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DSK Charges Dropped; Casey Anthony Update; Relatives of Famous Evangelists Discuss Growing up Gay

Aired August 23, 2011 - 22:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANNOUNCER: Coming up on THE JOY BEHAR SHOW, Casey Anthony is back in Florida waiting for a ruling on her probation order. Meanwhile, a juror from the trial said he fears for his life and has been shunned by his friends and family. We`ll have the latest.

And the prosecution drops all charges against former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn saying the victim`s credibility and history of lying will never sway a jury.

Plus legendary televangelist Oral Roberts often railed against homosexuality. We`ll talk to his openly gay grandson about growing up in that shadow.

That and more starting right now.

DON LEMON, HLN GUEST HOST: Sexual assault charges against former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn were dropped today. Manhattan prosecutors said the victim`s lack of credibility hurt their case saying, "If we do not believe her beyond a reasonable doubt we cannot ask a jury to do so."

Meanwhile, the accuser`s attorney called out Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance saying he has abandoned an innocent woman and denied the right to justice in a rape case.

Joining me now to discuss the case is Kenneth Thompson who represents the accuser, Nafissatou Diallo. What was your client`s reaction when she found out the charges were dropped?

KENNETH THOMPSON, ATTORNEY FOR ALLEGED DSK VICTIM, NAFISSATOU DIALLO: Devastated. She has told the truth about what happened in that hotel room. And she can`t understand why Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance would abandon her. She and her daughter have been crying through the night.

LEMON: Crying through the night?

THOMPSON: Yes.

LEMON: I spoke with you earlier and you said she could barely hold it together?

THOMPSON: Yes. She wanted to come to the courtroom today but she couldn`t because she feels that she has been denied justice.

LEMON: What kind of a message, if at all, do you think that this sends to people?

THOMPSON: It sends a clear message to women who may get raped or sexually assaulted in the future that they should think twice about coming forward.

What happened to Ms. Diallo was a travesty. Here`s a hard-working single mother, struggling to raise her young daughter here in New York City. She went to work that day to do her job. She had cleaned a number of hotel rooms that morning.

She went to Dominique Strauss-Kahn`s room because she was told it was empty. She was told it was empty. And she was attacked -- violently attacked, sexually assaulted. And then she mustered up the courage to tell the truth, and look what happened to her Don.

LEMON: Ok. Listen, here`s a question -- this is the question -- what happened in that hotel room? What happened Ken?

THOMPSON: We laid it out in the civil complaint that we filed.

LEMON: I want you to tell everyone --

THOMPSON: I`m going to tell you what happened. Miss Diallo went into that hotel room to clean the room. And as she was walking through -- it`s a very expensive room. I mean it costs $3,000 a night. It`s not a typical hotel room.

LEMON: Ok.

THOMPSON: As she was walking through saying "housekeeping, housekeeping" making sure it was empty because then she was going to clean it. Dominique Strauss-Kahn came out of one of the rooms naked and started to attack her. And then he closed the door so she could not get out of the room and pushed her as she was fighting him to get out, pushed her in the back of the suite. And then he got her down on her knees where he finished his attack.

LEMON: It has been said that she wasn`t even supposed to be on that floor and that with her account of what happened afterwards, that she gave several accounts. I hid at the end of the hall, oh, I told my supervisor, or I didn`t clean the room, I went to clean another room -- a number of different accounts that she has told prosecutors.

THOMPSON: Don that is simply not true. Ms. Diallo was scheduled and assigned to clean the rooms in the 28th floor. The folks at the Sofitel Hotel will not deny that. She didn`t go in that floor because she wanted to see Dominique Strauss-Kahn. She didn`t even know who he was.

This is a woman who came to this country from Africa years ago. Do you really think she knew who Dominique Strauss-Kahn was? Before this case, how many of us knew who Dominique Strauss-Kahn was?

She was told that no one was in that room and she had to clean it.

LEMON: But anyone who`s staying at that room -- and this is what the prosecution`s going to say -- anyone who is staying -- or the defense -- staying in that room has money; staying at the Sofitel, so he was sort of a sitting duck.

THOMPSON: Well, let me just say this. If he was a sitting duck, Ms. Diallo had worked in that hotel for three years. She`s never had an incident, never had a complaint, no hotel guest ever said anything negative about her.

So all of a sudden on May 14, 2011, she`s going to wake up and try to set someone up?

LEMON: Ok. Let`s listen to what the prosecution -- the prosecutor said today.

THOMPSON: Sure.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOAN ILLUZZI-ORBON, NEW YORK COUNTY ASST. DISTRICT ATTORNEY: One of the more egregious examples occurred early in our investigation when over the course of two interviews she gave a vivid, highly-detailed, and convincing account of having been raped in her native country, which she now admits is completely false.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: How do you respond?

THOMPSON: The way I respond to that is this. Ms. Diallo was raped in Africa by soldiers. She was raped. The DA may not want to believe that, but the clip you just showed of that particular prosecutor, she`s one of the prosecutors who went to court weeks ago and said that the evidence against Dominique Strauss-Kahn was substantial; that the forensic evidence backed Ms. Diallo, that the medical examination given to her an hour after the attack backed her. And her boss, District Attorney Cyrus Vance, stood in front of that very courthouse weeks ago and said, touted the grand jury indictment.

So now you can`t have it both ways. You can`t say the evidence is substantial one day and then try to run away from it the next.

LEMON: What about this recorded phone call with her boyfriend in an Arizona jail, talking about money. "I know what I`m doing. We stand to make money here." I`m paraphrasing.

THOMPSON: That never happened. Don, I filed a motion to disqualify the Manhattan district attorney. It didn`t -- it was denied today. One of the bases for the motion is the fact that we believe that the Manhattan district attorney leaked false information about Ms. Diallo connected with that call and that helped turn public sentiment against her. That helped severely destroy her credibility.

This is important. They tried to portray her as if she was scheming to take Dominique Strauss-Kahn`s money. They finally let us hear the tape a month later. That`s not on the tape.

LEMON: Do you think that she`s being put on trial here? All of a sudden she has become the person who is being prosecuted?

THOMPSON: Of course. Don, she has been --

LEMON: The reason I ask -- and I ask you this because I`ve been reading a lot about this, about the prosecution of women of color when it comes to rape. And do you -- there`s race and class involved in here. And that`s why all these protesters are showing up every time there`s a court hearing because they believe that she doesn`t stand a chance against a wealthy white man.

THOMPSON: Don, let me just ask -- let me just say this. If Dominique Strauss-Kahn was a bus driver from the south Bronx or construction worker from Harlem or a plumber from the Bay Bridge section of Brooklyn, do you think that Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance would care what was in Ms. Diallo`s asylum application? No. Do you think he walk away and turn his back on a seven-count indictment that a sitting grand jury of regular New Yorkers returned against Dominique Strauss-Kahn?

Clearly, the DA looked at Dominique Strauss-Kahn, his status, his power, there`s something here that Ms. Diallo thought she was going to get. She came to this country because of the promise -- the great promise of America. One of the great promises is equal justice under the law. Sadly Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance showed that he does not believe that.

LEMON: Your client has filed a civil suit.

THOMPSON: Yes, she has.

LEMON: What is she asking for?

THOMPSON: We haven`t asked for a dollar amount. What she will do is accept whatever a jury believes she`s entitled to.

LEMON: Do you feel that -- he can go back to France. What are you going to do about jurisdiction for your civil suit? Are you sure he`s even going to come back for it?

THOMPSON: Don, you know what, I was criticized for filing the suit when I did. And I`m glad I did because I didn`t trust the process. We filed the suit, and I told his lawyers, either you accept service of it or I`ll have it served on your client. They accepted service.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn`s lawsuit, the lawsuit against him has already commenced. If he goes back to Paris and he doesn`t want to come back to trial, Ms. Diallo will get on the stand and will tell the world about how she went into that room intending to clean it, and about how he attacked her, pulled up her dress, forced her on her knees, and did horrible things to her in that room.

LEMON: Ken Thompson.

THOMPSON: Thank you Don. Thank you so much.

LEMON: I appreciate you coming in.

THOMPSON: Appreciate it.

LEMON: When we come right back, I`m going to talk to famed victims` rights attorney Gloria Allred about the DSK case and what she has to say might surprise you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Sexual assault charges against Dominique Strauss-Kahn have been dropped. And I am continuing my conversation about the case now.

Joining me now Miss Gloria Allred, victims` rights attorney. Gloria, should the charges have been dropped?

GLORIA ALLRED, VICTIMS` RIGHTS ATTORNEY: I think that the district attorney, Don, really had no choice but to dismiss all of the charges. And I know that`s very, very devastating for the victim, but unfortunately, the burden of proof is very, very high in a criminal case.

The D.A. would have had to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, that`s a very high mountain to climb. They couldn`t climb that mountain with the credibility issues that were facing them with the alleged victim, the accuser in the case. And so they had to do what they felt was in the interest of justice which was to dismiss the case. That`s what they asked the judge to do and that is in fact what was done.

LEMON: Well, Gloria a lot of people watching are going to say that is exact the opposite view of what I thought Gloria Allred would take.

ALLRED: Well, I`m a practical person, Don. I`ve dealt with many, many sexual assault victims over the more than three decades that I`ve been practicing law.

And yes, there is no perfect victim. You don`t have to be a nun to be an alleged victim in a criminal case involving rape or sexual assault. But you do have to think about whether this case can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

And here I don`t know what she told her attorney in the first place when they discussed this matter, but definitely one needs to be candid with one`s attorney about what the truth was about any prior allegations because especially in a high-profile case, you are going to be scrutinized very, very carefully as the victim.

(CROSSTALK)

ALLRED: In the same way the defendant is going to have a lot to answer to, you as the alleged victim will also have to be accountable, and your credibility will always be an issue.

LEMON: I want to talk about how damaging it is because prosecutors said that she lied about being gang-raped in her native country. That appeared to be very damaging. And then there was another incident where she apparently spoke to her boyfriend in jail, discussing making money from this case. Too damaging to get over these two things?

ALLRED: Well, apparently those were two major issues for the prosecutor. The allegation that she had lied about a prior gang-rape or how it occurred or who might have been involved and lied about it on an application for asylum is a very, very serious allegation because the issue of rape is closely -- closely related to this particular issue in this particular criminal case.

In addition, if in fact she spoke to someone, her fiance or boyfriend, and discussed the subject of money as it relates to this case, then of course the defendant could use that to try to show bias. Now of course, she has the right to seek compensation in a civil case. There`s nothing wrong with that.

But it`s really a question of context. It`s a question of what she said and apparently whatever she said in that interview which the D.A. alleges was recorded, the D.A. considered to be very, very damaging to her credibility. It didn`t help her, it hurt her.

LEMON: Let`s talk about -- this is your specialty. You usually defend the rights of -- for women. Does this decision send a bad message to other women out there who may be afraid to press charges?

ALLRED: I don`t think it sends a bad message. And I certainly hope, Don, it doesn`t have a chilling effect on other sexual assault victims. It doesn`t help sexual assault victims for a criminal case to proceed when guilt cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

Ultimately, that would be even worse to proceed with a case and then there be an acquittal because there was insufficient evidence. I`m sure if the D.A. had known what the D.A. knows now they would never even have filed the case.

LEMON: Yes.

ALLRED: And I fault the D.A. for not having really been very much more careful before they filed the case. But I just hope it doesn`t have a chilling effect because we want victims to report if they believe that they have been sexually assaulted. They should seek the advice of a private attorney to -- to think about all of the benefits versus the risks of doing so before they do it.

LEMON: Gloria, I want to move on. But just real quickly, what do you think her chances are with -- in the civil case?

ALLRED: Of course, in a civil case, Don, she doesn`t have the same burden of proof. She only has to prove her case by preponderance of evidence.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: So you think she has a better chance?

ALLRED: That`s gives a whole lot less evidence, that`s less, that`s down here whereas reasonable doubt to prove reasonable doubt in a criminal case is up here. The reason less evidence has to be shown or provided in a civil case is because in a civil case if she prevails she`s only going to get money. In a criminal case if the prosecution prevails, the defendant is deprived of his liberty.

And that`s why so much more evidence has to be presented in a criminal case than in a civil case.

LEMON: Yes.

ALLRED: So she can proceed with it, that`s the good news. The bad news is she`s still going to have difficulty with a civil case for two reasons. One, her credibility will still be at issue. And two, he apparently is cross complaining against her for slander.

LEMON: Ok, all right Gloria, thank you very much. And Gloria stick right there because I want to get more of your take on another case.

This Friday is the deadline for Casey Anthony to begin serving probation in Florida for check fraud. Her lawyers are appealing the probation order. But Jose Baez told Fox News Casey has returned to the state just in case the court rules against her. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSE BAEZ, ATTORNEY FOR CASEY ANTHONY: She is back in Florida. We`ve brought her back in event that the appellate court rules sometime this week. And we`re going to follow the law, whatever the courts decide. We`re going to go along and follow the law, and I`m certain that she`ll do what`s asked of her if necessary. And hopefully it won`t come to that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: All right, joining us here to talk about this are Jeff Gardere, he`s a clinical psychologist; and Julie Dam, assistant managing editor for "People" magazine; and of course we have Gloria Allred with us, as well.

First question to Gloria, they said that she already served -- their argument is she already served the probation while she was in jail. But isn`t probation defined as supervision after release from prison?

ALLRED: Well, that is the argument of the attorney general. But we all remember that the law is what the courts say it is, not what the attorney general says it is.

LEMON: What -- what might it look like for her I wonder if she has to serve probation? Do we know, Jeff, what that might look like for her?

JEFF GARDERE, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, she will have to report to a probation officer either once a week or once a month. She will have to report to that probation officer where she`s working, what she`s doing, get permission to leave the state if she has to. But basically she has to report all of her behavior and walk a very, very straight line.

LEMON: And she`s had limited contact with her family I`m told.

GARDERE: That`s right. Absolutely, and she has not wanted to really speak with her mother and father. I think being back in Florida, that may open the door. But something that`s interesting and that we really don`t talk about, we say that yes, maybe she`s the bad seed, she is the sociopathic personality, so on.

I`ve said it myself I have to tell you. But there may be some real issues with her family. And those need to be addressed.

LEMON: All right, hold that thought. We`ll be right back. We`ll continue this in just a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: I`m back now with my panel talking about Casey Anthony. And the judge just ruled that Casey has to serve one year probation.

First to you, Gloria Allred, what do you think?

ALLRED: Well, I think that`s an important ruling. I don`t know whether or not the defense will be appealing from that ruling. But a very important condition and term of probation is that the defendant who was sentenced to probation must obey all laws. So she is going to have to walk on eggshells for the remainder of her term of probation because if she violates any laws whatsoever, she may be brought back into court, then may have to go to prison or jail to serve the remainder of her sentence for check fraud.

LEMON: And Julie, a judge may have saved her in a way from even more public hate -- a recent poll found that she was the most hated person in America. Had she gotten off with not having to serve probation, that wouldn`t have been good in the public eye.

JULIE DAM, ASST. MANAGING EDITOR, "PEOPLE": I think people would have been angry once again and feel like justice has not been served. She`s getting off on a technicality. She really needs to serve her time.

LEMON: Yes. Let`s talk about the jury here. You -- "People" magazine spoke to one juror who basically said that this case ruined his life. What did he say to "People"?

DAM: Yes. This juror said that his life has been a nightmare. He`s afraid for his life. He Googles his name every day to make sure that it`s not out there. That people won`t find out that he was on the jury. He says that a friend`s wife won`t even let his friend talk to him anymore. And his own sister cussed him out.

LEMON: Jeff, a lot of people have the same sentiment about serving -- about the outrage here. Some are questioning whether or not they want to serve on a jury because they may get the same backlash.

GARDERE: Well, certainly it is our duty to serve as citizens. And I think that these jurors did the right thing. They put their feeling aside. Obviously they are -- some of those Americans who really do not like Casey Anthony and they tried to go by the letter of the law.

I`m surprised the prosecution didn`t get more heat for presenting supposedly a better case. Gloria can speak better on that. And why they`re picking on the jurors really is beside me. I think at this point we should really look at these jurors as being heroes because they did a job that many of us may not be able to do.

LEMON: Gloria, you heard what the one juror had to say to "People" magazine. I`m wondering now with all of this, is this -- do you think this is discouraging people from wanting to serve on juries?

ALLRED: I hope it doesn`t discourage prospective jurors because it is important that we all serve as jurors if, as and when we are called to do so.

It is not the job of the jury to do what politicians sometimes do, which is put their finger in the wind and see which way it`s blowing, and then decide what their position should be. They have to decide this case based on the evidence. The jurors said they did decide the case based on the evidence. And that the prosecution didn`t prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

Let`s all respect the jurors. Let`s respect the jury process and not threaten them. Not denigrate them. And -- and not disrespect them in any way because we need the jury process, it`s very important to our democracy.

LEMON: Gloria, Julie, Jeff, thanks to all of you.

We`ll be talking about this more. I`m sure it`s not the end of that.

Make sure your check your local listings for the premiere of "We, the People" with Gloria Allred premiering September 12.

We`re back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DAN LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: It`s usually not easy to come out as a gay man, I know. And it`s probably even tougher if you`re the grandson of one of the nation`s most popular televangelists, Orel Roberts. Randy Roberts Potts struggled with his sexuality throughout his life and says the decision to come out as a gay man has caused his family cut him off.

Well, he`s now helping other gay youth to deal with issues of sexuality and religion. So with me now is Randy Roberts Potts. Thank you very much. You came out a while ago, but recently you sort of came out and spoke with it publicly. How you doing with that?

POTTS: It`s been -- I`ve gotten a really great response. As far as - - I get a lot of emails from people who tell me that they were inspired by the fact that I came out. So that`s been really good to hear from people like that.

LEMON: When did you know you were gay?

POTTS: Even when I was 5 or 6 years old. I mean, I -- I`d tell people that even when I was watching "the dukes of hazard," I was trying -- the boys were looking at daisy duke, and I was trying to figure out between Bo and Luke who was cuter, you know. Even then I kind of knew. I just didn`t know I was gay, but I knew who I was watching.

LEMON: You knew something was going on. I get it. Superman, it was superman for me. Did your grandfather know?

POTTS: No, he did in the last few years of our life, but not until then.

LEMON: Yes. You said your -- in the introduction, you said your family cut you off. Did they stop talking to you?

POTTS: We`d talk about once a year or so. You know, it`s not the easiest talk, but I -- they haven`t like formally cut me off, you know. We do talk about once a year.

LEMON: Yes, all right. And what do you talk about? What do you say? Do they want to fray out of you, or do they accept you for who you are?

POTTS: They don`t accept it. They strongly believe that I`m going to go to hell for being openly gay. And I strongly believe I`m not. So it`s hard to find a middle ground between us.

LEMON: What do you say to them? How does it make you feel when your family says that to you?

POTTS: For me, I feel like they`re trapped in a world that -- in a lot of fear. I think they really are legitimately afraid that I am going to hell. And they are too scared to look beyond that. And so it hurts me, but I also feel badly for them to be trapped or feel trapped in a place like that.

LEMON: Did it have anything to do with your uncle who`s Orel Roberts` son, who was also gay who ended up committing suicide? Was is because he never -- was it because he never felt accepted and they think you`ll end up the same way?

POTTS: I think so. I think my mother was always concerned that I was going to be gay. Even six months after he died, she took me aside and told me what gay was and how god hated it so much that he destroyed whole cities because of it. And I think, you know, that being only six month after he passed, I think it was on her mind that I was gay, and that she wanted to impress on me that it led to, you know, death and destruction. I think she was really scared. So I think it does factor in a little bit.

LEMON: Your uncle, the one I`m speaking of, is Ronny. How much did he inspire you to be open and proud of who you are? Did he inspire you at all?

POTTS: No. He had sort of a mixture of being open. He told, you know, close friends and family, but did not really live openly in the sense that we -- we do today. I was more inspired to not follow the exact same path that he did. When I saw his suicide and started to realize I was gay, I saw this as an example that I didn`t want to follow.

LEMON: But you -- you got married, didn`t you?

POTTS: I did, yes. I married my best friend at 20 years old. And she and I had a good, you know, emotional relationship for quite a while.

LEMON: Yes. Good emotional relationship for quite a while.

POTTS: Yes. We were definitely best friends. We loved to talk for hours. But I know now it really wasn`t a full relationship, but it was a very emotional, wonderful relationship. It was for where I was at the time, it was -- it was good.

LEMON: Yes. Are you still religious?

POTTS: I am very -- I call myself spiritual. But I don`t, like, I`m not a member of a certain organization or anything like that.

LEMON: Have you come across a lot of gay youth who feel like they can`t be both gay and Christian or at least follow an organized religion because they`re gay?

POTTS: I do. Almost all the people who e-mail me and write me have that fear. There are a lot of gay youths who want to stay Christian or follow the faith of their family and want to know if they can. And I think there is room in every religion for gay people. And there are starting to be, you know, gay-affirming church around the country. So that is a huge concern for people that write me.

LEMON: Yes. You released an "It gets better" video. Have you gotten a lot of response to that?

POTTS: Yes, still every day. A lot of people have watched that. And I hear all the time people, you know, coming from evangelical backgrounds that really relate to it and that really understand and really, you know, were suicidal like I was and like my uncle was. So yes, I still hear about it a lot.

LEMON: Is there anything you want to say to your family and other families who may be listening, who have -- are in a similar situation?

POTTS: Yes. You know, I think that the main thing I would say is that I love my family a lot, I understand where they`re coming from, I understand the fear, and I hope that someday we can all get over that fear of homosexuality because it`s a wonderful thing in my life, and I`m glad to be who I am. And I hope someday that everybody in my family can be just as glad about it.

LEMON: Randy Roberts Potts, you know, before I let you -- what do you think if your grandfather had known, what do you think? Do you think he`d still be proud of you?

POTTS: Well, he apparently knew I was gay, and about six months before he passed I went to visit him, and we didn`t talk about it. But he was wonderful to me, more gracious to me than he`d ever been in my life. And so I feel strongly that it was his way of kind of saying he still loved me no matter what.

LEMON: Best of luck to you. Thank you for doing this. Your first time talking about this publicly on television. We appreciate it, OK?

POTTS: Thanks, Don.

LEMON: I want to turn to Jay Bakker, son of the enormously popular evangelist Jim Bakker, and Tammy Faye Bakker. He`s also the author of "A Fall to Grace, a Revolution of God, Self and Society." What do you think listening to Randy there?

JAY BAKKER: It`s heartbreaking. I hear it all the time. And to think of his uncle and to think that he was in a place of suicide and that the church is making people feel like they don`t want to live anymore. And somehow getting that confused with Jesus is mind-boggling to me.

LEMON: Do you think you got this from your mom? Because your mom was enormously supportive of gay rights and was really one of the first sort of evangelists to reach out to gay people.

BAKKER: Yes. She was doing that in `82 and `83. I think so. She definitely influenced me very strongly. I guess I took it to the next level, but she was definitely a big influence on me.

LEMON: She was also one of the first people to care for people with AIDS.

BAKKER: Yes.

LEMON: When they were shunned -- people didn`t know what -- how you got it.

BAKKER: They were terrified.

LEMON: She didn`t care.

BAKKER: Yes. She said we got to love these people, reach out to these people, and did interviews and stuff like that. I don`t think Ronald Reagan had said the word AIDS, you know.

LEMON: Yes. Yes. And people say if it wasn`t for C. Everett Koop, that many more people would have died under -- on Reagan`s watch.

BAKKER: Yes. It`s amazing that just the sadness and denial that so many people have.

LEMON: You`re a pastor now, and you preach an all-inclusiveness sort of doctrine. That`s what you believe. And are you criticized by other Christians and by other people who are in the church for doing that?

BAKKER: Definitely. Yes, definitely, definitely. I mean, when I first said I was gay affirming, which is we accept gay people, we don`t think it`s a sin, I had to let my whole staff go.

LEMON: Can you stop there? You said you accept gay people, you don`t believe it`s a sin. That`s the whole thing about Christianity, about church. They say that it`s a sin.

BAKKER: Yes. They get held up by a few scriptures that really, in my opinion get taken out of context. And they almost let them trump love your neighbor as thyself. It`s really a scary thing.

LEMON: You had to let go of your whole staff.

BAKKER: Yes. I had five staff members at the time, and I had to let the staff go. I didn`t speak for about a year. All my speaking engagements got canceled. That was five or six years ago.

LEMON: My thing is how do you get young people to go back into the church, especially nowadays when young people are saying about social issues they really don`t care as much as they used to? They`re at least more open and more progressive about those issues? I want to talk to you about how you get young people to go back into the church, especially when you have -- when you espouse views like you, if you think that`s a future or some people are going to criticize you for it. We`ll have more with Jay Bakker in just a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: I`m back now with Jay Bakker, son of televangelist couple Jim Bakker and Tammy Faye. He is now a pastor himself and he preaches all- inclusiveness. Do you think this is the next generation of Christian? I know after the scandal hit you felt deserted by Christians and you sort of felt isolated. Is this your motivation here?

BAKKER: Well, I mean, my motivation was I felt isolated. I thought god hated me until I was about 19, 20 years old and started reading the Bible for myself and realizing that, wow, the Bible does have a lot of good news. There`s a lot of Grace there. A lot of the stuff I had seen before wasn`t -- didn`t mesh. I was really shocked that I was loved and accepted. I wanted other people to experience that.

LEMON: Religion is supposed to be, it`s supposed to be all- inclusiveness. It`s supposed to be about that. So why is there so little of it in the church that we see these days? Or is that just what we focus on?

BAKKER: Yes, well, I think religious people are always looking to find out who doesn`t fit in, who`s not accepted, who doesn`t get to receive grace. Religion has been notorious for being on the wrong side of history for so many things in the United States just in the past 100 years, you know.

So I think people have got to stop using it for that. I mean, it`s a thing of loving people. And I think they think, well, if I follow religion, I can love people just this way, and then I can find loopholes of people I don`t have to love. Or I can say I love them and treat them like hell, you know. I think we really have to get away from. That we`re not loving our neighbor as ourselves.

LEMON: Or people say things and say I`m not judging, but I can say that you`re going to go to see hell or it`s --

BAKKER: Right, right. It doesn`t make any sense.

LEMON: Yes. You have a very unconventional look. Look, you have -- on the sleeve. Let me see that on your fingers there. Do you -- do you think that -- I guess there`s room for everyone. That`s part of your message. It doesn`t matter how you look. You don`t have to be, you know, wear a suit and tie or khakis and a jacket to church.

BAKKER: No, no. I mean, my biggest hero is Martin Luther King Jr. And I think he preached such a beautiful inclusive message that, you know, everyone`s welcome.

LEMON: Do you think a lot of young people have a misconception about what it`s like or what it`s supposed to be like to be a Christian or to be a religious person?

BAKKER: Yes, definitely. I think there`s like a tradition, a traditional type of Christianity that says you don`t listen to this, you don`t hang out with these people, and you don`t go to these places. And people fall into it, and then they read the Bible between particular glasses and see scripture certain ways. And they`re told to do exactly the opposite thing that Jesus did. Jesus was known to hang out with sinners. They called him a wine bibber or drunk, a friend of the worst type of people.

And then we`re told don`t go to these places. Don`t do these things, don`t follow the example of Jesus. It`s like we`ve rewritten the scripture somehow, and it doesn`t make any sense to me.

LEMON: You realize, though, that you`re saying subversive things. And people with more traditional views, especially heads of churches and preachers and pastors are going to say, oh, that`s -- it`s just the devil.

BAKKER: Yes. I`ve grown up -- I`ve grown up with that. I know, yes, they do say it`s the devil or say that I`m compromising or trying to win, you know, approval of people. And I`m like, you know, you don`t understand. You guys -- I almost went bankrupt when I said I love everybody. You know, this wasn`t a popularity contest. This was just me following a deep conviction. And it all came from understanding god`s Grace and god`s love, you know. They say -- I`ve always had people say, you know, Jay, too much grace, it`s a slippery slope.

LEMON: Too much grace?

BAKKER: Yes. And it is a slippery slope to loving everybody. I`m glad I got to slide on down it.

LEMON: Do you think that -- it has been said that fire and brimstone really is about mind control and about controlling people to be like what you think they should be or how you want them to be. Do you think it`s about control?

BAKKER: Yes. I think it`s about control. And I also think it`s about preachers who are worried about how their congregation is going to reflect on them. I know there were times in my life when I wanted everybody to be really good in my church because I was afraid what people would think about me.

LEMON: Yes, but if you go through therapy as a person and you think of how your family will reflect on you or how someone else will reflect, that is the ultimate narcissism and it`s about you and not in a good way about people.

BAKKER: No, and we don`t confront that in the church. We say it`s normal, and it`s healthy, and it becomes a control situation rather than a loving situation, rather than getting to know people. You know, I used to ask all sorts of questions growing up. Oh, you shouldn`t answer that, you shouldn`t say this. This is how we think. This is how it`s always been done. And the church has suffered because of that type of thinking.

LEMON: You realize it`s -- it`s quite a thing to have. It`s all locked, all built in. You cannot if you disobey or go against and you`re doing something wrong and you`re going to go to see hell, or it`s blasphemy, whatever, it`s built in to sort of get people to do what you want them to do and not necessarily what the actual scripture says.

BAKKER: Yes, yes. It`s definitely built in. People made hell into like, you know, since Dante`s inferno, they made hell into something worse and worse and worse and worse and all the scary places to terrify people. Yes, it was a way to control people. It`s a way to -- also I think it`s a better way to -- you think if I follow these rules and these rules, but you have to have trust and faith.

LEMON: You talked about -- I can`t remember the number --

BAKKER: Rob Bell.

LEMON: He said there is no hell.

BAKKER: He doesn`t go exactly that far, but I don`t think he went far enough. But I thought it was a great book and it needed to be said.

LEMON: What do you mean he didn`t go far enough?

BAKKER: I think, you know, he went almost to the point of saying there is no hell. And I think what we`ve made hell out to be is this -- this place that god, this horrible god, a horrible, angry father that turns people away. And I just don`t -- doesn`t make sense to me. It doesn`t add up in the scriptures. When you look at the actual translations of hell, there`s like three different words.

But he did such a beautiful thing in that book as far as asking people how do you get saved? He showed like 15 different ways people came to Jesus and the Bible. So there`s really no -- this is how we do it. It`s the church who said this is how we do it. So I think hell is a tactic to scare and frighten people. I think god loves us more than we can ever grasp and understand. And I think a loving god doesn`t do that. And I`m called the heretic because of that, but that`s with I`ll stand.

But didn`t Jesus say, don`t -- if I`m wrong, tell me, auto -- didn`t Jesus say you should question, question, question, everything, and if you - - if you questioned doctrine or --

BAKKER: Yes, him and Paul both said that. But it wasn`t just that he said that, he did that. You know, the people that Jesus continuously rebuked were the religious people of the day. They`d ask questions, and then he`d ask questions back. Jesus us was always continuously pushing, you know. Some would say, well, what do I do to get eternal life? Love your neighbor yourself. And they would say who is my neighbor. And Jesus would go your neighbor is your enemy. Wait second, you know.

LEMON: I think it`s what you say. We have a presidential election coming up. You talk about politics and religion and whether the two should meet, if there`s too much religion in politics and vice versa. We`re going to talk about that in just a moment. Don`t go anywhere.

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LEMON: I`m back now having a fascinating conversation with Jay Bakker. Can we talk some politics here? You said it seems like Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, they`re fighting for the Christian vote here. What do you make of that?

BAKKER: To me it`s irrelevant. They`re playing to a group of people who deal a lot with fear and using fear to control folks. To me I`m a person of faith and they don`t seem to be pulling me in at all. You know, it almost seems like you`re hearing people who believe in -- and I`ve been accused of this myself -- almost these type of fairy tale type of things. And it`s scary to think these people want to -- I feel like they`ve hijacked Christianity.

LEMON: What do you mean by fairy tales?

BAKKER: They`re just like god put us here, we`re all going to hell and there`s no global warming. You know, we`re going to ignore science, we`re going to ignore archaeology, we`re going to ignore all these things because that`s what people do. They just pick and choose what they want to believe and what they don`t want to believe.

And it`s hard for people, for example, like when they find out books of the Bible, certain books of the Bible weren`t written by who they claim to be written by. Automatically they go that wasn`t a compliment back then. No, it wasn`t.

LEMON: Certain things in the Bible and most of it I would have to say and just giving you my opinion having read it, I went to Catholic school, raised Baptist, studied with the Jehovah Witnesses for a while. Most times it`s about lessons. Joanna lived in the belly of the whale. Is that more about the lesson than the idea of Jonah living in the belly of a whale?

BAKKER: I think that`s written more as satire. People don`t want to hear that. You question this, then are you going to question that? I love the Bible. It`s a collection of scrolls. I`m passionate about it. People told me to read it and study it more. And I did. When I did I started to find out things they didn`t like. When you start to go back to the historical backgrounds of the Bible and the Greek and the Hebrew, you talk about different things and people say no, no, don`t talk about that.

LEMON: When you talk about a good read, read the Bible. It`s an amazingly written book and it`s a beautiful book.

Let`s talk more politics here. Do you think there`s too much religion in politic, politics in religion?

BAKKER: Yes. To me it seems like it`s just been so overdone. It seems like in the 80s. In the 80s it was really scary, in the 90s it was really scary. Now it`s kind of almost like they`re a skit or something.

LEMON: Turning young people off away from church?

BAKKER: It does but I think people are kind of tired of politics right now and they want to see change happening, they want to see people have drinking water, they want to see the poor being taken care of.

LEMON: That`s more important --

BAKKER: And that`s exciting, whether or not even what you believe.

LEMON: Yes. Thank you.

BAKKER: You`re welcome.

LEMON: Fascinating conversation. I could sit here and talk to you forever. As a matter of fact, we`re going do it after the show. Thanks, Jay Bakker. Jay`s book is called "Fall to Grace." I want to thank everyone for watching. Have a great night.

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