Inside the multiple failures to stop Parkland shooting
Terry Turchie, former deputy assistant director of the FBI, on whether the school shooting could have been prevented.
This is a rush transcript from "The Story," February 26, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MARTHA MACCALLUM, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST: Hello there, Bret, thank you. So, tonight, Chairman Trey Gowdy reacts to the Democrat rebuttal memo in the Russian investigation. The highly anticipated response to Devin Nunes in Trey Gowdy's four-page memo that detailed abuse of the FISA court system to surveil Carter Page was met with this full-throated response from Chairman Nunes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. DEVIN NUNES, R-CALIF., CHAIRMAN OF THE HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: It should scare people that you have a political party in this country actually saying, don't worry American public. It's OK. We do this all the time. We're going to go dig up dirt on our opponent, get it from Russians, get it from the Brits, and we're going to take it to the FBI and open up an investigation to another campaign. That's what the Democratic memo says.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MACCALLUM: Chief National Correspondent Ed Henry here in New York with us tonight with the story. Hey, Ed.
ED HENRY, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, good to see you, Martha. Well, the problem for Adam Schiff tonight is not what Republicans are saying, is that his own predictions about the 10-page memo in his own words are now being turned against him. When Republican Devin Nunes released his memo on February 2nd, it was Schiff who complained that blocking the Democrats' rebuttal at the time was an effort to suppress the 'full truth'. Specifically, Schiff tried to claim that the FISA application to surveil Carter Page was not largely based on the dossier put together by former British spy, Christopher Steele.
Schiff adding in a February second statement, 'The majority, the Republicans suggest that the FBI failed to alert the court as to Mr. Steele's potential political motivations or the political motivations of those who hired him, but this,' Schiff said, 'is not accurate. Except, now we see the Democratic memo and number one admits that contrary to that February 2nd statement the FBI and Justice Department did not reveal to the FISA court the Steele info was paid for by the DNC and the Hillary Clinton campaign. It does not disprove the Nunes claim that former FBI Deputy Director, Andrew McCabe, testified to the House Intel panel that they could have gotten the approval to spy on Page without the dossier, and it does not disprove the Nunes claim that the does way was relied on heavily to get a total of four warrants against Page.' Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ADAM SCHIFF, D—CALIFORNIA: The FBI acted appropriately in seeking a warrant on Carter Page. They're not part of some deep state as the president, apparently, would like the public to believe.
ANDREW MCCARTHY: If you know for a certainty that there is a very specific political motivation behind, this, namely that it's the opposition candidate looking for basically monitoring of the -- of somebody tied to the other campaign, why not just come out and say that?
ERIC TRUMP, VICE PRESIDENT, THE TRUMP ORGANIZATION: You had them use opposition research to spy on presidential candidate in this country. And it's horrible; it's the worst abuse imaginable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HENRY: This is why tonight, Nunes is ratcheting pressure on top of Obama officials. Threatening potential subpoenas unless James Comey, John Brennan, and James Clapper reveal by Friday when they found out the dossier was paid for by the DNC in the Clinton camp. So, that could be compared to the time line on the FISA warrants. We've also learned that some top Republican lawmakers with security clearances have put in a request to sit in and listen to a session of the FISA court to better understand how much evidence they need before surveillance is approved. That request denied, raising even more questions tonight about the lack of transparently.
MACCALLUM: Indeed, it does. Ed, thank you very much. So, what does this mean for the Mueller investigation? Here now, Judge Andrew Napolitano, Fox News Senior Judicial Analyst. Judge, good to see you on this Monday night. So, first of all, your reaction to this Democrat memo.
ANDREW NAPOLITANO, FOX NEWS SENIOR JUDICIAL ANALYST: I think both memos overpromised and under delivered. I think there was ample evidence to surveil Carter Page under the FISA law as it exists, not the least of which were the words that came under his own mouth when he boasted that he was working for the Kremlin, at the same time he was working for the –
MACCALLUM: Then, why didn't they use that?
NAPOLITANO: I don't know why they didn't just use that. It is clear that they did not tell the FISA court everything that I, if had been sitting on my court, would want to know. But the FISA court is flawed. It's flawed because it is so accustomed to granting all the applications that come before it. Martha, it's granted literally, no exaggeration, 99.97 percent of all applications for warrants.
MACCALLUM: Based on trust.
NAPOLITANO: Correct.
MACCALLUM: Because it was initiated after 9/11. So, the feel is that if the FBI comes to them and says we need this, you need to give us this for the national security of the country. They say, OK.
NAPOLITANO: Court meets in secret, and there's nobody there to challenge the application. So, if a flawed one gets in there, they're going to grant it.
MACCALLUM: So, we need to rework the system.
NAPOLITANO: Yes, we do absolutely.
MACCALLUM: All right. In terms of the Mueller investigation and where it goes from here. A piece today, the left's fever dream of Mueller indicting Trump won't happen even if he finds something. And then it goes on to say here's why, and it explains the historical precedent that would be set.
NAPOLITANO: I agree with that piece. If Mueller finds that Donald Trump committed a federal crime while he was the president of the United States, the remedy is impeachment. The remedy is to send that to the House of Representatives and let the house decide what to do the do with it. Could the president be indicted after he left office? Probably. Has a president ever been indicted while sitting? No, because the constitution is pretty clear that the remedy is impeachment. That's the evidence of that piece that you site and almost all legal authorities agreed with that.
MACCALLUM: In terms of where it's going and how quickly. There's a lot going on with whether or not the president is going to speak to Robert Mueller, in what form or shape that might take, whether it's written statements. You know, what kind of sit down might be appropriate. And it feels like, you know, his attorneys obviously don't want to see that happen, but it could prolong the whole thing.
NAPOLITANO: Yes. OK, so Bob Mueller has asked to speak to the president, just as the FBI or a federal prosecutor asks anybody to speak to them, they may say no, the president may say no. Bob Mueller could respond by subpoenaing him before a grand jury. So, if Bob Mueller is facing the president, he has his lawyers there, they can he whisper in his ear, he can whisper in their ear, but that's a very dangerous environment for the president. Because four people will have agreed to speak to Bob Mueller and his interrogators have been indicted or pleaded guilty to lying.
It's very easy to trip someone up, particularly someone who doesn't necessarily use an economy of words like the president. Flip side is, that if the grand jury subpoenas the president, he can resist that subpoena but he will eventually lose that resistance and ultimately have to appear there, where there'll be no lawyer to give him any guidance and it's fair game as to what Bob Mueller could ask him and what answers he could give. Those are both very dangerous environments for the president. He needs to avoid both of them.
MACCALLUM: Yes. The president spoke the other night to Jeanine Pirro, and he was upset that there isn't an equal and opposite reaction happening on the Democrat side of this investigation into this FISA court, into how it worked out, into Hillary Clinton's side of the campaign. And here's what he said -- is it sound or we just have a screen of it? Let's play it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST: And you know what's interesting.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Somebody should look into it because what they did is really fraudulent, and somebody should be looking into that. And by somebody, I'm talking about, you know who.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NAPOLITANO: He's got a very good point.
MACCALLUM: And you know who is Jeff Sessions.
NAPOLITANO: You know who is probably Bob Mueller. Jeff Sessions would say, no, it involves Russia, I can't --
MACCALLUM: I thought he was talking about the attorney general.
NAPOLITANO: Well, is Jeff Sessions still the attorney general, because --
MACCALLUM: Or Rod Rosenstein, or whoever else that couldn't come onto it.
NAPOLITANO: Somebody in the Justice Department has a treasure trove of evidence of Mrs. Clinton's criminality at her own hands or through others that ought to be investigated. I fully agree with the president on that.
MACCALLUM: Judge Napolitano, always good to see you, judge, thank you very much.
NAPOLITANO: You're welcome. I'm sticking around to hear what Trey Gowdy has to say.
MACCALLUM: Me too. We'll all to do that. All right. So, a live look now at the House floor where a vote is wrapping up right now. Congressman Trey Gowdy will join us as soon as he finishes there and runs down the hallway and joins us in front of the camera. So, stick around for that with the judge and me. Plus, why the Supreme Court's decision today refusing to hear President Trump's bid to end the DACA problem is actually a win for the White House, according to them. We'll hear about that.
Plus, several new failures just revealed in the Florida school shooting massacre, including, have you heard the transcript? Looked at this transcript of this 13-minute phone call to the FBI? It will astonish you. We're going to show you what is actually in there and how it was laid out, and how this person on the other end of the phone answered these questions. Also, Terry Turchie, a Former Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI, takes us behind the scenes of the investigation next.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: But we have to take steps to harden or schools, so that they're less vulnerable to attack. This includes allowing well-trained and certified school personnel to carry concealed firearm.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MACCALLUM: We are back and fresh off a vote on the House floor, Congressman Trey Gowdy, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee and Member of the House Intelligence Committee as well. Good to see you tonight, chairman. Thank you for being here.
REP. TREY GOWDY, R-S.C., CHAIRMAN OF THE HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Yes, ma'am.
MACCALLUM: So, this obviously the Democrat memo of the rebuttal to your memo came out over the weekend and you've had a chance to look it over, no doubt. What did you think about their assertion that there was plenty of other reason to surveil Carter Page other than the dossier?
GOWDY: Well, my first reaction of that is if had you a bunch of other reasons to get a FISA application on Carter Page, then why did you need the dossier in the Yahoo News article? If you have enough information without using the dossier and a newspaper article, then why did you use it? So, I've never taken the position that they didn't have a reason for being interested in Carter Page. I've never taken that position. But, if you have enough, why are you relying on a national enquirer article, and no offense, but media reporting to get a warrant?
MACCALLUM: So, when you go to the -- you know, they had every reason to want to do that, right? You go through their document and you look at the meetings, the FBI surveillance of Carter Page starting back in 2013, discussions that he had with individuals at one point, members of the Russian Intelligence Arm call him an idiot, they say that he's practicing his Russian on them. So, obviously there's a lot of back and forth going on there. My question is, if there was so much concern over Carter Page, it doesn't seem like the investigation is particularly interested in him anymore and hasn't been for some time.
GOWDY: Well, he hasn't been indicted. We don't have any idea what's coming if anything by Robert Mueller, but you put your finger on something. The Russians didn't take him seriously. I don't think the FBI took him seriously. I spent a long time interviewing him. If ever a witness needed to avail himself of his Sixth Amendment right to a lawyer, it was Carter Page. That was one of the most painful interviews I have ever been part of. It was actually sad. I mean, Democrats, if they were to be honest, the House Intel interview of Carter Page, they would tell you, it was sad. He doesn't know when to stop talking, and nobody takes him seriously. So, he's not Jason Bourne. He's not James bond. If the FBI wanted to investigate him, fine. Go, do it. But why are you relying on opposition research by the DNC and not telling the court where you got it?
MACCALLUM: Yes, and your memo also pointed out that Deputy Director McCabe testified before the committee in December of 2017 that no surveillance warrant would've been sought from FISA without the Steele dossier confirmation. So, it's pretty tough to argue that given the fact that McCabe himself said that they needed that dossier in order to get it. Now, I know you have a lot of questions about the dossier and how aware the rest of the intelligence arms in the Obama Administration were of this, how is it going with getting answers or response from John Brennan and Mr. Clapper?
GOWDY: I just pumped into Devin on the floor. I don't think the deadline has expired for us to get answers. But you know, John Brennan, and Clapper, and others have a lot to say when they're on television shows. So, I would expect them to have at least enough time to answer some pretty rudimentary but fundamental questions about what they knew about the dossier and when they knew it. We've had -- I interviewed Brennan, what, several months ago?
MACCALLUM: Yes, we played that the other night.
GOWDY: I don't think he was aware that that dossier was used in a court proceeding.
MACCALLUM: All right. Another topic for you. Hope Hicks is going to testify in front of the House Intel Committee tomorrow, we understand. What is the scope of the questioning with one of the issues that delayed that? What is the scope of the questioning for her tomorrow?
GOWDY: You know what, Martha, I hate to be a bad Republican, but I don't think Congress ought to be limiting the scope of the -- it has to be relevant, obviously. We can't ask her about something that happened in high school. And I say that because the Democrats sometimes do like to go back 25 years to ask questions, but we're investigating what did Russia do with whom did they do it? What was the U.S. government's response and then the issue of disseminating classified information? That's the scope to me. So, if she was part of the campaign, then we ought to be able to ask her about Adam Schiff's allegations of collusion. So, I don't think we ought to be limited to anything other than that scoping document and what's relevant to that.
MACCALLUM: And you'll be asking about the Trump Tower meeting in June of 2016 and the response to that that was put together on the Trump plane, I would imagine.
GOWDY: The response might also be in Bob Mueller's jurisdiction. But we will ask about that, we're entitled to ask about it, but most assuredly that meeting June 2016 at Trump Tower. It's relevant.
MACCALLUM: Trey Gowdy, always good to see you, sir, thank you very much.
GOWDY: Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Thank you.
MACCALLUM: You bet. So, moments ago, the names of the victims of the Florida massacre read on the house floor followed by a moment of silence. This comes amid growing demand that Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel stepped down. As Florida Governor Rick Scott orders an investigation into how Israel's department handled all of this, which is getting murkier by the moment. Could this catastrophe have been prevented?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: When did your deputies, not Peterson, but the others, when did they arrive on scene because Coral Springs sources say, when Coral Springs police arrived, there were Broward deputies there in addition to Peterson.
SCOTT ISRAEL, BROWARD COUNTY SHERIFF: And I don't dispute that, but that is an active investigation. We have not taken statements yet from the Coral Springs officers.
TRUMP: I really believe I'd run into even if I didn't have a weapon, and I think most of the people in this room would've done that, too, because I know most of you. But the way they performed was really a disgrace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MACCALLUM: Trace Gallagher joins us now live in our West Coast Newsroom with the story. Trace?
TRACE GALLAGHER, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST: Martha, Broward County Sheriff, Scott Israel, thinks his leadership has been, 'amazing'. Governor Rick Scott will leave that assessment up to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The governor has now confirmed that FDLE will conduct a full and immediate investigation. Here's the governor, watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICK SCOTT, FLORIDA GOVERNOR: Give us the facts. Hold people accountable. The local sheriff's department, they've got to be completely transparent. We have to do a thorough investigation and whoever didn't do their job has to be held accountable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GALLAGHER: But 74 state GOP lawmakers don't want to sit and wait for the findings. They're calling on Governor Scott to suspend the sheriff right now saying, 'The failures of Sheriff Israel and his deputies during and after this horrific shooting and their failures to intervene regarding Nikolas Jacob Cruz in the years, months, and days leading up to the shooting are unacceptable and unforgivable.' The years, months, and days, part of that statement, I guess, read refers to the fact that dating back to 2008, Broward County deputies responded to at least two dozen calls involving Nikolas Cruz and his family, including a call from someone in 2016 warning a deputy that Cruz could be 'a school shooter in-the-making'. The deputy who mishandled that call has now been placed on restrictive duty.
And now, we're hearing a brand-new defense for school resource officer Scot Peterson -- he's the deputy accused of taking cover outside the school instead of confronting the shooter. His lawyer says, Peterson did the right thing because he thought the shooting was outside. So, he followed protocol. And Coral Springs police officers are now telling local newspapers that when they arrived on scene, three our Broward County deputies also waited outside the building -- the sheriff is not disputing that, he's also not commenting further. We should note that post-Columbine officers around the country are trained to confront the shooter even if they are alone and outgunned because the presence of law enforcement is proven to slow down or stop the majority of suspects. Martha?
MACCALLUM: Trace, thank you very much. So, there is outcry tonight for a new system to be put in place at the FBI regarding its tip line. Take a look at how they handled a call less than two months ago from a woman who said she was very close to the shooter. She describes his disturbing social media posts and how he likes to cut up animals. The FBI employee responding 'hmmm...' The woman says, he lives with guns and is 'going to explode'. The FBI employee responds, 'OK.' He has a 'whole bag with all kinds of rifles and he's going to buy more.' The operator responds, 'OK.' The caller thinks about Cruz getting into a school and just shooting the place up, and she is met with: Thanks. So, if anybody has questions they can call you back. Is that correct? Terry Turchie, is Former Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI. Terry, welcome. It's good to have you with us tonight. What goes through your mind when you hear that transcript?
TERRY TURCHIE, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF THE FBI: Martha, it's hard to sit here and do this interview with you. If we're going to go out to the public and say that if you see something, say something, we have to be ready to do something and that was always what the FBI stood for. And I have to think, if you look back to the days after 9/11 a lot of decisions were made about how to allocate resources and where to put agents and freeing up a lot of agents to do terrorism and other work. I think a lot of them were taken off complaint duty because in the day I was in the FBI, being a complaint agent was a big deal. We were very careful in field divisions to choose the right people to put on complaint duty.
So, you talk to an agent. You called your local FBI. You talked to an FBI agent. You didn't talk to a professional staff person. And the reason is simple, FBI agents start their career by going to the FBI Academy in Quantico. They learn how to take complaints, they learn how to go through what are violations are, they go out to the first field office, they have a senior mentor as an agent. They interviewed people who've -- that not only the victims of crimes but people that have committed crimes. And as they move on in their career, they're getting in more experience there, so when they get ready to want to maybe express an interest in being a complaint agent, they know how to sort through this information and they know what threats and risks are, and that's lacking today, that's very clear from those conversations.
MACCALLUM: And you caught the unabomber based on 55,000 tips that came into those kind of calls, right?
TURCHIE: Our biggest worry, Martha, in dealing with the unabomb tip line after we put that manifesto out. OK, it's out there. We hope somebody will recognize it. Now, we have to be able to pick it out the right complaint and right call from all the calls we got. And yes, we got 55,000 calls to the unabomb tip line between September 19th, when we put out the manifesto and the middle of February, that call was actually that actually was the call that broke this case came from an agent in Washington field office who actually refused to take no. She'd been discouraged actually -- her name was Mollie Flynn -- but she called out to San Francisco four times over the intercom system, and an agent supervisor names Joel Moss answered that call. And within 36 hours from that call everything else was closed down and we were pursuing Theodore Kaczynski.
MACCALLUM: What a story. I want to put up the final full screen here from this call. Because I think this is important because the caller says: 'Are you an agent?' This is at the end of the phone call that we just spoke about. 'We are intake specialists, ma'am.' 'OK. Very good. I don't know whether to call you or Homeland Security or who. I just want, you know, to get this off my chest in case something does happen. I do believe something is going to happen.' It's pretty shocking.
TURCHIE: It's terrible. And you know, when we put out that word call your local FBI, call some government agency. We can't just be another government agency, we have to be the FBI. And the person on the other side of that line might be saving the entire country. What if a dirty bomb call comes in? You only get one chance, you only get one shot at this, and you need to know what you're doing. And, in this case, there's no way to talk around this. We made it not just a mistake, but this was a huge failure, and we've got to find out why, we've got to dive into it, and it cannot happen again.
MACCALLUM: Well, let's hope they're taking this very seriously at the current FBI and that they are instituting the changes that you are talking about in terms of putting agents back in charge of receiving these calls. Terry Turchie, thank you so much. Good to talk to you tonight.
TURCHIE: Thanks, Martha. You bet.
MACCALLUM: So, coming up. What did President Reagan really think about Jane Fonda? A long-time Reagan aide is sharing secrets from movie nights at Camp David. Stick around for that. Plus, there are new developments tonight for DACA as Democrats paint a doomsday picture for DREAMERS and the Supreme Court decides to stay out of it for now. So, what is going to happen here? Mercedes Schlapp, assistant to President Trump has some answers coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: DACA is going to be put back into the Ninth Circuit. You know, we tried to get it move quickly, because we'd like to help DACA. I think everybody in this room wants to help with DACA. But the Supreme Court just ruled that it has to go through the normal channels. So, it's going back in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MACCALLUM: President Trump weighing in on that Supreme Court decision today not to step into the DACA debate. The high court refusing to review the administration's appeal to a previous ruling that blocked it from ending the DACA program. Mercedes Schlapp, Assistant to the President and White House Senior Advisor, joins me now from the White House lawn. Mercedes, good to see you tonight.
MERCEDES SCHLAPP, ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISOR: Great to see you.
MACCALLUM: What happens now on this?
SCHLAPP: Well, clearly, the administration is focused on the legislative solution piece of not only DACA, but as well as securing the border as well. Ending chain migration and ending the diversity lottery visa. As we know, the president proposed a very generous compromise and wants to have bipartisan support on this issue. When you look at it from the fact that the majority of Americans support the four pillars of the president, and you find that the majority of Americans also believe that the Democrats are not being sincere in the pursuit of a DACA fix and making it a political issue, I mean, it's just so important to realize that this legislative solution is needed to provide the permanent fix for DACA in addition to securing the border so this doesn't happen again.
MACCALLUM: I know the president has said he doesn't think that Democrats are serious about actually helping the dreamers. Dick Durbin this morning was espousing some pretty frightening numbers. And I'd like you to listen to this and respond to it, Mercedes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. DICK DURBIN, D—ILL.: One thousands of these young people a day will be subject to deportation, will be unable to continue to legally work in America. They include 900 of them who have volunteered to serve in our military. Risk their lives for our country. They will lose their status and be forced out of the military. Twenty thousand of them are teachers across America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MACCALLUM: The numbers that we saw was 800 military. About 1,000, I believe, teachers, but, whatever. Will those people, you know, does the White House want to have a deal where those people, DACA recipients who are in the military, would they be asked to leave the country, Mercedes?
SCHLAPP: Well, I mean, first of all, Senator Durbin's comments are outrageous. As we know, the president is proposing a very generous compromise. You're talking about 1.8 million DACA recipients that would then lead to a pathway to citizenship. He wants a permanent fix. The Democrats need to come to the table and need to provide a solution as opposed to playing politics with the lives of these DACA recipients. With that being said, the Democrat have to decide if they're going to be protecting the criminal alien or are they going to be protecting the American people? And that is why it is crucial at this moment for the Democrats to come on board with this reasonable, common sense immigration reform package that the president has laid out, which the vast majority of Americans agree with. They want this to have the solution. But, yet, the Democrats continue to play with this political football and at the same time using the DACA recipients as political pawns.
MACCALLUM: So, will the president -- you know, it was a fascinating meeting. Last time they all got around the table in there. Would the president initiate another one of those to have Dick Durbin sit next to him again and sort of hold everybody's feet to the fire on both sides of this?
SCHLAPP: Well, there's no question there's been ongoing discussions on the immigration framework. At this point, we'll see what the house does in terms of pushing forward immigration legislation. We were obviously disappointed that the Grassley bill did not pass. That contained the four pillars of the president, immigration framework. So what we want is we want congress to act. We know that DACA is unlawful. It requires a legislative fix. The president has provided a permanent solution as well as making sure that we give our ICE agents and we give our border patrol agents the resources and authority they need to ensure that we can stop the influx of drugs. The influx of illegal immigrants, the influx of MS-13 gang members who are killing Americans, and that is what we want to push for.
MACCALLUM: All right. Mercedes Schlapp. Thank you, Mercedes. Good to see you tonight.
SCHLAPP: Thank you so much.
MACCALLUM: Have a good night. So here now with more, Charles Hurt, political columnist from the Washington Times and a Fox News contributor, Austan Goolsbee, former chief economist for President Obama. Good to see both of you, gentleman. Thanks for being here tonight. Austan, first to you, you know, clearly, Dick Durbin is frightening a lot of people with those statements. The president has said that he would like to keep 1.8 million of the DACA recipients here as the beginning opening offer in this deal. Do they really want -- does Dick Durbin really want a deal to protect all of these Dreamers?
AUSTAN GOOLSBEE, FORMER CHIEF ECONOMIST FOR PRESIDENT OBAMA: well, yes. He wants a deal to protect the Dreamers. He doesn't want the president's deal. I mean, that -- what Mercedes told us was gas lighting of the highest order. The president created the crisis over DACA. Everything was going fine. The president created.
MACCALLUM: But President Obama said at the outset that it was a temporary program, Austan. Is that correct?
GOOLSBEE: The president put a deadline. And he picked a date and he said if I set this deadline, I should be able to get Democrats to give me some things that I want. And what happened today in the court is they said.
MACCALLUM: President Obama said it was a temporary program, so that means it's going to run out at some point and that Congress has to come up with some kind of solution. Charlie?
(CROSSTALK)
GOOLSBEE: President Trump's deal will cut immigration in half.
CHARLIE HURT, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: In addition to that the DACA deal that Obama gave us came after years and years and years of him, rightly saying that he didn't have the power to do any of this. Really, what happened with the Supreme Court today, there's been a lot of misreporting about it. What basically happened was the Supreme Court declined to get involved. But the fact that President Trump asked the Supreme Court to get involved in the first place, I think, is just further proof on top of mountains of evidence before now that the president really does want to do something and do something in a timely manner. And Austan, the thing that you just said I think is exactly right. Democrats -- it's not that they don't want to help the Dreamers. It's that they don't want to be helping the Dreamers with the president because it's all politics to them. And if.
(CROSSTALK)
GOOLSBEE: That's not what I said. I said they don't want Donald Trump's deal because.
HURT: Yeah, exactly.
GOOLSBEE: Donald Trump's deal is a bad deal for the country. It's not that they don't want to appear with him.
MACCALLUM: Increase border security which most of the country wants.
(CROSSTALK)
MACCALLUM: And allow the Dreamers a pathway to citizenship, which a lot of conservatives are against but the president kind of went to the middle.
GOOLSBEE: Covering your eyes like this so you don't see what else is in the deal.
MACCALLUM: All right, tell me.
GOOLSBEE: I agree with the Dreamers part. That would be good. And then it would cut legal immigration almost in half. That would be a terrible idea. And they wouldn't go along.
MACCALLUM: We have cut legal immigration in this country many times over the course of history in order to allow the people who are here to have employment, to get used to being in the country. Why is that such a marker to say -- all right, for period of time, we're going cut the number a little bit.
GOOLSBEE: Why is it a bad idea? Look, it's a fair question. The answer is because the native born population growth is extremely low. And if we deny ourselves to access to people who want to be American and believe in the American way.
MACCALLUM: Right.
GOOLSBEE: We're cutting off, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, the replenishing stream that allows us to keep propagating the American dream. I think it's a terrible mistake.
MACCALLUM: OK. So we need more people. Charlie?
HURT: Well, you know, Austan, you may be against cutting legal immigration, but polls shows the overwhelming numbers of Americans do favor it. And that, of course, that's how Donald Trump got elected in the first place because when you look at all of the issues he campaigned on, he did campaign a lot of issues. There is no issue that he was more specific and clear about than immigration. And a big part of that was actually talking about legal immigration, which nobody -- and this is a pox of both party houses. Neither Democrats nor Republicans in Washington like talking about that at all because both parties have very, very strong constituencies that want to keep or increase both legal immigration and to some extent illegal immigration.
MACCALLUM: All right. We've got to leave it there. Thank you both, though. Good to see you both. Austan, Thank you. Charlie, thank you. So coming up next tonight on The Story, these five powerful women who could change the future of the Democrat Party and the country. Karl Rove with his expert insight coming up next. Also, as Hollywood prepares to celebrate the 90th Academy Awards. A long-time aide to President Reagan reveals the former actor's favorite movie pick and the top pick might surprise you when we come back.
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UNINDENTIFIED MALE: Bueller. Bueller. Bueller.
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MACCALLUM: Prominent Democrats considering their future tonight and the future of these five powerful women. What role might they play in all that. Karl Rove is former deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush, and a Fox News contributor. Karl, good evening. Good to see you.
KARL ROVE, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Good evening.
MACCALLUM: On this Monday night. Let me start with Dianne Feinstein. She has been in the Senate since 1992, and she would like another round, but it looks like Californians are questioning whether or not that's a good idea.
ROVE: Well, at least California delegates, California Democratic convention delegates are. California has a rule that the party can officially -- at least the Democrats can officially designate their candidate in a primary give them the sort of party's official blessing if they get 60 percent of the delegates at their congressional district level, or in the case of the Dianne Feinstein, the state convention. She did not get -- not only did she not get 60 percent of the votes, but she came in second to her more left-wing Democratic challenger who is a member of the state Senate.
MACCALLUM: Yeah, that's going to be interesting to watch. Obviously, she is a very formidable person in the Senate and she holds a lot of leadership positions, and we'll see what her future holds. In terms of Elizabeth Warren, we know the president's favorite nickname for her, and she seems to be trying to shed that ahead of the election. I mean, I know why she want to shed it, but what about the whole relationship with her and her ancestry? It's kind of dogged her for a long time. Can she fix that?
ROVE: Well, she's going to try. She's been engaged in outreach to Native American tribal leadership in order to say I'm sympathetic with your cause and I'll carry your legislation, and I want to have an open line of communication which she is looking for. This is sort of preventative move. She's thinking ahead to 2019 and 2020. Particularly, a general election in 2020 where Donald Trump would be going after her for having claimed as she made her way up through academia as a law professor that she was of Native American ancestry when it might have helped her get points for diversity on her application. Now, she no longer says that. She now has a much more nuanced view which is I can't prove it, she admits, but it's my family tradition that we had -- that we were -- I believe it's Cherokee Indian descent. And we'll see how this works out. I don't think it's very smart on her part. It's not very smart for her coming up to be able to sort of claim it episodically when it matter when applying for a job in academia. She would not only say, I'm not only a woman but I'm also a member of Native American minorities.
MACCALLUM: Checking a lot of boxes.
ROVE: Checking a lot of boxes, yeah.
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MACCALLUM: All right. Let put these three women up and Juan Williams' quote from his op-ed. The three strongest Democratic challengers to President Trump's reelection are now all black woman, he writes. It's looking more, more likely that 2020 would be the year that a woman finishes the journey and shatters not one but two glass ceilings. Your thoughts on that?
ROVE: well, look, first of all, we've sort of got the Ouija board out, all of us. Let's be honest, the 2020 election, presidential election is several geological ages away.
MACCALLUM: I don't know about geological ages. That would be hundreds of thousands of years.
ROVE: It's forever.
MACCALLUM: It's not that far.
ROVE: It will feel like hundreds of thousands of years by the time. Look, we've got a long time to go. Now, there's three names mentioned. All of them, you know, you can make a case for. Oprah Winfrey, though, I thought was interesting. Right after the Golden Globe Awards which she made a big splash. There was a poll done, she had very high favorables and very low negatives and 54 percent of the people didn't want her to run for president. I'm not certain I see what going to make that go away.
MACCALLUM: What about Michelle Obama?
ROVE: Michelle Obama, accomplished individual. But remember in 2016, 32 percent thought the country was going in the right direction, and 65 percent said it was off seriously on the wrong track. Do we really think that in 2020 that the country will turned around and said, wait a minute, we were wrong? We were going exactly in the right place so let's have more Obama.
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MACCALLUM: And she's got a book coming out in November, so we'll see. Kamala Harris, real quick and I've got to go.
ROVE: Freshman senator. We'll see. My sense is she's got some talent, but she has yet to display it. She will, however, be the most vociferously resistant senator running in all likelihood, or she or Cory Booker will be competing for that one, Bernie Sanders. So she can be way up on the far-left of the Democratic Party. Not certain that's going to be what's going to win a 2020 presidential election.
MACCALLUM: Memorable feisty back and forth with chief of staff, General John Kelly. Karl, good to see you tonight. Thanks for weighing in.
ROVE: Thank you, Martha.
MACCALLUM: See you soon.
ROVE: You bet.
MACCALLUM: So coming up here, a trusted advisor to President Ronald Reagan getting personal, sharing what the former actor turned president really thought about Hollywood, including Mr. Reagan's behind the scenes comments about Jane Fonda. What does he say in the privacy of Camp David about her? Former Reagan special advisor, Mark Weinberg, joins us exclusively tonight. Don't miss it. Coming up next.
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BARBARA WALTERS, JOUNRALIST: Are you still haunted by the whole Hanoi, Jane -- kind of feeling, is that still there?
JANE FONDA, ACTRESS: I think that most people in this country feel enough already. That was 15 years ago. Dues have been paid.
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MACCALLUM: So as Hollywood is preparing for its biggest night, one man inside look at President Ronald Reagan relationship with Tinsel Town from big screen scenes that touched his heart to awkward run-in with some of Hollywood biggest name. Here now back with The Story tonight, Mark Weinberg, former special advisor -- press secretary to President Reagan, and author of the new book, Movie Nights with the Reagans, which we love, a memoir. Good to see you, Mark. Welcome back.
MARK WEINBERG, FORMER SPECIAL ADVISOR TO PRESIDENT REAGAN: Thank you very much.
MACCALLUM: So it's so fun to hear about the movies that he liked. And really, when he watched a movie, you say, he dug in. There was no sort of chatting with him. He was there to watch the movie.
WEINBERG: He studied the movie. The movie started. His eyes went to the screen and they didn't leave until the movie was over.
MACCALLUM: '9 to 5' was a favorite, but there was a little something he was not too happy with, right?
WEINBERG: Well, it almost was a favorite except for the scene where there was marijuana smoking. And he said that that bothered him because it wasn't necessary. Said, you know, they could have been having some wine and it would have had the same effect. And it sure bothered Mrs. Reagan as well for obvious reasons.
MACCALLUM: You say it would have been better if they all got drunk.
WEINBERG: Yes, he did.
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MACCALLUM: All right. So in terms of the people that came to visit, Michael Jackson came to a movie night?
WEINBERG: No, he didn't come to a movie night. He came to the White House for an event having to do with safe driving.
MACCALLUM: So tell us what happened there.
WEINBERG: Well, the staff got very excited, and Michael took refuge in one of the rooms from the White House to kind of collect himself because there were more staff members hanging out in the hallways that day than any other thing I've seen since before or since.
MACCALLUM: Everybody was excited.
WEINBERG: Everybody.
MACCALLUM: …picture from that day
WEINBERG: Oh, yeah.
MACCALLUM: How long was he hiding in the bathroom?
WEINBERG: Just a few minutes. But it seemed like a long time. No one was quite sure when he would come out.
MACCALLUM: All right. So in terms of Jane Fonda, what were his thoughts on -- great, great actress?
WEINBERG: Yes.
MACCALLUM: Controversial in her history, of course, based on the picture that you see there of her on the tank in North Vietnam. What were his thoughts?
WEINBERG: Well, she was a great actress and he respected the talent, but did not appreciate what she did with regard to the Vietnam War. And that bothered him because he thought it was unpatriotic and unnecessary and not helpful. And it just wasn't his style.
MACCALLUM: And was he worried about her influence on his own young people?
WEINBERG: I do write in Movie Nights that her friendship with Patty, his daughter, bothered him. And he was afraid that Patty might be being used.
MACCALLUM: Patty has written the most beautiful things about him in later years.
WEINBERG: Yes, she has.
MACCALLUM: Their elationship late in his life was pretty unique and special. Real quick, Ferris Bueller. Everyone loved Ferris Bueller, so does Ronald Reagan.
WEINBERG: They love that movie. It was one of their favorites. It was funny, it was relevant, it was clean. It had a song in there that they liked. It was a great night.
MACCALLUM: Mark, thank you. Always a great night when you come to The Story. Thanks for being here.
WEINBERG: Happy to be here. Thanks for having me. Thank you.
MACCALLUM: So coming up next, the preacher, the presidents, and the role of Billy Graham in terms of changing that gentleman, our former president's life when we come back.
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GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: If there's such a thing as a humble shepherd of the Lord, Billy Graham is that person.
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MACCALLUM: This week, we will be remembering Reverend Billy Graham on Wednesday. He will lie in honor in the U.S. Capitol. President Trump will lay a wreath in tribute. Today, they lined the streets for miles in North Carolina to watch his motorcade pass by. One who watched a former president who credited America's pastor for moving him away from alcohol and toward God. Our nation's 43rd president, earlier today, George W. Bush and his wife, Laura, paid their respect in Charlotte. The president had said God's work in him began in Ernest with Graham's outreach. And he wrote in the Wall Street Journal, quote, he told me about one of the bible's most fundamental lessons, one should strive to be better but we're all sinners who earn God's love, not through good deeds but through his grace. The president ended the piece by saying that he rejoices that Graham is now in the company of God whom he loves so much. We will see you back here tomorrow night. More of The Story tomorrow at 7:00. Tucker Carlson joins us next.
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