CALLER: I’m doing great, Rush. Say, my husband and I are both Trump supporters, so I guess one of the two of us is peeking out from the basket of deplorables, eh?
RUSH: Let me ask you a question before we go on.
CALLER: Sure.
RUSH: By the way, Deplorables, the T-shirts are ready. We’ve got ’em at the EIB Store. I’ve been meaning to mention that. We just ran in the commercial break, a spot for the “Never Hillary” shirts. The “I’m A Hillary Deplorable” T-shirts are now in the EIB Store. That’s part of the Never Hillary collection. They’re at RushLimbaugh.com. We’ve stocked up. These things are gonna sell like new iPhones out there, and we are ready for you at RushLimbaugh.com. I need to ask, you live in Asheville, right.
CALLER: Yes, just outside of town.
RUSH: Okay. Most of the people in Asheville are communists. They’re… Well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but they’re leftists. Are you?
CALLER: No.
RUSH: No, you’re not? Okay.
CALLER: No.
RUSH: So you’re in the minority of population. You went to the Trump rally last night; is that right?
CALLER: We did. I and our son.
RUSH: Okay. From what I heard, I just want to you confirm that what I found was true, that the arena — or the venue — was full, and that it holds about 7,000 people. Is that close?
CALLER: Yes. That’s accurate, yes.
RUSH: Okay, fine. Because what I have here, is I’ve got two stories. I’ve got an ABC News story, and I’ve got an AP story, and what they report… They don’t report the size of the crowd. They don’t report how uplifting and exciting and positive the crowd was. They don’t report how good Trump was. They focus on a skirmish that happened, and they’re trying to make it look like a bunch of Trump supporters were picking on Trump protesters and that the whole thing descended into a giant fight. ABC and the AP are both trying to report that as the primary event that happened at the Trump rally. Is that what you saw?
CALLER: They’re… No. So it was very interesting, because there was a sea of protesters, and we did have to pass through the sea — so shoulder-to-shoulder, face-to-face — to get into the event. There were some protesters that got in. Here’s a thing that really amazed me. There were F-bombs everywhere. They are all over the protestors. As protesters in the rally got up and made their point known and were escorted out, they prominently gave the finger to us — very, very visibly. There was a sign that was smuggled in somehow, and I don’t know what the sign said. I haven’t been able to find it. We couldn’t see it, but it had to be pretty vile. And we were just there having a good time. So like I said, there were absolutely F-bombs everywhere —
RUSH: How old is your son?
CALLER: He is 15. So that was not good. On our way out, though, the protestors, with signs, here’s what they chanted: “Love Trump’s hate! Love Trump’s hate!”
RUSH: That’s not new. They have been… That’s been a popular refrain of anti-Trump protesters for months now, and I think it kind of backfires on them. They’re trying to say —
CALLER: To watch what was going on there… We just peacefully went to a Trump rally! I’m very concerned that the things Hillary is saying are cultivating an incredible prejudice among people. I mean, I think that most voters on both sides are good-hearted people who love their country and care of their country. But we encountered just rabid protesters who believe that we are awful people and terrible hearted.
RUSH: Pam, let me —
CALLER: They really believe that.
RUSH: You’re mostly right when you say that Hillary is cultivating that kind of person, but it’s really not her. They existed long before Hillary, and they would be there no matter who the Democrat nominee was. Those are people largely paid. They are bought and paid for by activists like George Soros. George Soros funds, he invests in paid protest groups, and their express purpose is to go out and disrupt every Trump rally they can.
And even if they’re not acolytes for Hillary… I’m not trying to let her off the hook in terms of being responsible for cultivating the hate, because I think the left owns hate in this country. I think they promote it. I think they cultivate it. I think they use it. I think most of the hate in this country’s actually found on the left. You’re not a hater. I mean, you went to this rally just wanting to be part of it. You wanted to see what it was. You hoped it was fun. You hoped it was good. You hoped Trump was good, I’m sure.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: You didn’t go there to “hate on” anybody or hate anything, and hate is not what attracted you to it. But the people that protested you and were writing and shouting all those F-bombs, are obsessed with it.
CALLER: They were, and the protesters were very peacefully and courteously escorted out each time. One of the things I loved is there was a point at which they went and got a bunch of Trump supporters that hadn’t been able to get into the rally and they escorted them into the places that were vacated by the protestors. The building was all incredibly peaceful, incredibly peaceful. Outside the building, I saw Trump supporters, some of them. Long story, but my son and I got stuck in the sea of protesters. We got separated from husband and we were stuck there for about an hour, and so we missed a lot, and there were a few Trump supporters that tried to engage protesters in meaningful conversation —
RUSH: Was this your first encounter with protesters up close like this?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Yeah. I think I can tell. Nothing wrong with it. I can just tell. You read about ’em and you may see them make noise at a Trump rally. You’re watching on TV and you see ’em escorted out, and you think, “Okay, fine and dandy.” But here you came face-to-face with them, and it totally changes the way you see them. And it totally changes the impact they have on you. I can tell by listening to you that you think this was atrocious. You think this was outstandingly bad; it was egregious. You think it was harmful. I can hear all this in your voice.
CALLER: Well, and I think… I guess one thing that concerns me is that it’s as if democracy is being lost. I mean, the country stands for freedom to disagree, freedom to hold your own views, and the message that’s communicated is, “If you disagree with me, you’re full of hate and all these various isms.”
RUSH: And you are subject to potential violence. You are subject to threat. “We’re gonna threaten you, we’re gonna intimidate you, we’re gonna bully you if you don’t agree with us. We’re gonna shut you up.”
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: “We’re gonna send you packing.” There’s… Pam, look, you know, all of these wonderful statements that we keep hearing in association with this Kaepernick protest that he had? “America means that you have the right to say whatever you want! You can voice whatever opinion.” It’s a bunch of BS. This is the kind of thing that losers tell themselves when they don’t know how to deal with the protestors you’re encountering. The protestors that you encountered do not respect your right to think what you think.
They don’t respect your right to show up and say what you want to say and support what you want support. They show up to shut you down. There is none of this respect for the great concepts of dissent. If you dissent from them, with them — if you violate what they want — they’re gonna come after you or make you think they’re gonna come after you one way or the other. We get caught up in these flowery little bromides of America, freedom.
“I will defend to the death your right to say it even though I disagree with you.” That may describe some people and the way they look at it, but not the people you encountered last night. They’re not democratic. They’re not interested in the democratic process at all. They don’t trust it. If they lose this election, what you saw last night is Romper Room compared to what they’re gonna do. That’s the reason I asked you if this is the first time that you’ve actually encountered it face-to-face, ’cause it changes you.
It’s one thing to see these people on TV. You’re watching a Trump rally anywhere and you’ll see a disruption and they may show a protester or two being hauled out of there. But you don’t see the confrontations. You don’t see these people bullying, shouting all these F-bombs, making threats. You don’t see all that. That’s not shown. All you see is a couple of them taken out and then people say, “Isn’t that wonderful? We’ve got the fine art of dissent being practiced, and it’s just a beautiful thing to see.”
But you encounter it face-to-face, like you did, and it changes the way you see it, and it makes you start questioning very seriously, which I totally understand. This is why I don’t understand all this tolerance for these people. I’m not saying be impolite on them or any of that, but the idea that they’ve got the right come in and disrupt something because this is America? When did all this become a suicide pact? When does somebody’s freedom of speech permit them to come in and totally destroy your rally?
When does the Constitution permit somebody to come in and totally destroy the country? At what point do people stand up and say, “Wait a minute. We’re not engaged in a suicide pact here by extending to your your freedom.” I’m glad you saw it up close and personal, because it changes your perception of it the moment you see it. And, by the way, I’m serious. The AP story here and the ABC story do not talk about the Trump crowd. I’ve got some sound bites coming up during the break.
He brought some people up that Hillary calls deplorable. He wanted them to come up and speak for themselves. It was a typically good Trump rally with lots of energy, a full house, and there were just enough protesters to give the media the opportunity to focus on the protests as the main thing that apparently happened. If you weren’t there and didn’t see it, that’s all you would think happened.
You’d think Trump had a rally and half or more of the people shut it down, ’cause he’s hated and reviled and filled with hate. And that’s what the media’s trying to do. It’s how they carry Hillary’s water. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton couldn’t draw a thousand people to an event like this. And the people that protest Hillary don’t care enough about it to show up and do that. They’ll just be satisfied voting against her. Anyway, Pam, I’m grateful that you called. I appreciate the eyewitness account.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Okay. Here we go last night, Asheville, North Carolina, 7,000 people. The event was sold out. I’m told by people who live in North Carolina that it’s very unusual to have this many people at anything like this in Asheville. Asheville, by the way, the Biltmore mansion is there. Asheville is not the town that they had to build in order to build the mansion, but it’s close. I’ve been there. I didn’t know it was a communist outpost when I went in there. This is back in the mid-nineties that I was there. But it’s supposedly really, really unusual to have this kind of a crowd for anything there. So that’s the setup. We have two bites here as Trump invited “deplorables” on stage to respond to Hillary.
TRUMP: These are not deplorable people. That I can tell you.
AUDIENCE: (cheers)
TRUMP: Come on over!
MAN: My wife and I represent non-deplorable people!
AUDIENCE: (laughter and cheers)
WOMAN: I am probably a lot of things. “Deplorable” is not one of them, I assure you. We are going to make America great again, and Hillary needs to take a nap.
AUDIENCE: (cheers)
MAN: After all the horrible scandals that Hillary Clinton’s been involved in, and that she has the gall to call us deplorable? Unbelievable.
RUSH: It is. Don’t forget our “I’m a Hillary deplorable” T-shirt is now available at RushLimbaugh.com in the EIB Store, part of Never Hillary collection. It’s a blue T-shirt. It says, “I am a Hillary deplorable” on the front. On the back it says “Never Hillary,” and they are up and running now. After these people spoke, Trump then closed it up…
TRUMP: After months of hiding from the press, Hillary Clinton came out and finally told the world how she feels about the people of this country. She talks about people like they’re objects, not human beings. She said half of our supporters are “irredeemable” and not American —
CROWD: (grumbling)
TRUMP _- and describes the other half as having run out of options. Hillary Clinton spoke with hatred in her heart for these working-class Americans. Absolute hatred in her heart. She looks down on the people who cook her meals, drive her cars, and dig the coal that power her electricity! Her goal is simple: To bully the American voter out of voting for change.
RUSH: Now, what’s going on today in Philadelphia, I think it’s… Yeah. Obama and Biden and Tim Kaine are all campaigning in Philadelphia for Hillary. Isn’t it nice to know, ladies, so many men can step up and take Hillary’s place and keep her relevant while she is unable to show up? Isn’t that a beautiful thing? Why, it takes three of these guys to show up and do the job that Hillary ostensibly would do on her own. What does that say? It takes Obama, it takes Biden, it takes Tim Kaine.
By the way, here’s Nicolle Wallace. No friend of Trump’s, no friend of Sarah Palin’s. Nicolle Wallace worked in the George W. Bush communications office on the Today show today. Savannah Guthrie said, “Hey, Nicolle, you might say that the health headlines aren’t good for Hillary. But in some ways it actually overlooked this issue of her comment on Friday night where she called half of Trump supporters deplorable. Now, is this a larger, longer-term problem for her?”
WALLACE: The road to the White House does not wind its way toward attacking someone’s supporters. She gave a speech 10 days before she made that… I mean, I think this is what she thinks of the segment of the Trump base that we’ve all learned this new word, the alt-right, that sort of legitimizes white supremacy. So she has made a more focused case. But lumping in half of his supporters? You know, Trump did a really smart thing with it yesterday; he put Americans on stage — he put his supporters — who certainly didn’t look deplorable at all.
RUSH: How about that! That’s a great admission. Trump actually put some supporters up there who didn’t look deplorable at all. This alt-right business and white supremacy? Have you noticed how casually that has just snuck in there and seems to have established a life of its own as though it’s actual fact, and real that a segment of Trump supporters are white supremacists? That’s the folly. You know, all of these leftists accuse people who oppose amnesty and want to stop illegal immigration of having racial reasons. They’re missing the point entirely, as usual, which they know. They’re just trying to smear.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I take it back. All three are not in Philadelphia. Obama, Biden, and Kaine are all campaigning for Hillary today. It’s Obama that’s in Philadelphia. And the name of the Vanderbilt place in Asheville was the Biltmore Estate. That’s what I… Mental block. At one time, anyway, it was the largest private home in the country.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Just to illustrate what I was talking about about the Trump rally in Asheville, North Carolina, last night. The first is ABC News. “Man at Trump Rally Hits Two Protesters in the Head” is the headline. This is not the story. It’s what the Drive-Bys want you to think is the story. “A man in the audience of a Trump rally in North Carolina Monday evening hit two male protesters in the head as they were being escorted out. Further details were not immediately available.
“Earlier, Trump invited a group of his supporters to join him on stage to speak out against Hillary Clinton’s claim that half of those backing the Republican presidential nominee belong in a ‘basket of deplorables,'” and then the story quotes the people that Trump called up, the sound bites of which we just played for you. Later during the speech, a member of the audience appeared to faint not far from the stage upon which Trump was speaking.
“‘Could we have a doctor please?’ said Trump, who noticed the commotion in front of him. Trump noted that the room was ‘about 100 degrees’ as the supporter received assistance. Trump briefly left the stage and walked down to the crowd before continuing the speech after a few minutes.” Why do you think put that in there? “See? See? Everybody faints when it’s hot! Everybody faints. Everybody gets dehydrated when it gets hot! It’s nothing. It’s no big deal what happened to Hillary.”
That’s what you’re supposed to conclude on your own. And then the AP story: “Trump Supporter Grabs, Appears to Punch Protester at North Carolina Rally.” Folks, this AP story is almost a satire piece. If you didn’t know better, you would think somebody mocking the AP had written this. This is so filled with obvious pro-Hillary, anti-Trump bias. They’re not even trying to make it look like it’s real journalism.
And it’s along the lines of the ABC story. They want you to believe, “Everything was fine, protesters had to be escorted out and then these mean Trump supporters started beating this guy upside the head,” trying to convey the impression that Trump supporters are mad, violent, unhinged, insane (whispers) white supremacists. In fact, right here in the Washington Post, Dana Milbank — who wouldn’t know objectivity if it gave him a French kiss.
Headline: “Yes, Half of Trump’s Supporters Are Racist — Hillary Clinton may have been unwise to say half of Donald Trump’s supporters are racists and other ‘deplorables.’ But she wasn’t wrong. If anything, when it comes to Trump’s racist support, she might have low-balled the number,” and then he quotes what happened at Trump speaking to National Guard Association and so forth.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: We’ve got somebody else who was in the Asheville rally, the Trump rally in Asheville last night. This is Ed in Hendersonville, North Carolina. Hi, Ed. How are you?
CALLER: Hey, Rush. Thank you for taking my call.
RUSH: You bet, sir.
CALLER: Yeah, I was there last night, and the amazing thing when we came out of the rally, is that they had taken down all of the barricades so that we were immediately — within five feet of the door — being accosted by the protesters there. They were just screaming at us, holding signs as that lady previously had mentioned. I actually was near the guy that I believe was the one you mentioned that had hit a protester. He was probably in his mid-sixties, and he was with his wife. I’m not quite sure why he hit them, but I can say that the things that were being yelled at us as we had to pass through the crowd. There was no other way to get out. He very well could have just been protecting her honor. I’m not quite sure what the reason was.
RUSH: How many protesters were at this event? Outside, when you left, how many would you say were there?
CALLER: Oh, there was minimum 150, maybe 200 or more. There was quite a few. And when we first got there, there actually was a barricade. So we had to stand in line to wait to get in, and the whole time they’re just screaming at us, and everyone around, nobody responded back to ’em. Nobody said anything back to ’em. We stood in line, smiled. We moved through, and the volunteers were trying to keep us separated from them. But coming out it was like we were in a cattle chute. We just had to go immediately through them, and it was bad. I mean, I could see where an elderly person or someone with a child would be scared, afraid.
RUSH: Well, but that’s the only incident of violence that you know about when the guy you think we’re talking about here walloped an anti-Trump protester? That was it, right?
CALLER: That was the only one I was aware of. I was right near… Actually a cop stopped me, thinking I might have been invoved in it.
RUSH: See, that’s my point. Here you have a place filled up 7,000 people, and you have whatever number of protesters were there, and everybody inside had a great time. It was a typical Trump rally. It was filled to the rafters, overflowing. I have seen a photo of inside. The media will not show you this. The media… Even when Trump tries to shame them, they will not show you the insisted of these arenas. They will not show you. That’s why the Trump campaign has to tweet these things out themselves.
Anyway, so you had 7,000 people there. You had Trump bringing up people that Hillary’s calling deplorable, announcing that they’re not, showing that they’re not, demonstrating that they’re not, and then have this one incident where something provoked a Trump supporter to wallop some Trump protester upside the head, and that’s the story. That becomes the story. It could well be “the Trump supporter” was a foil anyway.
It could well be the Trump supporter’s a plant. You just never know, but I’m telling you these things are not organic. And when I say “not organic,” I mean whatever number of people were there, those 150, didn’t show up just because Trump is there and 7,000 people are there and they’re fit to be tied. They’re paid, they’re organized, they’re dispatched, they’re bought and paid for by people like George Soros. Black Lives Matter is being funded to the tune of tens of millions of dollars by Soros, for example.
I don’t know what group dispatched these people. I just know this how the left operates. Everything is manufactured, and they get away with it because the press, the media is on their side. So the media reports, “Oh, look at this! Donald Trump showed up and people who naturally hate his guts — because they should — showed up and let everybody know what a reprobate we all think Trump is.” That becomes the tenor and the flavor of the story. In that regard, that way they’re able to avoid reporting in any detail what happened at the rally.
They don’t go talk to people at the rally who had a great time and were moved by it. They simply focus because they’ve got this meme going, they’ve got this narrative going that Trump supporters are a bunch of white supremacists with sympathies to the KKK. “So here comes some 60-year-old guy barreling out of the rally and starts knocking some innocent flower child of the Trump protesters upside the head, and they get their story,” and they run with it, ABC and the Associated Press at the same time. But you notice, folks, the scope of this program?
Here we’ve had two people already who were at that event last night who’ve called in to tell us what happened and they saw.
We’re everywhere without having to actually go there.