BRIAN WILLIAMS (CO-HOST): Gene, what do you think?
EUGENE ROBINSON: Well, I go back to what I said way earlier in the evening, which is the really important thing, is how this speech sounded to people who were watching from their living rooms and/or their bedrooms. And you know, it was an angry speech for angry people. He painted this very grim, dystopian picture of America, an America racked with crime and violence even though crime rates are actually way down. Crime is half of what it was in the '90s. But he paints this picture in order to present himself as the solution. “I am your voice,” he says. And in identifying the problems, he talks about crime in the inner cities, where again, it's down. But, and he talks about African Americans and killings of police officers. He talks about illegal immigrants as being responsible for crime and --
WILLIAMS: Roaming free.
ROBINSON: Roaming free, right, as people do, right? They roam. You know, and frankly, this was a message, at least to my ears, to white America: be afraid. I will protect you.
