This is a rush transcript from "The Story," July 8, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

MARTHA MACCALLUM, ANCHOR: All right, everybody. Breaking tonight, look out below, this is a story that is about to heat up in ways that could get very uncomfortable for some powerful people. As Jeffrey Epstein looks for ways to potentially minimize his future jail time.

Once known as an international moneyman of mystery, Epstein ran in social circles that included presidents and princes. But behind the walls of his mansion, prosecutor say that he was running a sex trafficking operation. And in a bizarre legal proceeding that played out in Florida, he got what amounted to a very sweet deal.

But this time, the Southern District of New York has Mr. Epstein, and this thing may be about to get very ugly.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEOFFREY BERMAN, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: Epstein is alleged to have abused dozens of victims by causing them to engage in sex acts with him at his mansion in New York and at his estate in Palm Beach, Florida. The victims were all underage girls at the time of the alleged conduct. Were given hundreds of dollars in cash. The underage girls were initially recruited to provide Epstein with massages. These massages became increasingly sexual in nature that would typically include one or more sex acts.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Unbelievable. That's where it allegedly happened. Investigators broke in to that door. And they say that they broke into a safe in there, if they just announces today, and said that they seized hundreds of nude photographs of underage girls, and the reports that we've seen that 14, 15 years old, and that age rays marched in and out of this house over and over again over the course of these years in his townhouse.

Today, Epstein pleaded not guilty. Reports are that in some of his address books over the years, and we have to be very careful here because these people that you're looking at right now have not been accused of anything at all but he did have contact with them. Reportedly flying on Epstein's private plane. Bill Clinton did several times in the early 2,000. And, in fact, Bill Clinton has just put out a statement, breaking news on this, this evening. I'm going to show it to you in just a moment.

Also now, President Trump, way back in 2002 called him a terrific guy. Now, over the years, some of his associates were caught enough -- caught up, I should say, in actual accusations involving Epstein.

A young woman says that she was forced to have sex with his friend Prince Andrew and his lawyer Alan Dershowitz. Both of these men have vigorously denied these claims. Buckingham Palace called it false and without any foundation.

Dershowitz, says that the accuser is a proven liar. In 2008, Epstein struck what has been now called the deal of a lifetime with Florida prosecutors. He pleaded guilty only to state charges of child prostitution despite a 53-page investigation that resulted in an FBI indictment. He went to jail for only 13 months.

But during that time, he was allowed to leave, go to his office during the day, and then, check back in, in the evening. Now, the prosecutor handling Epstein's case at that time was Alex Acosta, who is now President Trump's labor secretary.

Here he is during his confirmation hearing because as you would imagine, he was asked about his role in the case back then. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALEXANDER ACOSTA, UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF LABOR: At the end of the day based on the evidence, professionals within a prosecutor's office decide that a plea that guarantees that someone goes to jail, that guarantees that someone registered generally and that guarantees other outcomes is a good thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: All right. So, my next guest demanded after reading this explosive story that came out in Miami Herald just about a year ago asked the Department of Justice to start to look into just how that whole deal in 2008 came about. And whether or not there was a way to reopen this case on different grounds. And the DOJ did open this brand new layer of Investigations.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse joins me now. Senator, thank you very much for being here. What was it about this case that -- you know, drew your attention so strongly, and got you so involved in reopening it?

SEN. BEN SASSE, R-NEB.: Well, this is what government exists to do is to protect the powerless and the voiceless. So, many things in Washington, D.C. that government does it has no business doing. But this is what government is for. It's to defend weak victims like all these girls.

Now, many of them, I guess, are 30-something women. But these little girls were raped by this guy and trafficked by this guy. In the Miami Herald reporting from late November and early December is really incredible. And they did -- those journalists did some really extraordinary work and service to their neighbor. And I chaired the Judiciary Committee's oversight subcommittee. And so, I reached out to the Department of Justice repeatedly in December and January saying they have to reopen this investigation.

MACCALLUM: So, with regard to Mr. Acosta who is the labor secretary now, you heard his explanation at that hearing. He says that the evidence, you know merited that the deal that they struck that he has to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life. That he has did serve time and he believes that there was nothing wrong with the agreement. What do you say to that?

SASSE: Well, let's draw a few distinction. So, first of all, just as an objective manner, this guy victimized dozens probably scores of little girls. And the sentence he got was pathetic, and every mom and dad in America -- frankly, not just moms and dads but anybody with a heart should be heartbroken by what happened here to those girls, to those victims, but also with the absurdity of a sentence that short.

Now, there are two investigations. So, I started demanding this in December, unfortunately, the Attorney General Barr, during his confirmation hearings in January, pledged that DOJ would reprioritize this issue. And in February, they started an investigation. But we should distinguish between two of them.

The criminal matter pursuing Jeffrey Epstein right now is a Southern District of New York investigation. And as disgusting and sick as this story is, this is good news today. That that's the N.Y. has opened this investigation. Lots of good prosecutors there and in the FBI have been looking into this case. So, that's a great investigation.

The other thing that's happening, is the Office of Professional Responsibility inside the Department of Justice has been looking at the question of how could he have gotten this ridiculously light slap on the wrist sweetheart deal?

So what that he's a billionaire? So what that he's rich and powerful and has the best lawyers' money can buy? He victimized a whole bunch of people and law should be on the side of those little girls.

(CROSSTALK)

MACCALLUM: I mean, one of the shocking thing --

SASSE: I'm not going to combat --

MACCALLUM: Yes, I'm sorry. One of the shocking things about the deal that was struck just to put in as an aside here is that it also basically absolved anybody who had any connection with him in any of these situations. You know, any of the people who may have also been there. Is that right?

SASSE: Well, it looks like the non-prosecution agreement -- and I want to say that we're getting near some really technical legal matters. And so, I'm glad we had the Southern District of New York pursuing this prosecution investigation.

MACCALLUM: Yes.

SASSE: But the non-prosecution agreement looks like it protected people who were raping those little girls in Palm Beach. But it looks like it didn't extend to Manhattan. And so, that's what the Southern District of New York has been able to do in reopening this case. I don't want to comment about the particular people inside the chain of command in the Department of Justice 10 years ago because there's an ongoing investigation now that the Office of Professional Responsibility is conducting. And they're going to be reporting back to us in the judiciary committee. And then, we'll have a lot more to say.

MACCALLUM: This tweet came from Christine Pelosi, who is the daughter of Nancy Pelosi. She said, "This Epstein case is horrific and the young woman deserved justice. It is quite likely that some of our faves are implicated, but we must follow the facts and let the chips fall where they may. Whether on Republicans or Democrats."

You know, the dangerous thing here is that you know, we have -- you know, people cross paths with him. And we have to be very careful because these are extremely awful suggestions here.

SASSE: Sure.

MACCALLUM: So, President Bill Clinton just put this statement out, very forceful statement moments ago. Saying that he had absolutely no connecting -- "knows nothing about the terrible crimes that Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has recently been charged in New York." He went on to say, he's not spoken to Epstein in well over a decade and has never been to Little St. James Island, Epstein's ranch in New Mexico, or his residence in Florida, which is where a lot of this was supposed to play out.

There's a story in the New York Post today -- and I think we have pictures of the two young women as they arrived at court. Courtney Wild was 14 years old. She said, "And I was in braces." She said that he convinced her to bring him 70 to 80 girls who were 14 to 15 years old over the course of those years. She's the person on the right.

On the left is Michelle Asada who said that she was, you know, told to give massages that became increasingly sexual in nature. You know, how is this different, I guess, the question is from, you know, I think of these young women in these tragic stories who are basically kidnapped and they're -- you know, held against their will in these cases.

SASSE: Right.

MACCALLUM: And everyone sort of understands that, it's very clean-cut. And even when questions are raised, you know, why didn't you just run away? Why didn't you give up? There's all kinds of psychological things that become in play here that prevent them from doing that.

SASSE: Sure.

MACCALLUM: Do you see a parallel here?

SASSE: Well, first of all, we should just admit that human trafficking is a scourge of our time. You know, we celebrate the 4th of July last week. An America that moved forward and included everybody without regard to race in the great American story. And so, the end of slavery is something that we celebrate in America, rightly. But I don't think a lot of Americans understand, they're actually more slaves on the globe today that at any point in human history.

And so, human trafficking is a scourge and we need to be pursuing this. Again, government does a whole bunch of crap, it shouldn't have any business involved in trying to regulate the size of your soft drinks.

Government ought to be doing a lot more of this going after bastards like this guy. And it shouldn't -- this isn't a time for people to say, always a Republican or a Democrat going to be implicated. Every American should stand on the side of those little girls.

MACCALLUM: Absolutely. We're going to follow this case as it moves forward. Senator Sasse, thank you very much for being here tonight. Great to see you, sir.

SASSE: Thanks, Martha.

MACCALLUM: Coming up next is someone we haven't heard from in a while. President Trump's Secretary of Energy Rick Perry on why he is speaking out after the president's big speech on the environment today.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: President Trump today touting the successes of his administration's efforts to promote a healthy environment arguing interestingly that he says a robust economy and clean energy are not mutually exclusive. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: For years, politicians told Americans that a strong economy and a vibrant energy sector were incompatible with a healthy environment. A strong economy is vital to maintaining a healthy environment. We're unlocking American energy and the United States is now a net exporter of clean affordable American natural gas. We're exporting all over the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Here now in a STORY exclusive tonight Energy Secretary Rick Perry. Secretary, good to see you tonight. Thank you for being with us.

RICK PERRY, UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF ENERGY: Thank you, Martha.

MACCALLUM: You know, I mean, the fact that the President was even giving a speech on the environment raised a lot of eyebrows and had you know, sort of critics going really. We don't think this is really a priority for this administration. What do you say?

PERRY: Well, I'm always amazed that people would say that. This president does care about the environment and he's doing something about it. When you think about the clean energy that America is delivering around the world whether it's in the form of liquefied natural gas or whether it's in our renewable technologies, whether it's in our nuclear energy technologies that are going around the world, we're displacing literally tons and tons of old dirty burning gas emissions and coal emissions in Europe and replacing them with clean-burning natural gas.

So the president has got a great story to tell not to mention the jobs that get created and the wealth and the quality of life that comes with that. So I don't -- I don't find it hard at all that President Trump is talking about the environment, talking about the economy in the same breath.

MACCALLUM: Well, he definitely has a different approach. You know, I think that the EPA under President Obama was criticized by businesses in America for being too aggressive in terms of increasing regulations that businesses felt were you know, unfair in many cases, and you all have worked to roll those back.

You know, the EPA isn't even an agency that we hear a lot about in the Trump presidency. We don't -- you know we haven't heard from you a lot on this front in that. Why is that?

PERRY: Well, I don't know why you haven't heard from me a lot. I travel internationally a substantial amount selling LNG all across the country. 36 different countries now are buying liquefied natural gas from the United States.

And frankly, you know, the EPA shouldn't be heard from when I think about it. This ought to be an agency that's out there doing its work, getting rid of the regulations that are stopping businesses from getting done what they need to do, and putting practices into place that help clean up the environment.

America is leading the world in the reduction of energy-related emissions. I mean, that's a great story. It's one that we ought to be parroting and talking about and being quite proud of. So Thursday, when we had the great tribute to America and American military, one of those stories is about American energy and the freedom that's being delivered around the globe by American LNG in particular.

MACCALLUM: Well, that has been a great story. There's no doubt about that. You know, the critics as I mentioned would talk about the rollback of these regulations, also EPA data shows an increase in fine particulate matter, emissions like smoke from the combustion of coal and oil since President Trump took office. What would your response be to those who point to that?

PERRY: Well, number one, I think they're wrong in their numbers. So when you look at what's happening around the world --

MACCALLUM: But that's EPA data.

PERRY: -- you may -- you may see that from the Europeans from the standpoint of what they're doing from the standpoint of the increases in particulate matter, but I don't find that to be the fact here in the United States.

I think we're removing those older inefficient power plants. I'll give you a good example. In the State of Texas, when I was the governor, NOx emissions went down 60 percent. SOx, the sulfur dioxide emissions went down by 50 percent. We had an almost 20 percent reduction of carbon dioxide.

So the fact is that as we put more old inefficient plants offline and replace them with liquefied natural gas, with gas plants basically, you're going to see a continual reduction of emissions and particulate matter.

MACCALLUM: Just last question for you with regard to climate change. 62 percent of Americans believe that global warming is caused by human activity. do you agree with that?

PERRY: Well, listen, the climate is changing. There's not any doubt about that. We can have our arguments about is it happening for this reason or that. Here's what I think we all agree on that we need to live in a world that has cleaner air and America and American natural gas, American innovation, that's what is going to change the world from the standpoint of having clean air.

So America is leading on that. This president's leading on that. And you know, regardless of what your politics are, you ought to celebrate the victories that the United States is having when it comes to the environment.

MACCALLUM: One last quick one. In April, there were a bunch of stories that said that you were thinking of leaving the agency. What do you say about that?

PERRY: I'm still standing.

MACCALLUM: Are you going to be there for the remainder of this term and into the next if the President wants to keep you there?

PERRY: If the president wants to keep me here, I've got a pretty good idea. I'm going to be standing and doing my work and continue to work with him and continue to work for the American people to really drive the energy economy in this country.

MACCALLUM: All right, well, great to see tonight, Secretary Perry.

PERRY: Thanks, Martha.

MACCALLUM: I hope you'll come back soon. Thank you very much.

PERRY: You're welcome.

MACCALLUM: You bet. Joe Biden defending his record on civil rights saying that his friend President Obama can vouch for him but do the Obama's agree? Anthony Scaramucci and Donna Brazile up next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- about the Kamala-Biden dust-up. He apologized today. You've been following that. Do you have any thoughts about that?

MICHELLE OBAMA, FORMER FIRST LADY: I do not.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. Let me ask you this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Let me ask you a quick 2020 question before I let you go because there was a report that you were quoted as having said at an event in San Francisco, don't tell anybody but I'm announcing in two weeks. So are you announcing for the presidency in two weeks to run?

REP. ERIC SWALWELL, D-CALIF.: I did not say that but I will tell you. I've made a decision. I will announce it soon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: So what a difference a few months can make in this whole crazy process that we're watching. Today Congressman Eric Swalwell's presidential aspirations for this time around officially ended. He pulled the plug on becoming the first 2020 candidate -- he dropped out of the race today. There's a huge --- 24 what, are we down to 23, maybe something like that, announcing that he will instead seek re-election in Congress.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SWALWELL: Today ends our presidential campaign but it is the beginning of an opportunity in Congress with a new perspective shaped by the lives that have touched mine and our campaign throughout these last three months to bring that promise of America to all Americans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: We'll see if that begins a domino effect with some of these other folks. Also tonight, former Vice President Joe Biden defending his record on civil rights over the weekend. This is an important moment for him this speech. He was trying to remind voters in South Carolina of his record and also of course that he worked for President Obama as his VP.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I was vetted by he and ten serious lawyers he appointed to go back and to look at every single thing in my background from finances to anything I had done, everything, and he selected me. I'll take his judgment about my record, my character, my ability to handle a job over anyone else's.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: So did that fix the damage? When former First Lady Michelle Obama was asked the question, here's what she said. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What if anything would you like to say about the Kamala-Biden dust-up. He apologized today. You've been following that. Do you have any thoughts about that?

OBAMA: I do no.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. Let me ask this.

OBAMA: I've been doing this rodeo far too long.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, moving on.

OBAMA: Like no comment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: No comment, she says. Joining me now Anthony Scaramucci, former White House Communications Director and Donna Brazile former DNC Chair and Fox News Contributor. Donna, let me go to you first on that. What do you make of that reaction from the former First Lady?

DONNA BRAZILE, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CONTRIBUTOR: Well, you know, my nieces, they attended that concert and they heard the First Lady and they thought she was right on point. And not only in her message encouraging them to register and vote but when Gayle King did that what I call that really tough round of questioning about whether or not she would support one of the candidates, she said no, we'll wait until the primary is over.

MACCALLUM: But, Donna, Donna, Donna hold on a second. I mean, you know, it was not the most -- you know, she could have said look, I don't have any comment on that, but obviously Joe Biden is very close to us. He was the vice president with -- for eight years with my husband's administration. None of that. There was no like soft-pedal. It's just like no comment.

BRAZILE: Look, I agree, Martha, that this was the right answer for the former First Lady to give. Democrat is on a shopping spree. We want to look at all of the candidates. We want to test them out.

MACCALLUM: That's fine.

BRAZILE: We want to make some judgments on my -- of our own. And we need the Obamas, in the long run, to help us pull out the vote and --

MACCALLUM: Yes. I mean, I think you could -- I think you could do both in a you know, slightly you know --

BRAZILE: No, I strongly disagree. I think it would be premature for the Obamas to come out and put their hands on somebody.

MACCALLUM: I'm not saying they should endorse.

BRAZILE: Let's put our hands. We want to touch these candidates first.

ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI, FORMER COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, WHITE HOUSE: Well, I'm not -- I guess I'm not --

MACCALLUM: That's already been the problem.

SCARAMUCCI: -- I guess I'm not supposed to be on to defend the First Lady. I just want to say, I wish in my White House career I said no comment more often. It would have helped me out a lot. In all -- in all seriousness, I think she's 100 percent has to do what she did there and so I sort of agree with Donna there because she can't really come out for the vice president right now.

And if you look at a tradition and the Obamas are basically traditionalists, they're not going to go out and endorse or try to say anything that's going to skew the situation. Clearly, they like Vice President Biden. He was the vice president for eight years of the Obama administration's term. They're very close.

MACCALLUM: Yes, but that clearly is -- that wasn't -- the message was not how much they know Joe Biden --

SCARAMUCCI: I know you -- I know you didn't like the body language, but I understand the box that she's in and I think she would --

MACCALLUM: If I'm Joe Biden's folks and you're working on the campaign, you're not super excited about that moment. That's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying.

SCARAMUCCI: I think that that's fair.

MACCALLUM: After eight years of service of the vice president.

BRAZILE: Martha, you have -- Martha, you have a point. Martha you have a point.

SCARAMUCCI: But I bet you if he was President Biden and Barack Obama was his vice president -- Michelle Obama was his vice president, you would have to say the same thing in that situation.

BRAZILE: That's right, absolutely right.

MACCALLUM: Elizabeth Warren brought in $19 million with no fund-raisers in Q2. Donna, I know you think that's a pretty big deal.

BRAZILE: You know why? Because she has so much grassroots support and energy. Over the weekend at the Essence Fest, I was, you know, I saw several of the candidates and I have to tell you, she was one that struck a chord with the audience along with Kamala Harris and Mayor Pete.

So, I really do believe that she is not only building a really good, strong grassroots foundation, but she's holding all of these town hall meetings all across the country. She's a sleeper in this race, we better pay attention.

MACCALLUM: Well, it's early on and I hear you. Let's put up the numbers for Q2. President Trump we know, we reported on last week, had a huge hall, $54 million. That's not including the other 50 that the RNC throws in -- Buttigieg $24.8 million, Biden $21 million, then Elizabeth Warren after that at $19 million, Bernie Sanders at $18 million. You know, I mean, she's fourth on the list right now, Donna.

BRAZILE: Yes, but you know what, you can be number five, but the fact is she has enough money to get her message out, to build the grassroots campaign in all of the early states and I do believe that she, like many of the others, she's running a terrific campaign so far.

MACCALLUM: All right, quick thought, I just want to put this up there. President Trump is at 44 percent, his career high approval rating right now. Anthony, is that, you know, a good time to be peaking or I'm sure you're going to say you need to go further?

SCARAMUCCI: No, I think he is going to go, obviously, go further than that. The economy seems to be getting stronger every month, so that's very positive. The one thing that's hurting the Democrats right now if you add up those four, it's $74 million versus $54 million for the president. Too much diffusion in the Democratic Party causing confusion.

MACCALLUM: All right. Guys, we'll have you back soon. Great to have you both. Thank you very much.

BRAZILE: Good to hear from you, Anthony.

SCARAMUCCI: Same here, Donna, nice to see you.

MACCALLUM: All right guys, thank you very much.

So, they were once hailed as the women shaping our future. Now, there seems to be a bit of dispute over what that future should look like. And Nancy Pelosi seems a bit fed up tonight. Tammy Bruce and Geraldo Rivera take that on next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLEY STAHL, CBS NEWS HOST: You have these wings, AOC and her group on one side.

REP. NANCY PELOSI, D-CALIF., SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: No, it's like five people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MACCALLUM: Tonight, an alliance of progressive females in the House is lashing out at their speaker, Nancy Pelosi, after she called out their "squad" for not supporting an emergency border aid bill. One of those squad members is freshman congresswoman, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who fired back today on twitter with this saying "A glass of water could have beat a 20 year incumbent. The green dream, or whatever. Those are not quotes from me," she writes. "They are from the Speaker. Having respect for ourselves doesn't mean we lack respect for her."

In moments, Tammy Bruce and Geraldo Rivera take this on, but first Kristin Fisher has the back story tonight, Kristin.

KRISTIN FISHER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well Martha, these tensions have been simmering for some time, but they really started to boil over after this four progressive freshman House Democrats opposed the border aid bill that was supported by Speaker Pelosi.

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley opposed the bill on the grounds that it did not go far enough to help migrants at the border. They also didn't like the idea of giving more money to fund the president's border policies.

So Speaker Pelosi dropped the House bill and went with the senate version instead, which President Trump signed last week. But things really heated up over the weekend when Speaker Pelosi was interviewed by the "New York Times" and seemingly downplayed the freshmen for its influence by saying "these people have their public whatever and their twitter world, but they don't have any following. They are four people and that's how many votes they got."

Well, those four people have been firing back on twitter and on T.V. Congresswoman Omar called Pelosi's comments "Patetico. You know they are just salty about who is wielding the power to shift public sentiment these days, sis. Sorry not sorry." And here's Congresswoman Tlaib's message to Speaker Pelosi. Listen here.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. RASHIDA TLAIB, D-MICH.: -- honor the fact that we are there, that 650,000 people are represented by each and every single one of us.

It is very disappointing that the speaker would ever try to diminish our voices in so many ways.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FISHER: Now, Pelosi's deputy chief of staff says that the speaker was simply responding to a question about the criticism that this group of freshmen Democrats have leveled against her personally. He said if you throw a punch, you have to be prepared to take a punch. Martha, there is now, I think it's safe to say, plenty of punching on both sides.

MACCALLUM: It looks like it. Kristin, thank you very much. Joining me now, Tammy Bruce, president of the Independent Women's Voice and a Fox News contributor, and Geraldo Rivera, fox news correspondent-at-large. Tammy, let me start with you, what do you make of this schism?

TAMMY BRUCE, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, on one hand it's kind of good news because a lot of people have argued that women are all going to govern the same. That if you get women in there, they're all going to the great, they're going to be better than men, they're going to be fabulous.

Whereas women, as I've always argued as a feminist, women are as complicated as men are. Women can be as bad as men or as good, or as wrong or as right as men have been, and this is a good example of that. Here you've got five women in the same party, very, very different points of view, and going after each other.

But there's a reason why Nancy Pelosi has been in Congress for a very long time and seems to understand that you can't punish people or abandon them based on your politics of wanting to hurt, as an example, President Trump. That there needs to be money at the border, that real lives are being affected.

And at the same time, they argue, the squad if you will, that they seem to think that it's twitter that matters. The "New York Times" made it clear a couple of months ago that the average Democrat is not on twitter, that these are the extremes.

MACCALLUM: The average human being is not on twitter.

BRUCE: Well, exactly. And so it's a matter of being I think experienced enough to understand what the difference is between the actual grassroots and what's going on in social media.

MACCALLUM: All right. Geraldo, what do you see in this battle?

GERALDO RIVERA, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT-AT-LARGE: I see it is as a gender play or rather as a chronological play rather than a gender play. You have the four young horsewomen of the resistance versus old "Queen P" -- Pelosi.

The four kids, you know, the youngest ever AOC, the first Palestinian, first African refugee, you know, the first black woman from the commonwealth of Massachusetts. These are, you know, seminal historic figures of the younger generation, and they want all of it. They want it now.

They want the green new deal. They want free college tuition. They want Medicare for everybody, which is great. Everybody wants it, but Nancy Pelosi, very impressive, 79 years old. In many ways, I think, she's more effective now than she was the last time she was speaker of the house.

She saw that there was a dilemma at the border. If you have these horrible conditions that the four young women were complaining bitterly about, heartfelt complaints, drinking water from toilets and so forth, and yet they were opposed to the bill to fix the problems they were complaining about. Why? Because they were worry that the president would use some of the money for a border wall or that they wouldn't establish standards.

MACCALLUM: Yes, and as we put it out here, that doesn't help those kids who are sleeping on the floor to much.

BRUCE: Yes, exactly.

MACCALLUM: This is Brian Fallon who managed Hillary Clinton's campaign. "The four House freshman whom Pelosi dismisses in the Dowd column have done more to define the vision and moral center of today's Democratic Party than all the message bills pushed by the party leadership combined." And my question is, do you agree with him, Tammy? Do they represent the party?

BRUCE: Well, that's the argument, isn't it -- is that conservatives and others, the Republican Party say this is a representation of who the Democrats are. But if you look at social media, I suppose that might be the case, but consider this. AOC argues that she is a representation of what the nation wants.

Only 11 percent of Democrats voted in her race, and then she only won by 4,000 votes. You know, that is not a representation of not just not the nation, but the Democrat Party itself. But this is the war right now, the civil war, if you will.

Who is going to end up representing them? And I think the Democrats are going to be stuck with this if they don't go out and vote and abandon the responsibility because then individuals who don't represent what the average American who happens to be a Democrat wants are going to be represented by that.

MACCALLUM: Geraldo, last word on this.

RIVERA: But you have to be idealistic. You have to be idealistic. You have to be aspirational if you are a young person. The world is your oyster. Everything is possible.

BRUCE: But then (inaudible).

RIVERA: There will be plenty of time for compromise as you mature in office. You know, some of these Congress people --

BRUCE: No, no, no.

MACCALLUM: You know what, I hear you, Geraldo.

RIVERA: They'll have plenty of time for that. Let them be the bucks now. Let them be the buckaroos.

BRUCE: Let them in when they've got some age and some experience and they know what they're doing.

MACCALLUM: Well, you know what, that's what the election process is for and the people in their district will decide whether or not they love what they are selling in Washington or not.

RIVERA: I think they're deeply invested.

MACCALLUM: But I know where Geraldo is coming from and I think there's always room for that young energy. It just determines whether or not, you know, if that's where the voter is. In the end, it's a quick term of two years, so we'll see. Thank you very much, good to see you both tonight.

RIVERA: Thank you.

MACCALLUM: Thanks Tammy and Geraldo.

RIVERA: You too.

MACCALLUM: So coming up next, it was one of the most contentious confirmation hearings in modern history and tonight we are bringing you the inside story of what happened behind the scenes during Brett Kavanaugh's fight to get on the Supreme Court. From two people who were granted unprecedented access to all the players, next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. DICK DURBIN, D-ILL.: With what degree of certainty do believe Brett Kavanaugh assaulted you?

CHRISTINE BLASEY FORD, ACCUSER OF BRETT KAVANAUGH: 100 percent.

BRETT KAVANAUGH, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE, SUPREME COURT: I'm not questioning that Dr. Ford may have been sexually assaulted by some person in some place at some time, but I have never done this, to her or to anyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAVANAUGH: I'm not questioning, and have not questioned, that perhaps Dr. Ford at some point in her life was sexually assaulted by someone in some place, but what I know is I've never sexually assaulted anyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: That was quite a moment. That was then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh defending himself against explosive sexual assault allegations here on "The Story" just days before his contentious confirmation process captivated the nation.

Now, there are brand-new details about what was going on behind the scenes at that time from coordinated efforts on the left to derail Kavanaugh's confirmation, including paying protesters, to revelations that the Trump team held back dirt on accuser Christine Blasey Ford with the understanding that "any criticism of Ford would be treated as a smear and depicted as victim shaming."

That was not the way they wanted to go. All of this is captured in the very fascinating new book that is out tomorrow, "Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court." Here now, co-authors Mollie Hemingway, a Fox News contributor and senior editor of "The Federalist" and Carrie Severino, chief counsel and policy director at the Judicial Crisis Network.

Ladies, great to have you here and the book is fascinating. I was digging through it throughout the course of the day today. Mollie, what surprised you the most?

MOLLIE HEMINGWAY, CO-AUTHOR, JUSTICE IN TRIAL: Well, there was so much that was interesting. We thought this was a very important story, what the country went through was really difficult. We interviewed more than 100 people, the president, Supreme Court justices, and senators.

And what really struck us I think was just these stories of courage, you know, people like Ashley Kavanaugh, who prays that her husband is not going to get the nomination. She'd gone through this before. She knew how brutal it was. Once he gets it, she is right there with him.

After she does your show, her hairdresser recommends she comes in for a touch up and while she's there she has to deal with the revelation of some completely scurrilous allegations about serial gang rape and just what it was like to go through that.

And women like Leland Keyser, who tried very hard to be able to support her friend. This is a lifelong Democrat who did not want Justice Kavanaugh confirmed to the Supreme Court, and she was expected and in fact, pressured to come up with something to support her friend.

She was unable to. She remembered that summer extremely well. She did not remember anything that would help out Christine Blasey Ford and she ends up having to tell the FBI that. That took amazing courage given her political views.

MACCALLUM: Yes. Carrie, what about you?

CARRIE SEVERINO, CO-AUTHOR, JUSTICE IN TRIAL: Yes, you know, there are so many exciting new things. I thought, I mean, Mollie and I both were really involved in this process, her as a journalist covering it, me working a group that was really supportive of his nomination.

We kind of thought we knew it all and we learned a lot of new things. One of the fun stories I thought was how Justice Kennedy retired and how he was able to do so without anyone finding out. I mean, not only coordinating this.

He had a former clerk of his who worked in the DOJ who he met secretly with at one of the Smithsonian sculpture garden to tell him get this news to the White House. Don McGahn has to get this to the president somehow without any -- he wasn't even officially told Kennedy was retiring.

So the first person Kennedy told really was the president himself, and what was even more interesting to us is finding out that there were actually -- the other Supreme Court justices were surprised as well when he told them right before he headed over to the White House.

They said we didn't even see it coming because he had been -- he had been hiring clerks, he had been talking about the next term as if it was coming. I thought that was really --

MACCALLUM: He must have very much wanted to keep it to himself, his decision, and he succeeded in doing that, which isn't so easy these days. I was of course interested having done the only interview that Brett Kavanaugh did, and as you point out, the only interview that a Supreme Court nominee has ever done.

It became obvious to the people that we're working with him on his nomination that he had to go out there and he had to respond to these allegations. In fact, the gang rape allegation came out I think late the night before or early that morning so I asked him about that in the interview.

They were -- I thought you captured the feeling in that room perfectly. There must've been 30 people in that room and they were very nervous, and it showed in the way he responded to the question.

HEMINGWAY: Even looking at how the media thought that interview was going to go and how they were predicting that it would be a very easy interview for him. It actually was not an easy interview for him, and he ended up learning a lot about how he would need to be in his eventual -- the eventual testimony.

MACCALLUM: I mean, he had not answered any of these allegations.

HEMINGWAY: And he was -- even in --

MACCALLUM: And he answered all of them.

HEMINGWAY: Right. He was encouraged by his Bush friends to be really calm and not too aggressive and as Don McGahn would remind him, you are a Trump nominee. You need to act like it.

MACCALLUM: You need to fight, as you say in the book and they want to --

HEMINGWAY: And getting to see that evolution.

MACCALLUM: But then it sort of, you know, as sort of robotic at times as he was in the interview that I did with him and his wife Ashley, he was the opposite. It was like -- I say it was like the cork got popped out of him when he walked into that hearing room, Carrie. He was completely -- he was yelling, he was, you know, perhaps may be overboard.

SEVERINO: Right. Well, I think one thing we found in the reporting we did is everyone pretty much agreed that when the moment when he was talking to Senator Klobuchar, yes, he definitely went too far.

But I think also a lot of people realized that he had to bring his emotions and that was something interesting that we saw throughout the process he had had that. They had been doing moots and practicing, answering some of these questions and the frustration and the indignation had been there and it was kind of a battle between how do I display this and talk about it.

We have the moments where he is deciding as he's getting ready to go out and thinking how do I present this, and I think everyone saw that was a turning point and he was -- he stayed strong and of course, you know, President Trump stayed strong and supported him as well, so it was really - -

MACCALLUM: Yes, absolutely he did. In that moment, right, he's got all these people telling him you should be like this, you should be like that, and he's in the worst moment of his life, accused of most heinous possible allegations, which he said that he, you know, did not do.

I thought it was very interesting to hear about Ashley and the role that she played and when he came back to the holding room after that moment with Amy Klobuchar, she said you got to fix this.

HEMINGWAY: Right, she tells him to ease up a bit, and so he goes right back out and he does that. But getting that kind of inside access was great. "Justice on Trial" was not just though about the Kavanaugh confirmation itself, but really about what the entire country went through and how important it is to make sure we all care about due process and rule of law and the presumption of innocence until guilt is proven.

MACCALLUM: Yes, I mean, you know, does it have an impact what America went through, Carrie, in this and what you guys write about in your book on the next round?

SEVERINO: We certainly hope so. I mean, that's one of the reasons we wrote "Justice on Trial" is because it's getting so ugly what's happening with these confirmation hearings and one of the things we saw is that it's the only way to get better is to understand what has happened.

So each -- we've learned something from each of these attacks whether it's on Robert Bork or Justice Thomas. And I think if we hadn't learned from those, it would've been harder to understand how to deal with the Kavanaugh confirmation. We need to learn from us if we are to not have -- become even uglier next time.

MACCALLUM: I got to go but we'd like, in one word, is anyone about to retire on the Supreme Court?

SEVERINO: Not that we know of but anyone's guess.

MACCALLUM: All right. We'll be watching. Thank you very much. Congratulations on the book. It's really good. "Justice on Trial." Still more of "The Story" coming up, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETE HEGSETH, FOX NEWS HOST: So, your sister, Colleen, has a liver disorder and you as her brother have decided to step up and donate a portion of yours.

ED HENRY, FOX NEWS CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's been a long journey and it's really -- it's good to talk about it. It's just hard to -- I hope it helps people because (inaudible). I'm going to give 30 percent of my liver and amazingly that 30 percent will become 100 percent in my sister.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACCALLUM: Our very own Ed Henry, emotional of course while sharing the news that he will soon donate a part of his liver to his sister, Colleen, who suffers from a hereditary disease. Earlier today I sat down with Ed, we talked about this decision and how he's feeling ahead of the surgery,

The full unedited, untold story available now at foxnewspodcast.com. I hope you'll check it out. We wish Ed well. And that is "The Story" on this Monday, July 8th. We'll see you back here tomorrow night at 7:00. Have a great night.

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