The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, Transcript 11/11/15

RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC: That does it for us tonight We will see you again tomorrow. Now it is time for THE LAST WORD with Lawrence O`Donnell. Good evening, Lawrence. I`m sorry to be going to nine seconds early, but I scared myself and talked too fast. O`DONNELL: I don`t know what I`m going to do with all this extra time -- (LAUGHTER) Rachel, I don`t have enough material to fill the extra nine seconds. MADDOW: Well, we just did, so we`re good -- O`DONNELL: Yes, we did? Oh -- MADDOW: Yes -- O`DONNELL: Great, thank you, Rachel. MADDOW: Thank you, Lawrence, appreciate it. O`DONNELL: Well, Donald Trump wants to hire tens of thousands of new expensive federal government employees, complete with full medical benefits and full pension benefits and give them the assignment to do the impossible. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DONALD TRUMP, CHAIRMAN & PRESIDENT, TRUMP ORGANIZATIONS & FOUNDER, TRUMP ENTERTAINMENT RESORTS: We will have a wall, the wall will be built. The wall will be successful. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you going to have a massive deportation for us? TRUMP: We`re going to have a deportation force, and you`re going to do it humanely. JEB BUSH, FORMER FLORIDA GOVERNOR: You`re doing high fives in the Clinton campaign right now when they hear this. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: GOP debate day aftermath, who won? Who lost? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You had a winner tonight. How many of you thought it was Marco Rubio? SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R), FLORIDA: I do think some people are going to have to be deported. BEN CARSON, AUTHOR & RETIRED NEUROSURGEON: Thank you for not asking me of what I said in the tenth grade, I appreciate that. (LAUGHTER) HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: A conservative group announced that they`re going to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to go after the new Consumer Financial Protection Board. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They call it CFPB; Washington`s latest regulatory agency, designed to interfere with your personal financial decisions. Those who need help the most are denied. CLINTON: That`s a board that exists only to protect Americans from unfair and deceptive business deals. Why would anyone have a problem with that? (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Howard Dean, did you see a winner in last night`s debate? HOWARD DEAN, FORMER VERMONT GOVERNOR: I am a little bit of a believer in Donald Trump these days. So I think Donald Trump -- (LAUGHTER) I am, I mean, I obviously don`t support him, but you know, he has defied every prediction that any of us have made -- O`DONNELL: Are you just now -- DEAN: So far -- O`DONNELL: Are you just a Democrat rooting for him to get the nomination because it will be so easy to beat him? DEAN: I don`t think it will be that easy to beat him. I think anybody who thinks that is making a mistake. But I do think -- you know, we do these - - we see these debates and we think, yes, Trump didn`t do that well. I don`t think it means much. We`ll see what the polls show Monday and Tuesday when they`re all in. I also agree with the conventional wisdom that Cruz and Rubio are making a good show of it. O`DONNELL: Michael Steele, I think there was a lot of suspense last night about how Jeb Bush was going to do. In a way, I started to score, it was basically as a win for Jeb Bush because he didn`t get knocked out of the debate. If he had suffered another knockout last -- MICHAEL STEELE, FORMER CHAIRMAN, REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE: Yes -- O`DONNELL: Night, I don`t see how he recovers from that, especially because the next debate is 35 days away. So, you got to live with the results of last night for a long time. STEELE: Yes, you do. And let me start by acknowledging my friend Howard as a member of the vast left wing conspiracy supporting -- O`DONNELL: To nominate Trump -- STEELE: Donald Trump -- O`DONNELL: Conspiracy -- STEELE: For president. O`DONNELL: Yes -- STEELE: So just so that we`re clear here -- O`DONNELL: Led by Bill Clinton, remember, Bill Clinton -- (CROSSTALK) Called him and urged him to run -- MARIA TERESA KUMAR, PRESIDENT, VOTO LATINO: So, basically -- so, you`re basically saying that it does exist on the Republican side as well, is that true, Michael? STEELE: Yes, right -- (LAUGHTER) So, no, Lawrence, I think you make an excellent point to knock this thing off the right way. And that is that, of all the candidates on both stages, Jeb Bush acquitted himself in a way that not only turned the heads of the people who were beginning to doubt whether or not he even had it in him or really wanted to do this. But to begin to firm up again and have some chatter, some among the -- you know, elite in the -- in a political intelligence here in town which is a little bit oxymoronic, but we`ll go with it. That you know, hey, maybe this is that turning point, this is that corner, I`m going to wait until the next debate, that`s five weeks away to get a sense of exactly where Jeb`s head is in this race. If he does what he did, you know, in five weeks, if he does what he did last night, yes, I think then he`s ready and is going to be game-on come January and February. O`DONNELL: And Maria Teresa, Donald Trump spent -- start of the day and spent the day talking about his favorite new kind of federal employee. Apparently, Republicans, the one area where they want to do a lot of federal hiring is the tens of thousands of deportation agents they`re going to need. KUMAR: Well, and this is -- this is once again he`s catering to the -- to the extreme right. Unfortunately, if you actually look at studies where they tried to -- they`ve been trying to actually hire 23,000 agents, it`s been really difficult. Because you need to find someone that has a clean record, that basically can do the job and that`s actually qualified. So, this idea of adding more to the fire doesn`t mean that the system can actually absorb it. So, again, he`s not actually providing policy, he`s just basically providing sound bites that rev up the extreme right. But that doesn`t really help the conversation down the line. O`DONNELL: And Howard, we`ve got 35,000 police officers right here in New York City, in the city we`re in now, with a population smaller than the population that Donald Trump wants to deport. And the one thing we know that the New York City Police Department cannot do tonight or ever, is round up everyone in this city and get us -- STEELE: Right -- O`DONNELL: Out of here. It is impossible. DEAN: See, that`s why I said what I said about Trump. We all think this is insane because from a policy point of view it`s -- I was reading the "Nbc" blogs today as they were sort of commenting on all this. Trump lives in a parallel universe. And all of us sort of in the commentating business, we understand policy, he doesn`t, or he doesn`t appear to. But it doesn`t matter -- O`DONNELL: But he`s only got -- but he`s only got -- KUMAR: Yes, he ought to be fair -- O`DONNELL: Twenty five -- KUMAR: Right -- O`DONNELL: Percent of Republicans living in that universe with him. That`s all he`s got -- DEAN: But the problem is, they have a primary system that he could win. He could be the nominee if he never -- O`DONNELL: Right -- DEAN: Gets above 30. O`DONNELL: All right, let`s listen -- DEAN: Because after March 15th, this is winner takes all. Florida is a winner takes all state. He could beat both Bush and Rubio in Florida. O`DONNELL: Well, let`s listen to what Ted Cruz said tonight about Rubio. He`s trying to keep Rubio in the amnesty group of Republican candidates. Let`s listen to this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You mentioned immigration today significantly, now, you both have said that you would wait until there`s some kind of (INAUDIBLE) before you consider any next step. Do you think there`s any significant differences between you two on immigration policy? What`s your point? SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: In my view, if Republicans nominate for president a candidate who supports amnesty, we will have given up one of the major distinctions with Hillary Clinton and we will lose the general election. That is a path to losing. And part of the reason the debate last night was so productive is you started to see clear, meaningful policy distinctions. Not just between what people say on the campaign trail, talk is cheap. But between their records. When the fight was being fought, where did you stand? That speaks volumes about who you are and where you will stand in the future. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: So Michael, Ted Cruz begins his argument against what he calls amnesty with Math, with electoral Math. He is making the argument that in order to win the election, you have to be opposed to this. And those who are in favor of some kind of program, as Jeb Bush was last night, as John Kasich was last night, some kind of program that could provide a legal status for many of these people. Their argument is, we cannot win an election without adopting this position. So who`s going to win this electoral math argument within the Republican Party? STEELE: Well, within the primary will be those who stand with Ted Cruz I think very firmly, that there`s no room, very little sentiment, Lawrence for anything that smells or remotely smacks of any type of amnesty. That is -- that is a bridge too far for many conservatives for a whole host of reasons. Going back to the last time in 1986 when Reagan passed an amnesty bill and with all these bells and whistles and promises that weren`t met to secure the border. So, that is the anchor position, and Rubio, who led as part of a gang of eight, and then sort of tip-toed quietly off of that is now going to have to begin over the next few weeks, leading up to the next debate, leading into January and February. Begin to account for his leadership on the Senate bill and ultimately what he decided to do or not do in that regard, and to defend what you see Mr. Cruz framing as amnesty -- DEAN: Right -- O`DONNELL: We just got some new video of Jeb Bush tonight that the control room tells me, we should take a look at, I guess it speaks for itself. Let`s take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: How about a chest bump. (LAUGHTER) (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: There it is, Maria, it`s the chest bump that we`ve all been waiting to see Jeb Bush do in order to humanize himself and show us that he`s not a stiff. KUMAR: So, I don`t know where to go with that or -- (CROSSTALK) O`DONNELL: You know about that, yes, and you know what? You can -- you can ignore it. KUMAR: But I think the -- but I think -- but I think to your point is that, he`s trying to get -- become softer and it`s so awkward. And he has still very much the same problem that Mitt Romney has had and that Hillary has had until very recently when she basically did 11 hours with Benghazi. And went toe-to-toe and actually provided a humanness and was able to stand up to her. But let me -- I want to go back to what Michael Steele is saying about this whole immigration debate. Quite frankly, the sound bite keeps saying, amnesty, but no one is talking about amnesty -- O`DONNELL: Right -- KUMAR: People are saying, let`s actually fix the system, we must get this done the right way. And what Cruz understands is that, in order to win the primary, he has to be as extreme as possible. But that doesn`t mean that he`s going to win the White House. And what Rubio understands is that, he`s actually has his eyes set on winning that White House. So, he has to figure out how to thread the needle very carefully, because listen to him when he says, I do believe that some people are going to have to be deported. I think most people realize that. But what Cruz is trying to do is that, he`s trying to get himself as closest to the right, as close to the extreme. Because who usually votes during the primaries? You know, the base does; the most right of the -- of the Republican Party. But when you poll Republicans and independents, regardless of male or female, they actually do believe that we should have a pathway to citizenship. So, this -- so, we`re talking about a very unique voter, because then the Republican Party, but not all Republican voters. O`DONNELL: Howard Dean, can Ted Cruz really believe his math on this thing? DEAN: This has nothing to do with math. This -- KUMAR: Right -- DEAN: Is a fact-free zone. As we call "Fox -- O`DONNELL: Yes -- DEAN: News" -- O`DONNELL: But to Maria Teresa`s point, if you really want to be president, can you play this immigration thing this hard? DEAN: I think Maria Teresa -- the exact right analysis of this. Rubio has got his eye on the White House. The problem is, he`s probably turning too early and Cruz is smart as hell and he just got them. So, you`re going to see -- this is -- this is the prime for the big fight - - O`DONNELL: And if Cruz -- DEAN: Between Cruz and Rubio -- O`DONNELL: Gets the nomination, he can somehow -- DEAN: No, he`s got -- O`DONNELL: Turn into a reasonable -- STEELE: Yes -- O`DONNELL: Zone on this subject? -- DEAN: He can, no, he`s -- STEELE: Yes, actually could -- O`DONNELL: Go ahead, Michael -- STEELE: Yes -- O`DONNELL: Tell us how he could do that, Michael, go ahead. STEELE: Well, you know, there is -- there is always the evolution that most politicians seem to find themselves doing at some point in this process. That`s something that he can pivot to. O`DONNELL: Well, it`s a question of how -- (CROSSTALK) Isn`t it? All right -- KUMAR: Well, I mean, I think conversely, what you can see is the way -- there is -- conversely the way Hillary has been talking about it and she`s actually getting heat from the extreme -- O`DONNELL: Right -- KUMAR: Extreme left. So, I think the way that she started using the word illegal immigrant and she started talked about securing the border. So, you can see why she needs to thread the needle as well. O`DONNELL: Maria Teresa Kumar gets the last word on this segment. Michael Steele, Howard Dean, Maria Teresa, thank you all for joining me tonight. Coming up, Elizabeth Warren thinks Republicans are trying to make her look like a communist. Barney Frank will join me on that one. And later, video obtained by Msnbc showing the final moments of a man`s life as he is repeatedly tased by police officers. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: Jeb Bush picked up another Republican establishment endorsement today, this time from former U.S. senator and former Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole. Senator Dole announced his support at the World War II Memorial ceremony in Washington D.C. Today, Bob Dole is of course a wounded World War II veteran. Senator Dole will serve as National Veterans of the chairman for Bush campaign. The Veterans for Bush Campaign. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BOB DOLE, FORMER UNITED STATES SENATOR: I endorsed Jeb Bush today at the veterans ceremony. I think he`s the most qualified and we need somebody with experience. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Dole endorsed you, what do you make of that? BUSH: He`s a great American, a great patriot. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Coming up, Barney Frank joins us to discuss the Republican attack on Elizabeth Warren and the attack on the law named after Barney Frank. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: During the Republican debate last night, American Action Network; a conservative nonprofit ran an ad attacking the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Senator Elizabeth Warren who helped create that agency. Senator Warren reacted to the ad in a tweet. She said, "So, can we talk about that ad that just ran during the GOP debate where I look like a commie dictator?" Here is that ad. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They call it CFPB; Washington`s latest regulatory agency, designed to interfere with your personal financial decisions. That car loan you need, your mortgage, that personal loan. With the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, those who need help the most are denied. Washington D.C. controlling your decisions, limiting your opportunity. Tell Congress to stop the CFPB now before they deny you. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Senator Warren tweeted a series of responses to the ad, saying, "Wall Street knows if they soften the CFPB support, the GOP will feel better undercutting the agency in closed-door deals. And so here`s my message to Wall Street and their GOP buddies, we`re ready to fight back to protect the CFPB." Joining us now, Barney Frank, former member of Congress where he represented Massachusetts for 32 years. He was the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Barney Frank, are you surprised to see this campaign developing at this stage? BARNEY FRANK, FORMER CONGRESSMAN: I am. I didn`t think they were that stupid. I knew that`s what they thought. But I would have thought that people -- I saw a former colleague of mine who have been representing this deal, I always thought he had some brains politically. This is the stupidest thing they can do from this standpoint. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is overwhelmingly popular. It was with Warren is justly regarded as a great hero for people. And this notion -- frankly, I listen to a lot of people. I hear complaints about things I`ve done, no one has ever said to me, you know that consumer bureau that was in the bill you put through? I couldn`t get a loan because of it. I mean, there were zero empirical backup. And you tell the voters, OK, here`s the deal. We`re not going to have this agency standing between you and the banks. We want to give you the right to deal directly with these financial institutions. It is a politically very stupid thing to say, because CFPB is understandably overwhelmingly popular. O`DONNELL: They say that it`s designed to interfere with your personal financial decisions. FRANK: Well, the first place, I would say, do you know anybody? Unless I ask everybody here. You know anybody whose personal financial decision was interfered with? As a matter of fact, the CFPB involves itself in individual cases. Guess how? By complaints. It does not make random selections of people who say I think I`m going to review your loans. It responds to many complaints. It does make rules, and -- but some of the rules we made in the law -- and here`s the greatest hypocrisy, Lawrence. You know that there was this right-wing argument to try and absolve the financial community of any responsibility to try and say that regulation, lack of regulation wasn`t a problem. They say the whole problem was caused because liberals insisted on giving loans to poor people who shouldn`t have gotten them. That is -- that was not true at the time. We tried to regulate those loans then, but that`s what they`re now reversing on. These lines that says, it`s keeping help from getting to the people who need it. They`re implying there that the CFPB is restricting the flow of loans to the poorest people. Well, it is, because some of those loans were being made to people who couldn`t pay them back. But again, the -- I would repeat, I don`t think they`re going to come up with many people who complain that this federal agency protected them from the banks or the pay-day lenders or the securities industry or anybody else. O`DONNELL: You may be out of politics, but you were in the Republican debate last night, a lot of attacks on Dodd-Frank. Let`s listen to that. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BUSH: Imagine America without its community banks. Well, that`s what`s happening because of Dodd-Frank. RUBIO: And then Dodd-Frank, you have actually codified too big to fail. This is an outrage. We need to repeal Dodd-Frank as soon as possible. CRUZ: So the big banks get bigger and bigger and bigger under Dodd-Frank and community banks are going out of business. CARLY FIORINA, FORMER BUSINESS EXECUTIVE: I think what`s interesting about Dodd-Frank is it`s a great example of how socialism starts. The big has gotten bigger, 1,590 community banks have gone out of business, and on top of all that, we`ve created something called the Consumer Financial -- (BELL RINGING) Protection Bureau, a vast bureaucracy with no congressional oversight that digs into hundreds of millions of your credit records to detect fraud. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Barney Frank, you have 30 seconds to respond. No, go ahead -- FRANK: They want to go -- O`DONNELL: Take your time -- FRANK: They want to go back to the days when AIG could run up $185 billion in credit default swap, derivatives, they couldn`t pay off. They want to go back to where people were getting loans they shouldn`t have gotten and then lost their houses. They have this great hunger for the situation that caused the terrible crisis of 2008. And I`m glad to say that among those by the way who recognize -- have done that was, for some of the leading financial regulators under the George W. Bush administration. People ought to see what former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke say in their recent books. This is a very clear-cut case of nostalgia for a lack of regulation and for allowing the kind of unregulated financial speculation that brought us the worst crisis in 80 years. O`DONNELL: And it seems to me that some of it is just the Republican need to be against things that Democrats have done in Congress. And Dodd-Frank is one of them. FRANK: Well, the Republicans have made a mistake. And I think (INAUDIBLE) -- they have so enthusiastically demonized Obama, frustratingly to me, because we were dealing with the recession that Obama inherited from Bush. That they now have voters on their side who aren`t just convinced that public policies were bad. The Republicans have created in their own electorate a strong group that doesn`t want to do what you need to do to govern. And now they`re embarrassed by that. The Republican establishment, people like Karl Rove don`t want to see Donald Trump or Ben Carson or Ted Cruz get nominated. They didn`t want to see any situation where you couldn`t get a speaker, except they subpoenaed Paul Ryan into doing it. So, this is a very serious problem. And the notion that regulation of financial institutions, telling people, by the way, that you can`t sell derivatives without having the capital to back it up if they fail. Telling people that you can`t make loans to people who can`t possibly pay them back. To identify that as socialism is bizarre. It is simply a response to their need to pander to the most right-wing elements in America who unfortunately have taken control of the Republican Party. O`DONNELL: The honorable Barney Frank, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Coming up, Msnbc has exclusive reporting about a deadly police tasing incident in Virginia that was caught on video. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: At 5:00 a.m. on May 4th, 2013, three police officers responded to a disturbance call at a motel in a small town in southern Virginia called South Boston. The officers found 46-year-old Linwood Lambert who appeared delusional, they said. They decided to drive him to a hospital emergency room for medical attention. When Mr. Lambert reached that emergency room, he was pronounced dead, but that was nearly 90 minutes after the police decided to take him to that emergency room. Now Msnbc has obtained 80 minutes of police cam video and hospital surveillance video that reveal some of what happened before Mr. Lambert died. Here`s Ari Melber`s report with some of the edited video. This includes graphic video of what happened to Mr. Lambert. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) ARI MELBER, MSNBC: Police video shows this handcuffed man repeatedly tased outside a Virginia hospital before dying in police custody. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, so, we need to take a little ride. MELBER: The police brought him to that hospital but they never took him inside for help. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Emergency room -- MELBER: For Linwood Lambert`s family, it`s been an agonizing mystery until now. New video obtained exclusively by Msnbc shows every moment of a hospital trip that turned deadly. Police ruled caution against repeated tasing, but officers tased Lambert at the door to the E.R. -- (SCREAMING) Again as he lay on the ground, then again in the squad car, discharging 20 tasings including while he was restrained, a violation of their own rules. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get up -- MELBER: The incident unfolded in about an hour. It all began during an early morning in May two years ago. Police responded to a disturbance call and say they found Lambert in a trashed motel room hallucinating and acting paranoid. He was unarmed and not accused of any crime. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come on to this side over here. MELBER: Officers told him to come to the hospital, handcuffing him but stressing he was not under arrest. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re not locking you up. What we`re doing here is we`re going to take you to the emergency room. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re en route to the E.R. MELBER: Arriving at the hospital, Lambert kicks out the car window -- UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s broken the window -- MELBER: And runs from the car towards the E.R. entrance. The officers tased him. (CROSSTALK) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roll up here, man, OK -- MELBER: They shackled his legs. Lambert pleads with the officers and tells them he did cocaine. LINWOOD LAMBERT, DECEASED: I just did cocaine, man. Why are you all trying to kill me, man? MELBER: But instead of taking Lambert into the E.R., they put him under arrest and dragged him back into the car. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do it now! Do it now! -- MELBER: Lambert slumps down, his hands and feet bowed. The officers tell him to sit up, and tased him again. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sit up or I`m going to tase you again. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A single tasing carries 50,000 volts of electricity. Federal guidelines warn multiple tasings may increase the risk of death or serious injury. Yet, nurses reported seeing three officers tasing the patient at one time. And the officers discharged their tasers 20 times in half an hour according to taser company logs. Not every discharge automatically reaches a suspect. Arriving at the jail, Lambert appears unconscious. Officers check his pulse. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, Lambert. MELBER: Later on, the same hospital surveillance camera shows Lambert`s body brought back to the E.R., dead on arrival at 6.06 a.m., roughly an hour after police first took Lambert from the hotel. LAWRENCE O`DONNELL: Local police declined to comment to MSNBC. In court papers, police say the use of force was appropriate and necessary because Mr. Lambert destroyed property and was a danger to others. Virginia State police conducted an investigation and prosecutors say a criminal inquiry is still open two years later. Earlier this year, Linwood Lambert`s sister filed a federal several rights wrongful death lawsuit against the police. That lawsuit led to a court order forcing police to turn over those videos from the night Mr. Lambert died. Here`s what Linwood Lambert`s sister said about seeing those videos for the first time just a few weeks ago. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GWENDOLYN SMALLS, LINWOOD LAMBERT`S SISTER: We couldn`t eat, we couldn`t sleep. We were calling each other at 1:00 in the morning after watching that video and every day got worse. So, you know what I did? I got up and I went to the grave site and I talked to my brother and I said, I`m sorry. I`m so sorry for what they did to you because I didn`t know. I just thought they tased you and you had a heart attack, because they told me nothing. But I didn`t know. So, I`m apologizing for them. We`re going to get justice for you. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNEL: Joining us now is Tom Sweeney, the attorney for Linwood Lambert`s family. Mr. Sweeney, the police account says that this was justified force because he destroyed property. I guess that was would be breaking the window of a police car? And he was a danger to others. Do they mean he was a danger to people other than the police officers? TOM SWEENEY, LINWOOD LAMBERT`S FAMILY ATTORNEY: We don`t know what they mean by that. I`m assuming that they`re -- they`re believing -- that they`re a danger to the police -- police officers or maybe somebody inside the hospital, but I`d only be guessing what they`re -- what they`re -- what they`re saying there. I don`t believe it that he was a danger to anybody. He had his -- his wrists shot -- bound and he wasn`t going to hurt anybody. He didn`t -- he wasn`t armed and he never had a weapon on him. O`DONNEL: And what do you make of the autopsy finding which says that it was -- that his death was actually due to the cocaine use? SWEENEY: Well, the medical examiner, the pathologist who did the autopsy did not possess the videotapes that you just showed. And I`m -- I`m confident that had those videotapes been viewed by the pathologist, they would not have reached to this, you know, the conclusions that they did. O`DONNELL: And so, what is the next step here legally? SWEENEY: Well, we have a hearing tomorrow in Virginia in a -- in a motion that the defendants have filed, and we`re proceeding with discovery. And we have a trial date next -- its` early next spring. O`DONNELL: And so, have you been able to obtain through discovery all of the police reports in this case? SWEENEY: We have. We assume we have. The police reports related to the police officers who were there that night, we did. O`DONNELL: And what is -- what is the clearest narrative that you see in the police reports that explains what they did? SWEENEY: Well, the police reports do mimic what`s contained on the videotape, but it doesn`t show -- they don`t -- they don`t summarize, I think, the graphic nature of the video. It doesn`t -- it doesn`t reveal Mr. Lambert begging for them not to tase him. It doesn`t mention the fact that he`s -- he`s struggling for breath and he`s having difficulty, and he`s perspiring profusely in the back of the car and he wasn`t -- he was confined in the back of that car and he wasn`t responding to their commands so they tased him again. I mean, that, I think, is some of the -- some of the details that we can get from the video is not really shown contained in their reports. O`DONNELL: And are there any parts of the video where the police do appear to be afraid or regard him as being out of their control? SWEENEY: Well, I think the police position is that they -- they think that because he`s running away from them that he`s not confined. But he`s ultimately restrained by the handcuffs, and he hits the door of the emergency room and he goes down because he can`t brace his fall because his arms are tied behind his back, and he`s sitting there and he`s not -- he`s not going anywhere. He`s not going to hurt anybody. And it wasn`t, at that point that they`ve decided to put shackles on his legs and drag him back into the car. O`DONNELL: And the tasing continues after the shackles are on the -- on his legs? SWEENEY: Yes. And they bring him in the back of the car and he starts slumping to his left side. And, but first, he asks, you know, and he calls for help. He says "help me." And you can see on the videotape, it`s terrible that he is -- he is laboring. You can see that he`s having some respiratory difficulties, and for failing to respond to, you know, to the command to sit up, they tase him again. O`DONNELL: Attorney Tom Sweeney, thank you very much for joining us tonight. SWEENEY: Thank you, Lawrence. O`DONNELL: You can see more about this case at msnbc.com where you can actually watch the entire raw video obtained by MSNBC. Coming up, "Spotlight," the new film about the Boston Globe reporters who exposed the scandal that brought down a cardinal and forced the pope to respond. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: There were death threats made against some students and faculty at the University of Missouri last night. A man who`s accused of making some of those threats will make his first court appearance tomorrow. A 19-year-old, Hunter Park, was arrested and charged with making a terrorist threat on social media. He`s a student at Missouri University of Science and Technology, which is about 100 miles away from the University of Missouri. Park is held without bond. Attendance on campus was low today because of those threats. Some professors canceled classes or students -- and allowed students to go home and some organizations canceled meetings. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) CALVIN FIORE, JUNIOR STUDENT: I think it`s messed up, man. I can`t believe this is -- I can`t believe this is even happening here. Because I`m -- well, one, you`re supposed to go to college -- you`re supposed to go to college to learn. Right now we`re being -- we`re too afraid to go to classes. I`m afraid to go to classes. And they weren`t even threatening -- they weren`t threatening white students. They were threatening black students. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: The University rejected the resignation of a professor who tried to step down after he came under fire for telling students to come to class to take an exam despite the threats. And according to The Washington Post, to Dale Brigham, a professor of nutrition and exercise physiology told students, "If you give in to bullies, they win. The only way bullies are defeated is by standing up to them. If we cancel the exam, they win. If we go through with it, they lose." His e-mail sparked outrage among some students. Brigham later submitted his resignation, but according to NBC, as affiliate KOMU, the university did not accept that resignation. Up next "Spotlight," the new film about the sexual abuse of children by priests in Boston, a film that could not be made without the research of Phil Saviano who was also a victim of that abuse. Mr. Saviano will join us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: The New York Times review of the film "Spotlight" said ""Spotlight" is a gripping detective story and a superlative newsroom drama, a solid procedural that tries to confront evil without sensationalism." "Spotlight" is the name of the investigative reporting unit at the Boston Globe, and it is the name of the new movie starring Michael Keaton. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MICHAEL KEATON, ACTOR: Lie, that`s enough. That`s why he had the reaction. He knew there were others. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that`s the bigger story. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The numbers clearly indicate that there was senior clergy involve popped. KEATON: That`s all they do, indicate. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you telling me that if we run a story with 50 pedophile priests involved... (CROSSTALK) KEATON: We`ll get into the same cat fight you got into on porter, which made a lot of noise, but changed things not one bit. We need to focus on the institution, not the individual priests. Practice and policy. Show me the church manipulated the system so these guys wouldn`t have to face charges. Show me they put those same priests back into parishes time and time again. Show me this was systemic, that it came from the top down. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Joining us now the co-writer and executive producer of "Spotlight," Josh Singer. Your co-writer, Tom McCarthy, director of this piece. And I`ve got to say in the reviews, there are two scripts this season that are getting just the most present reviews both by former "West Wing" writers, Aaron Sorkin. Aaron Sorkin`s "Steve Jobs," and you, former "West Wing" writer are in there. Because the reviews on the script are so deliberately praiseful of exactly how you laid out this story. And the way Lib Schreiber just said what he wanted to see as the editor saying, this is what I need you to show me, that is ultimately what the movie gets. JOSH SINGER, "SPOTLIGHT" CO-WRITER & EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Yes, I mean, one of the things we really wanted to celebrate is journalism and specifically, local journalism. Good, local journalism. And we feel that these reporters and these editors did something really terrific. And it`s something that, you know, they needed time and they need to go deeper. I mean, in that scene we just saw, you know, Marty Baron is telling them, just giving me a couple of priests is not enough. I want to get the system. And it was only with that kind of approach to the reporting that I think they could have created this story that actually, you know, became instrumental and heard around the world. O`DONNELL: Let`s take a look at this scene with Boston boy, Paul Gilfoyle who`s in this scene with Michael Keaton. (CROSSTALK) SINGER: Who went to B.C. High. O`DONNELL: Yes, he went to the high school, it features prominently in the story where one of the abuse cases took place that`s in the movie. Let`s look at this scene. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, you have a lot of people here who respect you, Robby. KEATON: Yes. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what you do? That`s good to know. KEATON: Yes, it`s good you care about this place. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. That`s why you do what you do, that`s who you are. You know, the people need the church more than ever right now. You know, you can feel it. And the cardinal and all the, you know, we can`t might be perfect. But we can`t throw away all the good he`s done because of a few bad apples. Now, you know, I`m bringing this up to you because I know this is Baron`s idea, his agenda. I got to tell you, I don`t know if he go out, I mean, he doesn`t care about the city the way we do. I mean, how could he? KEATON: This is how it happens in the peak. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What`s that? KEATON: A guy leans on a guy and suddenly the whole town just looks the other way. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Guy leans on a guy. I love this scene because you were not working off of a book. There is no book on this. So, that scene doesn`t appear on page 273 of someone else`s book. Here`s Josh Singer, the Jewish boy from Philadelphia who gets up to Boston and you dig into that culture, my culture, and you -- you found this dynamic. You laid this out beautifully. SINGER: Well, I had a lot of help. First of all, I had you. We spoke about this story many times, which is I think very, very helpful because you grew up in Dorchester, so, of course. O`DONNELL: My brother Michael who handled one of these case against the priests. (CROSSTALK) SINGER: Yes, I spoke to him. But, you know, also, you know, Tom, my co- writer, Tom McCarthy, who is fantastic, he went to B.C. O`DONNELL: Yes. SINGER: And his father, you know, was... (CROSSTALK) O`DONNELL: Boston College, not the high school. SINGER: Correct. And his father was, you know, born in Providence, but he had plenty of relatives up there. O`DONNELL: Yes. SINGER: So, two of us, you know, we`re exploring this culture, we had all spent -- we`d spent time in Boston, we knew lots of folks from Boston. And the other thing is we had incredible resources in terms of the reporters. I mean, Eileen McNamara who wrote the very first article about that this column, that Marty Baron responded to, you know, she schooled me on -- on this dynamic. And so, in some ways I was a lot, maybe like Marty Baron who came as an outsider. You know, in the... (CROSSTALK) O`DONNELL: All right. Quick break, and we`re going to bring in the person who, without whom you couldn`t possibly have done this story. (CROSSTALK) SINGER: That is correct. Phil Saviano. O`DONNELL: Phil Saviano who assembled a tremendous amount of information about it before the reporters did, and he was also a victim of this kind of abuse. SINGER: True hero. O`DONNELL: We`ll be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) O`DONNELL: We are back with Josh Singer, the co-writer with Tom McCarthy of the new movie "Spotlight" about how the Boston investigative team, led in the movie by Michael Keaton told the story of sexual abuse of children by priests in Boston. We`re also joined now for tonight`s Last Word from Boston by Phil Saviano, a victim of that abuse who created an organization to help victims. Phil Saviano also helped the "Spotlight" team at the Boston Globe to tell this story. In the movie, he is played by Neil Huff and this scene is his first meeting with the Globe "Spotlight" team. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What`s the treatment center? NEIL HUFF, ACTOR: It`s where they send priests when they get caught. This is all right here in the box. I sent this all of you, guys, five years ago. KEATON: To the Globe? Who did you send it to? HUFF: I don`t want to say who, but they said that they weren`t interested. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But, Phil, we -- we did run cover stories on yet, and you saw them in the clip. HUFF: Yes, but to be completely frank, it wasn`t enough. You guys got to understand, this is big. This is not just Boston. This is a whole country, it`s the whole world. And it goes right up to the Vatican. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any proof of that, Bill? HUFF: No, not yet, but think about it. There are so many of them. How else could have they have hidden it for so long? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So many of what? HUFF: Priests. Priests. I know 13 right here in Boston. KEATON: You know 13 priests in Boston who have molested children? HUFF: Yes. Why do you keep repeating everything I say? KEATON: I just like to clarify things. HUFF: Maybe you should have clarified it five years ago when I sent you all of this stuff. It`s all right here. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Phil Saviano, an awful a lot has happened since that meeting that you had with the Globe. You finally got the Globe to go to act -- go into action on this in a way that they had failed to and, in fact, ignored some of the stuff that you brought to them before. Then the next day, Josh, you have Josh Singer and Tom McCarthy interviewing you, working on putting this movie together. Like yet, your reaction to seeing the movie, seeing yourself portrayed in it having the story laid up this way. What was your reaction when the credits were roll in that movie theatre? PHIL SAVIANO, SURVIVOR OF CATHOLIC CLERGY ABUSE: Good evening, Lawrence. I can describe it in one word -- vindication. And a great deal of pride. I love Neil Huff`s portrayal of me. I love the fact that this movie was so well put together. I mean, all the details are accurate, the actors are superb. It`s getting fantastic reviews. So, it`s really in many ways a dream come true. O`DONNELL: And did you have any input in the script as it was developing? SAVIANO: I did. And I was very, very pleased that Josh reached out to me, and I did talk about a few things that I thought were important that did, in fact, get into the script. For example, the concept of grooming, which is the way the priests endear himself to the child and develops a child`s trust before moving in with the attacks, so to speak. The fact that many of the victims are women, as well. It`s not just about the altar boys. And then the other thing is that abuse from a priest or a religious person is much different than being abused by a coach or a teacher, or even a relative. Because you have the concept of spirituality. A child who is abused by a priest it really destroys their spiritual life, and that`s very, very difficult for many people to deal with. O`DONNELL: Yes, and Josh, it go -- these things go to the central question of how this could happen. Because there`s two sides. How could the priests do it, and then, but the victims -- it fascinated me because I grew up in one of those parishes that`s in this movie, St. Brendan`s. SINGER: St. Brendan`s, right? O`DONNELL: Yes. And none of this occurred during the time that I was at St. Brendan`s that we know about. And so, when it started to become public, these stories started to become public, we just -- we wondered about it. I was an altar boy, I grew up around these priests and we never felt threatened in any way. So, everything about it was alien to us, and the points that Phil is raising about exactly how these kids were chosen, the ones who -- who were in -- in more difficult circumstances with less stable family backgrounds, all of that stuff, was so important to understanding how this -- this happened. SINGER: Yes. I mean, these priests were predators. And they really were sort of, you know, pulling off the weak -- the weak from the flock, right? And they would -- they had the time to, as Phil said, groom these kids and really know which ones were the ones who were safe to attack. And, you know, this -- I got to credit, you know, Tom for pushing us to go and reach out to people like Phil, right? And people like Joe Crowley, and people Richard Siken (ph) the real experts in this field. And it was only by talking to them for hours and hours and hours, and then actually inviting them in with the script and having them comment on the script and having them -- and Phil was on set with us and Neil. You know, and that made everything, I think, better and allowed us to get -- get, you know, this accurately. O`DONNELL: Let`s -- let`s listen to what the pope said in Philadelphia in September. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) POPE FRANCIS: God weeps from the sexual abuse of children. These cannot be maintained in secret, and I commit to a careful oversight to ensure that youth are protected and that all response will be held accountable. (END VIDEO CLIP) O`DONNELL: Phil, what`s your reaction to that? SAVIANO: Well, the pope is a very popular man and we are all waiting to see how is his going to put this commitment into action. He said a lot of very important things very encouraging things, but, so far, there has not been any action. O`DONNELL: Phil Saviano gets tonight`s Last Word. Josh Singer, and Phil Saviano, thank you for joining us. SAVIANO: Thank you very much. SINGER: Thanks, Lawrence. O`DONNELL: Chris Hayes is up next. END <Copy: Content and programming copyright 2015 MSNBC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2015 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.>