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May 25, 2022 - Uncensored - Piers Morgan
45:59
20220525_piers-morgan-uncensored-texas-school-shooting-and-
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Guns Didn't Stop This Tragedy 00:05:47
Good evening.
19 children were shot dead at school in Evalde, Texas yesterday.
They were all under the age of 12, slaughtered in their classroom by an 18-year-old maniac who just bought the guns he used for his 18th birthday present.
These children's parents took them to school yesterday morning, their young hearts joyful with excitement, for another day of education and fun with their friends.
But they never went home and they're never going home.
And those parents will never recover now from the loss of their children.
They were slaughtered by this 18-year-old lunatic who was then shot dead by police in the deadliest school massacre since Sandy Hook, where 20 children and six adults were killed in another senseless tragedy that devastated the world.
That was 10 years ago.
And what's changed?
Well, nothing is the staggering answer.
America's endured more than 900 school shootings since Sandy Hook, including 27 this year alone.
In fact, there have been more mass shootings in 2022 in America than days of the year so far.
Some politicians, like Senator Chris Murphy from Connecticut, where Sandy Hook happened, can't understand why.
What are we doing?
Why are you here?
This isn't inevitable.
These kids weren't unlucky.
This only happens in this country.
He's right.
Whichever side of the gun debate you're on, America has a uniquely hideous record for gun deaths and mass shootings against the world's richest countries.
Only in America should mean the opportunity for any person to aspire to be anything they want to be in the most successful country on earth.
It shouldn't be the mournful lament we hear every time a maniac opens fire on innocent children in a place they're supposed to be happiest and safest.
History doesn't have to repeat itself, but with mass shootings in America, with school shootings, it does, again and again and again.
And the big question is why?
Steve Kerr, who's the coach of the Golden State Warriors basketball team and one of the biggest names in US sport, spoke for many last night.
Since we left Shooter Round, 14 children were killed 400 miles from here and a teacher.
And in the last 10 days, we've had elderly black people killed in a supermarket in Buffalo.
We've had Asian churchgoers killed in Southern California.
And now we have children murdered at school.
When are we going to do something?
Well, it's a very good question, isn't it?
I understand his anger and passion, not least because his own father was killed in a terrorist attack in Beirut.
So he understands pain and grief and loss.
I also understand that few issues are as impassioned or as divisive in America as guns.
It's not for me as a non-US citizen to tell Americans the laws that they should have.
I learned the hard way after Sandy Hook that a British accent shouting about gun control to Americans goes down about as well as an American accent telling Brits to abolish the monarchy would go down.
So let me say this instead.
I understand and respect the constitutional right of American people to own guns under the Second Amendment.
That was a right ratified by the Supreme Court in 2008.
But surely there must be some things that all parties can agree on.
Opponents of new gun laws say they wouldn't stop shootings because criminals will still get hold of them.
But by that logic, why have any laws against anything?
We have laws against murder, but we know it won't stop all murders.
We just hope it will reduce the number of murders.
The shooter, Salvador Ramos, legally spent $5,000 buying two AR-15 semi-automatic rifles and 375 rounds of ammunition just a few days after his 18th birthday.
And yet, he couldn't have legally bought a beer in Texas for another three years.
Nor could he have bought a Kinder Surprise chocolate egg anywhere in America because they're banned over the choking threat of the toys inside.
You don't have to be pro or anti-gun control to realize this is bafflingly inconsistent.
Just as it seems absurd that there's no law enforcing universal background checks on all gun sales when 91% of Americans in the polls want them to happen.
And those background checks must include all potentially relevant information.
Ramos was known to police after violent arguments with his drug-abusing mother and firing BB guns.
And we now know he posted his plan to attack a school on Facebook before carrying it out.
The supermarket shooter in Buffalo, New York, Peyton Gendron, was also 18 when he murdered 10 black people in a white supremacist rampage just 10 days ago.
He bought his guns legally too, and was also known to police after threatening to shoot up a school.
The Sandy Hook shooter, Adam Lanzer, was 20.
Banning people from being able to buy guns until they're 21 won't stop all young men like this getting their hands on guns.
But shouldn't we at least make it more difficult for them?
There were calls today for more armed security at schools.
We know from past experience that the most effective tool for keeping kids safe is armed law enforcement on the campus.
Senator Cruz may have a point.
I don't disagree with making schools more secure.
But the Texas shooter was engaged by an armed school guard before he even got inside.
The guard was shot and Ramos carried on his attack.
So the answer to these endless massacres can't always just be more guards or more guns, which are now the leading cause of death for US children, overtaking car accidents.
Frustration Over Gun Laws 00:13:18
Think about that.
Texas already has about twice as many registered guns as any other US state.
More than a million of them are registered.
But guns didn't stop this tragedy.
They caused it.
It takes a mentally ill monster to gun down innocent children.
But it's also monstrous to watch it happen time and again and do nothing, isn't it?
America is a magnificent country with great people.
I've lived there and worked for nearly 20 years in the United States and I love the place.
But the level of gun violence is spiralling out of control.
The massacres are getting worse and more frequent.
It just can't go on like this.
Toxic partisan point scoring which erupts after every one of these terrible atrocities achieves nothing.
Nor do the thoughts and prayers of people in the aftermath.
Nor do liberal celebrities screaming abuse at law-abiding conservative gun owners.
As I said, it's for Americans to resolve this gun violence crisis, not people like me who are not American.
But all I will say tonight as the bullet-ridden bodies of those poor innocent children lie in mortuaries is that surely, surely, doing absolutely nothing to prevent this happening again can no longer be an option.
Well next tonight, a shameful day for British politics.
I would like to correct the record to take this opportunity, not in any sense to absolve myself of responsibility, which I take and have always taken.
Yes, from a story about the truly unimaginable suffering of ordinary people to one about utter contempt for them at the very heart of the British government, Prime Minister Boris Johnson presided over a culture of disgusting and deplorable disrespect for British voters and for the laws that he had made and told us to follow.
Civil servant Sue Gray's report into illegal lockdown breaking parties at Downing Street would finish any politician with an ounce of shame.
But tonight the enduringly shameless Boris Johnson staggers on.
I want to begin today by renewing my apology to the House and to the whole country for the short lunchtime gathering on the 19th of June 2020 in the cabinet room.
And the House will note that my attendance at these moments, brief as it was, has not been found to be outside the rules.
I had no knowledge of those subsequent proceedings because I simply wasn't there.
And I have been as surprised and disappointed as anyone else in this House as the revelations have unfolded.
I believe that they were work events.
They were part of my job.
A lot of the stuff that I saw in the report this morning was news to me.
Was it, Boris?
It was news to you that there were endless wild parties going on in your home, under your nose, some of them attended by you.
This is all the usual Boris playbook.
More apologies, more insincere excuses, and then always a few laughs.
The only thing he's really sorry about is the fact he got caught.
We know that Boris Johnson broke the law.
He was fined for it by the police.
That would have done in any normal Prime Minister.
We already know that 83 people got more than 126 fines for partying.
His staff, when the country was told to stay home and save lives by him and the same staff.
We already know that Johnson lied, including, I believe, to Parliament.
That always used to be a resignation offence, but will it be for him?
I doubt it.
The devil is always in the detail and today's report is a rap sheet from hypocritical hell.
The lurid details about these parties, which happened in a place of work and in the Prime Minister's own home, would be shocking at any time.
The fact they took place during a pandemic is almost too outrageous to believe.
This is some of what was said.
There was excessive alcohol consumption by some individuals.
One individual was sick.
There was a minor altercation between two other individuals.
So they were vomiting and fighting as they broke their own rules.
Helen McNamara, Deputy Cabinet Secretary, attended for part of the evening and provided a karaoke machine.
Karaoke.
And this was the woman specifically in charge of ethics at Downing Street.
A text message from the Prime Minister's top advisor, Martin Reynolds.
A complete non-story, but better than them focusing on our drinks, which we seem to have got away with.
Well, you didn't, Mr. Reynolds, although in a way, perhaps you all have, because you're all still there, aren't you?
Including your boss, who said he knew nothing about any of this.
And so he goes on.
Some members of staff, says the report, drank excessively.
The event was crowded and noisy.
A cleaner who attended the room the next morning noted there was red wine spilled on one wall and a number of boxes of photocopier paper.
Vandalism, wine stains.
Some staff have witnessed, it says, or been subjected to behaviours at work which they had felt concerned about.
Multiple examples of a lack of respect and poor treatment of security and cleaning staff.
This was unacceptable.
You think?
You're damn right it was unacceptable.
It's an absolute kick in the teeth to all those people who couldn't go and see their loved ones as they died in hospital.
The people at the centre of the British government showed a calculated contempt for ordinary people, not only in their place of work, but for the rest of us too.
And most disgracefully, there was a party that went on until way after four o'clock in the morning on the very eve of Prince Philip's funeral.
A funeral where the Queen sat alone in her grief, away from her family, after losing the man she was married to for 70 years, because she was following the rules that everyone had been told to follow by Boris Johnson and his staff, who just ignored them all themselves, to party until 4 a.m.
Johnson's desperate defenders told us we had to wait for the police investigation before passing judgment.
So we did.
And it was damning.
Then they told us we had to wait for Sue Gray's report before passing judgment.
So we did.
And her verdict was damning too.
Boris Johnson and his staff took the public for idiots, brazenly breaking the rules they'd enforced on the rest of us.
And then he, the Prime Minister, lied through his back teeth about it.
He should, of course, do the honourable thing and resign.
He doesn't know the meaning of the phrase honourable thing.
Well, for survivors and victims' families of the 2012 Sandy Hook Massacre in Connecticut, the attack at the Robb Elementary School in Texas brings up chilling reminders of a very dark day in American history.
Scarlett Lewis' son, Jesse, was just six years old when he was killed, along with 19 other students and six adults.
And Scarlett joins me now.
Scarlett, thank you so much for joining me.
I thought of all of you because I was on air at the time in America at CNM when this happened.
It was an absolutely harrowing story to report on, as indeed had been the similar massacre at Dunblane in Scotland in the mid-90s.
And in fact, this morning I had an email exchange with one of the mothers of one of the children who died at Dunblane because I recognize that for all of you trapped in this appalling club of mothers and fathers who've lost kids to these school massacres, when another one happens, it must take you all right back to the day that you lost your own children.
Is that what it was like for you when you heard about this?
Absolutely, Piers.
I was living the experience right alongside all of those parents when they were waiting to get word whether their child was going to be found dead or alive those hours, those torturous hours.
And then, you know, my first thought this morning was how they would wake up and for one split second forget, and then this crushing blow would come down over them that their child was dead, that yesterday they were planning the summer fun, and today they're going to have to start thinking about writing an obituary.
They're going to have to start planning for funerals.
And it was a gut punch to me and so incredibly painful.
And honestly, I can't believe that I'm standing here talking to you 10 years after the murder of my own son, Jesse, at Sandy Hook, alongside 19 of his first grade classmates and six educators.
And now here we have another one after hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of school shootings later.
And of course, Columbine, 20 years before.
And we are still hearing the same tired narrative.
It is so frustrating.
You know, there's the saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result.
You could switch this round and say that with these massacres in America and the school shootings, the definition of insanity is doing nothing again and again and again and expecting a different result.
You know, I knew after Sandy Hook that if there was no change at all in the way that America was going to respond to these massacres, then inevitably there would be more of them.
I felt the same way, Piers.
I saw some movement, but we're always a step behind.
And the frustrating thing is these are preventable, every single one.
And we're reactive.
And as you said, we do the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.
It's the definition of crazy.
That's why after Jesse's murder, Obama flew in.
He was talking about gun control.
And I realized that that had failed, obviously, for Sandy Hook.
And so I took a different approach.
I decided to focus on the root cause of the pain and suffering that leads to these events.
And so, in other words, offering schools, homes, and communities skills and tools that they can use that help kids face their hurt and pain, be able to manage it, live with it, grow through it, be strengthened by it, and flourish.
I think that this is absolutely 100% necessary.
It should be in every single school.
And I'm actually on my Choose Love bus tour right now.
You caught me in New Hampshire working for Governor Sununu, traveling around the state, bringing love, hope, and healing to communities here that we've been doing through the pandemic, and we will continue to do.
You do remarkable work, and it's very inspiring that out of such an appalling tragedy, you're able to find the strength to do this.
And I commend you for that.
I want to take you back to what happened to your boy.
He was six years old, and he was an absolute little hero because he was in the classroom when the shooter, Adam Lanzer, came in, and his gun jammed.
And your little lad, Jesse, shouted at his friends to get out of the classroom, which a large number of them did.
I think eight or nine of the kids got out.
And then he was shot dead.
Absolute hero.
Was that in keeping with his character?
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
That was Jesse.
And if he wasn't coming back as we waited for those hours, I knew that he would have done something brave.
And when the shooter had shot his way through the glass doors of Sandy Hook Elementary School, he made a left down the first grade hallway.
Of course, he knew where that was because he had attended that school.
The principal and guidance counselor were meeting with a parent.
They were startled.
They opened the door to see what the noise was all about.
They were gunned down, and then the shooter turned into Jesse's first grade classroom.
Everyone was scattered.
His gun actually ran out of bullets at that time.
And during the short delay that it took him to change his clip, Jesse called for his classmates to run.
And he is credited with saving nine of his classmates' lives before losing his own.
No child should ever be asked to do that in school.
I mean, it is our responsibility to keep our kids safe and to address their mental health and well-being.
And we have to start taking that responsibility a lot more seriously.
In fact, we need to start making our kids a priority.
Yeah, I mean, it just seems to me that one of the worst things about these massacres, certainly the last two and Sandy Hook, is the age of the people doing this.
And there seems to be a pattern of sort of disenfranchised young kids, 18, 19, 20, disconnected from society, who I think this one was addicted to video games and so on, which I think also was the one at Sandy Hook.
Protecting Children From Violence 00:15:31
But what strikes me as completely perplexing, I think it does to many people in America as well as outside, is that none of them could have bought a beer legally in any of the states that they were living.
They couldn't buy a kinder surprise chocolate egg, but they can go and buy a semi-automatic rifle.
And this is what they do legally.
I mean, the last two massacres were committed by 18-year-olds who bought guns perfectly legally, but they couldn't get a beer if they wanted to.
It seems incomprehensible to me that you would have a set of laws where you can't get a beer, but you can buy a semi-automatic gun and go and shoot up a school.
Actually, what's really interesting to me is that the brain doesn't fully develop until you're 25.
So it becomes very frustrating.
And it is, Piers, it's the same story over and over and over again.
It is bullying.
It's disconnection.
It's isolation.
It's loneliness.
It's a focus on activities that are singular.
And it is a lot of hurt and pain and suffering.
And it's kids that do not have social and emotional competence.
They do not have coping mechanisms.
They don't have the ability to manage that pain.
So it continues to grow into rage.
And all they know to do, because they don't know that they have a choice, is to take that pain out on other people.
And each and every one could be preventable with literally what we're doing now.
That is why I am on the road.
And I want to tell you too that I have hope.
I was addressing a high school today.
There were 1,400 kids.
This was a speak-up event that was organized in New Hampshire, our strongest state for Choose Love, because of Governor Sununu understanding that this is a really important piece for school safety.
And the kids knew that they needed help.
They wanted to address their mental health.
And so they literally created this idea and created the entire day.
Their educators and administration got on board and supported them.
And so we talked about what was going on in a teenager's life today.
There's so much.
I mean, we have these cell phones and we've got 24-7 information that adults really can't handle that our brains haven't caught up to.
We have front row tickets to the worst of humanity.
And we're not giving our kids the skills and tools that they need to manage that trauma that's literally sitting in their hand.
And so today I shared with them some really life-transforming and life-saving skills that will help them manage their pain, not just today, but throughout their life.
And we know through science is a pathway to flourishing.
We need to do more of this, Piers.
Scarlett, I could not agree with you more.
I think the desensitization of this generation of kids is a massive problem.
I think it's driven by endless exposure to shocking imagery and videos and so on from social media shared around.
You know, they're seeing stuff in real time happening minutes after it happens, whereas 40 years ago, you would never have seen it.
And I think it's a massive problem.
I'm awestruck by your courage and your inspiration, to be perfectly honest.
You know, I remember Sandy Hooks so vividly.
You know, it made me upset just remembering it as I thought about your boy and all the others.
So thank you for what you're doing because we've got to try and work our way through this.
And there's not a simple solution, but there's got to be a solution.
I'll leave you.
I agree, and I'll leave you with this.
Jesse left a message on our kitchen chalkboard shortly before he went to school and then later was murdered.
He wrote three words, nurturing, healing, love.
Now, they were phonetically spelled because he was in first grade and just learning to write.
But I knew then and there that if the shooter had been able to give and receive nurturing, healing, love, the tragedy would never have happened.
We know that someone who loves and feels good about themselves, they're not going to want to hurt themselves and they're not going to want to hurt other people.
So that really gave me my mission.
Jesse gave me my mission.
He and his big brother, JT, are examples for me for courage.
And so I'm going to keep going because I truly believe in my heart that this is the solution and that we can reduce and prevent the majority of suffering that we're experiencing in our country and in our world by choosing love.
Yeah.
Scarlett, I couldn't put it better than you because I can't put it better than you.
You've just put it as well as it could be expressed.
And I just want to end by saying again how heroic your lad Jesse was that day.
He saved the lives of so many of his little classmates and it cost him his life, but what an amazing little hero he was.
And I wish you all the very best with your campaigning.
Keep it up.
Thank you.
Thanks, Piers.
They're remarkable people.
They belong to the worst club you could ever be in, isn't it?
The club of the parents who've never seen their children again because they got gunned to pieces at school in these massacres.
Well, earlier we heard the Texas Senator Ted Cruz, the call for more armed police officers to be stationed at schools across the United States.
Join me now as someone who agrees with that, conservative radio host Ben Ferguson.
Ben, you and I have had a lot of fiery debates over the years about gun controls.
I don't want to have one of those with you because I don't think they ever really achieved very much.
And when I watch social media today, everyone on all sides of this debate blowing up emotionally, raging on both sides, ever more entrenched.
What I want to try and do is try and get to a place where we can at least agree some things.
And I just wonder, you know, you're a guy from Texas, you're a father.
When you heard about this, you're a gun owner and you support the Second Amendment, and I fully respect that.
But when you heard about this tragedy, what was your sort of gut feeling about this?
I think first it was why in America do we not protect our children, our most vulnerable and most valuable, by making sure that there's law enforcement at every public school.
We protect our president, we protect our senators, we protect our governors, we protect our money at our banks, we protect the jewelry at the jewelry store with armed guards, but we don't protect our children with armed guards.
We can obviously afford it.
America just said so.
American people.
There was an armed guard at the school.
And he challenged the shooter before he got in.
And he got shot.
He got shot and disabled.
There was an armed guard there, but there was in the Buffalo City.
Let me finish.
Yeah, but I mean, you know that there was an armed guard, right?
Let me finish.
You had two different police officers that were actually shot by this individual yesterday, and you had Border Patrol agents that responded, but you had an open door to that school.
And if you have security measures at a school the way that many private schools do them in the country, they make sure that those schools are locked and that someone can't just randomly come in from the outside.
And that's part of the problem.
We don't have enough police officers who understand the lockdowns of a school to protect the children from outside individuals trying to get in.
And my point is this: we are supposed to be a wealthy nation, just like your country is as well.
We just spent $40 billion to Ukraine.
The people that, by the way, are yelling about guns right now, the same people demanding we send more guns to Ukraine, which I think is very odd.
But we have to do a better job of finding a consensus here and saying, you know, you mentioned earlier that the, and he said some interesting things.
The coach of Golden State, a couple years ago, he came out in a very fiery comment saying that he did not want to have armed guards at schools.
And then today he comes out with this very fiery statement.
There's got to be some compromise where parents can say, okay, we all agree that our children are valuable.
And we need to make sure that we have mechanisms and we have a way that we do business every day at these schools to protect these children the same way we have protocols around presidential leaders.
I would agree with you, right?
I don't think there's any option other than to protect schools more, given this appalling tragedy and given what happened at Sandy Hook and given the hundreds of school shootings since Sandy Hook.
There's got to be more security.
But just for the record, there was an armed police guard at this school.
It's emerged tonight.
And there was an armed guard.
And there wasn't an armed guard at the moment.
Let me finish, Ben.
There was an armed guard at the supermarket in Buffalo.
So armed guards alone are actually not that effective, it turns out.
When you're facing a guy with full body armor with a semi-automatic rival who has the ability and advantage of surprise, it's very hard for one armed guard.
So what do you do then?
Do you then have a number of armed guards?
That's a great question.
Every school.
Do you have a whole sort of small army?
Do you turn the schools into militarized bases?
What do you do?
Again, this is where I have to disagree with you.
My father's in law enforcement.
And what do you do when you have one police officer and you have a dangerous situation?
You immediately call for what?
Backup.
And then when you are around someone that's a world leader, what do you see?
You don't see one Secret Service agent or one police officer.
When there are people that you could know could attack, you have more than one.
And that's what we have messed up in this country.
We are not valuing the lives of our children to the point where we should say, if you have a large campus and you listen to the experts that talk about how quickly a police officer can get from one side of the campus to the other, they all tell you the same thing.
You do need multiple armed guards because it takes too long for someone to get from one side of the school to the other.
It doesn't mean it's militarized.
All right.
Look, so you're talking about multiple armed guards.
Let's come to the other issue of the age that people are legally allowed to get these high-powered semi-automatic rifles.
I don't understand how it can be illegal to get a beer until you're 21 in most states in America, but it's perfectly legal to buy a semi-automatic rifle or why you can't get a kinder surprise chocolate egg anywhere in America because you may choke on my little toy, but you can buy handguns.
I don't understand that.
Can you explain the logic behind that?
Sure.
I think one of the problems you have in this country, and I think you have around the world with lawmakers, is they're consistently inconsistent with actually doing things that make sense.
Is it weird that you can buy a gun at 18, but you can't buy a beer until you're 21?
Of course it is.
Is it weird that you can go serve your country and we'll train you how to become a killer of terrorists around the world, but you can't drink a beer when you come home from that trip?
That is insanity.
The fact of the matter is, though, it's not an age issue in this country right now.
As much as we want to obsess over it, it's a lack of parenting issue in this country that we have.
Look at what we see consistently.
Look at the man that we're talking about right now.
He just turned 18.
There were massive warning signs that this person was clearly mentally troubled.
He came to an event and he had slashed his own cheeks and said it was fun and he wanted to feel the pain.
He had talked about committing heinous crimes and violence.
Look at what happened in Buffalo.
We know the shooter there threatened to kill people at his school.
We have the warning signs.
You have a parent and grandmother who have called the police on this individual multiple times.
Now, think about that from a parent's perspective.
I agree, but Ben, when you as a parent, I protect your children and you call 911.
I agree, but all you're painting is an even more inexplicable picture as to why these kids who are clearly mentally ill, you have to be mentally ill to do what they do, mentally ill, are able to just wander into any gun stall perfectly legally and buy semi-automatic rifles when they can't get a beer.
Look, I've got to leave it there.
It's a sad day.
But it's a sad day.
Let me say this though.
Is it going to change if they're at 21?
Probably not.
An arbitrary age is not going to fix this.
If we want to fix this problem, we need to, number one, protect the schools.
We should have bipartisan support on that.
And two, we need to make sure that when law enforcement is called to someone's house from a parent begging for help for a child that clearly having massive problems, that we have mechanisms to stop them from actually doing this.
Yeah.
I think you need all of that.
And then you need to stop deranged young people being able to legally assault rifles and semi-automatic rifles.
Anyway, Ben, we've got to leave it there.
I want to have a constructive, ongoing dialogue about this because it can't go on.
America can't just keep waking up to these tragedies.
It's just heartbreaking for everybody.
You've got another whole series of families now, lives completely destroyed.
So at least I'm sure we can agree this cannot go on like it is.
Doing nothing cannot be the sensible, humane option.
So we've got to keep talking and we've got to find points of consensus.
I don't think shouting on either side ever gets anywhere with these debates.
So let's, you know, keep talking.
Come back again.
Let's discuss it and let's see if we can get to points of consensus and try and help things.
Good to talk to you.
Totally agree.
Thank you.
Brian says the next another shameful day with British politics.
Will Boris Johnson resign?
We'll debate that.
Well, now we've got Sue Gray's damning report into illegal lockdown busting parties in Downing Street.
And frankly, there should be a resignation matter for any Prime Minister, particularly one who's been fined himself for breaking the law that he set, but apparently not for Boris Johnson, who discussed this associate author Grace Blakely, and former Conservative MP, Louise Mensch.
Well, Grace, I read the report.
It's here, 40-odd pages of, frankly, awful stuff about a group of people arrogant, entitled, brazenly ignoring their own rules, vomiting, fighting, boozing, even on the night before Prince Philip's funeral.
And at the end of it, you just feel sickened.
And yet no one seems to be taking any accountability whatsoever, least of all the person at the top.
Yeah, I mean, even what this report is, which is just, it's written in kind of bureaucraties, it's fairly kind of, it's, you know, just explaining what was going on.
Even through all of that, you can still see this is pretty damning stuff.
This would be a clear resignation issue for any other prime minister.
The issue is, of course, is that it just seems as though Boris Johnson has no shame.
Accountability For Abhorrent Behavior 00:03:43
He's seen over and over again these allegations that have been made against him, these proven allegations that have been made against him.
And he just thinks that he can continuously kick the can down the road and hope that he can distract the media, distract the rest of the Conservative people.
I agree, with something else.
Maybe because he does always get away with it.
Louise Mensch, are you going to continue to defend the indefensible?
You think that's it?
Move on now?
Defend the indefensible, Piers.
Your problem is that you've got a smoking gun right now, but what you don't have is Boris Johnson being the one that pulled the trigger.
I have to wonder if we read the same report because I went through those 40 pages and it certainly did sound a bit like Animal House in number 10 or some kind of frat party that we all had when we were 20 years old and at college.
The problem that you've got and that Boris Johnson's enemies have got is that Sue Gray's report makes it clear that for almost all of these do's, he was in the room for a few minutes, then went on to another.
Actually, what it makes clear, what it makes crystal clear is that he's the boss.
It was all happening in his house and workplace.
He was living there throughout all this.
And he surely should have accountability as the person presiding over this mayhem.
The idea that there were literally scores of illegal parties breaking the very rules that he was setting with his team and doing it in such a brazen manner, shameless manner.
At what point in the old days, people would fall on their sword for far less than this?
Why hasn't Boris Johnson just said, you know what, actually, this is just beyond the pale.
I know what people were sacrificing in the country and I'm going to resign.
Isn't that the decent thing?
Because he's got no reason to resign, far from being scores of parties.
Let's just get this straight.
There were eight parties, in fact, for which 50% of the people were.
How many more do you want?
Eight, whatever.
It's not scores.
It's eight.
And it's very bad parties.
What are you talking about?
Piers, Piers, Piers, Piers, you say that he lives and works there.
He lives in the private residence about the flat.
He didn't hear this stuff going on.
Oh, no.
He didn't come down and say, turn down the music.
I've been in Downing Street many times.
Of course, he knew what was going on.
And by the way, apparently he knew about the Friday night party every Friday.
Everyone, living in Downing Street, knows exactly what's going on.
You don't have to read the long and boring report that Boris Johnson deliberately kicks down the road as long as he did to hope that by this point there'll be something else for us to talk about.
You don't have to go through all of those very, very clear allegations.
You don't have to count the number of parties.
Everyone knows that this is beyond the paleo.
That's all going on.
That's the body of abhorrent behaviour from a prime minister who thinks that he is above the law, who has no shame in making these laws and then breaking them himself.
But the real issue here, and the issue that this is exposed, the issue that this government has repeatedly exposed by miring itself in scandal after scandal after scandal is that there are no mechanisms in this country for holding our elites to account.
I agree.
We have parliamentary sovereignty.
Fine, that's the way that this Westminster system works.
We're supposed to also have checks and balances.
There are supposed to be mechanisms that you can use to force people who have done something wrong to step down and not just rely on.
I agree.
My point would be you shouldn't have to force Boris Johnson to step down.
That actually, in the old days, a prime minister who was convicted of breaking a law he'd set and had all these members of staff doing this kind of thing, they would just resign.
But you can only rely on that, Pierce, when you're talking about someone who actually has shades and think that things just, you know, not like it's not.
No, you're the major point.
You think it's all nonsense, overblown, he hasn't nothing to resign for?
Johnny Depp And Kate Moss 00:03:59
I get it.
I just think you're completely wrong.
Got to leave it there.
Sorry.
Yeah, I know.
I've read it.
If you can't resign over this, I don't know what you resign over.
I dread to think, frankly.
Thank you both very much for your time.
On sensitive next, Supermodel Kate Moss takes the stand in the deck third trial.
My friend Janice Dickinson will join me live after the break after the sensational developments today.
Well, the courtroom theatrics of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard took another dramatic turn today as Depp's former lover Kate Moss, the supermodel, gave evidence from her home in Gloucestershire.
She made a very brief appearance specifically to testify that she was never pushed down the stairs by Depp, contrary to rumors resurfaced by Amber Heard in the case two weeks ago.
I just, in my head, instantly think of Kate Moss in the stairs, and I swung at him.
Did Mr. Depp push you in any way down the stairs?
None.
During the course of your relationship, did he ever push you down any stairs?
No.
He never pushed me, kicked me, or threw me down any stairs.
Well, joined up by Sib Ordle and a friend of Kate Moss, Janice Dickinson.
Janice, great to have you on the show, and you know Kate and Johnny well.
I thought it was a very big moment in this trial because Amber Heard had tried to use this story, which everyone thought was true about Johnny Depp hurling Kate Moss down the stairs as evidence this is what he does and why she feared for her own safety.
And there was Kate Moss, who never ever speaks in public.
So it's sort of fascinating, popping up purely for a few minutes just to say, actually, that story is completely untrue and he never did anything like that to me in our relationship.
What did you make of it?
I think just from personal experience, knowing when Kate Moss was indeed the girlfriend of Johnny Depp, he was the boyfriend.
I was on a flight from Virgin Islands to St. Bart's and the both of them had clearly been drinking as I was clearly drinking on this air flight.
And he was a total gentleman to her and he was a total gentleman to me.
And I've ran into Johnny Depp several times in Los Angeles.
You know, after Happy Hour has like long set, the son has set on happy hour.
He was never violent towards anyone.
And as far as Amber Heard saying that she had been tossed down flights of stairs or beaten up by Johnny Depp or anything like that, I don't believe it for one New York City second.
I mean, look what happened between the two of them.
She severed his fingertip off.
I'm sorry.
I mean, I've got to say, Janice, I've watched the whole thing from time to time, the clips and so on, with just increasing kind of revulsion, really.
It's like the worst dirty linen ever washed, isn't it?
Don't you feel dirty watching this trial?
I mean, I have been watching it like this, but I'm planted to it at night.
And this is a big thing here in Los Angeles, this trial.
And I'm opposed to Amber Heard for my very own personal reasons about women's rights.
As you know, I was raped by Bill Cosby during the Cosby trials, and I went up against this monster and testified for Andrea Constance on her behalf.
Well, here, I would be ready to testify for Johnny Depp that Amber Heard had a fledgling career when she first met, when she first did the rum diaries with Johnny Depp.
And Johnny Depp is this mega superstar.
And I think the other thing, Janice, I think the bottom line with this is I think that Kate Moss today, in a very powerful few minutes, may have completely swung this back Johnny Depp's way because she nailed a lie that Amber Heard was trying to use.
I've got to leave it there, Janice.
Remembering The Young Victims 00:02:51
I'm sorry, we run out of time, but thank you very much for you.
Well, thank you.
I'm a big fan, Piers, big fan of yours.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate it.
Bye.
On Central Next, we pay tribute to those 19 children and two teachers who were tragically killed in the deadliest U.S. school shooting of a decade.
That's coming back.
I want to take a moment now to tell you the names and ages of every single one of these victims so that we can all fully comprehend what has happened here.
La Silla Garcia was eight.
Her granddad described him as the sweetest little boy I've ever known.
Javier Javier Lopez was ten.
He was bubbly and loved to dance.
Amory Joe Garso was 10.
Her grandmother said she was super outgoing and a teacher's pet.
Annabella Guada Lupe Rodriguez was 10 years old.
She was an exemplary student.
Nevea Bravo's cousin said she's flying with the angels above.
10-year-old Elie Lugo's father described her as a doll and was the happiest ever.
Rogelio Torres was 10.
His cousin said, it breaks my heart to say my Rogelio is now with the angels.
Tessmarie Mattis' sister called her a precious angel.
Lexi Rubio was 10 and was described as a bright light in everyone's life.
Jose Flores was 10 and loved to laugh and have fun.
JC Camelo Lua Venos, who was 10, and Jayla Nicole Siguero, who was 11, were cousins.
The mother of Jayla said of them, fly high, my angels.
10-year-old Matie Juliana Rodriguez's cousin described her as a sweet, smart little girl.
10-year-old Alethea Ramirez's dad said she loved to draw and wanted to be an artist.
11-year-old Miranda Mathis' cousin said, we loved you dearly.
I'm so sorry this happened.
Mackena Elrob was 10.
Her sister told us all to hug her loved ones tight tonight and tell them that she love them.
Eliana Elijah Cruz Torres was 10.
Her family said she didn't want to go to school on the day of the shooting.
10-year-old Jackie Casarez, her little sister pota online, that she was sorry she forgot to say good morning today.
Two teachers also died.
46-year-old Ima Garcia, who taught at the school for 24 years and had four children, along with 44-year-old mother of one, Eva Morelas.
I took my 10-year-old daughter to school today.
It was just an art exhibition day with all her friends.
They were all 10, 11, the same age as these kids that were slaughtered yesterday in Texas.
A Country In Horror 00:00:25
I can't even imagine what those parents are now going through.
Other than I've spoken to Sandy Hook parents, to Dunblame parents.
I have some idea.
But it's the ultimate unimaginable horror.
And once again, I just say to America, a country I love, do something about this.
Please, for the love of God, we have got to stop kids being slaughtered in their classroom.
That's all for us tonight.
Goodbye.
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