, was told by the Obama White House not, not to talk about the Russian probe. So, he had the go-ahead to say something about continuing investigation to Hillary Clinton about 10 days before the election, that he was given a red light by guess who? The Obama administration when he asked to write an op- ed talking about --
BOLLING: That's the op-ed part.
WILLIAMS: I'm sorry.
BOLLING: The op-ed is the operative part.
WILLIAMS: You talk, go ahead.
BOLLING: Well, listen. I think there are two Jim Comeys out there. The Jim Comey who came out and said we have, you know, a thousand active investigations, all 50 states in the union on surveilling ISIS and watching what they are doing. That's the good Jim Comey. Then there's the bad Jim Comey that wants to write an op-ed. A spy chief wants to write an op-ed to. How insane is that?
And I don't blame the Obama administration for saying no you can't and shouldn't write an op-ed. No, we don't want Jim Comey's opinion, FBI director. We want to know what he knows. Who is being surveilled and why? That's more important. So I think he's getting caught up in the politics. He wants to be everyone's friend and he keeps flopping.
WILLIAMS: OK, so Lisa, let's use Eric's parameters and say Jim Comey made the right decision or the Obama administration made the right decision in terms of the investigation that we want our investigators to come to a strong conclusion. But Jim Comey, in the mind of many people involved in politics in America, Jim Comey says everything is viewed through, are you left-wing or right-wing and does it fit your gender map? But in terms of politics, he damaged one candidate, Hillary Clinton.
BOOTHE: Well, I'm not a big fan of parameters. But look, I also think if you are the FBI director -- he was set up to be involved in politics from the beginning because he had a presidential candidate who was under investigation. Now we know that there, you know, at least two investigations involving both candidates. It was unavoidable.
How do you avoid being inserted in the political election when there's a major candidate being investigated? So what was he ultimately going to do? And I think no matter what decision he had come to, he was going to be criticized. Can you imagine if he had recommended an indictment, permanently changing the course of the election even more so than the decision that he ultimately made.
And also, don't forget the fact that Loretta Lynch put him in a pretty tough spot as well by compromising herself by meeting with Bill Clinton. So in his defense, to some degree, I don't honestly know if he's handled everything as artfully as he should have but I also think that he has been faced with some unprecedented things as an FBI director to try to sift through.
WILLIAMS: Well, you know, it's odd though Dana. The question is, did he adhere to the standards of the FBI in terms of the investigation but botch it in terms of the politics?
PERINO: Well, I think he kind of was between a rock and a hard place, but also understand -- I think the op-ed idea was just a communications vehicle. It wasn't that Jim Comey was like I want to give my opinion, which you would normally say. But he wanted to have one statement out there that would be something where he wasn't given an interview where anything could be left to interpretation. So maybe, what he should have said is -- I think what he want to do, he wanted to make it public in some way.
What I understand from the president -- Obama team, just going back a couple of months now, was that they were concerned that if they actually said that the Russians are trying to help Donald Trump in the election, that it would look like President Obama was trying to help Hillary at Donald Trump's expense. And President Obama didn't want to be that guy. So, everybody was caught in a tough decision-making process.
WILLIAMS: Greg?
GUTFELD: What?
WILLIAMS: First of all, we have news that Eric and president Obama agree on something here.
GUTFELD: Well, which is interesting because do you know who is behind this collusion, the Russian collusion? President Obama. He shot down the op-ed. Why did he do that? Because the birth of birtherism was Hillary Clinton and this was his payback. He is the one behind this whole thing. He didn't want Hillary in the White House so he killed revelatory information that was going to appear in the op-ed, destroying Hillary's chances, sending her to the woods where she belongs.
By the way, Comey, you know, I've said this before. Comey is no man's hommie. One of my favorite lines, because minute, you think you like to cut off his jib and the next minute you go, he's a treasonous cat. He's like Metallica. One year it's a good album, two years later it's a terrible album, then it's a good album.
Or maybe he's like vegetables, nobody likes it but somehow it's good for you. So I think, you know, the fact that everybody, right, left, center gets mad at this guy, means maybe he's kind of good for you like the Metallica album.
BOOTHE: Maybe he should turn to bands.
WILLIAMS: Don't tell The Wall Street Journal. Wall Street Journal can't stand him. But I will say this thought, you know what, Democrats are split between Obama's decision and the outrage that still exists among Hillary's --
GUTFELD: By the way, where is President Obama right now? He's left the country. Do we know where President Obama is right now? Could he be with Putin as we speak?
BOLLING: And they did love Comey for about a two-week period when he said we're not recommending an investigation.
WILLIAMS: No, nobody loved him after that press conference. That press conference was --
(CROSSTALK)
WILLIAMS: I don't know about that press conference. Next, is it treason to veto a bill that raises the minimum wage? Baltimore's Democratic mayor is being accused of just that, treason, after being persuaded that a hike would hurt low income workers more than help them. Hear her defend her controversial veto straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PERINO: Last week the mayor of Baltimore, a Democrat, did something that stunned many in her party. Catherine Pugh vetoed a bill that would have raised the minimum wage in her city to $15 an hour by 2022.
The backlash has been brutal. One local leader calls it an act of treason against the poor. As a candidate, Mayor Pugh said she would sign the legislation but changed her mind after talking to members of the community and business leaders about the consequences. She learned it would actually drive businesses out of the city, taking away jobs for the unskilled.
Here is more from Pugh on her decision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CATHERINE PUGH, D-MAYOR OF BALTIMORE: I don't think there's anybody that wants more to see the minimum wage increased than I do. But I think it's important that we follow the lead of the state.
For those reasons and the economic impact that I think that this has on the city, making us the hole in the doughnut is not appropriate at this time that I would sign this bill.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PERINO: OK, I think that is courageous. She -- what she was saying there is that she wants to follow the state. The state legislature is working on a minimum-wage bill that would raise it to $10.10 an hour. She said, Greg, that if it goes to $15 an hour, then jobs will leave the city of Baltimore and go to the counties surrounding it. She thinks that would be bad for the city.
GUTFELD: Yes.
PERINO: What's wrong with that?
GUTFELD: By speaking the truth, she left the cult of ideology. That's what happened.
OK. The easiest way to describe what the minimum wage boost does is if you have a piece of pie with eight slices, eight people can eat. If you divide it into six pieces, only six people can eat.
But this common sense goes out the window in -- in liberal cities, because, normally, we see the minimum wage as the first rung on the ladder of a career. So it's OK if it's $3.35 when I was young or whatever it is now, but if you live in Baltimore and other cities ruined by leftism, the first rung is often the last rung, so you understand why they're fighting to increase the minimum wage. Because that's all they've got.
What she's trying to say, the only way out of this is to create more rungs through more businesses. And other people are saying, "No, we need it now."
PERINO: What did you make of it, Juan? Because you know that city very well. Sorry, Eric.
BOLLING: No, no.
PERINO: Because you know Baltimore really well.
WILLIAMS: I do.
PERINO: And I don't know if -- did you cover that as a reporter?
WILLIAMS: No, no, never covered that.
PERINO: But you know, as the inner station (ph) covering Washington and Philly?
WILLIAMS: Well, I've been friends with mayors in Baltimore for a while. And I don't know...
GUTFELD: That explains it.
WILLIAMS: ... Mayor Pugh that well, but let me just say that I thought she was extremely brave and right. So she did the right thing by saying "no," because the counties right outside the city are already benefitting from loss of jobs that previously would have been located in the city, because Baltimore has been chaotic. We know about the riots, the high crime rate and all the rest. So it would have cost a loss of jobs.
So she is not saying now, and this is a response to Greg -- she's not saying, "Oh, it's a bad idea to raise the minimum wage."
PERINO: No.
WILLIAMS: She's saying let the state act so that you have a uniform playing field. And I think that's what people are saying across the board. Because if we -- I thought you were even going to raise robots.
BOLLING: That's the real answer.
WILLIAMS: Because robots will come in, right? Automation will come in, and it's cheaper than paying the minimum wage. But I would just say to you, as a matter of morality, first of all, it's not just kids. It's not your first job. Lots of people pay -- I think within range of the minimum wage are now adults, mostly.
GUTFELD: I know. That was...
PERINO: Eric, what about the economics of this? And do you think businesses will come out and defend her?
BOLLING: No. I think she stumbled onto the right idea for the wrong reason.
And I'll push back, Juan. Yes, she did the right thing, because when you raise the minimum wage artificially, businesses will do something different. I don't think they're going to leave the city. I think they are going to automate. Like Wendy's did, like restaurants in Seattle did. They said, "We're not going to pay the 15. We'll automate. You can have a robot do it, the same thing that these human beings are doing on the food lines."
But take it one step further. So if she does -- if she goes 15 and they go to the -- outside her city to the county, throughout the state, what if the state goes to 15? They're going to do the same thing anyway. So the answer is, yes, don't artificially raise the minimum wage, but not because -- not because they're going to -- they're just going to automate you out of business.
BOOTHE: But Dana, you had even mentioned the $10.10, which I think it was the Congressional Budget Office that found that increasing the federal minimum wage -- which we're not talking federally -- but increasing the federal minimum wage to $10.10 would cost, I think, upwards to 500,000 jobs.
But I really think it ultimately comes down to cents when dealing with the minimum wage. Cash goes into one pocket. It comes out of another. So where do you think that money is going to come from? And do you really think employers are going to want to pay someone without a skill set if it's an entry-level job, or minimal education, $15 an hour?
So as Eric pointed out, what ultimately happens, or at least in the fast food industry, what a lot of them are looking to do is to automate these jobs, because ultimately, that's substantially cheaper than bringing in labor that simply doesn't have the skill set to justify paying them $15 an hour.
So what do you think is going to happen to these businesses? And to Greg's point, what do you think is going to happen to that first step in the ladder?
PERINO: It's not easy, and what I would do, I would say to the people of Baltimore, have your young people look up to Catherine Pugh, who's a responsible public servant and doing the best that she can.
GUTFELD: You look up to her.
PERINO: I look up to everybody. But not really to you.
GUTFELD: No?
WILLIAMS: Whoa!
PERINO: Ahead, can a cup of coffee make Americans more civil to one other in these tense political times? Starbucks will pour you one for free.
GUTFELD: Where's the camera going?
PERINO: But only if you're nice.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GUTFELD: Starbucks is working with a Harvard start-up that gives free coffee to people with opposing political views, as long as they engage in polite discourse. Essentially, each person gets half a gift card, and then they have to meet up to get the free caffeine.
Sounds good to me, but how do you find two sides on campus? Remember, it's only one side of this divide that silences the other. It's not the right who needs a bribe to keep from shouting down historians or beating up professors. And it says something that it's a company pushing this new diversity. I sense the teachers' lounge would not approve.
But I have to say, I applaud Starbucks. This app is apt. The campus is now ground zero for toxic identity politics, which seeks to replace natural human collaboration with regressive vindictiveness.
Studies on the brain show how cooperation enhances positive feelings, which then drives collaborative activities like creating companies, cities, civilizations. Human evolution relies on cooperation, which is why identity politics feels so backward.
Social justice warriors want to return to the Dark Ages when you communicated with a club instead of joining one. So perhaps a free cup of joe is one small step against a twisted movement that rolls back progress by pitting us against each other.
So try the app. Have that coffee, and make one for beer. Civilization may depend on it.
Dana, I heard you go, "Muh." Is that -- do you think it's a bad idea?
PERINO: I don't want to talk to anybody.
GUTFELD: That's true; you are antisocial.
PERINO: I don't want to talk to anybody.
GUTFELD: You run from our fans.
No, I'm kidding. I'm joking. But why don't -- you don't think it's a good idea?
PERINO: I really don't care.
GUTFELD: No?
PERINO: Honestly. I think it's a good idea; I think it's unnecessary.
GUTFELD: Really?
PERINO: Yes, I don't think that people need to talk. I know this is -- I can't believe that you think this is a good idea.
GUTFELD: I think...
PERINO: I thought your monologue was going to go in a completely different, like, Greg Gutfeld direction.
GUTFELD: Well, I try to be unpredictable, Dana. And also, I love...
PERINO: Are you going to do this?
GUTFELD: I love people.
PERINO: Are you going to make some small talk with someone to get a free cup of coffee?
GUTFELD: I don't need to -- I do that every day. I disagree with everybody.
PERINO: So you're not getting free coffee?
GUTFELD: I take the subway every morning and talk to the real people.
PERINO: You talk to anybody?
BOLLING: What time? What time?
PERINO: Who do you talk to?
GUTFELD: I go at -- I go out every morning at 11.
PERINO: Who do you talk to on the subway?
GUTFELD: I talk to the singers.
PERINO: You do not. You look at your phone.
GUTFELD: I talk to the singers. No, I talk to the singers.
PERINO: I know you give them money, which is very nice of you.
GUTFELD: Thank you. Where are we going with this?
Go for it.
BOLLING: It strikes me that Starbucks is trying to reach out to the other side.
GUTFELD: Yes.
BOLLING: They've been well -- they've been social justice warriors for a very long time.
GUTFELD: True.
BOLLING: Remember, "We're going to take in this many refugees," yada, yada, yada? All of a sudden, they say -- they're starting to reach out, saying, "We're going to hire all these veterans now." It was 10,000.
WILLIAMS: That's not fair. They were hiring veterans before.
BOLLING: No, no. I know, but they made -- they're making a big push to hire more veterans. And I think it's great. I think it's fantastic.
But to say, hey, if you're on the political left, why don't you meet up with someone who's on the political right over a Starbucks? And maybe they can work their way into the more conservative group of consumers, which frankly, they haven't really -- they've made substantial inroads into liberalism, not necessarily into...
BOOTHE: Well, what do you do if you're an independent or a libertarian? Are you not invited?
PERINO: No coffee for you.
BOLLING: No coffee for you.
BOOTHE: I'd be fine with this in, like, the afternoon. In the morning, I'm with Dana. You don't really want to talk to anyone until you have your coffee. But maybe in the afternoon.
But I'm with -- I think this is a good idea. I mean, I typically don't like Starbucks, because they do engage and interject themselves in so many political debates; and it's really annoying. But I think at a time where people are lighting cities on fire, and people that have opposing political views are punching each other in the face, that maybe encouraging civil discourse, particularly on college campuses, is not a bad thing.
WILLIAMS: Well, you know what I want?
BOOTHE: In the afternoon.
WILLIAMS: I want -- I want a boxload of these free coupons, because I talk to you guys every day.
GUTFELD: Exactly.
BOOTHE: You can just milk the show.
WILLIAMS: So if I give you, Gregory and Eric, if I give you guys half a coupon, right, then I get to go with both of you and I get free coffee.
GUTFELD: There you go.
PERINO: That's an idea.
WILLIAMS: And in the back, maybe they have beer.
GUTFELD: Well, I think the think is coffee is hot. So it could -- people could throw it on you. Make it alcohol.
BOOTHE: You could put Baileys in your coffee.
GUTFELD: That's true.
BOOTHE: That's a good compromise.
GUTFELD: Put Bailey's and everything. I put Bailey's in my Bailey's.
BOOTHE: There's Bailey's in your little...
GUTFELD: No, no. That's water. Stop it, Lisa.
BOOTHE: I'm joking.
BOLLING: What do you mean little...
GUTFELD: Should President Trump and the Freedom Caucus take Starbucks up on the offer? Dana says no. The president has threatened war against caucus members in the midterms if they don't get on board with the Republican agenda. Their response, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BOOTHE: On Friday the conservative Freedom Caucus helped Democrats sink President Trump's effort to repeal and replace ObamaCare. The president hasn't forgotten, and today he issued a dramatic public warning to the members. He tweeted: "The Freedom Caucus will hurt the entire Republican agenda if they don't get on the team & fast. We must fight them, & Dems, in 2018!"
And here's how two caucus members responded earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JIM JORDAN, R-OHIO: I'm not here to assign blame to anyone. I'm not here to point to the future. What I'm focused on doing is doing what we told the voters we were going to do. Let's forget the blame and what may happen in the future. Let's just do what we said. And that's what the Freedom Caucus, and that's what Republicans are committed to.
REP. JUSTIN AMASH, R-MICH.: Most people don't take well to being bullied. It's constructive in fifth grade, but -- it may allow a child to get his way, but that's not how our government works.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOOTHE: Eric, what's your take?
BOLLING: So I'm very, very close to these Freedom Caucus. I love these guys; I love what they do. I love what they do with health care. Because again, the health care bill helped the very upper echelon of incomes: middle and lower income got hurt. Into the elections, that would have hurt both the House and a team (ph) and President Trump's reelection bid.
However, I will say I think they need to play ball on tax reform, and I think here's why. I think there's going to be both factions, but across- the-board, upper, middle, and lower income families, households, individuals will do better when we get tax reform. The whole conservative premise is lower taxes, keep more of your own money. You'll create growth. And lives get better.
So I think they need to work with the, whatever, Tuesday's Group or the moderates in the House to get that stuff pushed through. And I think they will.
By the way, Jim Jordan, next speaker of the House.
BOOTHE: Dana, so Eric mentioned tax reform. How does this affect that and trying to get other things done, big things done?
PERINO: I don't know. I don't know, but I'm going to pop some popcorn and watch it all. I'm just -- this is some hardball politics coming from the White House, and I don't know how these members, who are very dedicated to their principles, will take to it. If those two that we just heard from are any sign, are symbolic of the rest of the group, we could be in for a rocky ride. Or this could just be a way of, like, airing out all the differences, and then they come together.
BOOTHE: Greg, so Dana mentioned hardball politics. Obviously try to work -- or we tried to work with them on healthcare reform. So is this sort of like a carrot and stick approach?
GUTFELD: I don't know. Everyone always says they're going to pop popcorn, but they never do.
PERINO: I do.
GUTFELD: They go, "Oh, I'm going to pop popcorn." No, you don't. You're not going to pop popcorn.
PERINO: Actually, I buy it. I buy it.
GUTFELD: No deal is perfect. That's why it's called the deal. What do you expect from the guy who wrote "The Art of The Deal"? Deal comes before ideology. When you elect a centrist who likes to make deals, the deal is likely going to be reflecting a centrist.
And tribalism like this, it doesn't build anything. Differences are vital, but it's also important to settle them. So I say get together, have some coffee. Starbucks will supply the coupons.
BOLLING: Popcorn.
GUTFELD: And popcorn.
BOOTHE: The president -- the president did win by almost double digits in a lot of these districts. Do you think that this is going to have any effect in sort of pushing them in his direction?
PERINO: Some of them actually ran ahead of him.
BOOTHE: True.
PERINO: Yes, but they -- but he is threatening to go and campaign against people who would buck him. So, you know, to my mind, this is really interesting because, I believe they were some of his biggest supporters on the campaign trail, right?
BOLLING: Yes, but and here's the thing with tax reform. He's going to have the Freedom Caucus on his side.
WILLIAMS: No, no, no.
BOLLING: And he's going to have problems with the moderates.
WILLIAMS: Right, but let me just say that they needed health care reform to take away some of the taxing...
BOLLING: That's a theory.
WILLIAMS: ... in order to -- in order to create a justification for taking away some taxes.
BOLLING: For the moderates. For the moderates.
PERINO: Another thing that the president could do is threaten to take away their own ObamaCare exemption on Capitol hill.
BOOTHE: All right. Well, we can continue this conversation during the break, because "One More Thing" is coming up next.
GUTFELD: That's boring.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BOLLING: Time for "One More Thing," and Dana kicks it off.
PERINO: All right. So the world's largest humanitarian crisis in 70 years has been declared in the three African countries of Nigeria, Somalia, and South Sudan. They're all on the brink of famine, and 16 million people are at risk of dying very soon.
This coincides with the president's budget, in which has proposed some cuts to foreign aid, but the World Food Program is asking for more. And I do think the United States should help, because they are facing, one, deaths, and they're also looking at the possibility of more migrants into Europe and more support for ISIS. Here's someone from UNICEF talking about it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've seen this morning, as well, in the nutritional center, all these severely malnourished babies. A very, very sad story. We also see the figures going up.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The situation is extremely bad. If we don't do much, enough to mitigate the situation, we're going to get a catastrophe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PERINO: This is an international crisis that is not a surprise. We should do more now so that we don't have to do more later.
BOLLING: Very good.
Greg, you're up.
GUTFELD: Only on "The Five" can you go from something that serious to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GUTFELD: I hate these people!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUTFELD: All right. The most disgusting thing I've ever seen in my life is called the licky brush. You can send away for it. It allows you to pet your cat using your mouth. I'm not going to show you how to use it. That's why I brought Fred.
So see, you put your licky brush in Fred's mouth, right? Or Fred does it himself. I wouldn't help him, but he doesn't have any hands. And get it in there. And the let's say you've got a jackalope, which I do happen to have a jackalope right here. You pet it like this.
So if you really have this kind of a relationship with a pet, I suggest you seek help, some kind of therapy. I don't even think, Dana, you do this with Jasper.
PERINO: I wouldn't even do that.
GUTFELD: Yes.
BOLLING: That's a thing?
GUTFELD: This is a thing.
BOLLING: Pet your pet with your mouth.
GUTFELD: I wasn't even -- I figured there's no way you can show this on TV without disgusting people.
PERINO: They would sell that at Spencer Gifts.
GUTFELD: It's disgusting. Don't do it.
BOOTHE: Who doesn't do that?
GUTFELD: We learned something about you.
BOOTHE: Is that weird?
PERINO: You just had that on hand? You had Fred?
GUTFELD: I carry -- I carry Fred wherever I go. Fred has been with me for 15 years. You know what? It's our relationship.
BOOTHE: It's so you don't feel lonely. You never feel lonely.
PERINO: The pronoun is "they."
BOLLING: All right. We better go. Let's move on. So House Intel Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, or is it nun-yez? Politico has this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: New-nes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: : Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Congressman Noons.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Devon : Noon-yez.
MARY CATHERINE HAM, CNN COMMENTATOR: : Noon-yez never alleged...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nun-yez.
HAM: New-yez.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Devin Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Chairman Devin Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Devin Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Newman. New-ness.
MERCEDES SCHLAPP, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Congressman New-nen. New-nes.
REP. NANCY PELOSI, D-CALIF., MINORITY LEADER: Chairman New-jes? -- New-nes is...
Chairman Noon-yez.
Chairman Nyoon-yez.
SCHLAPP: Chairman Noon – New-news.
SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Chairman Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: New-yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Noon-yez. New-nes, excuse me.
MEGHAN MCCAIN, CO-HOST, "OUTNUMBERED": Noon-yez.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Noon-yez.
New-nes.
Noon-yez is.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I mean, Noon-yez is -- I'm sure he's a fine guy.
REP. DEVIN NUNES, R-CALIF., INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: I'm Devin Nunes, and I approve this message.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLLING: So there you have it.
PERINO: Nunes.
WILLIAMS: Oh, my gosh.
BOOTHE: Great.
BOLLING: Juanito.
WILLIAMS: So here's a mystery. Why is the press giving so little attention to the Trump White House pending decision to do away with your privacy on the Internet? President Trump is expected to end an Obama-era plan that will outlaw big Internet companies from using, collecting and selling your data.
It's not like anybody really thought the Internet was private, but now every Google, Safari or Yahoo! search will be money in somebody else's pocket. It's astonishing to me.
GUTFELD: It's already happening.
WILLIAMS: It's crazy.
BOLLING: So you know how they're pushing back? They're buying the lawmakers who voted for this, their information.
BOOTHE: Real quick, last Friday I had the honor to see an honor airflight. And if you don't know anything about them, go to honorflight.org. And it's really cool. It was started in 2005 after the World War II Memorial was finished, was completed. And it's to send veterans to look at these war memorials in Washington, D.C. They have 127 hubs, 41 states. Airlines, also members of Congress work with them, as well, to host these veterans who have done so much for us. Really cool. I suggest you go and look at it.
WILLIAMS: Yes, and that -- was that national airport?
BOOTHE: Yes, it was so cool. I was early for my flight which never happens, and I got to see it. And it was really awesome. And I've also been a part of one when I was on Capitol Hill, and it was a really, really cool experience.
WILLIAMS: It's wonderful to go down to the Mall and see them there.
BOLLING: We've got to go. Set your DVR so you never miss an episode of "The Five." That's it for us. "Special Report" next.
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