- 15 hours ago
The Last Word with Lawrence ODonnell - Season 13 - Episode 39
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00Well, there is exactly one first lady in history who met sex trafficker and raper of children and good friend
00:09of Donald Trump, Jeffrey Epstein.
00:10And today, Republicans on the House Oversight Committee decided to question a former first lady who never met Jeffrey Epstein
00:17instead of the first lady currently occupying the White House,
00:22who was friends with Jeffrey Epstein and his convicted sex trafficking co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell.
00:31Donald Trump's third wife was friends with both of them.
00:35The Epstein files contain emails from Melania Trump to Ghislaine Maxwell complimenting Ghislaine Maxwell.
00:41The Epstein files contain no communication at all between Hillary Clinton and Jeffrey Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell.
00:47But Republicans on the committee decided they wanted to subpoena Hillary Clinton.
00:52Where is there subpoena for Melania Trump, who actually knew Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell?
01:00Why aren't they asking Melania Trump, did Donald Trump introduce you to Jeffrey Epstein or did Jeffrey Epstein introduce you
01:08to Donald Trump?
01:10Why aren't they asking Melania Trump what she knew about Jeffrey Epstein?
01:15And the Epstein files show the Palm Beach police chief saying that Donald Trump told him in 2006, quote,
01:25thank goodness you're stopping him.
01:27Everyone has known he's been doing this.
01:31If true, that would mean that Donald Trump's wife at that time, Melania Trump, knew he was doing this.
01:40She would be included in Donald Trump's term, everyone.
01:45Melania Trump might have no useful information to provide to the committee, but she did meet Jeffrey Epstein.
01:52She was friends with Jeffrey Epstein.
01:54She was friends with Ghislaine Maxwell.
01:56And it is possible that she knew something.
01:59According to her husband, everyone knew.
02:02Hillary Clinton, in a written opening statement to the committee today, made the point that not everyone who has been
02:10subpoenaed by the committee has been actually required to testify to the committee.
02:14The former secretary of state, who was also a lawyer and worked on the congressional committee investigation of corrupt Republican
02:21President Richard Nixon at the beginning of her career,
02:23reminded the committee, quote, you subpoenaed eight law enforcement officials, all of whom ran the Department of Justice or directed
02:30the FBI when Epstein's crimes were investigated and prosecuted.
02:34Of those eight, only one appeared before the committee.
02:37Five of the six former attorneys general were allowed to submit brief statements stating they had no information to provide.
02:46Hillary Clinton should have been offered exactly the same option.
02:50Secretary Clinton did provide the committee with a statement stating she had no information to provide.
02:58But the Republicans on the committee refused to accept that statement from her, the same kind of statement they accepted
03:05from other former cabinet officials.
03:07Secretary Clinton's opening statement was a masterful and thorough condemnation of the Republicans on the committee.
03:13She said, quote, you have made little effort to call the people who show up most prominently in the Epstein
03:18files.
03:19And when you did, not a single Republican member showed up for Les Wexner's deposition.
03:24The institutional failure is designed to protect one political party and one public official.
03:31Secretary Clinton identified that public official by name repeatedly in her opening statement, saying,
03:38You have compelled me to testify, fully aware that I have no knowledge that would assist your investigation in order
03:45to distract attention from President Trump's actions and to cover them up despite legitimate calls for answers.
03:55Ask him directly under oath about the tens of thousands of times he shows up in the Epstein files.
04:05Ask him directly under oath. That's right. Ask Donald Trump directly under oath about the accusation in the Epstein files
04:12that he assaulted and raped a child.
04:16Secretary Clinton, as a former senator, knows how congressional committees should do their work.
04:21She told the Republicans on the committee, quote, a committee run by elected officials with a commitment to transparency would
04:28ensure the full release of all the files.
04:31It would get to the bottom of reports that DOJ withheld FBI interviews in which a survivor accuses President Trump
04:37of heinous crimes.
04:38It would subpoena anyone who asked on which night there would be the wildest party on Epstein Island.
04:53When are the Republicans going to subpoena Elon Musk and ask him if he ever went to the wildest party
05:01on Epstein Island and ask him under oath, make him answer that question under oath?
05:08And Secretary Clinton spoke authoritatively on the larger issue of sex trafficking, including the sex trafficking of children.
05:16She said, quote, if you are new to this issue, let me tell you, Jeffrey Epstein was a heinous individual,
05:23but he's far from alone.
05:24This is not a one off tabloid sensation or a political scandal.
05:29It's a global scourge with an unimaginable human toll.
05:32My work combating sex trafficking goes back to my days as first lady.
05:36I worked to pass the first federal legislation against trafficking and was proud that my husband signed the Trafficking Victims
05:44Protection Act,
05:45which increased support for survivors and gave prosecutors better tools for going after traffickers.
05:51Let's hear from Melania Trump about what she has done in her position as first lady about sex trafficking or
06:00anything else.
06:02Hillary Clinton described what she did as secretary of state.
06:06I oversaw nearly 170 anti-trafficking programs in 70 nations and directly pressed foreign leaders to crack down on trafficking
06:16networks in their countries.
06:18Every year, we published a global report to shine a light on abuses.
06:21The findings of those reports triggered sanctions by countries failing to make progress.
06:26So they became a powerful diplomatic tool to drive concrete action.
06:30I insisted that the United States be included in the report for the first time ever in 2011 because we
06:36must hold ourselves not just to the same standard as the rest of the world, but to an even higher
06:42one.
06:42Sex trafficking and modern slavery should have no place in America.
06:45None infuriatingly, the Trump administration gutted the trafficking in persons office at the State Department, cutting more than 70 percent
06:57of the career civil and foreign service experts who worked so hard to prevent trafficking crimes.
07:04The message from the Trump administration to the American people and the world could not be clearer.
07:10Combating human trafficking is no longer an American priority under the Trump White House.
07:16That is a tragedy.
07:17It's a scandal.
07:19It deserves vigorous investigation and oversight.
07:23A committee endeavoring to stop human trafficking would seek to understand what specific steps are needed to fix a system
07:31that allowed Epstein to get away with his crimes in 2008.
07:34It would demand that Secretary Rubio and Attorney General Bundy testify about why this administration is abandoning survivors and playing
07:43into the hands of traffickers.
07:45It would put forth legislation to provide more resources and force this administration to act.
07:50But that's not happening.
07:54Donald Trump, who was called a pedophile protector by an autoworker at a Ford factory, is running an administration that
08:02has eliminated the jobs of most of the people who were working every day to prevent sex trafficking crimes.
08:12The people who were working to stop the next Jeffrey Epstein.
08:16Donald Trump fired them.
08:19Even though we all know that in Washington the rules don't apply to Republicans, Republicans continue to find ways to
08:26shock by breaking rules that have never been broken before.
08:30Today it was Republican Lauren Boebert's turn to do something that has never been done before and is and always
08:36has been completely against the rules.
08:39Lauren Boebert took a photograph of Secretary Clinton during the deposition and immediately released it publicly to a Trump-supporting
08:45media clown.
08:46Secretary Clinton had every right, as soon as that happened, to leave the deposition, to just walk out.
08:53The Republicans would have no ability at all to prevent Secretary Clinton from leaving the deposition after one of their
08:59members violated the rules of that deposition and the rules of every Congressional Committee procedure in the history of Congress.
09:06Secretary Clinton, upon learning of the deposition, decided not to leave, but instead told the chairman that the news media
09:13should now be allowed in the room to cover her testimony now that the Republicans have broken the seal of
09:20that room.
09:21After half an hour, Secretary Clinton decided to resume her testimony and further humiliate the Republicans, who were afraid to
09:30question the two people who were friends of Jeffrey Epstein, Donald and Melania Trump.
09:37Secretary Clinton spoke to reporters after the deposition, which was held near her home in Chappaqua, New York.
09:46Secretary Clinton, I don't know how many times I had to say I did not know Jeffrey Epstein.
09:51I never went to his island.
09:53I never went to his homes.
09:55I never went to his offices.
09:57So it's on the record numerous times.
10:02It then got, at the end, quite unusual because I started being asked about UFOs.
10:10And a series of questions about Pizzagate, one of the most vile, bogus conspiracy theories that was propagated on the
10:21Internet, that was serving as the basis of a member's questions to me.
10:29And here's what some of the Democrats in the deposition had to say.
10:34One of the things that's been confirmed today is that in addition to having no relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, Secretary
10:43Clinton had, has no relationship with Ghislaine Maxwell.
10:48But there are important questions we should be asking the Trump administration about Ghislaine Maxwell.
10:54And I hope that our Republican colleagues will join us in asking these questions.
10:58Why is it that Donald Trump has refused to rule out the pardon, the clemency, that Ghislaine Maxwell is campaigning
11:09for?
11:09House Republicans need to get serious about this investigation.
11:14I understand now fully why Secretary Clinton wanted to make this deposition in her hearing public.
11:21Because the reality is we are talking to the wrong person today, who we should be talking to instead of
11:27people who are actually mentioned in the files, people who have made misleading statements about their relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
11:34We should oppose the person that is mentioned in the Epstein files almost more than any other person next to
11:41Ghislaine Maxwell, and that's Donald Trump.
11:44Leading off our discussion tonight is Democratic Congressman Suhas Subramaniam of Virginia.
11:49He is a member of the Oversight Committee and was at that deposition today.
11:54Congressman, thank you very much for joining us today, tonight.
11:57What, why did this go on for seven hours?
12:05It was very repetitive, and again, I'll reiterate what I just said earlier.
12:10I wish it was public, because it was humiliating for the Republicans there.
12:15They kept trying to corner Secretary Clinton.
12:18They basically asked the same question a hundred times.
12:22Did you know Jeffrey Epstein?
12:24Did you associate with him?
12:25Did you know Ghislaine Maxwell?
12:26How did you know her if you knew her?
12:29And she said the same thing over and over again, that basically could have been said over written testimony and
12:35was said, which is that she didn't know the guy.
12:38And meanwhile, there's so many other people in the files that are released.
12:42Remember, there's two and a half files that haven't been released, a million files.
12:45And the reality is we're talking to the wrong people.
12:50She was asked about the one linkage that could be found to Ghislaine Maxwell, which is that Ghislaine Maxwell apparently
12:57ended up at her daughter's wedding as someone else's guest.
13:03Let's listen to what Secretary Clinton said about that to reporters after the deposition.
13:10Why was Ghislaine Maxwell invited to your daughter, Chelsea Clinton's wedding in 2010?
13:17She'd already been mentioned in a civil lawsuit by Virginia Dufresne before that.
13:23Jeffrey Epstein had already been convicted before that.
13:26She came as the plus one, the guest of someone who was invited.
13:32The plus one from hell.
13:34We've all seen that at weddings and other functions where someone shows up with the inappropriate escort for the for
13:42the event.
13:43I assume Republicans kept going over and over on that point.
13:49Absolutely.
13:50And in the end, as Secretary Clinton mentioned, they started asking about UFOs and Pizzagate.
13:56And they were even by the end of the deposition asking for advice on how to move the investigation forward.
14:01That's where we were at the last hour.
14:03So, again, we didn't really get much.
14:05What was really striking to me was that there were 10 or 11 Republicans there.
14:10I felt like I was at a Republican caucus meeting.
14:12But at the Ohio deposition of Lex Wexner, who, you know, he bankrolled Jeffrey Epstein's operations.
14:20There were zero Republicans.
14:21So that just shows you where their head's at in this investigation.
14:24The real people who were like Wexner, who was a co-conspirator, named as a co-conspirator, they weren't anywhere
14:32to be seen.
14:32But with Hillary Clinton, they're all there in full force asking questions for seven hours.
14:38The part of her opening statement that actually intrigued me the most was a focus that has been lost, including,
14:46by the way, I would even say in our coverage of this, because we've been covering the Epstein case, the
14:51Maxwell case, and this sprawling worldwide conspiracy.
14:54But Secretary Clinton brought our focus to the worldwide problem, which she addressed both as First Lady and, even more
15:03importantly, as Secretary of State.
15:05And the work she described there, which not a single Republican on that committee is familiar with, and not one
15:12of them cared about when Donald Trump dismantled it.
15:16Yeah, she talked about that extensively.
15:19And one of the interesting things she's brought up is that the Republicans have cut funding to actually go after
15:26human trafficking here and around the world.
15:29And now there's less prosecutors to go after the perpetrators of these terrible crimes.
15:35So what is this investigation really about?
15:38Is this about going after Democrats, as Republicans kind of see it?
15:42Or is this about actually protecting women and standing up to perpetrators so that this never happens again?
15:50Congressman Suha Subramaniam, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
15:54Really appreciate it.
15:55And coming up, our next guest has issued a report showing how Donald Trump's federal invasion forces that attacked Minneapolis
16:02now seem to be preparing for a war.
16:06Senator Adam Schiff joins us next.
16:14Armed for violence.
16:16That's the title of the report released by Democratic Senator Adam Schiff.
16:21It is a new 33-page report revealing that in the last year, Donald Trump has committed at least $144
16:28million to purchase large quantities of weapons and munitions for ICE and Customs and Border Protection.
16:37AR-style rifles, tasers, tear gas, other lethal weapons.
16:42Senator Schiff's report says in just one year, ICE's spending commitments on weapons, ammunition, and accessories surged fourfold, over 360
16:53percent when compared to ICE's contracts in 2024.
16:56In 2025, CBP's contracts for weapons, ammunition, and accessories doubled when compared to CBP's 2024 totals.
17:07Joining us now is Democratic Senator Adam Schiff of California.
17:09He's a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
17:12Senator, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
17:14This is the kind of report that is so vital to our understanding of what is happening now.
17:21What are the key points of your findings?
17:26Well, we wanted to go through DHS's contracting records and document just how much they're spending to militarize this new,
17:35you know, effectively new police force, this palace guard of the president's that is wreaking such havoc in our cities.
17:40And we found dramatic increases in spending on weapons, as you said.
17:46ICE agents will be equipped with now three to four times the amount of weapons as the previous year.
17:53Customs and Border Protection doubling their expenditure on the same.
17:56And I think what we're seeing is a dangerous combination of a much more heavily armed immigration law enforcement complex.
18:06At the same time, we heard whistleblower testimony this week that they've cut the training for these new ICE agents.
18:14And they're getting inadequate training on when to use these weapons and how to use these weapons.
18:18That is a really dangerous mix.
18:21And we wanted to sound the alarm with this report that we're seeing the emergence of a kind of law
18:27enforcement or immigration enforcement industrial complex because it's not just the weapons.
18:34We're seeing dramatic increases in expenditures on detention centers they want to build around the country.
18:39And this is a way of gathering its own momentum.
18:42And we need to be aware of what's happening, that we're building a not-small army now that's going to
18:48be policing American streets.
18:51So this brings to mind Donald Trump's so-called border czar, Tom Holman, caught on videotape an undercover FBI video
19:00of him accepting $50,000 in cash for this purpose.
19:07This is what it was designed for.
19:09It was supposed to be about helping people.
19:12He was then in the business of helping people get these kinds of contracts.
19:18And he was talking about being able to help people get these kinds of contracts, help companies get these kinds
19:24of contracts if Donald Trump won the presidential election.
19:29Well, that's exactly right.
19:30And we're broadening our look at what DHS is doing because I think undoubtedly we are going to find just
19:37massive amounts of waste and fraud.
19:40We're going to find no bid contracting by DHS that, you know, the beneficiaries of which are friends of Kristi
19:47Noem and friends of Corey Lewandowski.
19:49We have thrown so much money at DHS in that big, ugly bill, just billions and billions and billions of
19:57dollars that, you know, they are going to rush to spend that.
20:01It is just a feeding frenzy.
20:02And so, you know, there's undoubtedly going to be, over time, the exposure of massive amounts of insider deals.
20:11So this is just the beginning.
20:12This is really the tip of the iceberg in terms of what ICE and DHS and Border Protection are spending,
20:19who's going to get the contracts,
20:22when contracts are going to be let in a matter of hours without real competition, undoubtedly the graft, like in
20:30other parts of this Trump administration, will be profound.
20:34And there are hundreds of Trump-friendly lobbyists in Washington who are trying to do exactly what Tom Holman was
20:43trying to do when that $50,000 was passed to him,
20:48basically broker, lobby for, broker these deals for companies who want to sell these weapons.
20:56Well, I think that's exactly right.
20:58We're already seeing the pardons that are being given out by the president to people that have donated to him
21:05or donated to his inaugural committee or this or that,
21:08or are represented by close friends of the president.
21:11They're managing to get pardons, so pardons seem effectively for sale.
21:16In, you know, the Gulf, I think our national security is for sale to the highest bidder that will invest
21:22the most in the Trump family crypto currencies.
21:26We're seeing, I think, really throughout the federal government, at the Justice Department, for example,
21:31whether it's, you know, Bondi's family, cutting deals, antitrust cases going away.
21:37You know, it is just like a corrupt feeding frenzy with everyone trying to grab as much as they can,
21:45knowing that they're just going to have three more years to do this and they need to get while the
21:50getting is good.
21:51Senator Adam Schiff, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
21:56And coming up, the Trump Justice Department, which is really the Trump Protection Department,
22:02issued a statement today saying that they are investigating the possible removal from the Epstein files of documents
22:08that include the unproven accusation that Donald Trump assaulted and raped a child.
22:15That's next with Andrew Weissman.
22:19Donald Trump's Justice Department, which is, of course, functioning as the Trump Protection Department,
22:24issued a written statement appearing to say that they will investigate documents that may be missing from the Epstein files
22:31that contained information about an accusation by an Epstein survivor who told the FBI that Donald Trump assaulted her
22:38and raped her when she was 14 years old.
22:41Donald Trump has not been charged, as everyone knows, and has generally denied wrongdoing,
22:47but he has not said one word about that particular accusation.
22:52MS Now's Lisa Rubin is reporting that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche,
22:57who served as Donald Trump's personal criminal defense lawyer, did not even begin to formulate a system
23:03for protecting the privacy of Epstein survivors in the Epstein files until January of this year,
23:08which was several weeks after the deadline imposed by law for releasing the Epstein files.
23:15And MS Now's Carol Lennig is reporting that FBI Director Kashyap Patel has fired at least a dozen FBI agents
23:21who were involved in the investigation of Donald Trump's criminal possession of classified documents.
23:27The FBI Agents Association condemned the firings as illegal and unjustified.
23:32Hours before yesterday's firings, Kashyap Patel told Reuters that the FBI subpoenaed his phone records
23:39when he was a private citizen in 2022 and 2023 during Special Prosecutor Jack Smith's investigations.
23:46Joining our discussion now is Andrew Weissman, former FBI general counsel
23:49and an MS Now legal analyst. Andrew, what do you make of the written statement today
23:56that seemed to say we are looking at that issue of the missing documents from the Epstein files
24:05that include the accusation of Donald Trump committing a crime?
24:09Well, let's just understand what the government's position here is.
24:14And it may be true, but I leave to the audience how likely that is.
24:19That the one report that was released, which doesn't have Donald Trump's name in it,
24:27so it doesn't explicitly identify him, that was something that was released in the latest huge tranche that we got.
24:35But remember, just one tranche. There's still millions, reportedly, that have not been turned over.
24:40But we're supposed to believe that the other interviews, but the three other interviews where Donald Trump is apparently named,
24:49I should point out the Guardian is reporting that they actually have now seen those documents
24:54and gotten confirmation that they are real from the administration.
24:59Those three reports that have Donald Trump's name, those have not been released.
25:05That's a coincidence.
25:06I mean, remember, this is a department that knows exactly where every document and every photo of Donald Trump is
25:13in those Epstein files.
25:14And the ones where he has his name there and his photograph may exist, those have not been released.
25:22But a report where his name is not there, that's the one that's released.
25:26It seems to me it does not pass the smell test.
25:31But where's the momentum here?
25:33Are we likely to see the stuff that has been hidden that the Guardian now apparently has seen?
25:39I think we are.
25:41I think, you know, this is one where they're caught.
25:44And I think they're going to have to just go with the story that they deny it.
25:50But, again, this is one where there's both the question of the underlying report, whether it's credible,
25:57but then there's the question, as you know, Lawrence, very well, of the cover-up.
26:02Because one thing that's absolutely clear is we are seeing, in my view, a cover-up of monumental proportions.
26:10It would be very, very simple for the President of the United States to announce publicly that every single document
26:17and every single image related to him has been made public, and that no privileges, no duplicative claims, nothing.
26:25It has all been turned out and turned over to the public.
26:28Why wouldn't you do that if there's nothing to hide?
26:31And the other thing to keep in mind for everyone, of course, is that Donald Trump spent a year fighting
26:38the release of the Epstein files.
26:40It's what his first year of this term of his presidency was entirely about,
26:44was fighting the release of the Epstein files until he got overwhelmed by that vote in the House of Representatives,
26:49that vote in the Senate, which was beyond a veto-proof majority.
26:53If Donald Trump had tried to veto that bill, there were enough votes to override his veto.
26:59He knew every day that he was fighting the release of the Epstein files, what the Epstein files said about
27:07him.
27:08He knew about this.
27:09This was his attorney general's job, and deputy attorney general's job was to go to talk to him in the
27:15Oval Office
27:16and tell him exactly what the Epstein files said about him.
27:20So he knew this stuff was there when he was trying to prevent the release of any Epstein files.
27:26I couldn't agree with you more that it's really important for people to remember that what is coming out is
27:32new to us,
27:33but it is not new to the people of the Department of Justice at the White House.
27:38They know all those stuff.
27:40So, for instance, when we talked about Howard Lutnick and what his sort of bogus press conference,
27:46where he's like his press statement, which is, you know, I cut off all ties because he's just so gross,
27:51they knew that was not true.
27:54A sitting cabinet member who just lied to the American people and sort of trying to tout himself as a
28:01paragon of virtue,
28:02they knew that was not true.
28:04It's only we that did not know and are only finding out now.
28:07So it's an incredibly important point that this is all material that they have gone over and know about,
28:13and only we are learning it now.
28:16And Lisa Rubin's reporting that Todd Blanche didn't even get around to thinking about
28:21how do you properly release these files in terms of protecting the privacy of the survivors who are mentioned in
28:29there,
28:29didn't even begin to do that until January.
28:32Well, let's remember, the number one reason that you are in the department is to help victims of crime.
28:41That is why you were there.
28:43That is the most noble part and the best part of your job.
28:48Whether he started now, whether he started months ago, the one thing we know is they haven't done it.
28:54These victims were re-victimized when public material was put out with their personal identifying information.
29:02That is like their addresses, telephone numbers, bank records, even images of them that really should never have been seen
29:12publicly.
29:12That is your number one job.
29:15It is either intentional or reckless.
29:17Either way, it is horrendous when that was your one job, that was to protect these people.
29:24Andrew Weissman, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
29:27You're welcome.
29:30And coming up, a great honor for us, Oscar winner Morgan Freeman will join us with a story of resistance,
29:38a story he's been trying to tell for 15 years and will now be told in an eight-episode limited
29:44series on Amazon Prime titled The Gray House.
29:48Morgan Freeman will join us next.
29:54Oscar winner Morgan Freeman made his first and only appearance on this program on the day of John Lewis' funeral,
30:02July 30, 2020.
30:04On that day, The New York Times published an essay by John Lewis that he wrote knowing that his life
30:11was coming to an end.
30:13His wish was for The New York Times to publish the piece on the day of his funeral.
30:19When I read it, my first thought was that I should read the piece in its entirety on this program
30:25that night.
30:26And my immediate better thought, my dream, was that Morgan Freeman should read it.
30:33I urgently called Hollywood legend Stan Rosenfield, who I know is close to Morgan Freeman, and within minutes, Stan called
30:42me back to say Morgan Freeman would rearrange his schedule that day to do a voice recording for us and
30:48send it in.
30:49And then our brilliant producer, Stephanie Kovach and editor Andrew Trattler went to work creating the imagery for the piece
30:57in which Morgan Freeman delivered John Lewis' last words to the world.
31:05Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and
31:12stand up for what you truly believe.
31:15In my life, I have done all I can to demonstrate that the way of peace, the way of love
31:22and nonviolence is the more excellent way.
31:26Now it is your turn to let freedom ring.
31:30When historians pick up their pens to write the story of the 21st century, let them say that it was
31:37your generation who laid down the heavy burdens of hate at last, and that peace finally triumphed over violence, aggression,
31:46and war.
31:48So I say to you, walk with the wind, brothers and sisters, and let the spirit of peace and the
31:56power of everlasting love be your guide.
32:01Morgan Freeman now brings us a true story of resistance and triumph, a story that has never been told on
32:08the screen before.
32:09The story of Mary Jane Richards, a black woman working in the home of the president of the Confederacy during
32:17the Civil War and leading a spy network of southern women who were sending invaluable intelligence north to the commanding
32:25general for the United States, Ulysses S. Grant, who after the war credited the women for their intelligence gathering.
32:32The story is told in eight episodes, now available on Amazon Prime titled The Grey House, directed by multiple Oscar
32:41nominee, Roland Jaffe.
33:02Oh, I'm married.
33:03I haven't helped us.
33:04Oh, please.
33:05If they reconcile, Rhett will move back in with us.
33:10We cannot allow that sneak peek in in the house.
33:13No one may have no choice.
33:15Oh.
33:22JDS now is Academy Ordering Actor Morgan Freeman, Executive Producer of The Grey House, now available on Amazon Prime.
33:29This is such an honor.
33:30Thank you very much for being here tonight.
33:33It's my honor.
33:33My honor.
33:34I want to go back to that day where I made the panic call.
33:39Can we possibly get Morgan Freeman to record John Lewis's words?
33:43And your answer, Stan had to call you, he had to call me back, but your answer came back to
33:48me in five minutes, saying you would do it.
33:53Again, I get to thank you in person for the first time for that.
33:57What was that day like for you, to suddenly get a request like that and to be thrown into the
34:02middle of that?
34:03I can't.
34:05I don't know.
34:07You know, like I suppose everybody, I had this real high feeling for John and what he stood for.
34:16So to be asked to read his last words to the world, it's an honor.
34:26I mean, I can't say any more than that.
34:31It's an honor to be asked to do something like that.
34:33We're going to put out the full five-minute version on social media for people to take in again.
34:39But those words are as important today as they were when he wrote them.
34:44They really are eternal words that he wrote.
34:46A little bit more.
34:47Yeah.
34:47A little bit more important, I think.
34:50Yeah.
34:50The world today is not the world he left.
34:53Mm-hmm.
34:54So it's an important message that he left.
35:02We should, it should be posted somewhere so we can remind ourselves of it time to time.
35:10With all your life experience and to say that the world he left is a different world from
35:18where we are now, how would you describe where we are now?
35:26Can I use any profanity?
35:29You can say whatever you want.
35:32Well, we have somebody sitting in the White House who's leading us down a shithole.
35:41I can't personally understand how a convicted felon, convicted, 34 felon, felonious, is that
35:54word, counts of wrongdoing, gets to be president.
35:59How do you do that?
36:01When you say, well, he was camp, I don't care.
36:05But that ruling went down before he stepped into the Oval Office.
36:10So it just doesn't make sense to me.
36:14Were you, with your life experience, did it feel like we were going backwards?
36:19Did it feel like the country was on, as Martin Luther King would say, you know, the arc of
36:25history was turning toward progress all the time?
36:28And did this feel different?
36:30Very different.
36:31Very different.
36:32I'm constantly reminded of Germany in 1935, what was happening there.
36:40The brown shirts, those people that are marching through, particularly Berlin, and rounding up
36:48people, putting them in boxcars and sending them off.
36:51Now, this administration wants to build large detention centers.
36:58And for what?
37:02Question?
37:03What do you tell young people who are living through this, and this, they think, is the worst thing?
37:11Certainly, if you're 20 years old, 25 years old, this is the worst thing you've seen, is the condition this
37:15country's in now.
37:16Absolutely.
37:17Absolutely the worst.
37:21I don't know what I would say to young people other than, if you are at all aware of where
37:32we're headed, where we are right now, and where we're headed, and if you don't agree with it, there was
37:37one
37:37sure way to change the direction of our country.
37:42Vote.
37:44That the old message is the new message.
37:46Yes.
37:47Yes.
37:48Let's go to Greyhouse.
37:50It took you 15 years to get this story told?
37:54Yes.
37:56A lot of things.
37:57By the way, not that unusual a Hollywood story.
37:59Exactly.
37:59In fact, it's...
38:01Exactly.
38:02Yeah.
38:05Leslie Grafe came to us some 15 years ago with this idea.
38:10It was a script, and we've been nursing it.
38:16Sometimes, you know, you put things on the shelf and let them ripen, as it were.
38:22Every project has its own time to surface, and that's, I think, what we're experiencing with the Greyhouse.
38:32You teamed up with Kevin Costner producing this, and you got an incredible cast.
38:38Ben Vereen.
38:39You have Mary Louise Parker here.
38:41You have Amistad Davis in the lead role there.
38:45Paul Anderson.
38:47It's just an incredible group that you pulled together here.
38:52Yeah.
38:52Roland Jaffe was our director.
38:56And it's...
38:58Have you seen any part of it yet?
38:59Yes.
39:00Yes.
39:00It's spellbinding, I think, to realize that four Southern women of all stripes, a couple of them are high society,
39:14one is low society, one is black, they, amongst themselves, just them, organized this little cell that was sending messages.
39:30There's urgent messages to Ulysses S. Grant, a spy network that was very dangerously set up, but bravery, bravery.
39:46This was a stop along the Underground Railroad, and they just switched what they were doing there and started messaging.
39:59I knew nothing of this story until you made this story public.
40:04I've done some research on it since, and we see all the real historical, factual material that underlies all of
40:11this.
40:11But it is a story of resistance.
40:14It is a story of the same theme of resistance that we saw in Minneapolis this year.
40:21And it's based on fact, actually.
40:29The problem with a lot of our history is how much of it we don't know.
40:35And these women, this story is actually buried somewhere, and it's time to surface, it's here.
40:45Like I said before, it's every project at its own time.
40:50And this is one.
40:52Fifteen years ago, we knew about this story, and it took us to now, thanks to Kevin Costner, to get
41:00it done.
41:01Well, thank you very much for bringing it to us, and I cannot thank you enough for joining us tonight.
41:07It's my great pride and honor.
41:08Thank you very much.
Comments