Frank Luntz on the top moments from the Democratic debates

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Frank Luntz on the top moments from the Democratic debates

Pollster Frank Luntz breaks down the most noteworthy moments from both nights of the second Democratic presidential debate.

This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," August 1, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: Hannity --

SEAN HANNITY: I worked so hard that our, I'm exhausted.

INGRAHAM: First of all--

HANNITY: That was great - He is great, I mean--

INGRAHAM: Okay. Any hour of the day, you think you he is on 3 hours a day but people forget, you are on three hours a day, I used to be on three hours a day and then I got sanity because I couldn't do too much. But you guys can just any hour of the day; you call Hannity he just goes his monologue is going. Any hour of day, Rush same thing.

HANNITY: You know it's amazing though, I mean, I do think Marry Matt (ph) this is a phenomenon. Talk radio is the number one format Laura as you know in all of radio, he starts in 1988, there are less than 200 talk stations - we have thousands. It is mind numbing. He took a lot of those hits and I think him and Trump have that same quality - fearlessness and willingness to get hit and fight for what you believe in. It's really Republicans need to learn from that.

INGRAHAM: Yes, they are human time axis they just keep going and going and going. It's not going to matter. Hannity, I --

HANNITY: You take care of hits, too, Miss Ingraham and I'm there I've got your flank. You and Tucker, I've got to like have your flank.

INGRAHAM: Now really -- you really -- I got yours, you got mine. Hannity, great show as always.

HANNITY: Well, have a great show, Laura.

INGRAHAM: All right, I'm Laura Ingraham; this is "The Ingraham Angle" from Washington tonight. Oh! My gosh, we have such an amazing show for you if I do say so. Two Angles on last night's debate including the real take away from the attacks on Former President Obama. Mollie Hemingway, Frank Luntz, and our body language expert she's back with everything you might not have initially picked up.

Why do folks like Jim Comey and Hillary Clinton continued to get away with saying things that you would never get away with, military men and women never get away with, pretty much no one else would. Joe Digenova, Allen Dershowitz will answers that question.

This is going to fun Cornel West, Niger Innis and Dr. Drew Pinsky are also here. I told you it was packed. But first, radical renegades gone wild, that's the focus of tonight's first ANGLE. Just last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, she assured us that any disagreement within her own party was just a family squabble.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): I have some level of confidence and actually joy in seeing diversity in our caucus. In a family you have a difference but you're still family.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, more like the Corleone's or the Manson's. Well, watching last night's Democrat Debate it didn't exactly have a feel of a family reunion to me. A majority of the Democrats on stage trashed the party's most recent standard-bearer Barack Obama.

He's one of the most beloved political figures on the planet but he is written off by the Democrats is kind of a cautious technocrat who was unable to deliver the fundamental change, the radicals really wanted and still want. Now AOC +3 have led the Obama reappraisal through their leftist activism. Remember what I said back in January, conservatives ignoring AOC's leadership in the Democratic Party do so at their own peril.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

INHRAHAM: I think it's a mistake to not take her seriously, to brush her off as a flash in the pan or upstart. She was as close to a thought leader as a Democrat Party has today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I get a lot of flag for that when I said that in January. But I saw where this was going and a lot of you did as well. Now we see AOC and company's radical ideas filling the 2020 Democrat Debate stages. Climate hysteria, open borders, free health care pretty much anybody and opposition is simply not permitted.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: To fix it is to decriminalize, that is the whole point.

SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND (D-NY) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: They are not criminals, so I believe we should have a civil violation.

HOST: Raise your hand if your government plan would provide coverage for undocumented immigrants.

SEN. CORY BOOKER (D-NJ) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Mr. Vice President, there's a saying in my community, you're dipping into kool-aid and you don't even know the flavor.

JULIAN CASTRO (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Mr. Vice President, it looks like one of us has learned the lessons of the past and one of us hasn't.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, Castro calls it a learned lesson but what he really means is that he and the base of the party have been dragged to the left by AOC +3 and the new left does not want energy independence for America, instead it wants a $93 trillion Green New Deal that will and they essentially said it last night Biden ended up saying it, banning cars, planes, cows, literally taking America back to the dark ages.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The greatest threat to humanity is global climate change.

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Literally the survival of humanity on this planet and civilization as we know it is in the hands of the next President.

MAYOR PETE BUTTIGIEG (D-IN) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: By 2030, we will have passed the point of no return on climate. We are ten years too late we also need to start moving our people to higher ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I wanted to go to higher ground. How far they have come from Obama and his little insignificant Paris accord. Now Obama is reportedly apparently today is unfazed by they said by these attacks on his legacy. At least that's what the sources told CBS news.

If that is true, it makes some sense because Obama over saw one of the most liberal administrations ever, it was even considered radical a few years ago. Today, a little different - he's a very wealthy man, worth 40 million, 100 million, according to a couple of estimates. He pals around with the global elites, jet sets literally around the world to lavish events.

Critiquing everybody else's carbon footprint I might add. So I can see why he's probably just not too bothered by the criticism between those hot stone massages. Perhaps the party should be, even if Biden gets the nomination in 2020, the trajectory of the party has moved far beyond the radicalism of Obama and even farther away from America. In moments, part two of my ANGLE will explore how Obama has been hoisted on his own petard.

But first, I want to bring in Mollie Hemingway, Senior Editor at "The Federalist" and Fox News Contributor Co-author of the fantastic new best- selling book "Justice On Trial". There it is. Mollie, I actually in the makeup room yesterday before we came on I said for them to really be the radicals that they want, they want radical change, they're going to have to go after Obama and someone I won't reveal make up room confidences, you know we don't do that. That's a very learned person said they will never do that. Literally, I said it like - we comment like oh, my God, they are attacking Obama.

MOLLIE HEMINGWAY, SENIOR EDITOR, THE FEDERALIST: And we saw in the debate last night. They were going after everything about his legacy including his signature policy achievement Obamacare. I think the real issue is his real legacy was the election of Donald Trump, it makes him extremely angry, but they are unable to talk about that so instead they talk about their disappointment with different policy issues. That's why Joe Biden the only candidate defending the Obama administration, a striking turn from a few years ago.

INGRAHAM: And I'm going to get into that a little of my second ANGLE, but what the amazing thing though is it's been a pretty short period of time since he left office two years ago. High personal approval rating, although his policy accomplishments one after the other had fallen into disarray, they couldn't launch the Obamacare website, remember that the Fiasco? Now the party has just gotten so impatient. We aren't messing around on the edges here we want to tear the system down. That's where it is today.

HEMINGWAY: Isn't it partly because of the progressive approach which doesn't want to acknowledge that there are differences of opinion, there might be people with different ideas that it would be proper to reason with them. There's a lot of brute force that you see on the left and you see it in "The Squad" in terms of how they want to accomplish things but it's obviously drifting into the rest of the field.

INGRAHAM: Jen Psaki Former Obama Spokesperson thought Obama would be fine with all of this. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEN PSAKI, FORMER OBAMA SPOKESPERSON: Barack Obama, when people did bring him up, they were criticizing him to your point. If that was the right strategy to make sure that Donald Trump wasn't in the White House, he would be leading the charge to say attack me, that's fine. I want one of you to be in the White House. It's not--

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I don't buy that for one millisecond. I think he thinks are you guys kidding me?

HEMINGWAY: I don't think anyone believes that he would be fine with this type of criticism and he obviously is playing still a pretty central role in this race. It's been beyond obvious that he is not as supportive as his former running mate as that former running mate would like them to be. They do not think that Joe Biden would be able to carry this all the way to 2020 so they want to be involved. I'll be curious to see how many more attacks will have on Obama the thing that he'll probably be a central point--

INGRAHAM: Well, Obama is going to make like six phone calls in Georgia and you're going to know who's going to win the state of Georgia mean while for the Democrat primary. I mean, he has that much power and yet they are playing this interesting game but it's kind of where it had to go.

Trump went after the Bushes, he took Bushes out really and all these people are upset because they love -and I love the Bush's people but their policies didn't work. He kind of had to do that, Romney wouldn't do that. He wanted to deal with the old Bush party and shoehorn it in; Trump said that was wrong, Iraq was wrong, China policy bad, trade deals bad, immigration bad. I'm going to do it all over again.

HEMINGWAY: But it also speaks to how unique Barack Obama was, he was able to be a radical politician that gave off an appearance of being moderate and that's what you're not seeing--

INGRAHAM: What did he have that they don't have? What did Obama have that they don't have? Charm, charisma, he dominated a stage, he lit up the stage. He just lit it up. I'm saying this is a political observer; obviously I didn't like his policies. I don't think anyone came close to that last time. Not one person came close to that.

HEMINGWAY: Last night was actually just boring to watch. You can see that even in the numbers, they aren't getting a lot of people interested in them and there's no way to just fight the fact these people are not exciting. The ones who are exciting are extremely radical.

INGRAHAM: And then, even Al Sharpton was a little bit put upon today about this, watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AL SHARPTON, CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST: This whole suicide mission of going after Barack Obama smells like desperation and I think that it certainly shows that some of them are just not ready for where they are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I think he was looking for the words prime time but Obama also warned about this last April saying this is not going to be good for the party. Where does this end up? This has got to be Joe Biden's to take even with his flubs of the number and all of that, if I had to bet right now I would still say it has to be Biden.

HEMINGWAY: I would assume it won't be Biden because the issue that the Obama don't want it to be Biden and they still have a lot power.

INGRAHAM: May be they don't even show us.

HEMINGWAY: He survived last night but he survived barely and a lot of people all they care about his the ability to beat Donald Trump. There wasn't a lot of vision or hope on the stage last night.

INGRAHAM: I thought it was doom and gloom period, I think the most optimistic I was Biden who was saying let's do Obama 3.0. That was pretty good for us, we were happy.

HEMINGWAY: Right. But somehow they're going to have to figure out how to take the excitement of those radicals and combine it with the moderates who can actually appeal to.

INGRAHAM: John Delaney is not going to be the nominee. Kamala Harris, God bless her but that was a disaster for her last night. That was a disastrous debate. They built her up into this kind of Joan of arc figure.

HEMINGWAY: People kept talking about how Joe Biden took all these incoming hits, what Kamala Harris took incoming hits and unlike Joe Biden she was completely unable to respond to any of them.

INGRAHAM: She just kept saying that's not true, great fact-checking by the way. Mollie, thank you so much, great to see you tonight. Obama as we were talking about on the outs? That's the focus of tonight's ANGLE, part two. It seems like yesterday when the Obama glow appeared would last forever.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, 44TH U.S. PRESIDENT: I am so in love with you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I love how he milks the applause and looks around. He and Michelle became global superstars, they inspired millions of Americans and of course the other global superstars.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEONARDO DICAPRIO, ACTOR: When I was at the U.N. and I heard our President say that climate change is the most important issue facing not only this generation but all future generations, it was inspiring.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And it made me feel hopeful and it made me feel proud to be an American.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, last night the 2020 candidates were singing a different tune. With their sights trained on Joe Biden, they decided to pick up key aspects of the Obama-Biden legacy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

INSLEE: There this mythology that somehow all these folks are in love with their insurance.

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D-CA) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm going to go back to Vice President Biden because your plan does not cover everyone in America.

BOOKER: Everyone should have access to health care, that it's a human right.

JOE BIDEN (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: My response is Obamacare is working.

INSLEE: I asked the Vice President point blank did he use his power to stop those deportations.

CASTRO: Open borders is a right wing talking point and frankly I'm disappointed that some folks including some folks on this stage have taken the bait.

BIDEN: I found that Julian - the Secretary and we sat together in many meetings, I never heard him talk about any of this when he was the secretary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, this morning the candidates try to back off a little of that criticism but the marker had already been laid down.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOOKER: I miss Obama. I miss her husband too.

(LAUGHTER)

BOOKER: Look, he is our statesman and anybody who was an executive, I too was an executive for two terms of a city he isn't perfect. And I'm sure Barack Obama was sitting here and I hope he's sleeping this morning. He would tell you I made some mistakes. We are having an honest conversation about an administration that was incredible.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Nice try, Cory, bad joke by the way. You can't have it both ways. Even though Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders weren't as explicit during that first debate, they feel the same way. As talented a politician as he was, as attractive a candidate as he was, Barack Obama didn't deliver in critical areas for the progressives. Remember when he said this about NAFTA?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: Do you scrap NAFTA Senator Obama or fix-it?

OMABA: I would immediately call the President of Mexico and the President of Canada to try to amend NAFTA.

OBAMA: It is absolutely true that NAFTA was a mistake.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, he never did anything about it but Trump did and what about this golden oldie?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Never again will the American taxpayer be held hostage by a bank that is too big to fail.

(END VIDEO CLIP0

INGRAHAM: Now one problem. As noted in "Bloomberg Businessweek" two years after President Barack Obama vowed to eliminate the danger of financial institutions that are too big to fail, the nation's largest banks are bigger than they were before the financial meltdown. Thank god for those bailouts. Then there was this classic.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan. No one will take it away, no matter what.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: We all saw what happened and we all felt it. More doctors are tired, higher out-of-pocket costs, higher deductibles and many Americans received policy cancellation notices. Then there was a time that Obama promised America shovel-ready jobs when he was lobbying for that $830 billion stimulus bill and a few years later, he said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Shovel ready was not as shovel ready as we expected.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: I love how they are laughing, what's a few billion dollars among friends? Big deal. From the outset, President Obama promised hope and change and Democrats were mesmerized. For all the White House party the Nobel Prize, the appearances on Ellen, what Obama delivered was President Donald Trump the liberal's worst nightmare.

Ever since, the party has been riving and venting, buoyed by the 2018 midterms but still vexed by the man who Robert Mueller couldn't take down. Now they are finger-pointing and it's ugly. But Barack Obama shouldn't be surprised at the party has moved to the extremes on issues like the Green New Deal and reparations. He talked a good game but remember when this went down? Or how about this? When activists blamed police out racism and these tragic deaths, the White House fanned the victimhood narrative.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: A deep distrust exists between law enforcement and communities of color. Some of this is the result of the legacy of racial discrimination in this country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Speaking of troubling, there was this punishing line from Obama urging Hispanics to vote in 2012.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: If Latinos sit out the election instead of saying we are going to punish our enemies, then I think it's going to be harder.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: That sort of reminds me of this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you tell them they are not welcome.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Obama shouldn't be surprised, no one should be surprised that the left is really angry and whipped up. Obama himself planted the seeds of their discontent. By the time he left office, this was a CNN headline. Take it in. Democrats should not be surprised that Obama himself isn't liberal enough anymore for today's Democratic Party. President Obama appeared to be a dream candidate but many feel on the left that they are living in a nightmare. Their rage will likely dominate the Democratic Party for many years to come. That is the ANGLE.

And moments away, Frank Luntz is here with the words and phrases that mattered most from the debate and our body language expert is here to break it all down. Awkward faces, the weird gestures, and yes, touches that mattered too, stay there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

INGRAHAM: You heard it, I laid it out in the two ANGLES. The one thing the Democrats made clear in the second round of debates is that there is a clear divide between the radicals and Joe Biden. Here now to break down the words and phrases that mattered is Pollster Frank Luntz. Okay, Frank, I want to start with Biden, he's being called the moderate one up there but there was one radical suggestion, watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: I have the only plan that mimics the ability of insurance companies that charge unreasonable prices flat out number one. Number two, we should put some of these insurance executives who totally oppose my plan in jail for those 9 billion opioids they sell out there.

(END VIDEO CLIP0

INGRAHAM: Frank, what about that?

FRANK LUNTZ, POLLSTER: So did you - and first up did you hear the audience reaction to it? I was there in the hall for both debates and I want to make it clear to the viewers that this is not a fight for the soul of the Democratic Party that fight is over. The hostility of these Democratic candidates most of them to corporate America, to CEO's to those who have been successful is significant. The language that I heard in the last 48 hours is language I've never heard from any mainstream Democrat, and every time you want anti-corporate, anti-CEO, anti-success, the audience just lit up with applause.

INGRAHAM: I want to move on to night 1 and something said by Bernie Sanders and Warren that struck you, let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP0

WARREN: Our biggest problem in Washington is corruption, it is a giant corporations that have taken our government and that are holding it by the throat and we need to have the courage to fight back against that.

BIDEN: Anybody here who thinks that corporate America gives one damn about the average American worker, you're mistaken. Stand up and take on the greed and corruption of the ruling class of this country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Frank, isn't that what Obama said he was going to do I mean standing up for the little guy? So can they replicate what Trump has already done?

LUNTZ: This is so much more extreme. Holding the government by the throat, it's graphic, it's visual. I say that every CEO who's watching right now and every corporate executive, they are after you. They're blaming you, they are holding you accountable.

I attended the SEIU rally because I wanted to see what language they used. And what they kept on saying was no peace, no justice. No peace, no justice.

INGRAHAM: That's original.

LUNTZ: You are going to have labor unrest over the next year. You are going to have a continued divide between corporate America and its people, this is significant. The tension in the workforce is going to be far greater. There's a lesson here that economic freedom is under direct attack. And Laura, I don't mean to over state it but it is significant.

INGRAHAM: Now, I could not agree more. And finally the - that embattled NYC Mayor Bill De Blasio, Frank, he was ranting a lot last night but this moment really stood out to you, watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DE BLASIO: For 40 years the rich have gotten richer and they paid less and less in taxes, it cannot go on this way, when I'm President we will even up the score and we will the tax the hill out of the wealthy. To make this a fairer country this has to be a party that's not afraid to say out loud we are going to tax the hell out of the wealthy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: He said it twice just so you understand. Why was that moment sound?

LUNTZ: He said the - because he said at the beginning he said that the end and the audience erupting in applause, that was his best moment among Democrats. That was his best moment of the debate. Laura, this is not just about politics, this is not just about winning the democratic nomination.

This is about changing the structure of the economy in the United States and they are determined to turn it upside down. I've got to tell you, I've been following this since 1992, I've never heard candidates this extreme, I've never heard candidates this hostile to economic freedom and they have got the base of the Democratic Party absolutely behind them.

INGRAHAM: Yes, I say freedom theory--

FLUNTZ: Absolutely.

INGRAHAM - anti-freedom on what kind of car you drive, whether you can fly somewhere, as long as they are able to fly to their stupid conferences that's okay. The rest of the little people, they're going to have to go on those little green scooters or whatever. All right, Frank, fantastic to see you tonight.

It wasn't just the words I think that made these debates sometimes cringe worthy. It was the candidate's body language, our body language how we hold ourselves tells us a lot. So here now is someone who studies this Tonya Reiman. Now Tonya, we couldn't squeeze you in last night. So I'm so glad you're back tonight. You noticed a particular way that Andrew Yang was engaging with the audience, let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDREW YANG (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Raise your hand in the crowd if you've seen stores closing where you live.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: You say these gestures matter are smart, why?

TONYA REIMAN, BODY LANGUAGE EXPERT: Right, because what he's doing is he's instructing you. So when he goes raise your hand, what he is doing is he's telling you what to do and in doing that you follow that first instruction and then you tend to follow whatever he tells you to do next. So if once you start yesing someone, you tend to yes them indefinitely. And he uses his hand gestures well. Very big gestures we tend to follow those gestures with our eyes. When somebody moves around a lot we follow their hand gestures.

INGRAHAM: And unlike Bernie Sanders, he is always doing that weird thing with his fingers. Yang is very - he kind of locks on. When he does something you pay more attention to it.

REIMAN: Right, because it's beautiful the way he does it, if you watch him it's like choreographed.

INGRAHAM: I want to viewers to also watch this moment we saw from Joe Biden. It seems like he is actually laughing.

(CROSSTALK)

INGRAHAM: Harris was responding to him, what does that mean? Engaging with what looks like laughter when another person is talking.

REIMAN: What was good was he pivoted towards her and then he laughed but then she said something that struck a chord and may be two seconds later after this clip ends, he turns around and looks down. So she says something that initially doesn't bother him so he is allowing himself to look towards her but then when she says something he doesn't like he turns back around and looks down. That's a sign that she said something that hit a sore spot with him.

INGRAHAM: Well, I think again Biden was - had the target on his back last night. At one point in time, Senator Booker made this really obvious gesture to Biden after his many interruptions.

REIMAN: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOOKER: Mr. Vice President, I didn't interrupt you, please show me that respect sir.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: He kept doing that, what does that hand motion, movement toward Biden tell us?

REIMAN: So watch what he does. He's very engaging right there looking at each other. Biden tries to interrupt and Cory Booker does two things, the first thing he does is he touches him, and we've talked about this how touching as a dominant status move. He touches him but he also puts up his hand like a stop sign. He puts up the stop sign, he touches his hand which is a dominant gesture and look he breaks eye contact right there. That's his way of disengaging and saying I still have the floor here, you need to give me a moment and let me finish my statement.

INGRAHAM: When you are explaining it, I'm watching it for the first time because I didn't notice any of these stuff. Finally, there was this really telling pause from Senator Gillibrand. Check it out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GILLIBRAND: To the people of Michigan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Well, maybe. Are we being unfair there? Was she a little not too confident there? There was a couple moments for her like that.

REIMAN: You know what it is? I think she held her own last night. I think she did well. There was a few times she was umming way too many times. But in addition to that, she tends to show her anxiety or her lack of confidence during certain times. But that mic tough, that is called a displacement activity. So when you do this, what you are trying to do is regain control. So when you feel like you are being taunted or you're online, you need to grab something to regain control of yourself. And then she blinks a lot. So those are two things that tell you when she's feeling discomfort.

INGRAHAM: So it's the rudder. The microphone becomes the rudder.

REIMAN: Yes, it does. It allows you to -- and you'll see this. It's almost a self-modification gesture that people do.

INGRAHAM: All right, Tonya, fascinating. We really appreciate it. Great to see you tonight.

And disgraced former FBI Director Jim Comey, he has joined a long list of powerful people who have avoided government prosecution. Why is that? And is he really out of the wood. Dershowitz, diGenova, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: Our president must adhere to the values that are at the core of this country, the most important being truth.

He must tell the truth. It matters enormously.

He's just wrong. Facts really do matter.

I think effective leaders, to be effective in anything near the long term, have to be ethical.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Those very compelling words from disgraced former FBI Director Jim Comey take on new meaning tonight as we learn that DOJ Inspector Mike Horowitz has referred Comey -- had, for a prosecution potentially as part of an internal review. But tonight other sources are telling FOX News the DOJ won't be prosecuting him despite that referral. So it all begs the question, why do powerful people in government continue to escape accountability, at least if they're Democrats?

Joining me now, Alan Dershowitz, Harvard law professor emeritus, and author to the introduction of the published version to the Mueller Report, and former U.S. attorney Joe diGenova. Joe, what do you make of this? The guy leaks information, and we are taking a pass here?

JOE DIGENOVA, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY: This was a bad case for the government to bring. They didn't have the evidence that they needed. Bill Barr is trying to do one thing. He is trying to restore the integrity of the Justice Department to get it away from the Obama FBI, DOJ political prosecution model back to professionalism. He took this case. They decided they didn't have enough to make a case, and so they decided not to bring a prosecution. That's what the Justice Department should do, bring professional decisions. Bill Barr deserves a medal for doing this.

But here's the point. Comey is not out of the woods. He is the target, along with a number of other people, of a major criminal conspiracy investigation by John Durham. It doesn't mean he is going to be charged, but this is only one of many --

INGRAHAM: He's a player.

DIGENOVA: He's right in the middle of the grand conspiracy that John Durham is investigating. I applaud what Bill Barr did in dismissing, in not bringing this case.

INGRAHAM: I am so against runaway prosecutors, whether it's Patrick Fitzgerald working against so many people over the years, or in this case anyone else who has political axe to grind.

Alan, I want to play for both of you what Comey said just a few months about the -- this is actually in 2018, about the leaking issue. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: The FBI gets upset when people make unauthorized disclosures of protected information. There was nothing protected about this, it wasn't classified, it wasn't privileged. I believe that I acted appropriately, and I handled the memos appropriately, created them for an important and appropriate purpose.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Alan, in light of everything, thoughts about that?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, HARVARD LAW PROFESSOR EMERITUS: No, he didn't act appropriately. He acted like a coward. He leaked the information, he laundered it through a Columbia law professor. He didn't have the courage of his convictions. If he thought it was perfectly OK to release these to the media, he should've gotten on television, held a press conference, and said here, I want everybody to read these memoranda. Instead he laundered them through a law professor.

I think it was absolutely wrong what he did. But I think it was right, I agree with Joe, that you don't weaponize the criminal justice system. They applied it to Comey the same standard he applied to Hillary Clinton. Close case, but in this case it said only confidential, and the confidential staff was put on after he leaked the material. So it was not a good case for prosecution.

I would like to see disarmament on both sides. I would like to see less criminal prosecution except in extremely clear cases. Runaway prosecutors are a danger to all Americans, and so I join Joe in praising Attorney General Barr in deciding not to prosecute this case even though what Comey did was disgraceful.

INGRAHAM: Remember, it was, Joe, Barack Obama who in 2012 told those Hispanic voters punish your enemies. They predicted that Trump would use the Justice Department to punish his post Sessions. None of that has happened. Instead you have a professional acting professionally, and everybody is shocked.

DIGENOVA: Look, accountability is what matters now after the disgrace that we've had where it's very obvious that the DOJ and the FBI under Obama, Sally Yates, James Comey, McCabe, all of these people tried to basically frame Donald Trump, to defrock him, to remove him from office, to prevent him from taking office.

So what we need now is accountability through disclosure, accountability, transparency, public reports, the Horowitz report. And if there are serious crimes, like let's say that a group of people got together and said even though we know Carter Page is innocent, we are going to lie to the FISA court so we can listen in and see if we can get stuff on Trump people. If that happened, I'm for prosecuting that.

INGRAHAM: Yes, if we are using the surveillance tools, Alan, as a cudgel in a political process -- they can talk about Russia all the time. That is what they do in Russia, OK. That's not what we're supposed to be doing.

DIGENOVA: That's correct.

INGRAHAM: So that's a police state. And if there was any little mini police state operation going on here, somebody needs to go to jail.

DERSHOWITZ: And I think the FISA court has the authority to hold in contempt any particular lawyer who filed a report that wasn't completely accurate in affidavit, or didn't correct a report that may have been accurate at the time it was filed. They have a continuing obligation to update the court as to changing information, and just didn't do it.

INGRAHAM: That was never done.

DERSHOWITZ: The Democrats are now saying -- no, the Democrats are now saying they are waiting for Trump to lose the election, and then they are going to criminally prosecute him. That would be a terrible mistake, too. In our country, we don't prosecute people who lose elections, that's what happens in banana republics. And I want the Democrats to call that off. Whether Trump wins or loses, that should be the end of the matter. No prosecution, the Mueller Report does not make the case for prosecution of a sitting president even after the president is no longer sitting.

INGRAHAM: Last night they were making it out like Mueller's Report actually gave all the grounds for impeachment. And they are moving toward impeachment, Joe, not Pelosi maybe, but I'm telling you, this desperation within the Democrat Party, they are positively seething. And 24/7, they say we're angry. No, no, we actually think things are going pretty well.

DIGENOVA: I think this is a big mistake for the Democrats to move toward impeachment. I think if they do that, they're going to lose the House, but that's a political judgment. What I care about is the law. I agree with Alan. What we need to do is we need to recalibrate the prosecution function. What Bill Barr is doing is brilliant. This is a great man. This is Robert Jackson back in the Justice Department. This is somebody who says, you know what, you have all the power in the world. You don't have to act like a thug. Act like a professional.

INGRAHAM: Alan and Joe, thank you very much for being here tonight.

And the president once again took aim at the Baltimore at tonight's rally. I have some breaking news about the initial target of his ire, Congressman Cummings. Cornel West, Niger Innis, debate it next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No one has paid a higher price for the far left's destructive agenda than Americans living in our nation's inner cities. The homicide rate in Baltimore is significantly higher than El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala. Yet Democrats, and they have run it for many years, want to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on illegal migrants instead of supporting their own struggling communities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: The president highlighting, of course, the failed liberal policies that have brought once great cities like Baltimore to the brink. And get this, tonight we also learned that Congressman Elijah Cummings had his Baltimore home robbed, broken into, just hours before the president's criticism last weekend.

Here to discuss all this, Cornel West, professor of philosophy at Harvard University, and Niger Innis, national spokesperson for the Congress of Racial Equality. Niger, start with you. We hope that the burglary of the congressman's home wasn't too serious, but there's kind of a sad irony to this, isn't there?

NIGER INNIS, CONGRESS FOR RACIAL EQUALITY: Yes. And the deputy police chief of Baltimore was mugged. It is an outrage.

I think Brother West and I and you would agree on this. One-party rule in any country, any state, any city, be it from the left or from the right, is unhealthy. And Baltimore has been under a progressive and corrupt reign of terror for over 50 years. And Trump was right when he said the homicide rate is worse in Baltimore than it is in the triangle cities -- triangle countries in Central America that are sending up many of their people to escape economic ruin. Right here at home, right here in the Baltimores, in the Chicagos of our country, we have economic and all types of other crimes and feces, and all types of disgusting depravity that's taking place. And it's taking place because of liberal one-party rule. That must end.

INGRAHAM: Professor West, you might not agree with what could fix this, you probably won't, but do you agree that liberal leadership -- this is going back decades and decades, to Pelosi's father, her brother, both were Baltimore mayors, all the way up to present day -- they haven't come up with any solutions, clearly.

DR. CORNEL WEST, PROFESSOR EMERITUS, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY: One is we have to be honest about both parties. Both parties have been unable to come to terms with unbelievable poverty, social misery, decrepit schools, inadequate housing, and not enough jobs with a living wage.

But I think we have to acknowledge, brother Elijah Cummings, he's not a racist. He's a hardworking liberal in a Democratic Party that is still unable to fully deliver when it comes to precious poor people of whatever color, but disproportionately black and brown. But this has to do with the system. And this is something I think, Brother Innis, I think you would agree, too. We're not just talking about parties. We are talking about an economic system that has been unable to deliver when it comes to the least of these, to use the Biblical language.

And I think it's very important to note, my dear sister Laura, that as a fellow citizen, as a fellow human being, as a revolutionary Christian, as a democratic socialist, I don't want to destroy America, I don't want to undermine personal liberties, I don't want to eliminate the private sector, I don't want to do away with markets. I want fairness for precious poor people, fairness for precious working people. There's been a massive transfer of wealth.

INGRAHAM: I think we all want better lives for everyone in America, 100 percent.

WEST: Absolutely, but if you have unfettered markets, you're going to get a distribution of --

INGRAHAM: Right, which kind dovetails --

WEST: My thing went off.

INGRAHAM: Cornell, we'll get you back.

WEST: What happened?

INGRAHAM: Make sure we get Cornell's audio back.

But I think this dovetails into what we were talking about earlier. Niger, we had eight years of Obama, we had eight years of Bush, we had eight years of Clinton. And these cities for the most part haven't changed. Now Trump tonight talked about what he's trying to do. It's one thing, but it's not nothing. Let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Nearly 8 million African-Americans live in opportunity zones, but every Democrat voted against them, every single Democrat.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Every single Democrat voted against it, that was a question I was going to ask Cornell before we for some reason lost his audio. That's something. You've got to give people a reason to invest into risky areas. Billions of dollars of government money, where has it gone? I think that's good question. Somebody has done well with the money.

INNIS: You've had to billions, not millions, billions of dollars going into the city of Baltimore, including in Congressman Elijah Cummings district. And what do we show for it? The fact is, I know I was supposed to be on here to fight with Brother West, but I actually kind of agree with some of the things that he says.

INGRAHAM: We have Cornell West.

WEST: We want jobs with a living wage.

(CROSSTALK)

INNIS: I'm applauding you and agreeing with what you said earlier about there is a structural problem. But the structural problem is you have this unholy alliance in these big cities.

INGRAHAM: OK, we have got to get Cornell in. We've got to get Cornell. We've got about 30 seconds, Cornell. Sum it up.

WEST: I think one thing we have to recognize is there is a spiritual problem in terms of losing sight of humanity of people so we don't demonize each other across the board. I can be critical of Barack Obama's mixed legacy without in any way demonizing him or thinking he didn't make any contribution. FOX News can't be so tied to Trump the way MSNBC was tied to Obama. We have to have a corporate media that allows for conversation that flows, that focuses on issues of working and poor people, not just the talking points. It's very important for the health of a democracy, my dear sister.

INGRAHAM: Cornell, sorry about the problem. We really appreciate --

WEST: No, no, that's all right. That's all right. No, no, indeed. Indeed. Stay strong, Brother Innis.

INGRAHAM: Niger and Cornell here on THE INGRAHAM ANGLE. We have a lot more to get to, stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Nearly half of all the homeless people living in the streets in America happen to live in the state of California. What they are doing to our beautiful California is a disgrace to our country. It's a shame. The world is looking at it, look at Los Angeles with the tents and the horrible, horrible, disgusting conditions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: There are a lot of tents in D.C. as well, but California certainly has the most. That was the president tonight addressing a topic that the moderators and the 20 Democrats failed to raise over the past two nights, homelessness ravaging cities in California and other cities across the country. Here now to respond is L.A. resident, addiction medicine specialist Dr. Drew Pinsky. Dr. Drew, explain why this should have been a topic at the Democrat debates last night.

DR. DREW PINSKY, ADDICTION MEDICINE SPECIALIST: It was not a topic of debate because, unfortunately, the homeless situation in California is directly the result of failed policies here. This is not a housing problem. The federal government does have a housing structure that they are supporting. This is not a housing problem. This is a mental health crisis. And the federal government does not have specific jurisdiction over mental health in the Constitution.

In fact, the Congress occasionally has tiptoed toward the care of the mentally ill. Previous presidents had vetoed that until President Kennedy who passed the Community Mental Health Act which was designed to strangle the state mental health system. Since then, we've had total decay of our mental health provisions for the chronically mentally ill. They are all on the streets. I spent the day there on Sunday. And Laura, 100 percent, other than the criminals I saw preying on the homeless, 100 percent of the people on the streets were either major mental illness or drug addiction, 100 percent.

And I talked to dozens of people, and they all told me the same thing. Everybody is on drugs -- no surprise there. But the other thing --

INGRAHAM: Easy access.

PINSKY: Right, it's everywhere. But this is the other thing they are not preparing for. They said the same thing over and over again, this never came up multiple times. Fifty percent of the people out here will refuse care no matter what you offer them, no matter how good the service is, no matter how good the housing. That's because this is a mental health issue, and part of having this condition, much like if you had dementia, you lose insight into what is going on and you become attached to the circumstances you are in.

You have to expand the definition of gravely disabled, we have to expand conservatorship. We have to modify Prop 47. These are failed policies of our state. We have to modify Prop 47 that moves people out and into care. They are dying on the streets, and my constant refrain to every one of them is, how many bodies, how many bodies on the street before they are willing to change the policy?

INGRAHAM: They certainly talk about the concerns at the border, and they are real, and bodies on the border, and that's real. But you don't have to go to the border. Two blocks from right here, Dr. Drew. when you come to D.C., two blocks from right here, there are people shooting up, out on the street, defecating on -- and people just drive by. It's D.C., though. This is D.C. government. It's local and state governments.

And we're almost out of time. And Dr. Drew, I'm going to be out in California, so we're going to try to maybe even film some stuff together.

PINSKY: I'll be here. We're going to get together, we will. We will.

INGRAHAM: But this is just -- it's so upsetting on so many levels. This is America and this is happening, and you've been leading the discussion. Thank you so much.

And when we come back, what do President Trump and Marianne Williamson have in common? Tonight's last bite explains.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You think she could be the nominee of the Democratic Party?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just want to clear that up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We better be ready for the fact that he might be leading the Republican ticket.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I know you don't believe that, but I want to go on.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sorry to laugh.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: That is funny. Maggie Haberman there? Now, I don't expect Williamson to be at the top of the ticket, but it was amazing watching the so-called experts left off candidates yet again.

All the time we have tonight. Don't forget, new podcast dropped today, podcastone.com.

Shannon Bream and the "Fox News @ Night" team take it all from here.

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