remember the white house was shot at, people forget that at one point during the presidency when all these stories were coming out in the alt-right media. again, i m going to bring you in, max. she says that it s underlying bigotry and xenophobia hardly concealed. that bigotry and xenophobia is in plain sight right now. certainly you saw it in plain view during the midterm campaign to the point that mrs. obama was making about the conspiracymongering about birtherism. we ve always had conspiracy nuts in this country. people who thought eisenhower was a russian agent or that the moon landing was fake. we ve never had a conspiracymonger in the white house and donald trump continues to propound crazy conspiracy theories even as president. for example suggesting that george soros was behind the
if you look at campaign ads around the country, republicans are doing exactly what donald trump is doing. vilifying immigrants, pretending that george soros is behind this invasion, suggesting that democrats are on league with criminals. all these horrible filthy destructive lies. the republican party is not just donald trump. that s why today i had a column in the washington post saying as a former republican myself, please vote against republicans. every single one of them, because you have to make them pay a price for this kind of hate mongering. you have to make them understand that this is not the way to win political power in america, by dividing americans, by stigmatizing minority groups, by lying, by conspiracy mongering. otherwise we re going to see a lot more of it in the future. i want you to stick around shall everyone, because you re not going to believe this. the president s response when asked by a reporter if he is truthful, okay. we re going to play it and get the re
gentlemen, good evening. so max, you wrote a column about the role of fox news in all of this. what is the impact the network is carrying this kind of message? it s very corrosive, don. it s very dangerous. this is a network that reaches millions of people, and it s spreading a message of hate. it s spreading a message of conspiracy mongering. i mean, even just today fox had a guest on their air saying that this caravan is bringing smallpox and leprosy. smallpox doesn t even exist anymore. okay? this is the classic kind of xenophobic slurs about how these immigrants are going to infect america and it s just crazy in 2018, a national news network is putting this kind of garbage on the air. it is radicalizing the right. it is turning sane conservatives into conspiracy mongers. and with a handful of people who may have already been unstable it helps to push them over the edge into violence.
the president s reaction? he tweeted on monday, this is an invasion of our country. of course criminals are the ones responsible for crimes. but people in public life are responsible for the climate and for the tone. so hopefully some of those political leaders, some of those tv stars are doing some soul searching tonight about how they hyped up a non-existent invasion. don? brian stelter, thank you very much for that. let s discuss now with max boot. he s the author of the corrosion of conservatism. also here, mr. mike shields. gentlemen, good evening. so max, you wrote a column about the role of fox news in all of this. what is the impact the network is carrying this kind of message? it s very corrosive, don. it s very dangerous. this is a network that reaches millions of people, and it s spreading a message of hate. it s spreading a message of conspiracy mongering. i mean, even just today fox had a guest on their air saying that this caravan is bringing smallpox and leprosy.
globe. i like the globe, too. but we have to take care of our people. we have to. he says, lock him up from the crowd. i don t know if that crowd member is so ignorant they don t realize george soros was locked up in a concentration camp. what do you say to the overlap, where people might have a grievance against soros because he gives to democrats, but it overlaps with oh, george soros is a jewish banker, and there s a lot of jews in the media. is there a concern that people who are lead thing country are exploiting that overlap? this isn t a concern, right? this is actually a five-alarm fire. the conspiracy mongering, accusing jewish financiers of manipulating events, this didn t start with george soros, but the continued repetition of this let tick