BILL HEMMER (CO-ANCHOR) I want to bring in Josh Holmes now, former chief of staff to Sen. Mitch McConnell. Josh, how are you doing, good morning to you. We have three great topics for you. We heard from [Megan] Rapinoe twice already. I just want to -- in one of the latest interviews, she says, “your message is excluding people” -- talking to Donald Trump -- “you're excluding me, you're excluding people that look like me.” I've heard her talk about equal pay. That is she was clear -- but to what else is she referring, Josh?
JOSH HOLMES (FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF FOR SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL): Well, you know, I don't know. Let me just say at the outset that I am one of the millions of Americans that was incredibly inspired by the women's soccer team. I thought the swagger that they had the world stage was just awesome, represented our country really well. But here's my advice to Ms. Rapinoe and others. You have an incredible platform at this point. And you have a platform that can make real change. So try to be more of a sort of inclusive team player here, where you pull people in, rather than push people away. And what she's doing is sort of auguring towards a more partisan point of view that honestly is not going to serve her very well. In my view, if you really want to make change, don't go amongst the partisans and slam Donald Trump, go to the White House and talk to him about it. I think she might find out that equal pay is something that just about everybody agrees with.
HEMMER: Well that's an interesting point. She has gotten all the attention. I don't know how the rest of the players on that team feel.
HOLMES: That's right. That's right. No, I think that's totally fair. And, in fairness, I think what we do as a media culture sometimes, is focus on the most controversial aspects and not sort of the overriding things that pull us together. That team certainly pulled America together. I would hate to squander that opportunity on focusing on something that pulls us apart.
