My opponent tonight is a former Rhodes Scholar,
the former mayor of Newark,
and the current senator from New Jersey,
-Senator Cory Booker. -It's good to see you.
-Good to see you, Jordan. -Good to see you.
-Good to see you, too, Jordan. -Welcome.
First I'd like to thank you for coming.
I'd also like to thank Aiden
for letting us use his room here.
BOOKER: This is a pretty great room.
KLEPPER: I'm a big fan of trains.
You know where you're going with a train.
Yes, yes.
You got to stay on track in life; it's a very good metaphor.
-Exactly. -Yes.
-I want to stay on track, Cory. -Yes.
-We've got some kids here. -Yes.
There's a big march coming up.
Can you just, can you just tell them
that this is a fad and it's time to move on?
What do you think about this march?
Well, two things. One is, you have to understand
that change has never in history come
It's come
Strom Thurmond didn't just one day say,
"Hey, I think those black folks should have some civil rights."
No. It was people that marched and demonstrated
and brought change to Washington.
What they're doing is not only consistent with history,
it's actually been the only pathway
that real, meaningful change has been made
is through the activism of young Americans.
And so you're supporting these kids.
Have they, have they bullied you?
Is that what I'm seeing right now?
Are you gonna be smoking some doobies
out by the park bench with the cool kids?
I think that what these guys are doing is leading by example.
They're letting adults know,
you guys haven't been able to make change.
We have a horrific reality where every day in America
dozens of people are dying due to gun violence.
And that this has to stop.
You guys haven't stopped it,
so we're gonna take the helm and lead the change.
Well, what-what's adults problems?
I mean, I know I'm fine. I got what I want.
Change not happening. Status quo, thumbs up.
But you're an adult, you're an adult in a position of power.
Why isn't change happening from your end?
Well, first of all, it's very frustrating.
I know what captures a lot of attention
is often the mass shootings, these awful, awful realities,
but every day in America,
we have lots of shootings in communities like mine.
I've had two shootings on my block in the last year.
Last-- most recently last week, Shahad Smith was killed
by an automatic weapon at the top of the block where I live.
I live in an inner city, low-income community.
And so this is hurtful
that we have not been able to make change.
And a lot of the times the people in power
often don't represent the views, Republican or Democrat,
of the majority of their citizens.
And so this is the time where the people want change.
They want common sense gun safety measures to be done.
But the people in power aren't doing anything.
And I think what these young people are gonna show,
what the truth in any democracy is,
that the power of the people
is greater than the people in power.
You mentioned mass shootings.
And this movement seems to be a response to school shootings,
but mass shootings are only three percent
of the gun deaths in America in 2017.
Is this a misguided movement?
Are they focusing on the wrong things?
No, in fact, I've heard incredible eloquence
by a lot of the young people around the country,
young people from Parkland, even young people in New Jersey,
who've been saying, "Hey, look, we're gonna use this moment
"to shine a light on the fact that we have,
"in many poor communities and communities of color,
"that deaths are happening every day,
and for some reason nobody is paying attention."
Because again, this is not a problem
that we can't do something about.
We have the power to make change.
And so what this is a question of not is "can we,"
but "do we have the collective will?"
And I think what they're doing is waking up
the moral imagination of this country,
uh, pointing to the moral urgency,
and they're determined to keep it going.
Now, you're talking a lot about people coming together.
-Yeah. -This is what you do.
You love to talk about that.
Wayne LaPierre talked about you
and your European socialism when it comes to guns.
-Yes. -Do you just want everybody to share one gun?
-Is that your ultimate vision for America? -Um...
you know, when our founders came together
and the end of the Declaration of Independence
with these noble words that if this country's gonna work,
we must mutually pledge to each other, you know,
they said "our lives, our fortunes,
and our sacred honor."
This is a country, yeah, of rugged individualism,
and it's a country of self-reliance,
but we also have proven to humanity, you know,
rugged individualism didn't get us to the Moon.
That when we come together and work together and partner,
we can do things that are beyond the imagination
-of our ancestors. -(scoffs)
You really think we went to the Moon?
(laughs)
I hate to do this because this is my show,
but have I children here,
and apparently they have questions.
So if you don't mind, there's some questions they'd like...
You're giving over some of your, uh...
-your platform, right. -You know, I'm a nice guy.
Just because I'm an adult and I think
we should talk down to children,
doesn't mean I'm always going to talk down.
I was wondering about this positioning.
You put them on the floor,
-Look, I... -and you had us lord above the young people.
This is just functionally the best position, all right?
-Okay. -Don't let the metaphor play out
that I'm literally talking down to children,
-Make you think that that's what I want. -Uh, all right.
All right, well, even though they're lower than us,
let's look up to them and-and their stature.
So come on.
Mr. Booker, thank you for talking to me today.
The Democratic party has helped my movement
by giving us a platform,
and we've been speaking a lot about change.
When will you actually propose any change?
Right. Well, I'm hopeful that this is gonna...
this election in November is gonna be a referendum.
And I... I don't want it to be a partisan election.
This is a... simply about left or right,
or Republican or Democrat.
To me, it's about right or wrong.
And if you are a person standing up and blocking,
if you're in Congress right now
and you're blocking what 90% of Americans want,
some of these common-sense things,
then you need to be voted out of office
because you are being complicit.
Our inaction is being complicit in the continued violence.
My favorite question:
you've talked about a lot of stuff I have no idea about,
and it really didn't stick.
So I'd like you to tell me something I already know.
Well, I think you know
that the long arc of history bends towards justice.
We are a country that's gotten better and better and better,
-and you know that. -Is that where it goes?
It does. It absolutely does.
But it doesn't bend automatically.
We've got to be the benders.
And so the right side of history right now
is finding the common ground and doing those things
that will make America safer.
Yeah, I totally knew that.
-(laughs): All right. -Senator Cory Booker.