#RolandMartinUnfiltered - 'We Have A Real Problem': White 'Domestic Terrorism Is The Number One Danger' In America

Episode Date: August 5, 2019

Roland Martin spoke with Congressman Bennie Thompson during Mondays edition of the Tom Joyner Morning Show about the horrific mass shootings that claimed the lives of nearly 30 people in El Paso, TX and Dayton, OH. Audio credit: Tom Joyner Morning Show Subscribe to the #RolandMartin YouTube channel https://t.co/uzqJjYOukP Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. So we are headed to NABJ time right now. Of course, so many people talk about what took place over this weekend, tragedies in El Paso, Texas, my home state, but also Dayton, Ohio, and what it is causing mainstream media to finally wake up and acknowledge that we have a white domestic terrorist problem in this country. If this was a Muslim shooter, I can guarantee you there'd be calls for revenge to blow up some country. But the reality is now all of a sudden when white men walk in places and kill folks, people

all of a sudden go, hey, this is a mental illness problem. Joining us right now is Congressman Vinnie Thompson of Mississippi, of course, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. Congressman Thompson, you have been trying to get this issue addressed. FBI has been, frankly, skirting this issue. They finally have been acknowledging recently that there is a problem in this country when it comes to white domestic terrorists. For our audience, explain how serious this issue is. Well, good morning to you, Roland. Let me tell you, it's real serious. For instance,

for a long time in this country, we were led to believe that the most dangerous element in terms of terrorists were Muslim terrorists. one of the reasons is the FBI stopped producing, uh, the data. Uh, we now, uh, who testimony as well as on July 23rd, uh, the director of domestic terrorism, which is a number one danger in the United States of America. Stop right there, Congressman. Congressman, he said domestic terrorism.

Why won't they call this white domestic terrorism? Well, you know who the problem is. We have somebody in the White House who is absolutely in denial. He says he's a nationalist. So we have a real problem. What we have more importantly, as you know, is we have a number of deaths that are occurring all over the country. What we had over the weekend is just the explosion of the episodes that have been going on. So what we're trying to do is next week,

my committee is going to have a series of hearings in Washington highlighting what's going on in the country. We're going to invite the FBI. We're going to invite the mayors of Dayton and El Paso and other parts of the country to come and talk to us, as well as advocates who want to look at this subject. And let's come up with some real solutions to the problem. Congressman, everybody keeps saying right now mental illness, mental illness. But Donald Trump overturned an Obama rule that made it harder for folks with mental illness to get guns.

The House actually passed the House passed a universal background bill. Senator Mitch McConnell won't even take it up. I just tweeted this. I said, I have absolutely no confidence that the Republican Party, Trump, the GOP chairwoman, Ronna McDaniel, McConnell, any of these people want to do a damn thing about guns because they are owned. They are wholly owned subsidiary of the NRA. Well, you're absolutely correct. If you look at McConnell's record, he's clearly said he's not going to bring any of those issues up.

The Trump administration made it legal for people who are adjudicated mentally ill to buy guns. You know, that is unfortunate in this country. That puts some 80,000 more people out here potentially who can buy guns who have been diagnosed with an issue of mental illness. Apart from that, Roland, we have some other issues out here in terms of the military-style assault weapons being legal, the clips in the guns, the large magazines. A hundred rounds of the guys who steal largely African Americans in Dayton.

I mean, there's no reason why an average citizen should be walking around with weapons that should be reserved for the battlefield. Oh, no, no. And you can't say that's a hunter. You leave and you'll write the battle. No, he was a hunter. He was hunting people. Absolutely. Absolutely.

But the notion is that when you do that, you're denying me my rights. Well, at some point, when the rights infringe on rights of others, government has to step in. So clearly, we're moving. We're going to hold a hearing. We're going to talk about this issue, and we plan to move it forward. But the real challenge is whether or not this country can demand that the powers to be in Washington do something. We can make those assault weapons illegal. We can say that you can't buy a gun if you have a criminal record. We can do a lot of things that we have not been able to do.

Congressman, can you do this without the Republicans? Can anything be done between now and Election Day beyond voting them out of office can be done to change some of this? Well, unfortunately, we're going to have to take it to the people. We're going to have to take it to the streets and say, look, if you want to fix this, then you're going to have to put people in office who are willing to do it. We can't get anything over on the Senate side. Simple things that can fix. We can't get it done. So that's why people absolutely need to be focused on next year.

Let me be as explicit as possible. White people are going to have to take to the streets and demand Republicans step up. That's what's going to happen. Absolutely. Yeah. And when will your committee meet, Congressman? Well, we're scheduled Wednesday and Thursday of next week in Washington. We will announce it this afternoon publicly and we want everybody uh, within the sound of our voice to please come to Washington or tune in to the hearing and you will see all the facts. All right. Congressman Benny Thompson, chair of the department of Homeland

security, a house committee. We appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you brother. All right. Why rolling? Yes. committee we appreciate the next live thank you brother all right why rolling the chair resin is real yes see you here in miami all right chat later this is an iheart podcast