Morning Wire - Texas Timeline & Depp Trial | 5.30.22

Episode Date: May 30, 2022

President Biden visits Uvalde as Congress debates gun control, the Johnny Depp defamation trial against Amber Heard heads to a jury, and the World Economic Forum sparks controversy. Get the facts first on Morning Wire. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Biden visits the small Texas town torn apart by a mass shooting. As the timeline of the tragedy becomes clearer, school safety laws come under increased scrutiny, while gun control appears to gain momentum in Congress. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howl. It's Monday, May 30th, and this is Morning Wire. After weeks of salacious testimony, Johnny Depp's defamation trial against Amber Heard heads to a jury. And the World Economic Forum came to a close last week. Why are some people concerned about some of the ideas presented by the world's most powerful people?

But before we get to those stories, we want to take a moment to remember and honor our fallen heroes on this Memorial Day. We know without the sacrifices of the selfless and courageous members of the U.S. military and their families, we couldn't enjoy the freedoms we do today. Thank you to all who have given so much for the rest of us. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. It's getting hot outside, which means it's. should be getting hot on your grill.

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On Sunday, President Biden visited Uvaldi, Texas. the small town rocked by a school shooting which left 21 dead, including 19 elementary students. Here with more on the visit and updates on the controversy over the response of law enforcement is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips. Cabot will get to the president's visit soon, but the big news this weekend centered on the actions of Uvaldi law enforcement in response to the shooting. What's the latest on that? Well, we now have a better idea of the timeline of the tragedy, and it's definitely raising questions about why it took so long to,

engage the shooter. We now know that after firing shots outside the school for around 10 minutes, the shooter entered the building through a back door that had been propped open by a teacher and began firing into a classroom. Just two minutes later, a total of seven officers were in the hallway of the school as the shooter was active, but it would be another hour and 15 minutes before the room he was in was breached and he was killed. During that time, fourth grade students from inside of the classroom were calling 911, begging for help and saying that many of their classmates had already been killed. And this brings us to the question everyone is asking, why did it take so long to get in? Yeah, that is the big question right now. The school district's protocol for active shooters is to

immediately engage the shooter and not treat the incident as a hostage situation. But according to reports, the school district police chief, who was in charge at the time, told officers to treat the shooting as a, quote, barricaded subject situation and ordered them not to breach the room until they could organize a response. So when members of the border patrols elite, Bortak team arrived, they were told not to enter, all the while shots could be heard from inside the classroom. It wasn't until those federal agents who arrived ignored orders after 40 minutes of waiting outside and breached the classroom. It was actually, they breached the classroom after seeing parents trying to rush into the school themselves.

Stephen McCraw, Texas Director of Public Safety, now admits that the decision to stall and delay entry was a mistake. For the benefit of hindsight where I'm sitting now, of course it was not the right decision. It was a wrong decision, period. There's no, No excuse for that. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who had initially offered a very different timeline of events at a press conference right after the shooting, says he was essentially lied to by local law enforcement right afterwards. He is now called for a full investigation of the response and vowed to hold the authorities

they're accountable. I was misled. The information that I was given turned out in part to be inaccurate. And I'm absolutely livid about that. And also on that note, the Justice Department announced yesterday that they'd also be conducting a review of the shooting. So pressure definitely mounting. Yeah, as it should, it appears to be an unthinkable mistake by Yuvaldi law enforcement. All right, shifting gears, tell us about President Biden's reaction so far.

Biden traveled to Yuvaldi Sunday to meet with victims' families and other leaders in the community. And ahead of the visit, he tweeted that he wanted to, quote, turn this pain into action and pass universal background checks, as well as a ban on assault. weapons and high-capacity magazines. White House press secretary, Corrine Jean-Pierre, also said Friday that the president wanted to see the minimum age for purchasing a rifle race from 18 to 21. And what can you tell us about the legislative response in Congress? Yeah, there had been a series of gun control laws earlier this year that had passed the House but then stalled in the evenly divided Senate. But there is some momentum now. On Thursday, a group of moderate Republicans, including Lindsey Graham, Susan Collins, and Pat Toomey met with Democrats

to discuss a potential compromise on gun control, specifically regarding red flag laws. Remember, those allow law enforcement to confiscate firearms from those they deem a threat to themselves or others. Many Republicans had opposed laws like that in the past, saying they were unconstitutional and denied the right to due process, but there's a growing chance that some might split with the party and support the measure. That bipartisan group currently debating measures like that is also discussing a bill that had passed the House already and mandated universal background checks for firearm purchases. Majority leader Chuck Schumer gave the group 10 days to finalize a deal, so we should know shortly

how Congress could be taking action on this. Well, as you mentioned, lots of constitutional questions here, but there appear to be some potential votes coming soon. Cabot, thanks for the reporting. Anytime. That's Daily Wire senior editor, Cabot Phillips. Coming up, ideas pushed at the World Economic Forum, Spark Controversy. You can get this show and all of the content you look.

love wherever you are, all on the Daily Wire app. Even if you're not a Daily Wire member, you'll be first to know what's trending with mobile notifications for the latest news. And you'll get content from all your favorite Daily Wire shows. Download the Daily Wire app and keep up with the facts no matter where your day takes you. After weeks of headline making testimonies and cross-examinations, the $50 million defamation suit between Johnny Depp and Amber Hurd is heading to a jury. Here to offer analysis on how both teams, finished out this high-profile trial is Daily Wire Culture Reporter, Megan Basham. So, Megan, for people who haven't been following the trial, can you briefly recap what this whole

case was about? Yeah, absolutely. So the case involves a 2018 Washington Post op-ed in which her described herself as a victim of domestic violence. Now, she didn't name her ex-husband Johnny Depp as the abuser in that case, but that was very widely taken as her inference. Now, Depp, of course, denies it, and he's even gone so far as to accuse heard of abusing him. So he's seeking around $50 million in compensation, claiming that the article destroyed his career. Now, keep in mind, this accusation came at the height of the Me Too movement, and Depp did lose a very lucrative role in Fantastic Beast, that franchise shortly after the accusation. Now, what were some of the most significant moments in the trial for you, at least? Well, you know, the most important,

was probably not the most exciting to a lot of people. In fact, it kind of almost seemed to pass under the radar. And that was when Hurd admitted that she did write the op-ed about Depp. Now, that was significant because, well, it's easy to forget, this is actually a defamation suit. And it was crucial that Depp's side prove that the article was indeed about him in order to connect it to material harm. And so when she admitted it, they accomplished that. Now, that's not to say that. that Hurd's team didn't also have some very effective moments. Two of the most prominent of those were when they read off texts of Depp, joking to a friend about killing Hurd. And then the second was testimony from Depp's ex-girlfriend, actress Ellen Barkin. She described him as controlling and jealous and said that he was always drinking and using drugs. Now, that said, Barkin's testimony was probably somewhat offset from a higher profile witness, supermodel Kate Moss.

So she dated Depp in the 90s and her testified that she'd heard a rumor that Depp had pushed Moss down the stairs once and that contributed to her own fear, she said, of the actor. Well, Kate Moss took the stand last week to address that story and she refuted it. Here's what she said. During the course of your relationship, did he ever push you down any stairs? No. He never pushed me, kicked me, or threw me. any studies. So I think you have to say from that that Dep did end on a very strong note.

Right. And in the court of public opinion, it definitely seems very pro-DEP over the past few weeks. Yeah, that's very true. And I'm glad you bring that up, Georgia, because I think while this trial has been, you have to say, fairly salacious and gossipy, it does speak to a larger conversation we all seem to be having as a society now about the Me Too movement and whether it went to far as a sort of believe all women argument. So Americans across the country have now watched this A-list actress get accused, not just of lying, but of being an abuser herself. Now, I'm not going to speak to the merits of those accusations, but it is clear that a lot of the public is willing to entertain them. And what that tells us is that we seem to have turned a cultural corner here,

where people are more comfortable questioning allegations of abuse in a way that they may be weren't a couple of years ago. So multiple newspaper articles in outlets like the New York Times, the Guardian, they've questioned whether Heard represents the death of the Me Too movement. To give you one example, a Vice magazine headline asked, why does it seem like the entire internet is team Johnny Depp? And to that point, a U-Gov poll from last week found that well over 85% of Americans have at least heard some news on the herd Depp trial, and 70% of them said they would like to see Depp on the big screen again. So that tells you they don't seem to entirely believe this particular woman.

So whatever the jury decides, the real test for whether this trial was worth it to Depp, I have to think, is going to be whether Hollywood reembraces him. Right, and it'll be interesting to look at the box office numbers if he comes back to the big screen again. Megan, thanks for reporting. Absolutely, my pleasure. That's Daily Wire Culture reporter, Megan Basham.

The 2022 World Economic Forum came to a close on Thursday in Davos, Switzerland. Some ideas discussed at the event have sparked concern among observers. The forum covered everything from rising gas prices to futuristic tracking devices. Daily Wire investigative reporter, Maray DeLordy, is here with more details for us. So, Maray, tell us what ideas came out of the forum and what the reaction has been so far. Right. So the forum covered a lot of ground. the global economy, advances in tech, plus a few ideas that sparked some controversy.

One of those controversial proposals is a tool for measuring an individual's total carbon footprint. J. Michael Evans, president of the Chinese internet giant Alibaba, told listeners to stay tuned because the concept is not operational yet, but the carbon footprint tracker is something they're reportedly working on. Where are they traveling? How are they traveling? What are they eating? What are they consuming on the platform? So individual carbon. footprint tracker. Stay tuned. We don't have it operational yet, but this is something that we're working on. The tracker prompted alarm and ridicule from critics, especially on social media. Other social

media users raised privacy and freedom concerns. So people are worried that a carbon footprint tracker would monitor their location and movements. Exactly. What else was discussed at the forum? Well, there was a lot of concern about rising interest rates, inflation, and supply chain problems. Climate change and energy were big topics. Kirsten-Brathen, CEO of Norwegian Financial Services giant DNB talked about small and medium businesses going through energy transitions and the financial strain they may experience.

We need to accept that there will be some pain in the process. It will open up for shortage of energy. It will create inflationary pressures, and maybe we need to start talking about that. That pain is actually worth it. Braden's comments seem to echo President Biden's comments that rising gas prices are a transition.

And when it comes to the gas prices, We're going through an incredible transition that is taking place that, God willing, when it's over, will be stronger and the world will be stronger and less relying on fossil fuels when this is over. Yeah, those comments came under a lot of scrutiny. Now, did any leaders at Davos actually offer solutions to the energy crisis? Well, we did get German Vice-Chancellor Robert Hebeck saying that countries should resist the temptation to look out for their own interests first and instead stick to global markets. Now, there's been some buzz from the event about issues like digital currency and free speech.

What can you tell us there? Yeah, so a CNN anchor hosted a panel with France's top central banker as well as the chairman of Credit Suisse, where they talked excitedly about central bank digital currencies coming within about five years. Perhaps one of the most eyebrow-raising remarks came from Australian East Safety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant when she said that we need to think about a, quote, recalibration of freedom of speech and other human rights. We're going to have to think about a recalibration of a whole range of human rights that are playing out online, you know, from freedom of speech to the freedom to, you know, to be free from online violence. Overall, critics have noted that ideas like watering down freedom of speech and suffering through high gas prices might sound good to the elites in attendance at Davos, but they don't exactly mesh with what your everyday American wants. Right, it's not hard to see why some of these ideas are prompting some pushback. Right. Thanks for the reporting.

That was Daily Wire Investigator reporter, Marade Allorty. Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, please consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend. That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us.

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