Commencements since becoming president. It comes after the white house fallout of the sudden dismissal of james comey during the fbi investigation into possible ties between the Trump Administration or rather trump campaign, i should say and russia. Now this is as four candidates prepare to interview today for the fbi director job. We have a team of political reporters and analysts standing by here. Lets begin with cnn washington Correspondent Ryan Nobles who is at the commencement. You see him there on the left. What are you hearing from the crowd there . I understand theres about 7,000 students and families who will be watching. What are they saying . What do they expect . Reporter well, this is expected to be a pretty friendly crowd for the president. This is a group of people and voters in particular that generally supported him during the election and, of course, here at Liberty University their president Jerry Falwell jr. A very influential evangelical leader that allowed the th
during the campaign we know there were protests today. but during the campaign there was a petition online and a letter liberty united against trump. i want to read just a portion of this to give us maybe some color about some of those in opposition. because our president has led the world to believe that liberty university supports donald trump, we students must take it upon ourselves to make clear that donald trump is absolutely opposed to what we believe and does not have our support. we re not proclaiming our opposition to donald trump out of bitterness but out of a desire to regain the integrity of our school. they go on to say we don t want to champion donald trump we want only to champion for christ. so, the narrative that this is in full an audience that is friendly to the president, maybe not 100% accurate. i think that s true. i think that certainly if you re an evangelical who believes that lying is against what the bible teaches, if you believe that
flames. that story prompted a long time president of another school to write a letter to jerry. it s a letter that reverend falwell would have been very, very pleased to read. jerry tells me that letter now hangs in the wall in the boardroom of your great university. it came from the late father theodore hesper who was the beloved president of the university of notre dame, 35 years ago. like this school s founder, he was a truly kind-hearted man, of very, very deep faith. in the letter the father recounted recount ed notre dame s own rise to a football powerhouse and he wrote something so amazing and generous, he wrote i think that
is jerry falwell jr. president of liberty university. we re just minutes away from hearing from president trump, his first commencement address as president of the united states. we ll take a quick break and we ll be right back. ponent was.. pe blood clots in my lung. it was really scary. a dvt in my leg. i had to learn all i could to help protect myself. my doctor and i choose xarelto® xarelto®. to help keep me protected. xarelto® is a latest-generation blood thinner. .that s proven to treat and reduce the risk of dvt and pe blood clots from happening again. in clinical studies, almost 98% of patients on xarelto® did not experience another dvt or pe. here s how xarelto works. xarelto® works differently. warfarin interferes with at least six blood-clotting factors. xarelto® is selective. .targeting just one critical factor, interacting with less of your body s natural blood-clotting function. don t stop taking xarelto® without talking to your doctor as this may increase risk of
family members still stand by their choice. i don t think there will be any one time oh, okay shouldn t have voted for him, he was not the her joy thought he was. like he wasn t a hero to begin with. you didn t vote for him thinking avenues hero. i have trust issues with the former president. and the president before that. so the idea of trusting this president, or not trusting is not new. reporter: this is the kind of dialogue you ll find at the white s dinner table. intense. we get very intense and passionate. there s a lot of us so it s hard to talk at the dinner table. reporter: this weekend it s trump s turn to talk in lynchburg a place that welcomed him as a candidate and now as president. this part of virginia is home to some of trump s steadfast supporters as the city republican vice chair. he was part of the reagan revolution. it s important for people to come to lynchburg, meet voters,