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Don Lemon Tonight

White House Covered By Cloud Of Turmoil, Tensions; Incoming U.S. House Freshmen Class; Trump Spreads False Voter Fraud Conspiracy; Attorney Michael Avenatti Arrested in L.A.; Reagan's Daughter Says Prejudice and Hatred Should Not Exist in America; Police Officer Shot and Killed Black Security Guard Who Was Holding Alleged Gunman. Aired 11-12a ET

Aired November 14, 2018 - 23:00   ET

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

[23:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon. Thank you so much for joining us. Tension, turmoil and uncertainty hanging over the White House with the President markedly scaling back his public schedule after the midterm elections. Democrats' margin of victory in the house increases by two tonight for a net pick of 32 seats.

With the majority comes the prospect of investigations into the President and his administration. And speaking of investigations, the Special Counsel Robert Mueller is inching closer to issuing his report on the Russia investigation. White House officials telling CNN that President Trump is this is a quote, pissed at damn near everyone. Staff shake-ups are almost certain to be on the horizon.

Trump reportedly telling advisers he wants to the fire Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, he is also considering replacing Chief of Staff John Kelly. And there's the mystery surrounding Deputy National Security Adviser, Mira Ricardel. A day after the first lady's office publicly said that Ricardel no longer deserves the honor of serving in this White House, she showed up for work anyway how.

Word from the White House tonight is that she will be reassigned to a new role within the administration. Multiple officials say they have no idea where that might be. So let's talk about all of it now. There are people inside the White House, Michael D'Antonio is here, and he is the author of "The Truth about Trump." Also Joan Walsh, the national affairs correspondent for the Nation and Steven Moore the author of "Trumpenomics."

Good evening everyone.

JOAN WALSH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hi, Don.

LEMON: I want to show you Michael, blue wave in the midterm. The Mueller investigation. A chaotic White House. President Trump is blaming everyone, but himself. The defense mechanism to this President is to point to anyone, but himself, right?

MICHAEL D'ANTONIO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: That is his -- he tries to project his own pain out onto the world. So if he can call someone stupid, if he can say everybody's being unfair to me, that is his set point. The problem is here that there are so many problems that I think it is penetrating even his personal ability to deny them.

And you know, denial is a very powerful force, and when he was on the campaign trail, he was able to Basque in that adulation to say well, everybody loves me and really at those rallies everybody does love him, but he comes back to Washington, it's still the swamp. He is still dealing with all these problems and now he is facing a house that is going to investigate him 24/7 for the next two years. That is got to bother him.

LEMON: Let me read that quote again for you here and the quote is "Trump is pissed at damn near everyone." I'm talking to you, Steve, right? At what point should the American people be concerned about drama getting in the way of governing. We know he likes chaos. What point should they be worried about that?

STEPHEN MOORE, CNN SENIOR ECONOMIC ANALYST: Look, Donald Trump is pissed. Donald Trump is a winner. As you know, he likes to win and hates to lose. That is one thing I like about the guy. He also is running the White House like a CEO of a company and he doesn't tolerate failure.

Look, you can say well its Donald Trump's fault himself. He can't fire himself. There are going to be changes in this White House. It's quite possible that there will be a new chief of staff sometime in the next few months. What's wrong with that?

I mean, I always say with Donald Trump you want to look at the results of how his policies are working, not get caught up in the day to day malaise going on in the White House. I mean, it's the results and the results have been pretty good. His feeling is look, we've got a booming economy. How did we lose 30 seats in the house? That is a good question.

D'ANTONIO: The result in that election would have been a lot better if he had conducted himself.

(CROSSTALK)

WALSH: God, yes. Those suburban Republicans paid for his sins. And Steve, if he was a CEO, the board would fire him at this point.

MOORE: Are you kidding? With this economy?

LEMON: Hold on.

You guys keep talking about the economy. Have you looked at the deficit? I keep saying this.

WALSH: The deficit.

LEMON: The former President set the table. This man, the President who is in office now got an amazing economy. Of course, this should be a great economy. It should be all good news. If it started to falter, we should be concerned about him screwing up the economy. [23:05:00] MOORE: The economy was growing about 1.5 percent.

LEMON: The key word -- what's the key word.

The key word is growing.

When the President before him took office.

MOORE: Was the economy growing?

LEMON: No. When Obama took office, was the economy growing?

MOORE: You mentioned the debt. Barack Obama took the national debt from $10 trillion to $20 trillion.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: More money. I'm sick and tired of hearing this because it's a bunch of crap.

MOORE: What is?

LEMON: It is a bunch of crap, because what economy did Obama inherit?

MOORE: It was a horrible economy.

LEMON: It was horrible. What was it called? What was it called?

MOORE: A recession. By June of 2009, we're out of it. We had the weakest recovery.

WALSH: We weren't out of it by 2009. Oh, my god.

MOORE: It was the worst recovery forever recession since the great depressioning (ph).

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: It was it the only one.

MOORE: The economy was so -- Hillary Clinton would have won the election.

LEMON: That has nothing to do with the price of tea. Let me ask you this, when you talk about jobs, for the first two years, the first two years of the Trump administration and the last two years of the Obama administration who, created more jobs?

MOORE: They're about equal.

LEMON: No, they're not. Who created more jobs? The last two years.

MOORE: Equal amount. We created about 200,000.

LEMON: You didn't answer my question.

WALSH: Obama created more. I'll answer it.

MOORE: It's very difficult to get employment rate down, down, down.

LEMON: Stop with the economy thing because this is President did not screw up the economy. You want to give him plaudits for doing his job? I could have gotten in there and not screwed up the economy. I want to do the same thing the last President did and the economy would grow.

MOORE: Answer me this question. How is it that in eight years?

LEMON: I'm not an economist, but I did not just fall a turnip truck.

MOORE: Why is it in eight years in the White House, Barack Obama never got us to 3 percent growth?

LEMON: You answered that question when I asked you.

MOORE: In 18 months.

LEMON: When I asked you the first question about what economy did the former President inherit?

MOORE: But it took him eight years and he couldn't get to where we are.

WALSH: I really don't understand why we let Steve change the subject every single time. The economy is not all that matters. It's great, but it's temporarily great. We are heading for a fall.

MOORE: We'll see.

WALSH: What we're really talking about is a man that -- he hits new lows all the time. But for me the new low, Don, was telling staff that he was so angry that nobody told him that it would look terrible not to go to the cemetery in France on Saturday. That he was blindsided by the public reaction. Steve, I give you credit. You would have gone to that cemetery that day. My dog would have gone to the cemetery. My daughter, I mean, that he needed to be told to go to the cemetery? If he was a CEO, he would be out.

MOORE: I don't know what his political people told him.

WALSH: That is tragic.

MOORE: I mean, my point is --

D'ANTONIO: And you would have gone to a veteran's memorial on Monday.

WALSH: I would have gone to Arlington. You can walk to Arlington.

MOORE: He should have gone to Arlington cemetery.

LEMON: Do you think he need a staff to tell him those things?

WALSH: To honor the death? MOORE: I think he need a political director to tell him if you don't

do a, b, c.

WALSH: What a whiny.

D'ANTONIO: Wouldn't John Kelly know that? He has a chief of staff?

LEMON: That may be why John Kelly might be on the way out.

WALSH: Oh, god.

D'ANTONIO: There is a profound mistake when people think the economy is the nation. The economy is not the nation. The nation is (inaudible) million people.

MOORE: I think Trump has fantastic political instincts. That is how he won the election.

WALSH: That is why he is hovering under 40 percent approval.

MOORE: He won the election with 38 percent approval rating.

D'ANTONIO: He lost the election. He lost the popular vote.

Del He won the presidency. He won the presidency.

I do have to say, I think he actually does have very good innate political instincts. I'm not sure. That I think his compass may have been off when it comes to the midterms. With going so hard.

D'ANTONIO: You may very well be right.

WALSH: His compass has been off for a long time. He doesn't win the presidency without Jim Comey and the Russians, let us just be honest about that.

D'ANTONIO: He doesn't have human instincts. This is the problem.

MOORE: You can lack the humanity to treat people well.

LEMON: Wait a minute.

WALSH: he is letting these people twist in the wind. We hear rumor after rumor.

MOORE: You're asking like this is going to slam on Donald Trump and this was a typical midterm election. Look, I lived through 1994 when after two years of Bill Clinton, every Democrat in the country.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Here's the difference.

MOORE: The same thing happened in --

LEMON: I conceding your point. MOORE: Obama won re-election. That is why Donald Trump is going to

win re-election.

LEMON: I see you point. Here's the difference. Bush said what? Because oh my gosh, we did terribly. Obama said we took a shellac. This President came out and said what, oh my gosh, this was great. It was a huge victory. We won.

WALSH: Then he went to his bedroom.

LEMON: It wasn't true.

[23:10:04] MOORE: Because what happened was, I was elated on election night, because it looked like they had won all these races and then we had the mysteriously all these Democratic votes came in.

WALSH: It's not mysterious. Stop saying that.

(CROSSTALK)

MOORE: We lost.

LEMON: Oh, my god.

MOORE: I'm not saying --

WALSH: Why are you laughing? That is destabilizing of democracy. It's not a mystery. People have to count the votes. We're moving into the 21st century where more people are voting by mail.

MOORE: Democrats would never question account legitimacy of an election right. They would never question the legitimacy of the 2016 election.

LEMON: Here is the thing. You said all these votes mysteriously came in. Just remember when you mentioned the 2000 election, right? OK. Al Gore won that, right? And you mentioned the 2016 election and who won that.

Who won the 2016 election? George W. Bush.

MOORE: No.

LEMON: 2016.

MOORE: Donald Trump.

LEMON: OK. So 2000, George W. Bush, a Republican. Right? 2016, Donald Trump a Republican. Yet it's rigged? Is it rigged in the Republicans' favor?

MOORE: I'm not saying it's rigged. I'm saying the reason that we all thought it was going to be a very good election for the Republicans is that the -- there are three or four big races that turned the next day.

The Nevada race, the Arizona race.

WALSH: It's democracy. It's the way we vote.

LEMON: My gosh.

WALSH: People need to.

MOORE: I like democracy. I'm in favor of democracy.

LEMON: I've got to go. I've got go.

MOORE: Come on, you guys are being hypocritical to say how dare we question the legitimacy of an election?

LEMON: We need more than a wardrobe change. We got to go. Thank you all, I appreciate it. Thank you so much. The incoming 2019 congressional freshman class is the most diverse in U.S. History. Notice the difference between the Democrats and Republicans. We're going to discuss next.

[23:15:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: All right. Check this out. You're looking at the 2019 congressional freshman class, the most diverse freshman class in the history of the U.S. House of Representatives. Now, I want you to take a look at this flyer that circulated on Capitol Hill that breaks down the new lawmakers by party.

On the left the Republican class overwhelmingly white with only one woman. On the Democratic side to the right of your screen, women and people of color are the majority there. So here's how the incoming class breaks down by gender so far with some races is still undecided, 33 female and 21 male Democrats, one female and 30 male Republicans.

The class includes the first two Native American women elected to congress, Deb Holland of New Mexico of Sharice Davids of Kansas. Davis will also be the first LGBT person to represent candidates in congress. There is also Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ilhan Omar, of Minnesota.

They will become the first Muslim women in Congress. Omar will also be the first Somali American member of congress. She came to the U.S. more than two decades ago as a refugee. Nine new African-American representatives will be serving in Congress next year including Jahana Hayes from Connecticut, the first African American woman from the state to serve in Congress and Ayanna Presley, Massachusetts first black Congress woman.

There are also eight new Latino members of the house. That includes Veronica Escobar and Sylvia Garcia the first Hispanic woman to represent Texas. And for the first time, Iowans also are sending women to the House Democrats Abby Finkenauer and Cindy Axne. Finkenauer along with Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez of New York are now the two youngest women ever to be elected to congress, they are both 29 years old. The list of firsts for this Democratic class goes on and on, but the

bottom line is, Democrats heading to Capitol Hill are younger, they're browner, and definitely more female than the Republicans. So let's discuss now. Democratic Congressman Cedric Richmond by home state Louisiana, he joins me now, he chairs the congressional black caucus. Good evening to you.

REP. CEDRIC RICHMOND (D), LOUISIANA: Thank you Don. Thanks for having me.

LEMON: This Congress is starting to look closer to what the rest of the country looks like, right?

RICHMOND: Absolutely. The Democratic Party is starting to mirror what the country looks like. So that is a good thing.

LEMON: Yes. Do you understand how some people may be concerned not that you know, condoning any of that, but they may be concerned, you look the names of the people I just read, right. You look at their backgrounds, their ethnicities, their religions and on and on. If you're used to being sort of having the preeminent voice and being the preeminent ethnicity and you see this, it may be a little bit concerning, right. You may be threatened by it a bit.

RICHMOND: Generally, I think if you're talking about the other side, the day of everybody being named Billy or Jane, that day is over. Why I'm so proud of the Democratic caucus, because we accepted the diversity. So, if you look at people like Johana Hayes or Lauren Underwood or Lucy McBath, Colin Allred, they all represent districts that are not black districts.

So, I will say again that the black caucus represents 78 million Americans, but only 17 million are African-American. We take our job seriously. We fight to make this a more perfect union or less imperfect union depending how you look at it.

It's not all about race, but the Democratic Party I believe is starting to embrace people of all races, all religions, all genders and that is a good thing that Congress will start to look more like the people it governs.

LEMON: Perfectly answered. Thank you, representative Richmond. So let's talk about Nancy Pelosi. She is confident that she is going to be the Speaker of the House. But there are Democrats who oppose her. Do you support Pelosi? Does the CBC support her?

RICHMOND: Look, I'm chair of the congressional black caucus. I don't put my fingers on the scale of many races.

[23:20:00] I wouldn't bet against Nancy Pelosi. She was a great speaker. She ushered in the affordable care act. Many people in the congressional black caucus support her, but there are things that I think people bring up valid reasons and right now, I'm tunnel vision on one race. It has I'm not for or against Nancy Pelosi. I love Nancy Pelosi. I love Steny Hoyer. But I'm for Jim Clyburn. Out of the three leadership positions, only the African-American male has opposition within our Party.

There's no announced opposition to Nancy, nor Steny, but there's opposition to Jim Clyburn and if you take out Jim Clyburn that means out of the top three leader positions we would have no diversity, because the person running against him is not a minority. So I think this talks about who we are as a Democratic Party. We're good enough to vote.

We are good enough get elected, but not good enough to lead? That is a real issue. As chair of the congressional black caucus, that is something that I won't bite my tongue about. I'm sure I'll ruffle a couple of feathers, but Jim Clyburn having opposition in this party after traveling to 100 districts and doing all he did, I believe is insulting.

LEMON: Well, and we have you on because of your candor. Thank you for saying that. Let us talk about the President now, because he made some wild claims today about voter fraud in Florida. He told the Daily Caller, he said the Republicans don't win and that is because of potentially illegal votes.

When people get in line, they have absolutely no right to vote and they go around in circles. Sometimes they go to their car, put on a different hat, put on a different shirt, come in and vote again. Nobody takes anything. It's really a disgrace what's going on. If you buy a box of cereal, you have to have a voter I.D.

They try to shame everybody by calling them racist or calling them something, anything they can to think of when you say you want voter I.D. I mean, besides the desperation in that tweet, what's your response?

RICHMOND: Don, if we had all day I'd count to 10 before I respond. But I won't do that to you, because I know you have a time limit. The President's delusional. The President is a liar. He still thinks more people went to his inauguration than President Obama. He still thinks he won the popular vote.

He tells more stories than little Cedric and little Cedric is 4. We just can't spend much time I believe giving the President much attention on those types of tweets and those types of responses. He knows who he is talking to. He is talking to people who need a reason to believe that.

He is talking to people who feel they're vulnerable in this country that the country's getting browner and younger and that they feel vulnerable. So let me tell them why they feel vulnerable or why minorities are taking their place in life or why they're poor because minorities are jumping in line and taking welfare. He knows what.

LEMON: Besides the desperation in the tweet, completely pandering to a certain element. That is why I made that comment, but go on.

RICHMOND: I mean, it's just what he does. And I find myself talking about him far too much. What I'd really like to talk about is how we should hold both Democrats and Republicans responsible, but specially Democrats in the House. We need to do the things that the people elected us to do, raise the minimum wage, protect pre-existing conditions, paid family leave. The voting rights act and criminal justice reform. So, possibly a much time worrying about Donald Trump and his ways --

LEMON: Can I ask you a question? Listen, I think a lot of lot of people are saying that too much is being discussed about sometimes nonsense coming from the highest office in the land, but I mean just so that we can have a reality check on this, if this was rigged against Republicans, how did he win?

RICHMOND: Well, Don, I agree with you 100 percent. That is why I think you just have to call it B.S. when you hear it. He won the election. Look, I would acknowledge what he won't acknowledge. He won the election fair and square. He didn't win the popular vote, but he won the election. And how he won it is a whole different story, but he won it fair and square. But he keeps holding on to this fact that he is not a legitimate President.

And I'm out of the life coaching business. I'm not going to give him a hug and not going to give him a boost. I'm not going to be supportive. You're the President of the United States, act like it for once. So you know, we are where we are. In two years, hopefully he won't be the President.

Then he can have all the temper tantrums he wants, but there are people out there who need us to focus on their issues. They're trying to pay their bills, put their kids in school, pay college tuition and retire and get health care. Those are the things we care about. And you know, you know, I would love to borrow a phrase from Jay-z. He got 99 problems, but Donald Trump ain't one.

(LAUGHTER)

You still there, Don?

[23:25:01] LEMON: I'm glad you said Donald Trump. Because I thought you were actually going to say the lyrics. Cedric Richmond. Always interesting, but always a pleasure. Thank you.

RICHMOND: Thank you for having me.

LEMON: Ronald Reagan's daughter has something to say to President Trump. Why she sees his rhetoric as allowing blatant racism to sweep across the country and what she says her father would think about it. That is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Attorney Michael Avenatti arrested in Los Angeles today on suspicion of domestic violence. Let's bring in now CNN Sara Sidner. Sara, good evening to you. Give us the latest.

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good evening. Los Angeles police detectives did tell us that they brought in Michael Avenatti and you know who he is. He is the person who has become a household name going after Donald Trump and his lawsuit on behalf of Stormy Daniels. He comes at him hard. He has been arrested for suspicion of felony domestic violence.

What does that mean, it means that police had a suspicion and had evidence they believed resulted in some sort of physical violence and that is where the felony comes in. He bonded out $50,000 bail. And he is now out of jail. We have heard from him. He has spoken to cameras. He had a statement earlier talking about the Los Angeles Police Department that they were just doing their job. He praised them. And he also said this about the allegations against him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL AVENATTI, ATTORNEY: I have never struck a woman. I never will strike a woman. I have been an advocate for women's rights my entire career, and I'm going to continue to be an advocate. I am not going to be intimidated from stopping what I am doing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: Now, this is as usual, police have not released the name of the person who is accusing him of domestic violence. We have heard, however, from his estranged wife. He is going through a divorce at this time. She has come out in support of Michael Avenatti, saying that she had never experienced any sort of physical violence in her relationship with him. And his ex-wife, who he has children with, two female children, she said he never showed that sort of violence, as well.

So, we're in a situation now where he will be going to court in the morning, and I'm sure we'll hear more from him. We are also trying to get in touch with the person who has accused him of domestic violence, Don.

LEMON: Thank you for your reporting. Thank you, Sara Sidner.

The word "unprecedented" gets thrown around a lot these days. It's often warranted. But perspective is important and there's a danger in these turbulent times in forgetting what we have lived through as a country.

Joining me now to discuss that is Patti Davis. She is an author and the daughter of the great Ronald Reagan. President, of course. Patti, thank you. Good evening. We appreciate you joining us.

PATTI DAVIS, DAUGHTER OF RONALD REAGAN: Good evening.

LEMON: You have a new op-ed.

DAVIS: Thank you.

LEMON: It is in "Washington Post." And the op-ed is called "Prejudice and hatred should not exist in America. My father understood that." You tell a story about how your father paid a visit to a black family in Maryland. This was in 1982. That family had a cross burned on their front lawn by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Tell us more about that.

DAVIS: So, he picked up The Washington Post that morning and read the story about the butler family who had in 1977 had a six-foot cross burned on their lawn. It wasn't the first time that they had been attacked in their -- on their property in their home. And they had caught the man who had done it. Five years later, a judge awarded them a civil judgment of $23,000.

By that time, this man had disappeared. And he was -- my father was so upset by the story he went down to the Oval Office and said, I want to -- they were in Maryland -- I want to fly out to see them today. The main point that I wanted to make in this is that my father said to them, something like this should never happen in America.

LEMON: Yes. But what you're saying though is that the quality that your father had is empathy, that he could understand --

DAVIS: Yes.

LEMON: -- empathize with these people. And the reason I'm saying that, there's a method to why I'm saying this, because you also write, you said that we need to remember when children are ripped from their mothers' arms and put into cages, that there was a time when such a thing wouldn't happen in this country.

These days -- these days when blatant racism has been allowed to emerge from the shadows and sweep through neighborhoods, so that young black boys are yelled at for mowing a neighbor's lawn, we need to think about how other presidents including my father, viewed leadership.

So, I want you to talk to me more about that. How your father viewed leadership, hos it's different from what we're currently seeing from the president, and I think one of those qualities you're talking about is empathy.

DAVIS: Yes, and also, you know, I made it clear in this piece because I got a lot of -- a lot of flack in some of the comments in The Washington Post by people who said, your father was a racist, he spoke at the Neshoba County Fair in 1980, and he used the phrase states' rights.

He used the phrase states' rights, he probably shouldn't have, but he used it very literally. I don't think he had a clue that there was a racist connotation to that phrase. Should he have known? Should people in his campaign have told him? Yes. Apparently, they didn't.

But the idea that Ronald Reagan was sending out dog whistles to white nationalists and the Ku Klux Klan is absurd. I can't defend his policies, but I can -- I can defend the man because he had -- he had a generous and good heart.

[23:34:57] And he lived by the belief that each and every person on this planet is a child of God and should be treated as such. Look where we've come to now.

LEMON: I want to ask you about that because when it came to -- it really got down to it, you can say whatever you want about President Reagan, which you just said the criticism was. When we need a consoler-in-chief, he was there.

DAVIS: Yes.

LEMON: He consoled us. We believed it.

DAVIS: Yes.

LEMON: And now?

DAVIS: Now we have someone who apparently was born without an empathy gene.

LEMON: That simple. Patti Davis, thank you.

DAVIS: Thank you.

LEMON: Another young black man killed by police. This man, Jemel Roberson, was a security guard subduing a suspect in a shooting when an officer opened fire on him. His family joins me, next.

[23:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Another young black man shot and killed by police. I'm talking about 26-year-old Jemel Roberson who was working security at a Chicago bar. Chicago area bar, I should say, because it wasn't specifically in Chicago. Witnesses say that security asked several drunk men to leave the bar and at least one person opened fire. Roberson pinned the alleged gunman to the ground.

But moments later, a white police officer arrived and shot Roberson. The Illinois State Police now investigating the shooting. They released a preliminary report saying in part, "upon his arrival, a Midlothian police officer encountered a subject in plain black clothing with no markings readily identifying him as a security guard, armed with a guard in the west parking lot.

According to witness statements, the Midlothian officer gave the armed subject multiple verbal commands to drop the gun and get on the ground before ultimately discharging his weapon and striking the subject.

But tonight, the police chief is grieving Roberson's death, calling it the equivalent of a blue on blue friendly fire incident. Chief Daniel Delaney also wrote on Facebook.

"What we have learned is Jemel Roberson was a brave man who was doing his best to end an active shooter situation at Manny's Blue Room. The Midlothian Police Department is completely saddened by this tragic accident and we give our heartfelt condolences to Jemel, his family and his friends. There are no words that can be expressed as to the sorrow his family is dealing with."

Let's discuss now. Joining me now is Lee Merritt. He is the attorney for Jemel Roberson's family. And also Avontea Boose, the mother of Jemel Roberson's nine-year-old son. Good evening -- nine-year-old son. I think -- Yes. I'm sorry. Nine month. Sorry about that.

Good evening to both of you. I'm so sorry. Avontea, the loss is unbelievable. By all accounts, Jemel was a wonderful person. Bright future. The father of your baby boy Tristan. Now this is tough time for you. How are you holding up?

AVONTEA BOOSE, MOTHER OF JEMEL ROBERSON'S CHILD: I'm hurting and sad.

LEMON: Go on. What do you want the world to know about how you're feeling?

BOOSE: My baby's not going to have his father for Christmas. His birthday, any holidays anymore because a police officer took his life from him. And it's hurting real bad.

LEMON: I've read the response from the police department. What do you say to that, Avontea?

BOOSE: I guess I want the police officer to get his badge taken away.

LEE MERRITT, ATTORNEY FOR THE FAMILY OF JEMEL ROBERSON: It's one thing, Don, for them to give that lip service to say that this was like a blue on blue shooting, it was friendly fire. But there's nothing friendly about it to this family. They want to see justice.

And so to say that they're sad and that they're hurting, but to still employ this police officer who was in a situation, that we don't believe deadly force was necessary. And mind you, the other officers who were also there on the scene, they didn't believe deadly force was necessary because they didn't use it.

And so it's one thing to sympathize with the family. It's actually something completely different to take tangible steps towards justice. They haven't done that yet. Something Avontea didn't have a chance to mention earlier, not only is her 9-month-old son going to be without his father, they just learned 10 days ago that they're expecting. She's pregnant with Jemel's second child, and he won't be able to see her through that.

LEMON: Oh, my goodness. So, let's talk about the police department turning this investigation over to the Illinois State Police Public Integrity Task Force because it was an officer-involved shooting. You heard their statement. They say that Jemel was in plain black clothing, he was given commands to drop his weapon. You disagree with that finding.

MERRITT: Yes, and Avontea can sort of bring some light to that subject. What the witnesses say, the people who there at the scene, they say that he was not only was he marked three times over with a black cat (ph) that said "security" in white letters, a vest that said "security" on it, and a coat that said "security" on it in white letters.

[23:45:00] But people were around and they were watching him subdue this would be mass shooter. And they were screaming. He is the security officer, he is a security officer, as the police were shouting commands at him. But before he had an opportunity to react, this officer escalated the situation to a deadly force situation.

And what we see in Jemel is what we expect from law enforcement. We expect them to come into a situation and assess and take in all the facts before escalating the deadly force. If Jemel had been a police officer and he had witnessed someone fire into a crowd like the suspect that he apprehended did, he would have been just heroic by shooting the suspect.

Jemel was almost like a superhero in the sense that he not only was able to apprehend the suspect, but he even preserved his life. And to see the exact opposite of that thoughtful effort to preserve human life, to see law enforcement officers just come out and say well, he didn't respond to our commands, and mind you, what you don't hear even according to their facts, they don't say and then he made a direct motion or there was something that he did to put other people's lives in danger, they said he failed to comply quick enough and so we escalated to deadly force and we killed this hero --

LEMON: Yes.

MERRITT: -- and this community champion. It's just really tragic.

LEMON: Avontea, I want you to respond to this because I think it's a very cruel irony is that Jemel wanted to be a police officer and he lost his life doing what he was --

BOOSE: Yes.

LEMON: -- what police officers do and that's trying to protect others.

BOOSE: Yes, that's true. He's a protector of everybody. Anybody he knew, he got close to, he was a protector.

LEMON: Uh-huh. What do you want people to know, Avontea?

BOOSE: We want justice for Jemel and his family.

LEMON: Thank you both.

BOOSE: Thank you.

MERRITT: Thank you, Don.

LEMON: We'll be right back.

[23:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: So here's what the NRA says, that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Twenty-six-year-old Jemel Roberson was a good guy with a gun, and he was still shot and killed by an police officer.

We are going to discuss now with West Lowery of "The Washington Post." Wes, good evening. Of course our hearts go out to that young lady and her entire family. I'm sure you heard some of the interview there. It is just awful. So Jemel was that good guy with a gun. He was the hero in the story and yet he was killed. What does that say?

WESLEY LOWERY, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Of course. You know, as we've had this conversation, you and I have had it, we has it on CNN and other places, there is a conversation for a long time about what do we do about mass shootings, about the idea that people can walk into a place, be at a bar, a church, restaurant and open fire.

And one thing that some groups of NRA included, has advocated, is that if only you were to put more "good guys" with guns out there. We've heard the president advocate this as well at schools and other places, this question of, if you had someone there with a gun to stop them, perhaps it would stop these mass shootings.

What many people, civil rights organizations, many activists have noted is that, well, what happens when the police show up and they see that good guy with a gun? That seemed to be what happened here. Here you had a black man who was doing his job.

He was working as a security guard and had to pull the gun that he owned legally and carried legally to subdue a threat. And when the police arrived, what they saw was a black man with a gun, and they shot and killed him.

LEMON: Yes. I have to say this. Roberson had a valid firearm owner's identification card, was licensed by the state to work on security, do you think black folks who legally carry guns risk becoming targets in a scenario like this?

LOWERY: Well, certainly. We know what we know about the way that black men and black women are perceived in our society. We know about the kind of stereotypical feelings and views of us as dangerous, as potentially threatening. We know that if someone happens upon a black man holding a gun, they're more likely to see them as a perpetrator as opposed perhaps a police officer, a security guard.

We've heard countless stories over the years of black police officers themselves being at times, you know, at crime scenes detained by their own colleagues who don't necessarily believe they themselves are the police.

And so what we see here is that we know when a black man has a gun, be it legal or not, there's a likelihood be it from a police officer or anyone else, that they're going to be seen more likely as a threat. Right?

And so we think about shootings like that of Philando Castile or John Crawford with a toy gun in a Walmart near Cincinnati, cases where these men were not doing anything wrong, nothing illegal, and yet they were still seen as a threat and ended up losing their lives.

LEMON: The state police preliminary report says it shows that Jemel was told multiple times to drop the weapon and that he wasn't wearing clothes that identified him as security guard. What do you make of that? People say otherwise.

LOWERY: Certainly and it's really early, and what we know having covered a lot of the shootings and these types of incidents before is that very often these initial police reports are based solely on the account of perhaps the officer who pulled the trigger. And so it's going to be interesting to see what these witness accounts say, if there's any video perhaps of what has gone on.

We know that these early police reports very often follow a very specific script, and that script almost always includes, well, this person was instructed clearly multiple times. What we know, obviously we don't know in this, case, but what we know is in many cases when the police claim that to be true, it isn't always necessarily.

[23:55:01] Either way, what we saw in the statement you put up earlier is that even the police themselves are acknowledging that this was a man who was doing his job and in fact would have been the hero in this incident and found himself on the wrong end of a police shooting.

LEMON: I have just a short amount of time left. So, Wesley, I see this bar, Manny's Blue Room is located in a predominantly black Chicago suburb of Robbins, Illinois. Midlothian police said that's where they responded. So most of the folks here including employees would be black. What are the main differences in policing in black communities versus white neighborhoods and how does that pertain to this case?

LOWERY: Of course. In this case, you know, there's this question of who are the police and how do they relate to the community therein? It is a scenario that has a lot of crime where there's difficulty here, are the police going to be more suspicious of this man when they're coming across, and what we know are there's historic rifts between police in black and brown communities, and it's unclear to what extent that might have been a role here as well.

LEMON: Yes. Wes, thank you for your time. Appreciate it.

LOWERY: Anytime, Don.

LEMON: And thank you for watching. Our coverage continues.

[24:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)