Vince Ellison, a conservative columnist and lecturer and author of the book, The Iron Triangle and David Schoen, Civil Liberties Attorney and former Board Member of the Alabama Civil LIberties Union are here to unpack the press conference on the Rayshard Brooks shooting in Atlanta, GA today. The Fulton County D.A. is addressing the encounter with the police and the public’s response in the wake of the George Floyd murder. The Sean Hannity Show is on weekdays from 3 pm to 6 pm ET on iHeartRadio and Hannity.com. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
We are expecting, it should be happening any minute now, a decision on the issue of charges and the shooting in Atlanta, Rayshard Brooks case.
We'll go to that when that announcement takes place.
Man, I tell you, this, I was talking to a friend of mine today, and it's like, this year has been rough.
It's been rough on everybody.
Worst pandemic, yep, since 1917 and 1918.
I never, you know, then we had to all in horror, the country watch what happened to George Floyd.
Can't happen.
President laid out his reforms, as we told you yesterday.
You know, the amazing thing about that is, you know, those are all things that Joe Biden and Barack Obama could have done.
They did nothing.
They didn't do any of these changes.
Now everyone's telling President Trump what to do and how he needs to do it.
Did they forget Cambridge and Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri?
Because it seems like they all did.
Forget it all.
There's a Rasmussen poll that should make every American pause and be sad, frankly, that was released yesterday.
34% of likely U.S. voters think that the U.S. will experience a second civil war sometime in the next five years.
And that includes 9% who say it's very likely.
We are the United States of America.
Do we want to remain the United States of America?
Because I do believe it's the greatest country God ever gave man.
You know, we have the ability to right wrongs, correct injustices.
I wrote my book, Live Free or Die, with the history of why we've become the greatest wealth-producing nation on the face of the earth and what is at stake when you compare the Democrats' 2020 agenda, new Green Deal madness, everything's free madness, everything's government-run madness.
Get rid of and eliminate all the, you know, the lifeblood of the economy, oil and gas and coal, gone forever.
Okay, they're nuts versus capitalism and liberty and risk and reward and ingenuity of the American mind.
You know, put it in this context, I said from the very beginning of the COVID breakout that I have a lot of faith in our medical scientists and researchers and medical professionals.
And every indication is, and there was an article about this today.
We'll get an update actually on this today from Dr. Oz.
Bill O'Reilly also joins us today.
I mean, the ability to break down the sequence of coronavirus never happened this fast.
They did it in weeks, like six weeks.
And now there are, they believe at the latest that they might be able to now Operation Warp Speed is what it's called to deliver 300 million doses of a vaccine for any American that wants one.
By the way, testing, I can tell you, you can go anywhere and get a test in New York and pretty much every place I've gone to.
There's no line ever.
You know, maybe you have to wait 10 minutes.
That's it.
You go in, you actually register yourself, you put in your insurance information, blah, blah, blah.
And, you know, email address or phone number.
They send you over your results, text back to you, whatever.
Anyway, the officials now saying that 14 promising candidates for a vaccine, originally it was 100.
They've now sort of weeded it down to the 14 best already in clinical trials.
And they're going to now get it further down to about the seven most promising candidates.
All successful vaccines will be approved by the FDA.
And I'm hearing it might even be sooner than January when that number is available.
That's American ingenuity.
That's what freedom gives you.
We have Comrade de Blasio.
I mean, I can't understand this.
Now there's a pushback about the president and the rally and every Democrat criticizing the president.
He's having a rally in Oklahoma.
You know, they're going to have temperature checks.
Everybody, if you want to go to the rally, will have to wear a mask and still nearly a million people.
And you have to sign a waiver that you understand that there is a risk.
There's been some resurgence in about 19 states.
We'll talk to Dr. Oz about it.
I go through anecdotally what I always say is, well, every store I went to, my grocery store in particular, my Rite Aid, my pharmacy, they never closed.
They never shut down.
The medical professionals, those making all the PPE equipment in the world, they kept working.
They never shut down.
They kept New York and all of these states, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, every state that was struggling alive and fed, and farmers and packers and drivers, truck drivers, and the kids that stock the shelves and the cashiers that would check you out.
I like the fast one to do it myself.
I just do it faster.
And I don't mind packing my own bags.
I prefer to do it anyway.
It's all good.
And then you got the hypocrisy.
There's been no talk of COVID during all of these protests.
Many peaceful people, but unfortunately, the anarchists are there.
The troublemakers are there.
The rioters, they go out and riot and looting and arson and 800 cops hurt, bottles, bricks, rocks, Molotov cocktails, number dead, 800 injured.
One guy in Vegas now paralyzed.
But all of a sudden now, Trump is having a rally.
Now we're going to talk about COVID.
I guess the simple answer is just to say that it's not a rally.
It's a protest.
Then they should have no problem with the president going to Oklahoma on Saturday.
Comrade de Blasio is out there every day.
Sometimes he got caught without his mask on, you know, driving to places he need not even drive just to take little walks and going late into this whole thing with going to his gym.
And he says that it's inappropriate for kids to use playgrounds.
It undermines the virus fight.
This is the guy that's let anarchy rule the streets of New York every night.
Nobody listens to him ever on his curfew.
I mean, it's madness all over the place.
And him and Cuomo, they're still fighting each other.
You can't even make it up what's going on in the city and the state of New York.
Now, there's been a lot of talk about, well, what should the president do as it relates to, I guess they've negotiated it down that they're going to only put up concrete barriers instead of the walls that I thought were bad.
Walls apparently, it's okay to build walls if you're in the autonomous free love zone, chops or chaz or whatever you're calling it at any given moment or the spaghetti potluck zone.
Funniest thing I ran on TV last night is you have fake news CNN.
The reporters are calling it, it's like a street festival.
And the people there here, the reporters say it's not a street festival, correcting them right on the air.
The people that are in the autonomy zone, the free love zone.
Then you have the same thing with conspiracy TV, MSDNC.
They say the same stupid thing.
They get corrected live on television.
No, it's not.
This isn't a festival.
And so now we have, you know, it seems like the mayor is just aiding and abetting.
How long is it going to go on?
Well, it could be the summer of love.
Well, there are residents that live in there.
There are businesses in there.
And they're doing nothing to help restore law and order.
And they're enabling and helping the anarchists take over city blocks.
And they're doing it basically with the seal of approval of the governor and of the mayor.
Well, then that raises the question.
The president every day has been going out saying, I am ready at a moment's notice to give you the help you need to restore order.
Now, my advice is: well, the people of Washington State, you voted for this.
Just like the people of New York, look, I didn't vote for Democratic rule all these years.
I live here because of my job.
I'm hoping to move one day soon and get out of here.
Stop paying the massive amount in taxes.
And I don't even think the governor of New York, based on previous comments he's made about conservatives, basically said, you're not a New Yorker.
Okay, I'll take him at his word.
I can live in a place with better weather, lower taxes, cheaper housing.
And I think, having spoken with my staff on radio and TV, they all love the idea.
We've all learned teleworking works, not that hard.
So, and I think that's all going to be a game changer.
So, but the president now, okay, he's offering help.
They're supposed to ask him for the help.
He's begging them and he's offering the help.
Illinois, same thing.
All the violence in Chicago, nobody's fixed over the years.
You know, keep saying, I'm here to help.
Whatever you need, tell me what you need.
Just like during Corona, he built hospitals.
He manned the hospitals.
He sent all the ventilators, all the PPE.
I've given you the laundry list.
We have good news on the economy.
I love the news yesterday.
Perhaps that what we've been talking about, what we wanted, was the V-shaped recovery.
I'm seeing numbers that are really blowing me away.
Retail sales, month of May.
I didn't think we'd see this kind of number.
I didn't even know it would be this large till maybe August after we got the July numbers, hoping that by then everything would be open up.
And, you know, it's very slow still in a lot of states.
They're going to be hot spots.
It's not if, it's when.
They're happening.
We're dealing with them better.
We're going to have, you know, there's going to be little waves.
We're dealing with them better.
We're learning.
If you protect the most vulnerable and the elderly, there's a new study out of Great Britain as it relates to what is a steroid, not your typical steroid, more in the line of, I guess, prednisone.
It's not prednisone, though, but he'll tell us all about it.
That once you're in a state of respiratory unrest because of COVID-19, that it, you know, they're saving a third more lives.
So we're coming up with better treatments.
They think they have the vaccine.
All these things are going to happen.
Great news in terms of the jobs that were created, 2.5 million.
They thought projected we lose, what, 9 million.
They're only off by 11.5 million in their projections, just like all the models and projections, how many would get coronavirus.
It does bring into a fine focus the president's instincts on quarantines and the travel ban 10 days after the first known case.
Anyway, when you get retail sales month of May rising nearly 18%, wow, that's amazing.
2.5 million jobs created in May.
That's amazing.
That is great for everybody in this country.
So in 139 days, this will all factor in.
And then I watch Joe and I watch Barack and I watch all the Democrats.
All they do is hate Trump, as they've always done.
And, you know, they all had an opportunity.
You know, Ferguson happened under the watch of Barack and Joe.
What did they do?
Nothing.
It's Cambridge, nothing.
Other incidents, nothing.
They did nothing.
What did they do to improve police community relations?
Nothing.
I mean, Chicago was in the news a lot in the eight years that Barack and Joe were the leaders of government.
They barely mentioned it.
You know, did they improve relations after the riots in Ferguson or Baltimore or Maryland?
Any of these?
They didn't do anything.
They rushed to judgment and they often vilified the police, which, by the way, has to stop.
What's happening in this widespread, unending, unfair vilification of police officers, that's not going to end well.
Already, 800 are injured.
Some are dead, and some will be paralyzed for the rest of their lives.
You can't demonize a group of people because of the actions of a few.
And I'm consistent in this point of view.
I said it about the FBI and the deep state.
Most people that are cops, they don't get paid a lot.
It's a hard, hard job.
It's a risky job.
You're putting your life on your line on the line.
And what happens, by the way, when you need the help?
What are you going to call?
You're going to call the autonomous zone, summer of love, street festival, carnival-like atmosphere, protesters to come help you?
That's not going to work.
You know, we need the police.
Now, I like the improvements we're making.
Joe and Barack did nothing to make those changes.
They had the same issues when they were in office.
You know, over 4,000 people killed in Chicago alone.
What did they do there?
Nothing.
Tens of thousands of others shot.
Nothing.
This is a peaceful zone.
This is part of the deep-seated protests and rage around police brutality.
The extent to which it has been peaceful since Monday.
After more than a week of clashes between the demonstrators and the police, now you've seen essentially almost like a street festival type atmosphere.
A street festival type aspect atmosphere.
No, with a very intentional purpose.
It is not a street festival.
It is not a street festival.
Do not say that.
Shame on you for saying that.
What you're seeing in front of me is a peaceful situation.
In fact, it sort of looks like a street festival.
Is this an area that has been, I mean, the president makes it sound like this is an area that has been taken over and is being ruled by, I don't know how we would describe them.
Everybody, everybody.
How long do you think Seattle in those few blocks looks like this?
I don't know.
We could have a summer of love.
Well, tell that to the police who's supposed to be in that precinct, though, but I understand your sentiment, Mayor.
We don't have to sacrifice public safety for First Amendment rights.
Both can exist, and we'll make sure that both exist in Seattle.
This isn't public safety.
This is the taking over of your city.
I mean, unbelievable.
I guess yesterday, I guess it was the mayor of Olympia, Washington, and it wasn't her talking about her house and how frightening it is.
Look, I'm just going to tell you something.
They're aiding and abetting this.
Now, I think there's a trap.
Now, constitutionally, we have been over the Insurrection Act, 1807.
Now, does the Insurrection Act give the president the authority to send military troops or guardsmen?
You know, he could even send in other law enforcement agencies.
The problem is, Washington State doesn't want it, nor does this nutty mayor want it.
Neither does Chicago want it.
Neither does Comrade de Blasio or Governor Cuomo want it.
Now, if it gets to a point where the president has to act, he has all of the constitutional authority to do so.
If a city or state refuses to take actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then he said, I will deploy the U.S. military and solve the problem for them.
He doesn't want to do that.
He has the ability to do that.
The Attorney General acknowledges that he has the ability to do that.
It can be invoked if there's insurrection against state law and a state government requires federal assistance to restore order.
He can do all of that.
It can be invoked.
Now, let's all hope and pray that moment never comes because when it comes, we'll know when the moment is.
All right, the case of Raychard Brooks in Atlanta.
We have now, we're going to go to Paul Howard, the Fulton County, Georgia DA, announcing the charges.
Before we started today, I wanted to acknowledge Mrs. Miller, who is the husband of Richard Brooks.
She is here today with her attorney, and after we make our presentation, she is going to make some remarks on Mr. Stewart.
We also have with us today three witnesses from West Memphis, Tennessee, and they are here with their lawyer, Sean Williams.
And we are also going to ask Mr. Williams to address you as well.
So, we have decided to issue warrants in this case today.
I don't know.
I have with me copies of the warrants, and after my presentation, we will let you know how you can get copies of the warrants today.
So the question is asked: why were we able to charge this case now?
So I want to explain that we have already had an opportunity to speak with three of the witnesses in this case, and those are the three witnesses who were from West Memphis, Tennessee.
We have had an opportunity to conduct interviews with seven other witnesses other than the three witnesses from Tennessee.
We've also had an opportunity to view.
Let's see if you can turn it on.
So, Tracy.
That's fine, bro.
So, we have had an opportunity to review eight videotapes, two Atlanta body cam tapes, two Atlanta police.
We have also had an opportunity to review a Wendy's surveillance tape.
We have also viewed three citizen cell phone videos.
With many of the videos, we had the opportunity to enhance the videos so that we could get a better look.
The other thing that we have had an opportunity to do is to view some of the physical evidence.
The Chevrolet Trailblazer was a vehicle that was in the line at Wendy's on the night of this incident, and it received a shot from Officer Ross' gun.
We've had an opportunity, along with the GBI now, to view that trailblazer.
My office has had an opportunity to inspect the crime scene.
We have conducted a canvas of the area.
We started our investigation at about 1.15 a.m. on Saturday morning, and we have been working on this case around the clock since that time.
Go to the next slide.
We have spent some time examining the taser evidence in this case.
We've actually examined and possessed the two tasers that were used.
We have also had an opportunity to examine the taser logs that are prepared as the tasers are used.
And we have also consulted with a taser expert from the company that manufactures the tasers.
We received a preliminary medical autopsy.
We've received a preliminary ballistics report.
And in reaching our conclusions today, we have worked with both the Georgia Bureau of Investigation as well as the Atlanta Police Department.
This will be the fourth time that we have asked that arrest warrants are issued in a case before an indictment.
This lists the other three cases that we were involved with where an arrest warrant was issued prior to indictment.
Unfortunately, this marks the 40th prosecution of police officers for misconduct here in our county.
And this is the ninth time that we've prosecuted a homicide case committed by a police officer.
Eight of those cases involved black males and one of those cases involved a black female.
So in reaching our decision, there were some considerations that we considered important.
And one of the things that we noted from our evaluation was that Mr. Brooks on the night of this incident was calm, he was cordial, and really displayed a cooperative nature.
Secondly, even though Mr. Brooks was slightly impaired, his demeanor during this incident was almost jovial.
Also, we noted that he received many instructions from the Atlanta officers and he was asked many questions.
Some of the questions he was asked repeatedly, but for 41 minutes and 17 seconds, he followed every instruction.
He answered the questions.
The fourth thing we noted is that Mr. Brooks was never informed that he was under arrest for driving under the influence.
And this is a requirement of the Atlanta Police Department.
When one is charged with the DUI, the Atlanta Police Department's own procedures require that that person is informed immediately that they are under arrest.
And then he was grabbed, and then he was grabbed from the rear by Officer Roth, who made an attempt to physically restrain him after the 41-minute and 17-second discussion.
We concluded and considered it as one of our important considerations that Mr. Brooks never presented himself as a threat.
At the very beginning, he was peacefully sleeping in his car.
After he was awakened by the officer, he was cooperative and he was directed to move his car to another location.
He calmly moved his car.
Mr. Brooks was asked whether or not he had a weapon.
He indicated that he did not.
Without any resistance, he passed his driver's license to the officers.
And the officers then asked Mr. Brooks whether or not he would consent to a pat-down or a body search.
And Mr. Brooks allowed them to search him, and the search yielded no weapon.
We found that it was of interest that when the officers patted Mr. Brooks down, they noticed there was a bulge in his pants.
They did not pull that item out of his pocket.
They took Mr. Brooks' word that that bulge represented a number of dollar bills.
But Mr. Brooks never displayed any aggressive behavior during the 41 minutes and 17 seconds.
Now, this is another important consideration that we discovered as we evaluated this case.
Once Mr. Brooks was shot, there is an Atlanta policy that requires that the officers have to provide timely medical attention to Mr. Brooks or to anyone who is injured.
But after Mr. Brooks was shot for some period of two minutes and 12 seconds, there was no medical attention applied to Mr. Brooks.
But when we examined the videotape and in our discussions with witnesses, what we discovered is during the two minutes and 12 seconds that Officer Rolf actually kicked Mr. Brooks while he laid on the ground, while he was there fighting for his life.
Secondly, from the videotape, we were able to see that the other officer, Officer Brosnan, actually stood on Mr. Brooks' shoulders while he was there struggling for his life.
We were able to conclude that based on the way that these officers conducted themselves while Mr. Brooks was lying there, that the demeanor of the officers immediately after the shooting did not reflect any fear or danger of Mr. Brooks, but their actions really reflected other kinds of emotions.
So as we are drawing our legal conclusion in this case, we were led by the two foundational cases in this matter, one being Tennessee versus Garner.
And what that case points out is when an officer is pursuing a fleeing suspect, that the officer may not use deadly force to prevent escape unless the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses an immediate threat of death or of serious physical injury to that officer.
The next foundational case that we used in our analysis is Graham versus Connor, which says that this test is based upon that of a reasonable officer on the scene and not the individual officer, but a reasonable officer on the scene.
We've concluded at the time Mr. Brooks was shot that he did not pose an immediate threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or officers.
If you would get the photographs along the Sean Hannity Show Network, we're going to stay with our coverage here.
And if you're listening to specifically the DA of Fulton County, Georgia, Paul Howard Jr., talking about the case of this recent shooting of Rayshard Brooks.
Let's go back to this.
What this photograph illustrates is the point that Officer Roth at this point was firing and we take you.
All right.
And this is Mr. Brooks who was firing a taser as well.
But I don't know if you can see it clearly.
The prongs from the table, the taser, were actually fired above Officer Roth's head.
I'd like you to also look at the position of Officer Roth and Mr. Brooks, that they are here next to this red automobile.
If we look at the next photograph, if we look at the next photograph,
we'll see that the positions of both parties have changed.
Mr. Brooks has now moved away from his original position, and we estimate the distance is probably about 12 feet.
And Officer Roth has moved about 10 feet from the position in what is our exhibit number one.
This second video or second still shows the very instance that the shot was fired into the back of Mr. Brooks.
And we have also calculated the distance and the distance that they are apart at that time was 18 feet 3 inches at the time that this shot was fired.
So based upon that information, we have concluded that Mr. Brooks was running away at the time that the shot was fired.
Mr. Brooks was shot twice in the back.
One of the shots was a center shot to the back that penetrated his heart, and it was done by a nine millimeter block.
Now, one of the things that we also relied upon in our conclusion is something that is called under the law or referred to as an excited utterance.
And that's when someone makes an immediate statement.
And because it is made without the ability to consult with counsel or to think about it, under the law, an excited utterance is considered as highly reliable.
And at the time that the shot was fired, the utterance made by Officer Roth was, I got him.
That was the statement that was made at that time.
We also noted that Officer Roth was firing a taser at Mr. Brooks.
The state of Atlanta SOPs, in fact, prohibit officers from firing tasers at someone who is running away.
So the city of Atlanta says you cannot even fire a taser at someone who is running away.
So you certainly can't fire a gun, a handgun, at someone who is running away.
So in addition to our findings, as many of you all already know, that the Atlanta mayor, Mayor Keisha Bottoms, and the police department concluded that Officer Roth's actions were excessive and in violation of APD's SOP.
There's an SOP, I believe it's 4.1.1.
And after their analysis that the actions were excessive, Officer Roth was fired.
We have also concluded that Roth was aware that the taser in Brooks' possession, that it was fired twice.
And once it's fired twice, it presented no danger to him or to any other persons.
Now, we have had something quite remarkable that happen, and it involves the testimony of the other officer, Devin Brosnan, because Officer Brosden has now become a state's witness.
He has decided to testify on behalf of the state in this case.
What he has said to us, that is within a matter of days, he plans to make a statement regarding the culpability of Officer Roth.
But he indicated that he is not psychologically willing to give that statement today.
Officer Brosden, however, has admitted that he was in fact standing on Mr. Brooks' body immediately after the shooting.
So these are the charges that we have had filed today signed by one of our Superior Court judges.
These are the 11 charges against Officer Roth.
The first charge is felony murder.
This is the death that is as a result of an underlying felony.
And in this case, the underlying felony is aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
And the possible sentences for a felony murder conviction would be life, life without parole, or the death penalty.
Now, he's also charged by in the arrest warrant with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
And this is Account charging him for the shooting of Mr. Brooks.
And the possible sentence for aggravated assault is one to 20 years.
The second, the third aggravated assault account is for the shooting towards or in the direction of Mr. Melvin Evans.
Mr. Evans was the person who was seated in the car.
We have the picture of this automobile is the place that Mr.
Evans and his two companions were driving and a shot was fired.
And I believe we've also got a photo of the shot that ended up in the vehicle.
I think you got to stand it up.
And so with count four with the who was in that little difficulty there as soon as we get the audio back, if you're just joining us, wow, just unfolding really in live time before our eyes here.
And that was Paul.
All right, we have the audio back.
Paul Howard Jr., Fulton County DA.
Towards or in the direction of Michael Perkins.
Mr. Perkins was seated in the rear of this same vehicle at that time.
There's a charge for criminal damage for shooting into that vehicle.
Also, Officer Roth is also, Officer Rolf is charged with seven violations of office.
Each one of those carries a one-to-five sentence.
These are violations of his oath of office for the city of Atlanta.
Arresting Mr. Brooks for the DUI without immediately informing him of the arrests.
Shooting a taser at Mr. Brooks while he was running away, which again is a violation.
All right.
Wow.
If you're just joining us, a lot to go through here.
That's Paul Howard Jr., Fulton County Georgia District Attorney, saying a lot there.
The second officer, not the one that fired the shot, apparently has turned state witness.
There are 11 specific charges in this case, and starting with felony murder, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, possible life sentence for Officer Rolfe.
All right, glad you're with us.
Howard 2 Sean Hannity Show, we start with the breaking news.
Now, there's a question and answer period.
The DA of Fulton County in Georgia, Paul Howard, has now announced he's charging Officer Garrett Rolfe.
That is the officer in this Wendy's parking lot shooting that took place with 11 counts, including felony murder, aggravated assault, criminal damage to property, violations of his oath.
Officer Devin Bronson is being charged with aggravated assault and two violations of his oath of office.
The DA said they were able to interview several witnesses to the shooting as well as eight videos that recorded the incident, including the surveillance, the body cams, personal cell phones of people that were there, witnesses.
He said that they have examined the taser stun guns used.
I never had an answer to this question.
Did it shoot once or twice?
That was resolved.
It's shot twice.
He talked also about the officers failing to render aid, which by law they need to do as quickly as possible.
And it took two minutes and 12 seconds.
He talked a lot about the original time lapse in this, 41 minutes, 17 seconds.
And that was a point that I made in my analysis of this, is that up until the moment when the officers tried to cough, in this particular case, Rayshard Brooks, everything was fine.
Everyone seemed professional, courteous.
There was even a rapport established.
In the case of officer, the second officer, Devin Bronson, he had said, I'm sorry to hear about your mother's death.
We just got to do this, make sure it's okay for you to drive.
Then is that moment, everything changed.
There's a lot of other issues involved in this.
We're going to get to our legal panel here in just a second.
But the two minutes, 12 seconds, he also, I had not heard this by anybody before.
The DA claiming that the one, the officer involved in the actual shooter, shooting incident, Officer Rolfe, had actually kicked Mr. Brooks as he was on the ground.
Officer Bronson said he stood on Mr. Brooks' shoulder.
Not sure exactly what that is, but you've got to understand here, when we're talking about the charges, 11 total, and that they're charging him for felony murder.
That could be a life, that could be life.
If you talk about the second charge, aggravated assault, in that particular charge, now you're talking about one, I'm sorry, you're literally now one to 20 years.
That's aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, criminal damage to property, violation of oath.
Now, the biggest, I think, the most interesting development to me in this is that the second officer, Devin Bronson, apparently has turned a state witness, says he will make a statement on the culpability of Officer Rolf, who was the actual, well, actually involved in the shooting, did admit that he stood on his shoulder after the shooting.
I'm sure there's video of that.
And anyway, here to break down this from a legal point of view, we bring in David Schoen, civil liberties attorney, board member, by the way, Alabama Civil Liberties Union, former board member.
Leo Terrell, civil rights attorney, is with us.
Vince Ellison, conservative columnist, lecturer, author of the book, The Iron Triangle.
Leo, I'm going to start with you today.
A lot of times in these cases, you know, we have what we call overcharging, right?
I think that, and it was an interesting post on Twitter by Jonathan Turley, a friend of mine said, and talking about this specific case and what he was saying, the new evidence is important, and any abuse following the shooting could be a basis for different charges.
He talks about Tennessee v. Gardner, you know, would focus on the actual shooting itself.
And you have a wide variety of charges here, and that Gardner would be focused on the shooting, not the abuse following the shooting.
But now that the other officer is a state witness that will testify against Rolf, that's Bronson against Wolf, I agree with him.
That could be a game changer under the case law in the area.
It would otherwise be a lot tougher for the prosecution.
Now, there will be a jury of 12 people that will ultimately now make these decisions.
And in other cases, we've seen, and we've witnessed this over the years, Leo.
And if you overcharge, you take a great risk in doing so.
What are your thoughts?
Well, Sean, you did a great summary of this, and I got 25 years of police misconduct cases, and I'll tell you right now, very clearly, first of all, overcharging, no question about it.
Tennessee Gardner is in play.
It's the case that basically concerns what was in Ross's state of mind.
The other officer can't tell the jury what was in Ross's state of mind when he fired those shots.
Let's also remember that Mr. Brooks, when he was running, he was a fleeing felon himself, and that's going to be played because he assaulted those officers, took the officer's stun gun, and started running.
So he is a fleeing felon.
Not like the situation we have in the Floyd case.
This case is totally separate.
So there's a lot of facts that the district attorney did not talk about.
And, of course, he did not make any reference or any statement as to what was in Officer Ross state of mind because he doesn't know.
Well, he did try to say he tried to imply with his immediate what they call utterance when he said, apparently on tape, I got him.
I don't know how you interpret that word, I got him, other than meaning that he aimed and he shot and he didn't miss or something like that.
I mean, you can interpret it a million ways, in my view.
You're 100% right.
That statement, I got him, is that after he fell down?
Again, we're talking about what led up to him firing that weapon.
What did he see?
What did he fear?
Did he fear, for example, that he thought that he was going to be shot with a stun gun, that he was going to be overpowered, and this guy was going to take his weapon from him?
There is a variety of different factors.
Let me sum up by saying this.
This is a jury-fact question.
Overcharge, I think they way overcharge.
Felony murder?
That meant that basically the officer was committing a felony as he was pursuing him with his gun and shot it.
There's one other interesting thing that he said.
Under Georgia law, you're not allowed to fire a taser at anyone running away.
Well, there might be a mitigating circumstance, that being that he turned around and I believe from what I saw, fired the taser in the direction of the officer.
He made another statement that Officer Rolfe was aware that the taser had been fired twice.
I've been waiting to hear how many times that taser could be fired.
Again, there will be a defense and a defense attorney that is going to challenge all of that.
Let me follow up by saying this.
You have had a lot of experts on your show, a lot of police experts who are going to justify this officer's conduct.
And let me tell you right now, Georgia state law is one thing, but that U.S. Supreme Court case that you keep mentioning, the listeners should know, Tennessee versus Gardner and Graham versus Connor.
Those cases control everything, Sean.
Bottom line, tough case.
I think he was overcharged.
And let's not forget the DA is up for reelection.
Let's go to David Schoen.
You're a defense attorney.
This is what you do.
How do you look at the case, the charges, and everything else in between?
Yeah, I suppose I agree and disagree with some of what Mr. Trell said.
First of all, because he charged felony murder, the officer's state of mind is not directly relevant.
That is, one advantage the government has is they don't have to prove malice.
Under Georgia law, the statute reads 1651C, person commits offensive felony murder, commission of a felony causes the death of another without irrespective of malice.
I think it's an overcharge because it shouldn't have been charged as felony murder.
They had a struggle at first.
The felony murder has to be, you know, an assault was committed, something like that.
The key here, it's a self-defense case from the defense standpoint.
And the bad facts, though, for that is that he was shot in the back.
A taser can be considered a deadly weapon.
If he fired the taser at the officer, the officer convinces the jury he feared for his life, then the officer could win.
Tennessee versus Garner says you can't just shoot a fleeing felon.
You have to believe that he was posed in imminent danger to yourself or to a third person.
Okay, based on the tape as you see it from a legal perspective.
Again, you're a defense attorney, a civil rights attorney like Leo.
When in fact they turned and shot the taser, does that then make the standard?
In other words, this is a legal question.
Does that legally warrant?
It can turn in a matter of seconds.
If he's facing him and that's when the cop shoots, the cop has a lot better case.
Once he turned, the forensic shows he shot him in the back.
He was running away, apparently.
We don't know that yet.
A different forensic.
The law says you're not allowed to fire a taser at anyone running away.
That's right.
Yeah, that's the law, by the way, around the country.
There are a number of cases that say as long as the person no longer posed an imminent threat, you can't even fire a taser at him.
It sounds counterintuitive, but that's the law.
I had a case in Alabama in which a guy was running away, and the cop understood the law to be because he had committed a felony, he could shoot him.
He shot him and killed him.
That cop ended up becoming our best witness because that was a mistaken policy.
The jurisdiction hadn't changed it after Tennessee versus Garner.
Vince Ellison, I know you're not an attorney by background.
We have a lot of horrific things that we've been watching going around the country.
Universally, everyone's condemned what happened to George Floyd.
Very different case here, still sad and tragic.
And you just, you know, if you go all that time, 41 minutes and 17 seconds, and everyone was professional, courteous, respectful.
And it's so sad, all of it to me.
Well, those two, the two lawyers you have gave great, great analysis.
Here's the political analysis.
Those officers didn't have a chance.
They saw the mob in Atlanta, and they were going to charge them no matter what.
That is the political landscape.
The guy got swept.
Let me play devil's advocate.
I'm playing it on both sides now.
Okay, but he got shot twice in the back.
Is it if you're not allowed to fire a taser at anyone running away, the guy turns back and shoots it.
They're going to have to prove that he knew that it had been fired twice.
I didn't know whether it had one or two shots.
At that moment, does that meet the legal standard?
In other words, in other words, that you believe there's a real threat of physical injury.
Well, from my law enforcement experience, you know, I was a correctional officer.
I think it does.
I don't think officers should have to take any type of punishment.
I think he chose to turn around and shoot at the officer.
The officer, whatever his mind was, he'll have to testify to that.
But politically, it did not matter what happened.
Those officers are going to go down.
I think the biggest game changer is this other officer's attorney state witness as announced by the DA, by the prosecutor.
I'll tell you what I'm troubled by.
First of all, Mr. Ellison is absolutely right, but I'll tell you what I'm troubled by.
The prosecutor here went well beyond what he's entitled to do under the rules of ethics, both the American Bar Association standards for the prosecution and Georgia's rules of ethics.
He cannot align himself exclusively with the victim, throw the cop under the, or any defendant under the bus, and then host a press conference for a lawyer.
You're absolutely correct.
I mean, that was.
All right.
Stay on that point, David.
Leo Terrell, David Sean, Vince Ellison, more on the other side.
Bill O'Reilly today.
We are 139 days out of an election.
We'll get to that.
Dr. Oz on whether or not it's a second wave of COVID.
And as we roll along, 800-941, Sean, you want to be a part of the program?
Bill O'Reilly at the bottom of the hour.
Yeah, we still do have an election in 139 days.
We'll get his take on that.
Also, we'll check in with Dr. Oz, the rise of COVID protests, rallies, and everything in between.
But the Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard announcing that the officer in the Atlanta shooting at the Wendy's parking lot now has, well, been charged with many separate issues, including felony murder, aggravated assault.
Could be a life or even a death penalty case.
Anyway, all right, we don't have a lot of time.
David, the point you were making on this, and then I want to get Leo's take.
Yeah, the point I was making is the prosecutor went way overboard today in holding this press conference and hosting a victim's lawyer.
He has to be neutral.
The public depends on it.
The integrity of the system depends on it.
These two experts have told you like it is.
Mr. Ellison is right politically.
It's a tough political climate.
Mr. Terrell is an expert in police misconduct.
He knows about people running away.
He demanded an investigation in 1999 in the Mitchell case for that.
So he's calling it straight for you.
But the prosecutor's got to be neutral.
What's tough in this case is it's tough to beat forensics.
Shooting in the back is a tough way to go with self-defense.
And you've got his fellow officer turning stage witness in this case, Leo.
I agree with, thanks, David, for the comments.
And I agree.
Look, this was a performance.
He was arguing, the district attorney was arguing his case before the public.
He argues his case in a court of law.
And that today was well beyond just laying out the facts.
What I think is also very important.
But that gives a defense attorney now an opportunity.
If I'm a defense attorney, I'm loving it.
But I'm just saying from an ethical standpoint, as David pointed out, totally inappropriate.
Totally inappropriate.
And I guarantee you, this case is going to take place six, seven months down the line after the election.
Totally political motivated in this climate.
Overcharge.
Vince Ellison, thoughts?
Yeah, man, they're allowing mob rule to dictate justice.
And you find the brave people in times like these.
We've seen the old Westerns where a lynch mob comes to a jail to take a guy and hang him.
And the sheriff stands here by himself with one gun and backs them all up.
We don't have that anymore.
But ultimately, this is where it goes, Vince.
You got to convince a jury of 12 beyond a reasonable doubt.
Leo, David, the lawyers, you agree that's a high standard, right?
Yes.
Okay.
All you need is one.
All you need is one.
All right.
So with that in mind, Vince, you know, this will play out.
Justice is going to be a good thing.
No, it's going to be the process, Sean.
The process is the punishment.
They fired these men.
They've slandered their names.
They destroyed their reputation.
And so the process is going to be a grueling one.
And they're going to put distance between this and what happened.
And they were afraid of the mob.
Playing it simple.
They know what they did is wrong, but they're cowards.
And they've been doing this for years in these Democratic consultations.
Well, I think you're talking sort of a political argument.
I'm looking at the legal side.
It is going to be what it's going to be.
It's going to be 12 people on a jury that decide.
All right.
Vince, thank you.
David, thank you.
Leo, thank you.
Leo on TV tonight.
Thank you.
Now, getting back to your first question, which was what about a month or so or two or three ago when people were saying you don't really need to wear a mask?
Well, the reason for that is that we were concerned, the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal protective equipment, including the N95 masks and the surgical masks, were in very short supply.
And we wanted to make sure that the people, namely the healthcare workers, who were brave enough to put themselves in harm ways to take care of people who you know were infected with the coronavirus and the danger of them getting infected, we did not want them to be without the equipment that they needed.
All right.
Well, not everybody had to have an N95 mask.
Look, I use this one anecdote over and over and over and over again.
Had a conversation with a woman at my local grocery store, and I see the same guy stocking the shelves, same cashiers every week.
And in my particular grocery store, my particular pharmacy, nobody ever got COVID.
Everybody wore a mask.
I didn't see many people with N95 masks on.
I saw a couple, but not many.
Some had face shields even.
But nobody in either store got it.
Now, Dr. Fauci, and it's not a criticism.
This was evolving.
We were all lied to.
We've gone over everybody's timeline.
Worst decision made were by the four governors in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.
And that was they didn't protect the vulnerable.
So I'm not blaming Dr. Fauci, but you know, and I know some of you are upset that I say, just wear the mask.
Let's open, let's open safely.
And I get it.
Maybe I certainly have a different perspective, but it worked.
And that anecdote for me is very powerful because at the epicenter of this virus, the guys that were in the stores seeing the most amount of people every day never got it, not one.
And they all wore masks.
Most wore gloves.
So for me, I like to learn from the things that worked and we did well and adjust and change the things that we did wrong.
Now, with that said, you know, nobody was talking about COVID-19 at all.
On the left, when the protests, which still are going on, and city blocks now taking over, and even some of the politicians were out there marching with no social distancing at all, and not everybody in a mask during these protests.
But now that Donald Trump is going to have a rally in Oklahoma this weekend, now we're back to talking about, oh, it can't be safe.
So my humble suggestion is the president just needs to call it a protest, and then I guess they'll be fine with it.
But by the way, everybody will have a mask on at the rally.
Probably the president will not because he will be completely socially distant.
Anyway, here to weigh in and update us, there are now about 19 states.
I always said it's if, not when, I'm sorry, it's when, not if that we're going to have hotspots.
We've seen them and we've dealt with a number of them very successfully.
We bring back our medical aid team.
That can mean only one thing, Dr. Oz.
Sir, how are you?
I'm doing well.
You know, it's interesting when you look at the expectations we've all crafted.
And just to follow up on what you were saying, the Swedish Minister of Health and the folks who crafted their program to keep the country open always made one really poignant point.
And there's nothing you can say about it, except they're right, which is, yes, we didn't shut down.
The rest of the world's mostly shut down.
We get the difference.
And our country is okay with what we're doing.
Your country's okay with what you're doing.
But one day, you're going to have to open.
And when you do open, you're basically going to be using our model, the Swedish model.
So now we're the Swedish model.
We're opening up.
Many parts of the country are pretty wide open, but we've got to deal with it the way Sweden dealt with it.
And how did they get through this without a catastrophe?
They doubled down on social distancing, wearing masks.
People just acted responsibly and kindly towards each other.
They, by the way, also had a problem in their nursing homes.
You mentioned the four states that really got hit hard.
That's one area we just cannot compromise.
I went to a nursing home in New Jersey, which is where my home is.
A friend of mine actually runs a couple, and I wanted to see what it looks like.
What are the real issues?
And he and all the people there, the nursing room was livid that for a while they had been forced, and more importantly, other facilities that really weren't up to scale because they didn't know how to actually deal with COVID-19 were forced to take COVID-19 patients.
And that led to, you know, half to deaths in New Jersey and New York being from in nursing homes.
You know, I got to sing your praises, and I know you don't like when I do this, but I'm going to be mean and do it anyway.
So a close friend of my sister's, a woman that happens to be in her 50s, has kids, she had COVID really bad.
She was on a ventilator for over six weeks, maybe I think six and a half.
At one point, she had a trach put in.
I mean, it was touch and go for a long period.
And Dr. Oz checked in regularly with the doctors that were working on the case, her case, offering advice, suggestions, help, assistance, anything you could do.
And she's now home.
She's got rehab to go through, you know, a lot of difficulties if you're in a hospital bed nearly two months like that.
But you're a rock star, and I know many other cases where you did the same.
And when I said you weren't sleeping during this, you weren't sleeping during this time.
Thank you for that.
I was keeping Sean Hannity hours.
Because a lot of the effort was almost giving pep talks to the caregivers because it is emotionally incredibly draining when you're desperately trying to find answers.
And there's no textbook.
In fact, the reason that I'm so happy today is because of this dexamethasone study that came out of the UK.
And just for everyone who might have missed it, this is an important deal.
Dexamethasone is a simple steroid.
It's not the kind you use to build muscles.
It's the one we use for allergies and inflammation and lupus, by the way, just like hydroxychloroquine.
And they found that they could use it in people who were already having trouble breathing.
So you don't use it early in the case the way you make other medications.
This is designed for people who are already on oxygen, in which case it cut deaths by a fifth.
Or if you had a ventilator in, which, as you know, Sean had a very high mortality, especially early on, they cut deaths in the UK by a third.
If they gave this simple, easy, inexpensive, accessible drug.
And so it's now the standard of care.
24 hours later in the UK, most American centers were already experimenting with it.
We were trying to give it to patients like our mutual friend and others, just trying to buy time so their body's overreaction to the virus could be mitigated.
But this gives us, and other advances like this, give us a little bit more breathing room.
Because for the vast majority of people who get sick and don't have risk factors like obesity and hypertension, diabetes, the kinds of things that make them called vulnerable for the CDC.
But if you're not vulnerable, you don't get admitted to the hospital.
95% of hospital admissions are vulnerable, 80% of people who die over the age of 65.
The average death age is 80.
So we know who's at risk.
Keep them out of the way.
Protect them.
And you can copy Sweden, which is what we're doing now, and do reasonably well.
Not perfect.
Good to have a vaccine.
But we can get through this if we do that.
You know, we've had all these protests going on now for a couple of weeks.
We do have states now that are seeing hotspots come up, 19 or 20 of them.
Numbers are not like what happened at the peak of all this by any stretch, but we're seeing this happen.
What will the protests, you know, what will the aftermath of that likely teach us or show us?
And not just the protest and the other, the bad part of it, which led to rioting, arson, looting, and all other behavior.
But there was no social distancing.
There were many without masks.
And, you know, what are we going to learn from all of this?
And what do you make of this increase of incidence in some states?
Well, 19 states, as you mentioned, have an increase, but seven have a 60% or greater increase over the past two weeks.
That's a meaningful increase.
Let's just focus on those seven.
And four of those have increased hospitalization.
So that's where the rural issues are.
I mean, there's no question.
I don't think you can argue that the protests are going to result in more cases.
Hopefully, they're younger people, so they don't pay a significant price generally.
And hopefully, because they're outdoors, the virus gets spread around.
So if they were wearing a mask, it reduces the chance of them having a problem.
Outdoor activities are much less problematic because you don't have a small and unventilated room where one person who's got virus coming out of their mouth spreads everybody else.
However, just to be concrete about it, Mayor de Blasio today says we're not going to for sure open up New York City to the next stage on Monday, even though we're supposed to, even though the numbers are perfect in terms of following guidelines, because he's worried that because of the protests, you might see some increased cases.
So even if it doesn't actually do anything, the fact that our leadership is considering it as a factor that may impact whether we open or not is a problem.
In New Jersey, I mean, I went out with my son to play tennis yesterday, and the parks are still closed.
And I'm sort of stunned and thinking, I mean, how is that possible?
I don't understand.
There's no defensible medical reason, I don't think, to keep a park closed.
So in a beautiful June afternoon, kids can't go out and play, except that you're trying to do things just in case something bad's about to hit.
And that's where I feel that even though we should be equal across the board, we may be paying a price already, even if we don't see a spike.
You know, look, all of that is true.
But again, we go to the most vulnerable population, those with compromised immune systems, underlying health conditions, older people, certainly more than younger people.
That is pretty much health steady.
So they really have to take the extra precautions.
And one of the reasons, I know I haven't made much progress on this, but I guess maybe with the president's rally that has taken place, they had almost a million people want to go to this thing.
And I think there's room for a couple hundred thousand.
So it's going to be a lot of people, but all the people will be asked to have masks.
Everybody's going to go through a temperature check.
These are things that you and I discussed about opening stadiums.
Everyone's saying, okay, you know the risk.
You're accepting the risks.
And you have to abide by the guidelines they're putting out there.
What are your thoughts?
Well, I don't think it's wise to get people to expose themselves to potential infected individuals.
You know, certainly be outdoors.
Do the best you can to stay away from everybody else.
And for sure, if you're one of the folks who has a risk factor that makes you vulnerable, if you're overweight, if you're hypertensive, if you're diabetic, if you've got chronic lung issues, you should not attend the rally because, God forbid, someone that you walk by, and it's not necessarily the person that you're standing next to.
It could be someone getting into the portal, wherever this place, the thing is going to be held, could infect you.
And you might not have had an infection there, but you're not going to know it.
Here's the question, Sean.
Five days later, you wake up and you got a little sore throat.
I mean, do you have COVID-19 or not?
You're going to be in your mind thinking, maybe I have COVID-19.
Now you're destroying quality of life for people and getting folks panicked.
And when they're appropriately socially distancing, they don't.
The thing that gives you the most peace of mind is I do everything I can.
And I'm not about as you are.
I mentioned I was at nursing home.
I went to the Cache Valley in Utah last week.
It's the epicenter.
They had that meat processing facility where they had hundreds of people who got infected.
I sort of understand what the issues are.
But I'm really careful.
So when I get up in the morning with a sore throat, I'm not thinking COVID-19.
I'm thinking I got a sore throat.
And I think these are subtle issues, but why introduce risk when you don't need to?
That's the big question.
No, I think, look, you're giving everybody good advice.
Do you see a potential for outdoor stadiums to open and baseball and football?
And what are your feelings on the NFL?
I know the U.S. Open said they're going to play, but there'll be nobody at the U.S. Open.
I have a studio audience, as you know, of a couple hundred people.
And I'm not going to be allowed to have audience members there.
And I actually don't want to have audience members.
I sent them home way before the city shut down for fear that imagine a fan of mine traveling all the way from wherever they came in the country to be in my audience and then I get sick.
I mean, I think I had the opportunity to at least signal what I thought was appropriate for them to keep my people who are closest to me safe.
And I think that's what most teams are going to be thinking.
Do I want my fans worried?
Maybe that they don't actually get sick, worried about this.
And the other question I'm asking myself is how impactful is it?
I talk to folks in this own stadiums and I've been called by different leagues.
They say, you know, if I can put half the people in the stadium, does that really help me?
They don't make the same kind of noise.
It's probably not going to even be a half.
It's expensive to open up.
Do I really get that much out of it?
Or should I just be smart and safe and make sure no one gets sick?
We're talking about holding our breath for maybe six months.
We are going to have vaccines by the beginning part of 2021.
And we should play our teams, play our events.
A lot of the revenue for the leagues, as everyone knows, comes from TV radio and other venues.
It's something that gives us all joy to watch our favorite players perform.
And then it becomes a math equation for the leagues, though, because they count on that money too to be able to pay the players.
And it gets complicated.
I know that's why the major league baseballs are fighting.
But again, I'm just thinking long-term.
Major League Baseball is 125, 30 years old.
I'm thinking that if they can just play and do this kindness to the country and not have to worry about the distraction of this, whether someone got sick, what happens the first time someone goes home and says, you know, I got COVID-19 from the game.
You can't prove he's right.
You can't prove he's wrong.
You're stuck.
All right, quick break.
More with Dr. Oz, our medical aid team.
Next.
Quick break.
Right back.
We'll continue.
All right, as we continue with our medical aid team and Dr. Oz.
Boy, it's been a rough ride.
I'll tell you.
You know, it's just one thing after another, it seems.
It just keeps hitting.
It's hard, but we'll get through it.
We're Americans.
We have the best medical scientists and researchers.
Yeah, real quick because I got to go.
Between the new medications, overall increased care, and the vaccine, we are ahead of this.
And we don't have that much further to go.
And I don't think we're going to have to shut down again with what we're doing now if we all behave ourselves.
It's all good.
All right, dude.
That's good news.
All right, Dr. Oz, thanks so much for being with us.
800-941 Sean.
All right, simple man Leonard Skinner.
There can only be one thing, and that thing means all things Bill O'Reilly and all things Bill O'Reilly are at billo'reilly.com.
Let me ask you a question.
The world, this has not been an easy year, Mr. O'Reilly.
That's a simple observation from a fellow simple man.
And I'm serious.
I mean, look, we've had the worst pandemic since 1917 and 18 as a country.
That's been rough.
And obviously, what happened to Mr. Floyd never should have happened.
That's been rough.
The aftermath of that, you know, there's genuine, you know, universal outrage.
I don't know anybody except crazy keyboard warriors in their basement, their underwear, you know, saying otherwise.
And on top of that, then you got the lawlessness, and then the looters and the rioters, 800-plus cops now injured.
A couple have died, one paralyzed for life, we understand in Vegas, burning down police precincts, taking over city blocks in Seattle.
And we have an election in 139 days.
So, as you know, we're both simple men now.
I'm glad I converted you, by the way, over to the simple.
Why did I open myself up?
I am so glad now that you're going to be able to do it with me.
So, my simple question is: why isn't anybody trying to solve the problem?
The problem of injustice or income inequality.
Why isn't anyone trying to solve that?
Burning down a Wendy's, does that solve it?
I don't think so.
So, let me give you a real simple man scenario.
Something that happened this week.
You know, Brad Pitt, right?
I don't know.
I don't know him personally.
I know him as the actor.
I know you know a lot of famous movies.
Brilliant in that Tarantino Hollywood movie.
So, Jennifer Annison is his former wife.
You know her, friends.
So each of them announces through their PR people who they pay an enormous amount of money that they're going to donate a million dollars each to an anti-cop organization, an anti-police organization.
Okay?
And I say to myself, what are you doing?
If you're going to donate a million dollars, why don't you donate it to my Brother's Keeper?
a mentoring organization that I worked with President Obama on.
Why not give it to Best Friends Foundation, another mentoring organization in D.C.?
Or as I did yesterday, Hannity, donate to Nassau County Big Brothers and Big Sisters in a mentoring capacity.
By the way, I'll match your donation.
Excellent.
Excellent.
I like Big Brothers and Big Sisters.
I've never been a part of that organization.
I had three.
I had three kids, and I stayed with them their whole into adulthood.
But it's a big donation, Hattie.
So, I mean, you know, pretty fast on the trigger there, but I'm holding you to it.
But you're getting my point.
Why wouldn't you give the money to organizations that are lifting people out of poverty and out of hatred into a system where they can have a terrific life like you have and I have and Colin Powell has and Ben Carson has and Barack Obama has.
So by the way, the only one thing that I got to say is every simple guy, you know, drops the name of a former president and says, oh, yeah, well, I work with President Obama on this one charity.
Maybe I'm not as simple after all, Bill.
That never happened to me.
Obama and I had common ground on this, on this issue.
What, hating Hannity?
I know.
I got it.
I believe that.
I am a simple man, and I'm a former high school teacher, and I know that mentoring poor children with lousy parents or non-existent parents is the only way to get these kids in a position to succeed.
And therefore, any group that does this, Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston, you want to support.
You don't want to support people who hate the police.
The police are good.
Look, I say that 99%.
And I am watching now.
It's fair to these police officers, all 800,000 of them, to demonize them the way they're being demonized.
It's not.
It's got to end.
It's wrong.
Bill, over 800 cops now.
A number are dead, 800 hurt, bottles, rocks, bricks, Molotov cocktails, precincts burned to the ground, and precincts taken over by anarchists.
Now, you know, here's the position that the president is in.
Illinois, New York, all these blue states that run into the ground for decades now and neglected by Democratic governors and mayors.
They don't get the job done.
Same thing.
You know, the mayor, the governor in Washington are just pathetic.
I mean, this is, oh no, it's like the summer of love, the autonomous zone, the chaz zone, the chop zone, the spaghetti potlug zone, a festive atmosphere.
You know, they all use the same words.
And it's not that way.
And there are business owners in there that are not being protected.
And there are, you know, there's a police precinct being run by the anarchists that took it over and chased the cops out, won't let them back in.
And I guess they're negotiating.
Give back part of the city, but keep this part of the city.
Okay.
So we're watching all of this unfold.
The president keeps offering help.
They keep saying no.
Now, I think that for the president, this is a bit of a trap because if the president goes in and God forbid something happens in the process of taking back law and order, which they should do in the state level, president's offering all the help they want, and something happens.
Oh, Trump did that.
And so, unless it gets to that moment, and we'll know when that moment comes, my attitude is let Washington deal with Washington's problems.
Let Seattle deal with Seattle's problems.
They elected these guys.
Let them fix it.
Well, I had a simple solution last night on billorilly.com that I think Donald Trump should consider, and that is to send about 100 U.S. Marshals to Seattle to guarantee that anyone trapped in this anarchy zone has the ability to get out and in when they want to.
Well, can I just answer that one point?
National Guard, they're not Army, they're Marshals.
Every person, apparently, that wants to leave, come and go.
If you're a resident in there, that freedom does still exist.
Although, you notice they built a wall.
I thought walls were bad, and you need basically.
We really don't know the pressure and the intimidation.
Well, we have reporters and spies in there.
I had Ami Horowitz in there for us spying there for a day.
All right, but there's nothing wrong with sending U.S. Marshals, a federal present, to observe the situation.
You don't want a Waco, you don't want a Ruby Ridge, you don't want any of that.
But I think that President Trump has got to run, and he can start this in August.
I wouldn't do it now.
You don't want to inflame now, but he's got to run on is this the kind of country you want?
And then show pictures of Seattle.
Here's the problem: let's say all hell breaks loose, Bill.
By the way, we've seen all hell break loose in recent days, and it's not pretty.
And let's say that they throw rocks, bottles, bricks, and Molotov cocktails.
Then the 100 is going to become 1,000 to 2,000.
And there's no way that's ever going to end.
It's never going to look good.
The optics will be terrible.
And then you got the possibility of a worst case scenario.
Now, it may come to that.
But from my perspective, that's the governor of Washington's job and the mayor's job.
The president keeps offering the help.
He says, I'll help you.
You can run it.
I'll give you the backup, the support that you need when you're ready.
They don't want any help, Bill.
And they elected these guys.
I guess that's what they want out in liberal land, la-la-land out there.
They want, you know, anarchists to take over city streets.
I have considered your point of view.
And you rejected it on TV and radio.
No, I did.
I'm not mocking you.
I thought about it a lot.
Yeah.
I think the American people at this point are looking for leadership.
I think if the president got on and said, I'm going to send in 100 marshals to make sure that anyone who feels threatened or anybody's rights who are being violated in the anarchy zone have support.
I think that would do them a lot of good.
You don't go in with tanks or gas or anything like that.
You just create a presence that shows leadership.
And that's what I will say.
I'm not where you are.
That is probably going to happen next if I had to give my best guess.
I don't have any insider information.
I think that is sober, thought, well thought out.
But you have another problem, though, and that is the mayor doesn't want them.
The governor doesn't want them.
The anarchists don't.
Well, I got it.
Now, here's the all right.
So the bottles get thrown.
The Molotov cocktails get thrown.
The bricks and rocks get thrown.
It's going to be, you can't send 100 guys in without, you know, 5,000 behind them.
If anybody does that, the Marshals withdraw.
All right.
Video is taken, of course.
They don't confront.
They just withdraw.
And then the people in the country see who the anarchists really are.
Look, based on all of the reporting, like you, I'm paying very close attention.
The residents, now we have one resident, Shelby Telcott at the Daily Caller, interviewed a business owner.
He's not too happy.
And I would imagine that there's probably legal liability for the city and for the state.
And that will work itself out through the courts.
I think there's going to come a moment for your idea.
I'm not quite there yet.
It's well thought out.
I appreciate it, but it also is predicated on one assumption.
I think that you think that the people in the zone will allow it.
I have a feeling that it has the potential to be a lit fuse.
Do you know the city of Seattle?
Yeah, I know you've been there.
Of course I do.
I've been there many times.
Okay.
So the six-block area that they are occupying does comprise some residences and a lot of businesses.
All right.
My contention is that many, perhaps most, who are trapped there don't want to be trapped there.
Correct.
But they're allowed to get in and out.
And I'm only giving you straight reporting that I have.
Man, if it were in your neighborhood or my neighborhood, Hannity, we wouldn't be putting up with it.
We would not be putting up with it.
I only can say we wouldn't be living in Seattle, Bill.
We wouldn't be welcome in Seattle.
And by the way, we're not really welcome in New York either.
Well, New York is, I mean, what happened at St. Patrick's Cathedral, I don't know how much time we have, but the district attorney Cy Vance not prosecuting the people who desecrated the cathedral.
Sad.
That is probably the worst thing I've ever seen.
All right.
Let's reverse this real quick because we don't have a lot of time.
Let's say that the people that took over and are running the autonomous zone were some conservative or radical right-wing group, as they call it.
These are left-wingers.
What if it was that?
What would happen now?
Well, Inslee would have the National Guard in there.
Exactly.
Exactly.
Well, everybody knows that.
Everybody knows who Inslee is.
I mean, that's what I mean, that in this next election, people's got to choose what kind of country you want.
It's really stark.
Now, you may not like Trump, but you want Inslee?
Is that what you want?
You know what I do in this book, and I'm going to send you an early copy.
Special Father's Day first edition, specially bound copies, Hannity.com.
Bill, I'll give you yours for free.
I give the history of how this great country was founded.
I give a history of radicalism in this country.
I give the complete 2020 Democratic agenda.
I go through socialism and their history of failure.
I go through what is at stake between what they want on the left and what the radical party they've become and all of Donald Trump's views and successes that he's had in his first term.
I go through the hoax that they put us through with Russia, the phony impeachment, trying to literally undo an election.
And I go through, and that's why it's live free or die, America and the world on the brink, Bill.
This is not, for me, a game.
I believe you're tipping point.
You promised that I could interview you about this book.
You remember that?
I don't know.
Was I drinking that day?
I don't remember.
I really, no, of course I'll let you.
I don't matter, Hanny.
I got it on tape.
You're sitting down.
All right.
But I'm telling you, Bill, 139 days, Bill, this great republic is hanging in the balance.
The choice cannot be any more clear.
I've said that in past elections.
It's nothing compared to this one.
All right, billoilly.com.
Thank you, Bill O'Reilly.
We'll continue.
His words are meaningless.
He is lying to you.
He is lying to himself.
He is lying to the American people.
And Congress and the next president of the United States need to stand up to the billions and billions of dollars in Silicon Valley and hold these people, hold these billionaires accountable for their lies and for their undermining of American democracy.
All right, news roundup and information overload hour.
Joe Scarborough going nuts against Mark Zuckerberg and Google and all the interesting details that have emerged surrounding this whole issue and report that, in fact, Google may be financially blacklisting Zero Hedge, the Federalist site, Google to ban ads on the Federalist after NBC News raises concerns about the George Floyd protest.
Well, Joe works for NBC News.
They're looking for them to basically censor content that they don't like or agree with.
There's plenty of things I read about me every single day.
Linda, a lot of stuff about me I don't particularly like.
A lot of it's lying, but definitely don't agree with it, that's for sure.
But if you're, look, the bar is what the bar is.
You know, Congress shall make no law as it relates to freedom of speech.
Now, we have libel laws.
By the way, I'd like to see where the suit ultimately goes with our friend Lynn Wood.
Probably, you know, him and Charles Hart are by far, you know, standouts in terms of libel law, malice, Times v. Sullivan, Landmark case, which is, you know, it's a very high bar.
If you're a public figure, they can pretty much say anything they want about you, just the way it is.
Now, so it's interesting that it's NBC News, you know, apparently pushing, according to a Foxnews.com article, that they're pushing and now facing intense backlash for influencing Google to punish these two conservative news sites.
Now, we can also go through all the conspiracy theories of fake news, CNN, right?
We could do that.
And we can go through all the wrong reporting on Russia.
You know, what about those lies that damage this country?
Immeasurable damage.
Look what they put this country through.
They ever admit they're wrong?
No.
Look at what they did to one kid, Nicholas Sandman.
They're going to pay in that case because Nicholas Sandman, he's not a public figure.
The bar is much lower.
The lies that were told about this kid, the smears and the slander, all of that involved.
I mean, it is like unbelievable.
Anyway, so it's interesting.
Now, we dealt with this a long time.
Well, it wasn't that long ago.
It was May 28th, I guess we dealt with it, about a month ago.
And the president signed an executive order and he had Bill Barr, the attorney general in there.
And as it relates to the executive order fighting back against Silicon Valley with the president and censorship of conservatives, this is something now conservatives have had to deal with for a very long period of time.
This is something conservatives deal with all the time, as a matter of fact.
And, you know, on top of everything else, every single word we utter is being recorded in the hopes that one day that, you know, some conservative will say one thing they don't like, they don't agree with.
And instead of just letting the general public go out there and make their own decisions, because people, I can't force people to listen.
I want you to listen.
I'm going to try and do the best show I can every day so you'll listen.
I'm going to put on the best TV show I possibly can so you will listen and watch, but I can't make anybody.
You know, that's freedom.
You have the freedom to choose.
We have more choices now than ever.
Netflix, you've got Hulu, you've got Amazon, Prime, Prime Video.
You got it all.
Prime movies, Prime Prime, this, that, and everything.
Then you have all the social media content providers as well.
YouTube.
I mean, if you have a smart TV, you want to watch something on YouTube, you just put it on your TV.
It's that simple.
But there is a very important legal component to this, and that is the Communications Decency Act.
And the order interprets that key provision as not providing special protections for Silicon Valley titans like Facebook and Twitter and Google and the rest of them that are engaged in censorship.
If you're just a pure content provider, you are protected in terms of libel if in fact somebody were to say something offensive that could in fact be interpreted as libel.
In other words, you have that protection by your government.
They have that protection.
Now, if you're going to become an editor and then editorially, then all bets are off at that point.
You know what?
If you're not going to be a pure content provider and let people post freely, well, then if you don't become an editor, okay, you won't have the liability.
Once you become an editor, well, then that liability that you have, the protections are gone.
And by the way, this first happened with Twitter when they took the unprecedented steps of fact-checking the president's tweets.
And now they're deleting this conservative emails account.
And it goes on and on and on.
You had a Twitter employee linking to the platform.
The fact-checking came from where?
The Washington Post.
They hate the president.
Fake news, CNN.
They hate the president.
You know, so I actually put this on TV and on radio.
I tweeted it out to At Jack, or we said on the air, at Jack, that's your fact-checker?
The Washington Post, fake news, CNN.
Are they people that should have a voice in deciding how to target a president's Twitter page?
Well, now you're no longer just a content provider because you're deciding what's on there.
There's a lot of stuff I don't like that I see about me on social media.
Guess what?
Too bad.
I believe in freedom.
I believe in freedom of speech, liberty.
And people say lies about me too.
Not much I can do about it now.
When people are warned and people are given the truth, New York Toilet Paper Times is a case in point.
There's going to be a landmark case.
Sarah Palin, remember the whole thing, targeted districts and what they said at the time?
Yeah, that hopefully will go to trial.
And I want to see where that turns out.
I am paying very close attention to all of that.
So if you're going to take the role of fact-checking, then you also take on the liability and the responsibility.
And you may not want to use fake news, CNN, and MSDNC in the New York Toilet Paper Times and Washington Post as your fact checkers because they have agendas.
At Jack should know this.
We've met at Jack.
You ever, by the way, talked to him, Linda?
He seems to be unavailable.
So your connection is over.
I wouldn't say that it's over.
I would just say that it's going through an interesting phase in our relationship.
But remember, NBC now, and this is what I have, what Joe Scarborough is asking here is for them to censor speech he doesn't like.
Now, to me, it's a little bit of a joke.
I have nothing against Joe Scarborough.
He can say whatever he wants.
It's not the point.
But if you're going to edit people's opinions, you no longer get the liability protection that I've been talking about here, the Decency Act protection, the Communications Decency Act protection, because now you're an editor.
Now you are deciding.
You're not just a content provider or you're not just a place where you allow people to speak freely.
You're editing that speech.
Okay, that means that's a whole different ballgame.
And the liability is real.
By the way, I eviscerate.
Oh, in live free or die.
Linda, that whole chapter, I think it's what, chapter seven, the media mob, enemy of the people, the hate Trump media mob.
That's chapter seven.
Spot on, boss.
I eviscerate them.
I can't wait for August 4th.
We're going to get on the road again as well.
We're going to have some fun with this.
But more importantly, you know what?
The mob deserves everything I'm going to, I do throw at them because they are so irresponsible.
They're so reckless.
They tell so many lies.
They smear so many people.
There's such an agenda-driven, it's a fourth estate, and they abuse their power, frankly, with no accountability, no responsibility.
You know what?
You know, good thing, Nicholas Sandman, I can't wait to see this kid become a billionaire.
And that's what's going to happen.
But they won't disclose how much we had a private settlement.
That's fine.
They agree to a private settlement.
You're going to pay through the nose.
Great.
Good for Nicholas Sandman.
He deserved it.
He deserves so much better.
And by the way, Father's Day is this Sunday.
If you want to get a specially bound first edition copy, Live Free or Die, America and the World on the Brink, Live Free or America Dies in Latin.
For dad, print out a beautiful gift certificate.
He gets it first week delivery in a specially bound edition first edition copy.
Hannity.com for that.
Amazon.com if you just want to order it early and get a good discount.
All right, let's go to our phones here.
Let's say hi to Cheryl in Virginia.
Cheryl, hi.
How are you?
Glad you called.
Hi, Sean.
How are you?
So good to talk to you.
Good to talk to you.
What's going on?
Thank you.
Yes, my first question is, why isn't the Seattle FBI getting involved, shutting down Chaz when they've got armed BLM and Antifa members there blocking entrance into their zone?
And second, can the citizens of Seattle sue the mayor and other city officials for obstructing access and emergency services to that area?
I absolutely, if I was a homeowner, I was a store owner, and my business was under siege and with reckless disregard for the law, they did not uphold the oaths of their office and their responsibility to the citizenry.
I absolutely see a case there where they are financially, legally liable and responsible.
I'd love, and by the way, that's going to happen.
And by the way, the taxpayers of Washington, taxpayers in Seattle, yeah, they're going to be the ones that end up paying whatever the settlement is.
And depending on how much insurance they have, we'll see what that all comes down to.
How would you feel if it was your business, right?
I'd sue.
I'd sue.
I would too.
I can't blame people.
What about FBI involvement?
Can they not get involved?
Yes, the president has full constitutional authority to go in under the Insurrection Act of 1807.
He can go in, he can clean it up, and he can get it done.
But you know what?
I don't think he should.
I mean, the president keeps offering help.
It's the governor's job.
It's the mayor's job.
The mayor is hating and abetting these anarchists.
The mayor is saying something that's not true, that it's one big street festival, that it is a summer of love, and in the autonomous chop zone, chaz, whatever they want to call it on any given day, and spaghetti potluck dinners.
And you know what?
It's funny because fake news, CNN, and conspiracy TV, MSDNC reporting inside the autonomous zone.
And while they're inside there, they're saying, oh, no, it's like a festival atmosphere, using the same words as they always do, then no originality whatsoever.
It's one big liberal socialist talking point.
And while they're saying it, the people inside the zone say, no, it's not.
This isn't a festival.
It's hilarious.
They're getting beaten down, you know, right on live television.
I showed some of that last night.
It's hilarious, actually.
Anyway, thanks, Cheryl.
Yeah, appreciate it.
Say hi to Scott in New Jersey.
Scott, you're on the Sean Hannity show.
Hey, Sean, how you doing?
I had a quick question.
I was watching the TV this morning and on one of your competitors' channels, they were talking to the CEO of General Motors Corporation, and she was talking about basically creating all these inclusivity and diversity boards and all this stuff, right?
And a lot of these companies are coming out and saying this, right?
So civil rights movement happened almost 60 years ago, right?
Shouldn't the boards and the CEOs and the executives, like they're taking a reactive approach is what it sounds like.
Shouldn't they be stripping and cleaning all these boards out and all these CEOs that are taking a reactive approach?
Because these solutions and these problems should have been solved 20 or 30 years ago.
So like, that's my big question.
Like, what are they going to do about that?
And like, how are these executives taking such a reactive approach to something that should have been in their bylaws and corporate policies years ago?
Look, every corporation, it's easy for us, I would argue, you know, to say they should be focused on this, this, this, this, and this.
I don't care what the business is.
You're usually, everybody I know in business gulps water, if that makes sense.
I'm gulping water every day, all day.
It's like a fire hose in my throat.
You know, I'm trying to get all the information, news, information shows together.
And, you know, you just don't usually have the time to get to a lot of these other things.
And, you know, I've been blessed because I've hired so many good people around me, and that makes a big difference.
And I always let everybody do their job.
I'm not a micromanager type of boss.
And, you know, but in the end, when sometimes problems, you know, once they're illuminated, once they become a problem, then you have to give the attention that is due to it.
Should people be more proactive at times on a lot of issues?
Absolutely.
Quality control, safety issues, personnel matters, all of this stuff has to be dealt with.
It's complicated.
Then you have all the government regulations.
Then you have all the accounting and taxation that you got to deal with in any business.
It's, you know, I'm not disagreeing.
You got to focus on people too and the people that work for you and your customers and do it simultaneously and do it under that environment, which is also more competitive in a lot of industries than ever before.
It's not an easy answer, but we can get it right.
You always want to become more perfect.
That's how I love a more perfect union, for example.
All right, that's going to wrap things up for today.
We've got a lot of news to cover.
By the way, the president will be on tonight on Hannity, 9 Eastern on the Fox News channel.
President Trump is saying, absolutely, Kaepernick, if he can play in the NFL, should be playing in the NFL.
That surprised people.
We'll have the charges in the Atlanta case.
Lindsey Graham, Dan Bongino, Geraldo, Leo, and Larry, and President Trump also all coming up.
Hannity, exclusively, tonight, 9 Eastern, Fox News.
