Mike Huckabee speaks out after quitting country music board

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Mike Huckabee speaks out after quitting country music board

After facing backlash, Mike Huckabee resigned from the country music organization, citing political and religious intolerance; the former Arkansas governor speaks out on 'The Story.'

This is a rush transcript from "The Story," March 2, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

MARTHA MACCALLUM, "THE STORY" HOST: Good to see you, Bret. Breaking tonight on "The Story," the Andrew McCabe news that triggered his removal from the FBI and the leaks that have been such a part of this story from the White House, to the FBI, to the DOJ, now coming a bit more into focus.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're going to find the leakers. We're going to find the leakers. They're going to pay a big price for leaking.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Tonight, a scathing new report from the Justice Department points to McCabe as one of those who was willing to share information with the press. McCabe, of course, was often blasted by President Trump because his wife had ties to Hillary Clinton. About $700,000 for her local campaign from Terry McAuliffe. He abruptly resigned back in January as you may remember as this scandal continued to grow, over the FISA abuse of members of the Trump administration. So, now, he's been revealed as one of the people inside the FBI who authorized the release of sensitive information. In this case, tied to an ongoing investigation into Bill and Hillary Clinton. Fox News Chief National Correspondent Ed Henry unravels it all for us tonight, live from Washington. Hi, Ed.

ED HENRY, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Martha, great to see you. Andrew McCabe was put on leave last month within hours of the FBI Director Christopher Wray examining that Republican memo behind closed doors about FISA abuse during the Obama days. But as you noted, tonight's development shows McCabe and other former top FBI officials like James Comey may face far more trouble from this blockbuster new investigative report that's about to come out.

Fox confirming tonight, the man writing that report, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, is planning to be sharply critical of McCabe's actions in the final weeks of the 2016 campaign, and has uncovered information that McCabe was behind improper media leaks of sensitive information. McCabe was overseeing the FBI probe of Hillary Clinton's handling of classified information even though, as you noted back in 2015, his wife had run for state office in Virginia and received hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign money from allies of Clinton.

In the final weeks of the 2016 campaign, classified e-mails were found on a laptop shared by Anthony Weiner's estranged wife Clinton Aide, Huma Abedin. And yet, McCabe did not move forward on checking them out. In some of their text messages backs and forth, FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page suggested those e-mails were found in September 2016, but nothing was done for almost a month. After McCabe sat on those new e-mails, Comey was then forced to deal with the e-mails days before the election, infuriating the Clinton Camp because it put the e-mails front and center, yet again.

Now, the New York Times is suggesting McCabe will also be sanctioned by the inspector general for leaking sensitive details about the Clinton probe to the Wall Street Journal, even though Comey testified to a senate panel last year he and his top aides never leaked this kind of info.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY, R-IOWA: Director Comey, have you ever been an anonymous source in the news reports about matters relating to the Trump investigation or the Clinton investigation?

JAMES COMEY, FORMER DIRECTOR OF THE FBI: Never.

GRASSLEY: Have you ever authorized someone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source news reports about the Trump investigation or the Clinton investigation?

COMEY: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HENRY: Well, that might not be true. There's a big twist on this story, though. The Times says, McCabe's leaks about the Clinton Foundation involved giving out information that actually hurt Clinton politically, not help her. So, we're all waiting for this new report to come out as early as this month to explain whether McCabe just acted improperly for some other reason beyond helping Clinton, which has been the sort of suspected motive all along. There may be a whole lot more here, Martha.

MACCALLUM: Yes, there is. It's so clear that this is all just starting to unravel, and we're picking up all the pieces and putting them together. Ed, thank you very much.

HENRY: Good to see you.

MACCALLUM: Great report. So, joining me now: Mollie Hemingway, Senior Editor at The Federalist and a Fox News Contributor; Chris Stirewalt, Fox News Politics Editor; Basin Smikle, a Democrat Strategist and Former Aide to Hillary Clinton. So, good to have all of you here tonight. Chris, let me start with you. What did you make of this report?

CHRIS STIREWALT, FOX NEWS POLITICS EDITOR: Well, I make of it that Andrew McCabe is going to have an unfun 2018. We know -- it was being quite fair. We don't know exactly what his motives are, but it's pretty clear based on what he and Comey were doing. In the closing weeks of the election, they were afraid it was going to look like they were too far in the tank for Clinton, they wanted to get out. Because they figured she'd win, the Republicans would be mad, and they'd be in big trouble. So, they dumped this stuff on her. They put out the letter about the e-mail. All the yadda-dada-dada, and obviously leaking now too because they were trying to clean up from what they had done before. It worked only too well, she lost the election, and Andrew McCabe is out of a job. Funny how it works.

MACCALLUM: So, Chris, your suggestion is that the part of this New York Times story that basically says that he was the one who was dogged on the Clinton Foundation. That he thought that the DOJ was softening on the whole thing, and he wanted to make sure that that investigation was not dropped. Are you suggesting that he leaked that about himself to make himself look better?

STIREWALT: I'm not saying that. I'm saying that there's -- evident on Comey, evident on prima facie with Comey that that dump at the end was designed to try to do a make good on what they had done in the beginning when he said he wasn't going to bring any charges. So, they did this thing at the end. And here's the point, for the FBI: stay out of politics. Doesn't work. Doesn't help. Don't do it.

MACCALLUM: Mollie, your take.

MOLLIE HEMINGWAY, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR AND SENIOR EDITOR AT THE FEDERALIST: Yes. Well, this story in the New York Times is so favorable to McCabe, even though it's about him leaking that you have to imagine that he either himself leaked this to the New York Times and tried to position it as something that isn't as bad as it is, or the FBI itself is leaking it because they know it looks bad about the culture of the FBI. It's worth remembering that it is a felony to leak classified information, and this is something that this agency has had tremendous problems with.

I mean, James Comey admitted under oath that he leaked out of vengeance, to seek vengeance against President Trump. You have this now McCabe situation. You also have Andrew Weissmann under investigation for his meetings, and the FBI is stonewalling congressional inquiries into that. We also have Strzok meeting with reporters. So, it's a real culture of leaking here that needs to be dealt with, and it needs to be taken seriously -- not just internal reports but actual action taken.

MACCALLUM: Yes. I mean, the big picture, Basil, is that appears to be coming together, is an FBI/DOJ leadership who were doing what they could to undermine the Trump Campaign and to support the Hillary Clinton Campaign. That's the worst of the charges. It's bad, that would be -- you know, that would be what would come to light. Michael Horowitz was about to drop this report. We're going to learn a lot, obviously, when that happens. You know, what's your response to this piece today into how this looks like it might be coming together?

BASIL SMIKLE, DEMOCRAT STRATEGIST AND FORMER AIDE TO HILLARY CLINTON: Well, as a person on the panel that was deeply hurt by the -- by what happened with Comey at the end of 2016 and the effect of that, I don't know if it was trying to make up for actions taken previously because a lot had to have been done then to actually wind up losing the campaign for her. So, I don't think it was so much that. I do think, however, only to all of the points that may be surprised to believe that I actually agree with a lot of what was said. That there seemed to be a lot of politics infused in what happened throughout 2016 and the part of 2017. I don't know if it still continues.

I don't know if it's the deep state that the president likes to talk about. Because, I think he is not being disadvantaged by it as he himself would think. But I do believe that there has been part of the political culture of leaking in Washington, D.C. I think it is particularly problematic when the FBI does it and certainly did it in the context of our presidential election. So, there needs to be -- I don't want to say an overhaul, but I do think there needs to be some real sort of investigation into how the FBI is operating notwithstanding the good work that all of them are doing down there.

MACCALLUM: So, you know, sort of stepping back for a moment, for the next round of questions here for you guys. John Brennan today was on another network, and he was speaking with Nicolle Wallace. And here's what he said about President Trump.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BRENNAN, FORMER ADMINISTRATOR OF CIA: We have somebody in the oval office who is unstable, inept, inexperienced and also unethical. We really have rough waters ahead.

MACCALLUM: Chris, you know -- I mean, that is not entirely a new language coming from John Brennan.

STIREWALT: No.

MACCALLUM: You know, what do you make of that when you look at what's going on here and look at his leadership at that time. He was both in the Obama Administration and in the Bush Administration prior to that. So, you know, he's clearly infuriated by this president. But he is not without his own faults in this whole game as well.

STIREWALT: Look, Brennan -- we know what Brennan is, and he's a partisan, right? And that's -- CIA directors are supposed to rise above partisanship. I don't know if there's any reason to believe that he didn't do that as CIA director. You know, the current CIA director is a Republican chosen by a Republican, he's a former member of congress. I assume he has opinions of Hillary Clinton. The question is: did it interfere with doing his job? Did it interfere, by the way, in the way he handled the Russia stuff and whether or not they announced or alerted or what the president's thinking was. I don't know all of that stuff. But making those kinds of statements in public, by the way, for Brennan all the time. Like, all over and over, and over he'd like says all that kind of stuff. It does not do much to diminish the thought that partisanship was at play.

MACCALLUM: Yes, let's play Brennan with Trey Gowdy, talking about whether or not Brennan knew that the dossier was funded in part or in whole, at that point, by the supporters of the Hillary Clinton Campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. TREY GOWDY, R-SC, CHAIRMAN OF THE HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE: Well, Director Brennan, do you know who commissioned this Steele dossier?

BRENNAN: I don't.

GOWDY: Do you know if the bureau ever relied on the Steele dossier as part of any court filings, applications, petitions, meetings?

BRENNAN: I have no awareness.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Mollie, the Nunes project, which is ongoing, is looking at John Brennan. I mean, they want to know what John Brennan understood about this dossier, about who was being unmasked. All of it, right?

HEMINGWAY: Right. So, Chris said we know that he's a partisan. We also know that he is a liar. This is a guy who perjured himself under oath before Congress claiming that his agency was not spying on the Senate when it was. So, I don't think that because he said something, you can take it to the bank. When he says that he doesn't know who was funding the dossier, at the same time, he's playing around with the dossier and have good reason to believe he did know precisely that it was funded, and bought and paid for by the Hillary Clinton Campaign and the DNC. That's bad if he's lying about it. But it's also bad if he doesn't know about it and he's supposed to be some top intel chief. But this is -- he's just got problems all around.

MACCALLUM: I'm going to give you last thought there, Basil, before we go.

SMIKLE: Yes, I know, I actually -- I tend to agree with a lot of that, actually. Though, I agree with Mr. Brennan's statements about the president. I don't necessarily believe that that he is -- that he did his job in such a -- at a particularly partisan manner, though. I don't think that there is tremendous evidence of that. But, you know, I'm not going to argue with his assessment of the president.

MACCALLUM: Thanks, guys. Great to see all of you. Thanks for your opinions and your insight tonight. Good to see you, all. Have a great weekend.

STIREWALT: All right. You bet.

MACCALLUM: So, music and movie stars love to promote inclusiveness and tolerance. But what happened when Former Governor Mike Huckabee joined the board of the CMAS? He says, that hate won and he is here with a very strong message for the folks who forced him out. And Republicans, Democrats, global leaders, all shocked when President Trump announced his plan to impose tariffs on imports from countries like China. Tom Rogan, says it's a terrible idea. But hasn't this been Donald Trump's message all along?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: They come over here, they sell their cars, their VCRS, they knock the hell out of our companies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: The rise of China economically was, if you look at it, directly equal to the date of the opening of the World Trade Organization. It has great for China and terrible for the United States. It will be imposing tariffs on steel imports and tariffs on aluminum imports, and you're going to see a lot of good things happen. You're going to see expansion of the companies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Only one day after President Trump announced high tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, the markets continued to not like it so much. They liked it a little better than they did initially; down 75 points for today. It was off quite a bit more than that at one point, but you got four days of losses this week. It was pretty ugly for those -- for the stocks. So, as most of the so-called experts agree, that this is not a good idea for the U.S. economy, including some people in the White House. But my next guest says that there is one saving grace that he found to write something nice about in this. He says, it will actually upset China and that may be the goal. So, here now, Tom Rogan, Commentary Writer at the Washington Examiner. Tom, good to see you tonight. You basically hate everything about this except that right?

TOM ROGAN, COMMENTARY WRITER AT THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Correct. Yes, good to be with you, Martha. That's the basic gist, yes.

MACCALLUM: So, tell me why.

ROGAN: Yes. Well, so, the basic premise of my argument -- apologies -- here is that with China being the key, as I see it, mechanism towards getting North Korea to the table diplomatically in a serious way on the North Korean nuclear crisis. But President Trump taking this action out of the blue, surprisingly, in a way that actually hurts China to some degree, that's a positive step. Because I think following the Olympics, the Chinese had basically come to the conclusion that there was going to be no more negative pressure from the United States and they could essentially play out the clock with North Korea, and I think that shakes this up.

MACCALLUM: I mean, we talk often about China and its desire to become the world dominant country, the world dominant power, and they're trying to do it on every front -- and we're going to show in a moment. But this is something that has been, you know, sort of in Donald Trump's crawl when he was not president for decades. I mean, this might be actually the thing that drove him to run for president in the first place. He has been very unhappy about this trade imbalances for a long time. His people claim that it's going to make such a miniscule change in the price of things. That's their argument. Are they right or wrong, Tom?

ROGAN: Well, I think they're probably wrong in the sense that, yes, it will be marginal in terms of basic canned goods. I mean, we saw Wilbur Ross talking about that today. But the problem is for poor families, that marginal cost has a disproportionate impact. But when you get to the higher end stuff, building high-end parts, the comparative advantage the United States has, for example, building airplanes. That's a problem when you build up that marginal cost. And ultimately, the people who will benefit, yes, President Trump did promise this. I don't think he can be criticized for delivering on what he promised in that regard. But at the policy level, the hundreds of millions of Americans will feel a marginal difference of different degrees, and hundreds of thousands of Americans will feel a marginal gain, and those in the steel and aluminum or aluminum as we say in the U.K.

MACCALLUM: Aluminum -- Stuart Varney says it that way, too. All right. Tom, thank you. Good to see you tonight.

ROGAN: Thank you.

MACCALLUM: So, why was there shock and surprise at this announcement? Remember that this is what President Trump has been promising the American people he wanted to do and wanted to change since the early 80's.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: It's a shame what's happening. Japan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, everybody is taking advantage of the United States.

I think a lot of people are tired of watching other countries ripping off the United States. It's very important that you have free trade. But we don't have free trade right now. Because if you want to go to Japan or if you want to go to Saudi Arabia or various other countries, it's virtually impossible for an American to do business in those countries.

You ever go to Japan right now, and try to sell something? Forget about it. They come over here and they sell their cars, their VCRS. They knock the hell out of our country. Kuwait, they live like kings. We make it possible for them to sell their oil. Why aren't they paying us 25 percent of what they're making. It's a joke.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Some things never change, right? I mean, those are exactly the words with, perhaps, some different countries. He's more upset about China now than he was. Japan was really the country that he was upset about back then. But Guy, you know, this is the disrupter. You know, I'm going to introduce you guys. Oh my, God! Guy, Political Editor at Townhall.com; Jessica Tarlov, Senior Director of Research at Bustle.com. Everybody knows that you guys are both Fox News.

Guy, you know, he's the disrupter, he wants to throw the chessboard up in the whole trade environment. He wants to come in like a bowl in the China shop and then start working on the perimeters of the deal. Maybe it's a nicer situation with Canada, maybe not so bad with the U.K. That's what we've learned about this president, right?

GUY BENSON, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR AND POLITICAL EDITOR AT TOWNHALL.COM: Yes. I mean, I think is a terrible policy. I think trade wars are lose, lose propositions. But to your point, if he wants to be disrupter, and he did talk about this on the campaign trail. He was tipping his hand that he's more protectionist than most Republicans have been in the past. I think the least he could've done is inform his own team that he's going to do it, so they were prepared to roll out what is, in my view, a bad policy, at least they would've done it one voice with preparation. But he didn't do that he caught everyone off guard and blindsided his own policy and communications staff which is stupid politics on top of stupid policy.

MACCALLUM: And this surprises you?

JESSICA TARLOV, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR AND HEAD OF RESEARCH AT BUSTLE.COM: No. If you were asking me.

MACCALLUM: All right. Go ahead, Jessica. This is what we see time and time again, right? The president goes, you know what? Today is the day. I'm going to talk about trade.

TARLOV: And he also had incredibly stressful weeks on other fronts, which I'm sure contributed to this, with Hope Hicks' resignation, which has been described as President Trump actually losing a limb. That attacking Jeff Sessions and Jeff Sessions pushing back, and then the meeting, the bipartisan meeting on gun control where he said, eh, due process out the window, just take the guns and then we'll talk about it. Which obviously his own party was not going to be thrilled about whatsoever, including many of us on the left who do respect due process anyway.

So, I think that contributed to this a lot. But I mean, he's put people like Gary Cohn in an incredibly difficult position, someone who has been vocally against this even on the campaign trail when Donald Trump started talking about this. So, it may be consistent but I agree with Guy it's bad policy, and its bad policy for inside that White House, which I think that it's, you know, I want to say increasingly chaotic, but I think it's just kind of the norm now.

MACCALLUM: So, I mean, you know, just to play devil's advocate. You look at the trade imbalance, $800 billion, I believe. You know, that we do have deals with countries that are not pair. And that's the reason why you've seen President Obama input tariffs at times, President Bush did it at times, because they wanted him to stop dumping, he said, steel and to even out the market so the steel companies in America had a better shot at it, Guy.

BENSON: Yes, the problem is, and I get that, right, this is something that looks unfair. And I'm not just opposing this because I want to oppose Trump. I think it -- the evidence, the economic evidence shows that tariffs and trade wars don't improve the situation for either side. American workers and consumers, and the economy will be harmed by a trade war. And so, politically speaking, one of my concerns is Trump has done an excellent job on the economy. Look at the booming Trump economy because of pro-growth policies that he has implemented. That's one of the biggest things to commend his presidency. This is anti-growth policy that can blunt some of that progress and that, to me, is also a political loss, potentially.

MACCALLUM: It's a great point.

TARLOV: Can I just payback off of that and say, with the midterms approaching and with the increasingly high approval ratings for the GOP tax reform policy, that marginal difference that your previous guest, Tom Rogan, was discussing for poor families and middle-income families could hurt them.

MACCALLUM: It looks like it's going to hurt him on the economy. He's going to probably to change his tune around the edges here.

TARLOV: Maybe by Monday.

MACCALLUM: Good to see you both.

TARLOV: Happy weekend.

MACCALLUM: You too.

BENSON: Bye, Martha. You, too.

MACCALLUM: Students revolt after their popular high school teacher is alleged placed on leave for warning them that a school shooting could happen even in their school in the wake of the Parkland massacre. Some of these students here with their plea to bring him back. And music and movie stars love to promote inclusiveness and tolerance except sometimes. Mike Huckabee, after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: So, we have all seen music and movie stars join their voices in support of inclusiveness and tolerance. But it often doesn't extend to include tolerance of real political or social diversity of thought. This week, Governor Mike Huckabee, never shy about his Christian and conservative beliefs earned a spot on Country Music Associations' Foundation board -- a nonprofit organization that helps to support music in schools.

But within hours, the uproar began. Music Executive, Jason Owen, led the charge telling the CMA, "Huckabee uses language that has a profoundly negative impact upon young people all across this country, not to mention how harmful and damaging his deep involvement with the NRA is. What a shameful choice," he said. The governor resigned from the board to avoid causing "unnecessary distraction to their work." And now, he is speaking out in a new piece today that is titled "Hate Wins". Governor Huckabee joins me now. Good to see you, governor. You know --

MIKE HUCKABEE, FORMER GOVERNOR OF ARKANSAS: Thank you, Martha.

MACCALLUM: -- you write beautifully in this letter about the impact of music on your life, and I would imagine that that was what led you to want to be part of this organization that helped to spread the art to children who maybe wouldn't be able to enjoy them otherwise.

HUCKABEE: Absolutely, Martha. Without music as a child, I wouldn't be talking to you today. I'd be eking out a living trying to pay rent on the little rent house in Southern Arkansas. For me, this was about continuing something that I've been doing for decades, and that's using every means available to try to put musical instruments in the hands of kids in public schools. I did that as a governor. We created mandates for music and art education for every student K through 12.

That's why I was invited on the board. It had nothing to do with my politics or my faith, and I didn't bring either one of those to the board. But obviously, it made some people unhappy. This is the world we live in today. And it's unfortunate, but I don't want to be a distraction for the CMA foundation. I'm going to continue to do everything I can to see that kids get musical instruments and that public schools offer music and the arts for every student in America because it's life-changing.

MACCALLUM: You know, Mr. Owen, who is a music executive, basically took a lot of issue with your views on same sex marriage and said that you had said hateful things about his same sex marriage by saying negative things about same sex marriage in general, and the family that he is building. Do you have anything that you would want to say to him tonight about that?

HUCKABEE: He might be very surprised to know me. He doesn't know me. And I don't know him. And I don't have any hate or animosity toward him. Why would I? I don't know him. And I'm sorry he feels that way. But I'm also sorry that our country is at a place where on the one arena where people ought to be able to get together, putting aside anything from race, or ethnicity, or religion, or politics, or heritage or anything that we could come together and celebrate that one part of life that's civilizes us, which is the arts. And when we can't have that then I fear that our civilization may not be long for this earth if that doesn't even civilize us a little more.

MACCALLUM: You know, I agree. I think that when single issues divide people, where it becomes a blockade to working together on any project, you know, I think that that's a sad state of affairs. I think that there are sort of hot button issues and if you don't line up with people on them or some people on them, they're going to drive you out of town, essentially.

And that's exactly what happened to you. But there are people, I would imagine, who will be on your side of this equation since a lot of people do agree with you about traditional marriage. And they may be less likely to support this foundation because of what happened.

HUCKABEE: And that would be the real tragedy. This shouldn't be about my views on marriage, which are biblical and traditional. It shouldn't be about my politics, which are conservative. It should be about kids getting musical instruments. That's all this was ever about for me. And that's why it's just painful to me. But there's a new maximum today, Martha, that if you want to disagree with someone, rather than respectfully disagreeing, sitting down having a conversation. Maybe not walking away with a different view, but at least on an understanding, today it's let's go after that person personally.

Let's try to destroy their livelihood. If they own a store, let's shut them down. And that's not how we make progress in America. There are people who very strongly disagree with positions I have. Fine, this is America. They're welcome to do it. But, I don't want to hate anybody over this. I don't want to hurt anybody over this. And I'm sorry that some people feel that those are the weapons of choice when it comes to how to have a disagreement with someone on anything.

MACCALLUM: Yeah. I mean, you've got to have people with truly diverse views especially on boards, because then you get a lot of different thinking that goes into the decisions that are made and all of that. So I think it's too bad for this foundation. Governor Huckabee, good to see you tonight. Thanks for sharing your story with us. We appreciate it.

HUCKABEE: Thanks, Martha, great to talk to you.

MACCALLUM: Up next, students fight back after a popular high school teacher is allegedly placed on leave for warning his class about the reality of school shootings. Two of the students protesting his punishment have a strong story and they join us next. Plus, the parent of Timothy Piazza joining with forces of other families who are affected by the deadly side of college hazing, what they want to see happen at campuses bonding with others across this country.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: We want this for Max. We want it for the Piazza's who wanted for everybody that's been affected, and we just don't want it to happen again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: This story developing tonight. Students are fighting back after their popular high school teacher was placed on leave for warning them about a school shooting in the wake of the Parkland tragedy. Trace Gallagher lays this out for us with the back story tonight. Good evening, Trace.

TRACE GALLAGHER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Good evening, Martha. Even students who love 59-year-old history teacher, Timothy Locke, acknowledged his style is unconventional. For example on the website, rate my teacher, Locke gets 4.8 out of 5 stars with students saying he gets off topic easy but is an awesome teacher and guy. And there's really no dispute about what Mr. Locke said in class last Thursday.

Everyone, including Locke, agrees that he was voicing concerns about security at Cherry Hill High School East saying a situation similar to the Florida shooting could happen there because campus police are not armed. Locke then reportedly agreed with President Trump that teachers should be armed, saying he be the one with the gun. Most students were fine with the comments. But at least one, who spoke anonymously to local media, said the remarks verged on reckless. Quoting, we were shocked and taken aback but brushed it off as something he would say. Before, it had never been anything related to him. It was just general commentary.

After the principal was told about the comments, Timothy Locke told Philly.com that he was called into the office, placed on paid leave, had his belongings searched and was ordered to undergo a physical and mental health exam. When asked about his conversation in class, Locke told the website, quote, I was adamantly concerned with the welfare of my students. And his students are clearly concerned about him. His suspension triggered two days of demonstration and a firestorm of criticism from both students and their parents who say they have long appreciated Mr. Locke's candor. Even concerning things like his tour of combat in Iraq, and battle with post-traumatic stress disorder.

A dad whose son was in Locke's class last year said he's baffled at the outcome, quoting, the students love him unequivocally. After the events in Parkland, there was no mention in the schools, there was no addressing the issue with students, and the one teacher that brings up the concerns is suspended. The school district won't talk about Locke because it's a personnel matter, but the district is suddenly implementing a series of school security measures that begin on Monday. Martha.

MACCALLUM: Very interesting, Trace. Thank you so much. So joining me now, two students who are pushing for school officials to reinstate Mr. Locke. Cade Zaris and Justin Prechooko, join me now. Justin, he's your favorite teacher, right? And do you think this is unfair?

JUSTIN PRECHOOKO, STUDENT: Yeah. He's always been my favorite teacher. I've had him since the beginning of the year. And I definitely feel like it's unfair what happened to him.

MACCALLUM: Cade, do you think that teachers in your school should be armed if they're trained, obviously, he's an Iraq war veteran, so I would imagine that's why he said, you know, it'd probably be me because I have experience and I've been trained with a gun. Are you OK with that?

CADE ZARIS, STUDENT: Yeah. Well, I feel if the teachers and campus police are properly trained with a gun and with a firearm, then they should definitely be able to be there with a rifle or with a pistol or whatever in case the school shooting does happen because the way it's been looking, our demographics are very similar to Parkland, so it's very possible that a shooting could happen at our school. And we would feel a lot safer if the teachers and campus police were armed.

MACCALLUM: You know, Justin, originally, when this started, the principal said that anyone who marched or protested was in danger of losing their privilege to, I believe, to attend the prom and to walk in graduation, is that right? And what happened after that?

PRECHOOKO: Yes, ma'am, that's correct. To be honest with you, I kind of just brushed those comments off. I was willing to take a big enough risk like that to -- for my favorite teacher. Like I said, he's my favorite teacher, bar none. So after that, we basically had a couple of -- we had the walk-out, and then after that we had like -- kind of like an open forum in the auditorium led by the principal of our school. And it was basically just a big cycle of question being what happened to Mr. Locke, and the principal saying I can't answer that right now. So it was definitely a lot of secrecy and just a lot of the same thing over and over again. And we, as the student body, definitely started to get frustrated and me, personally, because at the end of the day I just want my teacher back.

MACCALLUM: Yeah. Cade, you know, how do you think your school has handled this whole thing? And do you feel like they're taking the issue that he raised seriously? I know that even some of the leadership in the town has said that they would like to put some armed police officers on your campus.

ZARIS: Yeah. Well, the district did implement a few new safety procedures for our school with people entering and exiting the building. So I feel like they're hearing our voice and are taking action. As for our teacher, Mr. Locke, unfortunately, they have not said anything whether or not he'll be coming back in a soon period of time. So that's a little disappointing. But, the school safety procedures and everything are improving which is very nice to see.

MACCALLUM: You guys, thank you very much. Keep us posted on your story. And we would love to talk to Mr. Locke and have him on as well to kind of get his perspective on what's going on here. But a lot of schools are going through the conversations that you are. And that's why we wanted to share what's going on with your story with everybody else in the country who's watching. Thank you very much, fine young men. Good to see you tonight.

ZARIS: Thank you.

MACCALLUM: You bet, take care. All right. So still ahead this evening, the parents of two young men, both killed in separate college hazing incidents, uniting around something that drives them every single day of their lives. Their powerful story when we come back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I saw my son in a coffin, and now I'm saying something about it. He shouldn't have been in that coffin. That shouldn't have happened. And we're going to do everything we can to change how that-- why that happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: Developing tonight, Louisiana State University announcing that they will enact zero tolerance policy for hazing. It comes after the death of Maxwell Gruver, the 18-year-old freshman, was on the Baton Rouge campus just 29 days before he died while he was pledging Pia Delta Theta. Max's parents Steve and Rae Ann, this is them at his high school graduation with him. They spoke to him before he left about the dangers of hazing.

They even warned him about what had happened to young Timothy Piazza, the Penn State sophomore who died in February 2017 after being left unresponsive for 12 hours at his fraternity house before any of his so- called brothers picked up the phone to call for help. So now, the Gruver's and the Piazza's are joining forces together with other parents of hazing victims to make their voices heard to college leadership and to students across this country.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: Max was a gentle giant. He had an infectious laugh that, you know, he shook with his shoulders every time he laughed and gave the biggest hugs. And he was a goof ball. He loved LSU. He couldn't wait to get there, and he was ready. And we were ready to let him go and experience that part of his life. We never expected what happened to him to happen.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: They had him in a room that was black, dark, with strobe lights going on, loud music, and they would ask him questions about the fraternity or recite the Greek alphabet, and if he got it wrong then they would have you just basically take, I guess, the handle or the bottle of alcohol and just turn it up and continue to drink until they called it a pool, until they told you to stop. His blood alcohol content was .496 the following day. So that night it had to be a lot higher.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm here because we keep saying you need to see something. If you see something, say something. And I saw my son in a coffin, and now I'm saying something about it. He shouldn't have been in that coffin. It shouldn't have happened. And we're going to do everything we can to change why that happened.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: I am here because we need to make a change. We need to stop hazing all together in fraternities, sororities, and other walks of life.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm here because there's strength in numbers. And I think together we can be a powerful force. Nobody is wearing a toga and swallowing a gold fish. This is hard alcohol. This is handles. This is crushing glass and doing planks on broken glass. This is getting branded. This is fighting each other like a fight club. This is wrong. This is not bonding. This is not tradition.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: When Tim's story came out and it's such a horrific story, it got people talking.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: Piazza died in the hospital on February 4th from a traumatic brain injury and a shattered spleen. Prosecutors believe he could have survived had authorities been called sooner.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: And then, seven months later, Max happened and it kept people talking.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: Eighteen-year-old, Maxwell Gruver, an LSU freshman from Roswell, Georgia, was rushed from the fraternity house and died at the hospital.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: And, you know, unfortunately, seven weeks later was another boy, Andrew Coffey, is seven weeks later it kept people talking.

MACCALLUM: Nine men are now facing charges in connection to the hazing death of a Florida State fraternity pledge. Twenty-year-old, Andrew Coffey, died in November. His blood alcohol level was reportedly more than five times the legal limit to drive.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: We've been thrust into this position not by our choice, but it is our choice to be here because we feel obligated to prevent this from happening to other people. And when this happened to the Gruver's, and to the Coffey's, and the Ellis', it was like a knife through the heart that were we not speaking out loud enough, were people not listening? We need to speak out more because we have to stop it.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: If Tim saw what developed from his story, he would have looked at it and he would have been appalled at how he was treated.
He would have been appalled at the indifference to his life that the members of the Beta Feta Pi fraternity showed towards him. And, I think, frankly, I would have a discussion with him and I would said, Tim, that's not you. You don't need to be joining a fraternity. And I think he would have gotten it pretty easily because that's not who he was. That's just not what he did.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think he'd say he was sorry. I think he'd feel bad that this happened, that he would think that he let us down.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: But he didn't let us down. The people that killed him let us down. I think he'd be looking down on us and he'd be proud of the fact that we're carrying this torch and hopefully saving other people in the future. People are listening and the difference is being made. And I think Tim would look down and he'd be happy and say keep going. There's more work to do.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: We found a passage that Max had written in a journal that said God works in funny ways. He sometimes does bad to ultimately create good. And we felt that spreading the word is how we're going to create that good from Max's passing.

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think he would give me one of his big hugs and he'd be like mom, I love you so much. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: We're going to stay on this story. We talk about students being killed in schools. These are students who are being killed on campuses by, in part, by the acts of the people who are supposed to be their friends around them. So, this is a very important topic and we're going to stay on it. Quick break here. We'll be right back with more of The Story.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: Finally tonight, more than 2,000 people gathered in Charlotte today to say goodbye to Reverend Billy Graham. And while attendees included some of those powerful people in the world, perhaps the service would be best remembered for its simplicity. For the wooden casket that was crafted by prisoners in Louisiana, specifically, for him. To remarks by those who knew him and loved him best.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNINDENTIFIED FEMALE: I will preach the word. I will do the work of an evangelist. I will share the gospel. And I will run my race and live my life so that five minutes before I see Jesus I have no regrets. I will live my life to exalt and glorify the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. So I love you, daddy.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: My father preached on heaven, told millions how to find heaven, he wrote a book on heaven. And today, he's in heaven. His journey is complete.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: From the words of his children to his own, he once said, some day you will read or hear that Billy Graham is dead. Don't you believe a word of it. I shall be more alive than I am now, I will have just changed my address. I have gone into the presence of God. Rest in peace, Billy Graham. That's our story for tonight. We'll see you back here on Monday at 7:00. Tucker Carlson is up next.

END

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