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That. joining me now, mark thompson, radio post. derrick johnson is president and ceo of the naacp. let me play a little devil s advocate based on what we just heard out of virginia. a man should be judged by who he is today, derrick. you heard that young african-american man saying, you know, i m not sure we should be throwing people away over a photo that was taken 35 years ago. if you were in that room right now as governor northam is, listening to people for their advice, what would you say to him? well, you know, unfortunately, he may be surrounded with the reality of the culture of the old south. it is ae duality of the sympathizers ar sympathizers, along with those who want to grow out of the reality. 1984, 20 years after the passage of the civil rights act, 19 ....
well, my suspicion is that he is circling the wagons. i don t truly know what s going on in the meeting. i don t have any eyes or ears in there. there was a meeting last night. nothing happened. then again, i would suggest to you the circling of the wagons. i suspect that s what s going on now. this has been, in many ways, a test, of whether democrats, who have been critical of donald trump, whether his comments after charlottesville, his s-hole countries comments, let s go back to birtherism. is there any room here for anything but zero tolerance? you know, the real question that we re faced with is, can ralph northam, at this point in time, lead us and heal us? there s always room for redemption. there s always room for forgiveness. should that be as him as governor, who should that be as him as a private citizen? i suggest to you the latter. you know, with all the ....
Take a listen to what senator lucas told me yesterday about this whole episode. i have no clue what changed, but i ll tell you, i think with all of his friends and his colleagues, folks who were telling him that he needs to resign, he needs to understand that he no longer has the moral authority to lead as governor. reporter: we talked to some of northam s constituents on richmond s south side, who they say believe the governor should be judged by the man he is today, by the policies he embraces today, not by what he did or didn t do 35 years ago. of course, the governor now says he is not one of the two men in the racist yearbook photo. he now says he s not sure how the photo got placed on his dje yearbook page. here s what some of his constituents told me. has the way the governor handled this episode, has it undercut his ability to govern effectively? i think so. if he is not in those photos, then i think he deserves a second chance. he s been great for virginia. i don t t ....
Redemption. absolutely. you do it in a different context, a different space. the reality is, this is harmful to the state of virginia, first and foremost, and its voters. it is harmful to the democratic party. it is harmful to the nation. when democrats speak about impeaching trump for whatever reason, northam staying in office makes the democratic party an impeachable witness, chris. if you re on the stand, and i m testifying against you and your behavior, and then the defendant s lawyer is able to show that my own house is not in order, as is the case with northam, then i m an impeachable witness. that s the posture he s put the democratic party in. it is untenable politically. also i mean, do you think that he s thinking, or at least maybe was thinking on saturday and even into sunday, you know what, we live in this 15-second world, where stories come and go. all i need to do is wait this out. if i wait this out, something else is going to come up. ....
Argument with what looks like clean hands. i think that one of the reasons there is such overwhelming pressure for the governor to resign is that national democrats want the clear contrast with president trump, want to be able to make these arguments without the counterargument that, obviously, a democratic governor is accused of these awful, racist things. and there s i mean, we talk a lot about the politics of this, but what about just the simple morality of this? just making a statement that doesn t have anything to do with politics, that isn t about whether or not you re going to have to win, try to win virginia, whether or not somebody is going to be able to say something about a democrat who is sitting in the governor s seat. isn t there a clear and unequivocal statement that you need to make, just to say, this is who i am as a candidate? i totally agree with you. i think that is one of the problems with how ralph northam has handled this. you re right, it shouldn t be ....