This is a rush transcript of “The Five” on March 29, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

GREG GUTFELD: All right, I’m Greg Gutfeld along with Judge Jeanine Pirro, Piers Morgan, Jessie Watters and she plays volleyball on a ping pong table, Dana Perino, THE FIVE.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KATE BEDINGFIELD, WHOTE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: I think the words of the president here were incredibly powerful. He spoke personally about the moral outrage that he felt which is shared by people all across the world. It does not mean he is articulating a change in policy. It does not mean he’s laying out a change in U.S. policy.

Does he regret that those words at the very end of the speech overshadowed a larger message, which obviously he put a lot of thought into the days leading —

BEDINGFIELD: Absolutely not. He spoke from the heart.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUTFELD: Is that Michael Scott and Pam? Brand new spin from the White House as they try to walk back their walk back after President Biden walked back his walk back over what he said about removing Putin. Apologies if that sentence just made your brain walk back. The White House now claiming Biden was speaking in his personal capacity about Russia’s president even though they said he wasn’t several times.

Trying to figure out what Biden actually meant is so confusing that Joe actually had to use note cards just to get his story straight. It even came with the helpful label tough Putin Q&A talking points in case he got mixed up with other cards. And if you think this turned into a total disaster, don’t worry. Don Lemon’s got the White House covered.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: Quite honestly I think this is a media manufactured story. I think we should ease off a little bit because that’s not what the president said. He did not say regime change.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUTFELD: Okay. It’s all just manufactured like the crime wave and Hunter’s laptop. Jesse, the personal capacity line.

JESSE WATTERS, FOX NEWS HOST: Yes, 25th amendment, right?

GUTFELD: Yes.

WATTERS: Do you remember that?

GUTFELD: Yes.

WATTERS: Remember that? What was — what did Trump say? Television lying – –

DANA PERINO, FOX NEWS HOST: Camera (ph).

WATTERS: Right. The best scores ever. Yes. I don’t know. This seems a little more serious this time. Last time it was trivial. They’re — I think they might have to stop playing the hail to the chief when this guy walks in the room because he is not up to performing the duties we expect as a commander-in-chief.

Has anybody seen the raw footage of his sit-down lunch at the mess hall in Poland with the American soldiers? The media is covering this up, but I got to the bottom of it.

GUTFELD: Oh jeez.

WATTERS: He walks in the room and there’s no electricity. He starts telling a story about the last time he went to Iraq and saw Beau Biden. And he says, oh, Beau Biden wanted to hide his name so we changed it to Hunter. And then the story never landed and the whole place was silent. And then he just sits down and gets a piece of pizza. And I remember seeing the footage of Bush and Trump, you know, you go to a mess hall in a war zone wherever you are and you’re serving the food you’re lighting it up. There’s selfies everywhere and people are juiced up. This place you could have heard a pin drop.

PERINO: Yes.

WATTERS: He sits down and he shoves a piece of pizza in his mouth. And you know what happens next, he starts choking. There was a jalapeno pepper on it and pepperoni and he starts having trouble getting it down.

GUTFELD: Right.

WATTERS: And they notice, the soldiers notice, and they start assisting him and they start handing him a glass of water. And he sips on the water and then he starts taking a napkin and he rolls up the napkin and he starts dabbing his forehead and he puts it down.

PERINO: Hot pepper.

WATTERS: There it is. Now, is this the way you expect the president of the United States to act with our soldiers, a couple of miles from a hot war with Russia? No. You expect more from someone like this. The wheels are falling off. This guy’s like a vintage car. You see the gauges, the brakes are shot, it’s no longer fun to drive it any place. This now dangerous.

PIERS MORGAN, FOX NEWS HOST: Do you know why — do you know why — yes, but you know why he ate the pizza like that?

WATTERS: Why?

MORGAN: Well, Leon Panetta gave us the answer yesterday. It’s because he’s Irish.

WATTTERS: He’s Irish.

MORGAN: And now being Irish, I’m Irish.

WATTERS: Yes.

MORGAN: Being Irish is now the go-to excuse apparently for every one of these ridiculous farces and I thought the moment yesterday when Peter Doocy very calmly as he does brilliantly just talked him through all the ridiculous gaffes then all the ridiculous walk-backs and Biden just stared straight at Peter Doocy and went, none of that happened.

GUTFELD: We got that tape.

WATTERS: Do we have that tape?

MORGAN: None of that happened. It just didn’t happen he said.

GUTFELD: Here you go.

MORGAN: Have we got it?

GUTFELD: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER DOOCY, FOX NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That other leaders in the world are going to start to doubt that America is back if some of these big things that you say on the world stage keep getting walked back.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICEA: What’s getting walked back?

DOOCY: It made it sound like just in the last couple days, it sounded like you told U.S. troops they were going to Ukraine. It sounded like you said it was possible the U.S. would use a chemical weapon. And it sounded like you were calling for regime change in Russia, and we know —

BIDEN: None of the three occurred.

DOOCY: None of the three occurred?

BIDEN: None of the three.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MORGAN: I mean, what does he mean none of the three? We heard you say it. But you’re the president of the United States. We heard you say each of those things. Then we read the walk-backs from your own administrative White House press office. And then we saw you walking back the walk-backs and now you’ve moved to full denial mode, or perhaps more sinisterly he’s moved to completely forgetting mode.

GUTFELD: Yes, that could be.

MORGAN: But he genuinely doesn’t remember ever saying it.

GUTFELD: It could have been, it could have been the hot pepper. You never know —

(CROSSTALK)

GUTFELD: Yes. You know judge, I’m a — I was gonna say — ask you about, you know, having your most basic ideas on note cards, but I have that written down as a question. So who am I, who am I to judge, judge?

JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS HOST: Well, I’ll tell you this. I mean, either he doesn’t understand the consequences of what he said or he doesn’t remember. In either case, it’s time for the 25th amendment. And you know who has to get involved in the 25th amendment?

GUTFELD: Oh, jeez.

PIRRO: The vice president, Kamala Harris, would be all in on that one. But the problem really is that he’s on the world stage. He is in a nation that is literally next door to a country where there is fighting and we’re on the verge of Zelenskyy thinks World War III.

And when he calls, when he says for god’s sake this man cannot remain in power, Macron has to pull him back. They have to have a phone call. The ambassador to NATO has to pull it back. These are very dangerous, dangerous times.

And by the way, the Russians themselves are fed up. Their economy is shot. They’re losing people they don’t even know how many people. Their ruble doesn’t amount to much anymore.

GUTFELD: That’s bounce back, the ruble.

PIRRO: Yes. Is it?

GUTFELD: I actually read that.

PIRRO: When did it bounce back, today?

GUTFELD: Yes. It bounced back. It’s actually showing — doing well against the Euro. Somebody was watching FBN today. I pretended I read an article. No one believes me.

MORGAN: But didn’t you find — didn’t you find the Irish thing, the most ridiculous thing (inaudible) ever heard.

GUTFELD: Yes. That’s when you’re digging.

WATTERS: You know what that reminds me of? Remember when Cuomo was getting a little handsy and he goes, hey, I’m Italian. I just touch people.

GUTFELD: Yes. You know, Dana, do you want me to ask you a serious question?

PERINO: Sure.

GUTFELD: You and I both love reading Niall Ferguson. He believes that our White House wants to prolong — to prolong this war to bleed Russia dry, but also to defend the Ukrainians because it satisfies public opinion, but without costing American lives. However, you’re risking thousands dead Ukrainians and millions of homeless just to bleed the country dry. That doesn’t seem like a moral stance.

PERINO: You know, well, one thing I want to get to that question, but on the point about the president having note cards, some people have them all right.

GUTFELD: Right.

PERINO: But one of the things he was saying is he was expressing a moral outrage.

GUTFELD: Right.

PERINO: When you express a moral outrage you don’t need notes.

GUTFELD: Exactly.

PERINO: Because that comes from the heart. I also do not believe that you can claim that a president of the United States on the world stage at a speech that they build as the most important speech so far that the president has given in this war is done in his personal capacity.

GUTFELD: Yes.

PERINO: That’s just not believable to me and that’s why the European leaders were like whoa, let me back away from this and they had to have that meeting this morning. To Neall’s point, Neall Ferguson.

GUTFELD: Yes. Not Nile (ph)

PERINO: Not Neil (ph), not Nile (ph).

GUTFELD: And Beau not (inaudible).

WATTERS: The “U” is silent.

PERINO: I think that what he’s talking about might be the practical result of what’s going on.

GUTFELD: Right.

PERINO: I don’t know if it’s the intention or the strategy because it seems to me if you wanted to bleed Russia dry you would have started with the sanctions, which would have had the benefit of possibly deterring this whole situation in the first place. And certainly Zelenskyy thinks that.

GUTFELD: Yes.

PERINO: Because now you have a situation where multiple cities are destroyed. You have millions of people that are displaced. You have a Russian economy that is going to be in dire straits even if the ruble does come back a bit. They are in a terrible situation.

But the one thing that Biden, I think he does not want to do and we should not want, is for this to continue because of the risk of miscalculation or misrepresentation as you saw on World War I that led to the killing of millions, which led to the resentments of the Germans, which led to the World War II.

All of that could be stopped, and that’s why I think that we should be hopeful that this these talks are at least are ongoing.

MORGAN: Can I ask one difficult question because I know this flies against the general narrative, but at what point is the red line for our morality – –

PERINO: Right.

MORGAN: — the west? At what point do we watch maternity hospitals being bombed, refugees being targeted and murdered on the way out as they try and escape, Americans in lines for bread because they’re starving being gunned down, holocaust survivors being incinerated in their homes as happened last week? What is our red line because we know what Hitler’s was and we know when we stood up to him.

I just look at what’s going on and I’m — I keep reading that Putin’s losing. This is all going badly. Ukraine are winning. I don’t believe any of that. I think Putin is doing exactly what he’s set out to do. He’s ruthless. He’s barbaric.

He’s getting more ruthless and more barbaric and we’re all sitting back hiding behind, well, he hasn’t attacked a NATO country, but I bet if he prevails in Ukraine and attacks a NATO country what’s he going to say? He’s going to say if you come after me I’ll use my nukes and we’re going to face the same moral quandary of a guy taking nuclear armament as a protective shield to genocide.

And I just asked the question because at some point we’re going to have to stand up to him. Otherwise, where does it stop? I’m just throwing that out there.

GUTFELD: All right.

PERINO: Good point.

GUTFELD: There you go. Coming up, Chicago’s mayor getting extra police protection after calling to defund the cops.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WATTERS: Stunning hypocrisy from the corrupt Democrats who rule over crime ridden Chicago. As homicides skyrocket in the windy city, up 29 percent year-to-date since 2020, Mayor Lori Lightfoot can sleep soundly at night thanks to her secret army of cops. In 2020, a special unit of ready, 70 officers was reportedly created to keep the mayor safe, in addition to the normal 20-cop strong security detail she already has.

This is really rich considering Lightfoot was a major advocate for cutting funding to police.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LORI LIGHTFOOT, MAYOR OF CHICAGHO: It is essential that the police department take responsibility for the way in which it’s policed and the way in which it has in many instances alienated people of color particularly African-Americans in this city.

We live in a city that is traumatized by a long history of police violence and misconduct.

We can’t rely upon the police to provide public safety.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATTERS: Judge, why would you need 70 officers to protect someone like that?

PIRRO: Listen to this. I am going to shock you. I have spoken to two rather significant high-level people in law enforcement and they tell me what I didn’t expect I would be saying. And that is that the number 71 is not that unusual because you’ve got 24/7 operation, okay. And so it’s around the clock. And you’ve also got the mayor’s house, her security detail, and city hall.

So if you think about that, that’s a lot of people assigned. Now that doesn’t mean that I forgive her for all her lunacy because I think that what she has done is terrible. Her job instead of blaming the police and saying the city of Chicago is traumatized because of the police, she should know from her own statistics that when she stopped defunding the police and decided to somewhat up the budget from not to where it was, but a little bit from where she defunded it, crime started to go down a teeny bit.

She understands that police on the streets are what stops crime. And so she has a right to have her own, you know, security detail. I had a security detail when I was a D.A. I mean, it is — its serious business and only they know what is appropriate.

GUTFELD: That’s the — it’s easy to talk about defunding the police when you’ve got up your own brigade, right? I mean, this reminds me exactly of like TV hosts talking about how important the shutdowns were because we still did our shows, like she has — she never had to deal with the consequences. She never had to talk to the victims or worry about crime because it didn’t touch her.

This has been a problem with every — in every city. They have to be stripped of this stuff. The moment that they say that they’re going to defund something they should be stripped of it immediately because they’ve got a live. They should walk the walk, right?

PIRRO: Well, that’s a different issue. I mean, the question is, is 71 appropriate for your house, for the mayor’s office, and your personal detail, the answer is yes, but I agree with you. People like Corey Bush, I mean, we want to defund the police, we hate the police, they’re responsible, and yet you’re spending $200,000 a year whatever the crazy number is. It’s wrong.

WATTERS: Joe Biden’s still really on the defensive about to hold to fund the police then so he’s throwing a lot of money at the issue and he was asked about it. I’m not sure if he had a note card for this answer, but let’s listen, Dana.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN: Is any of it related to political pressure from republicans saying that Democrats are soft on crime that, you know, that you guys are careening to the left?

BIDEN: Ain’t that kind of fascinating? When I first got elected I was being beat up because I supported the police too much for the previous 30 years. No, it’s what I think.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MORGAN: A creepy whisper.

PERINO: I think that —

MORGAN: It’s so creepy.

WATTERS: It is.

PERINO: I think that is what he thinks and I don’t think it is for political reasons that he has put this in the budget. Maybe a little bit, but his political problems for the midterms aren’t necessarily on the right or in the center. His problems are on the left.

Remember what AOC, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said last week, nobody on the left is energized by him. Nobody wants to get out there and campaign. They feel disappointed by him. And mid-term elections are about your base and he needs something for the base. That’s why he put in the billionaires tax, which probably won’t go anywhere and it was easy for him to say give more — police — money to police. I think he personally believes it, but all the people on his left do not.

WATTERS: Piers, you went out and did a man on the street segment, which we’re going to be airing tonight at 7:00. Were you assaulted immediately upon leaving the building by all these people out here in New York City?

MORGAN: Celebrated would be (inaudible).

WATTERS: Celebrate.

MORGAN: Celebrated. You know what this reminds me of though, this defund the policing. It’s the worst political slogan I think imaginable, you know, like 99 percent of people, they hear and go, what the hell are you talking about?

So politically it’s a complete fiasco, but if there’s one thing that is guaranteed, doesn’t matter where you are in the world, guaranteed to enrage an electorate it is elected officials preaching one thing and doing the complete opposite.

And we’ve got a very interesting case in the U.K. right now with partygate where Boris Johnson, the prime minister, and his entire Downing Street staff having announced all these lockdown rules for the country and very draconian restrictions for, you know, 18 months. It turned out they were partying breaking their own restrictions every single week.

In fact, 20 of them got fined today. We don’t know who they are yet. It may even include Boris Johnson in which case his own position might become untenable. But the rage is not about the fact they were having parties. And the rage about this is not that Mayor Lightfoot is having her own security. I think most people accept that she needs it.

The rage is the brazen hypocrisy. I’d like to defund hypocrisy because that is a corrosive thing for any elected official. It’s the fact that she was out there saying we don’t need so many police, but actually I do. You don’t so you can all suffer the crime. You know my youngest son is currently at University in Chicago and he says it’s scary out there.

WATTERS: Is that because he’s your son or is it because —

MORGAN: That’s the best thing about being in Chicago. People are stopping him in the streets saying, wow, I love your dad. No.

WATTERS: Right.

MORGAN: It’s — we’ll see that on the video later unless you’ve (inaudible). Have you?

WATTERS: Yes. We’re going to make some minutes.

GUTFELD: What’s up with Boris’ hair?

PIRRO: Yes.

MORGAN: I hate the thing about Boris’ hair. I’ve seen him. I’ve seen him do this. I did a show called “Question Time.” Panel show in the U.K. about politics, and it was all straight when he arrived in Kent. And I watched him look around like that and then ruffle it up. It’s completely deliberate as most things are with —

PIRRO: What? Does he think it advantages him?

MORGAN: Yes. He thinks the sort of, you know, slightly wild scotty (ph). He sees himself as a kind of Heathcliff —

PERINOI: No he spends much time on making his hair look like that as we do in the make-up room.

PIRRO: Yes.

WATTERS: Speak for yourself, Dana. I wake up like this. All right, ahead, Dr. Doom is back, Fauci out with a new warning. We’ll tell you about all that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MORGAN: Well, Dr. Anthony Fauci warning of new COVID lockdowns as cases of an omicron sub-variant surge around the world. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY FAUCI, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF MEDICAL ADVISER: I don’t want to use the word lockdowns that has a charged element to it, but I believe that we must keep our eye on the pattern of what we’re seeing with infections. If things change and we do get a variant that does give us an uptick in cases and hospitalization, we should be prepared and flexible enough to pivot towards going back at least temporarily to a more rigid type of a restriction such as requiring masks indoor.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MORGAN: But Americans apparently have had enough of the lockdowns. According to a new poll, 62 percent opposed bringing back mask and social distancing rules. This issue with Fauci, Greg, he reminds me a bit of Governor Cuomo. That at the start of the pandemic they were sort of heroic figures and it went massively to their heads.

GUTFELD: Right.

MORGAN: So the more praise they got, the more they went on television. And the worst thing I think for an elected official or a health official in a pandemic is to combine massive ego with a craven desire to be on television. Now, that may sound rich coming from me, but I’m talking specifically about elected officials and health officials.

The more America sees a Fauci, the more it looks like it’s about him —

GUTFELD: Right.

MORGAN: — and not about actually the reality of people wanting to get on with their lives.

GUTFELD: You got to know when to leave, you know. That’s been my — oh, don’t even go. I just don’t go, but you know, he’s had a taste of this, right? And also there’s something addictive about telling people how to live their lives.

MORGAN: Yes.

GUTEDL: I think I call it the ideology of punishment, it’ll be my next book. But it’s like it’s a combination of like identity politics, COVID, climate. It’s like I have to — it’s not enough to me to tell you that you’re wrong. You have to be punished and I’m going to punish you like over climate restrictions. I’m going to punish you over COVID. I’m going to punish you because of your identity.

That’s now coming together and he and he’s one of the — he’s one of the four horsemen of punishment, right? He’s addicted to sadism and I’ve been there.

MORGAN: Jesse?

WATTERS: Yes.

MORGAN: The thing about it is we don’t want to hear what might happen that’s bad. What people want to hear and the polls clearly reflect this massive surge away from wanting restrictions to the opposite because people want a bit of feeling good about life again. They want a bit of freedom. They want to get on with their lives, right? Dr. Doom appears and says it may be terrible.

WATTERS: You know why doctor doom went on the BBC? Because Americans are sick and tired of listening to him. That’s why. Next trump interview I do, you know what I’m going to ask him first question? Not about the hole-in- one.0 I’m going to ask him, what is the biggest mistake you made?

And I know what he’s going to say. And if he says something else, I’ll tell him what his biggest mistake was. His biggest mistake was listening to Fauci on lockdowns. That was the biggest mistake we ever made. It was China’s idea. It’s a dumb idea. We’ve never done anything like that before in pandemics. It destroyed small businesses. It destroyed children. It isolated Americans so we — it killed our spirit. We’re people that need to be next to each other.

GUTFELD: Not me.

WATTERS: And it’s — well, everybody but you —

GUTFELD: Yes.

WATTERS: And you can even back it up because we shut the economy on and off. You can even blame inflation and the supply chain stuff too. So, it all goes back to Dr. Doom. And he’s so arrogant, to your point, so arrogant and stubborn that he won’t admit that he choked. And he needs to apologize to me personally. And I will only accept his apology unless he (INAUDIBLE).

MORGAN: I’d like to watch that. Dana, I mean, the debate about lockdowns is an interesting controversial one. I supported the first lockdown at the very start of the pandemic in the U.K., because I felt with no vaccine and no apparent hope of any vaccine, and no therapeutic drugs to treat it, and with the thousands of people dropping dead every day, I didn’t know what else we could do before we found out what we were dealing with.

PERINO: Yes.

MORGAN: But after that, once you get the drugs, once you get the vaccines, once it’s demonstrated that you can get on with your lives and you either get jabbed up or you don’t it’s your choice, but if you — if you do got a better chance of getting out the other end —

PERINO: Yes.

MORGAN: You have to learn to live with the virus. And him coming back like sort of the ghost of Christmas past, wanting his media airtime again to warn us something that may never happen, I think is a depressive tool we just don’t need.

PERINO: Well, it’s also just not based on the facts, right? So, in March of 2020, everyone hung on every word the CDC said. We were hungry for it in March of 2022, everyone is like blowing them off. And it’s very dangerous to have a centers for disease control that is not trusted or believed or look to, because there probably will be another pandemic, hopefully not, one as serious as COVID, but it could be.

GUTFELD: We’ll be dead — we’ll be dead by then.

PERINO: It might — well, that could be. That could be. I do think that President Biden should consider making a change there and to do it fully and to reestablish the credibility that is needed out of CDC because it’s also — it’s not just for the United States, it’s for the world.

I also don’t think that the governors are going to go for this, right? It was the blue state governors that led the way to start pulling away, one because their citizens demanded it, but also they saw all the polling, and they knew that that was just not going to apply.

MORGAN: Judge I mean, the problem is he’s obviously a very eminent guy in his field. He’s done a lot of great work with things like HIV and so on. But I do feel watching him, it’s the ego is driving all this, isn’t it?

PIRRO: Well, there’s no question that ego is driving it. There isn’t a TV show this man hasn’t been on for the last two years.

MORGAN: He should be on THE FIVE.

WATTERS: He’s even been on “WATTERS WORLD.” I’m not kidding. He went on “WATTERS WORLD.”

MORGAN: No.

PIRRO: Yes, he is.

WATTERS: He wants to be on air, that man was.

MORGAN: That’s a desperate man.

WATTERS: I know.

MORGAN: And I figure, somebody on board as well tonight. That’s how desperate I am.

WATTERS: I’m on “PRIMETIME” now but —

PIRRO: He was also on — he was also on “JUSTICE WITH JUDGE JEANINE.” So, I also shared him on television. But what he’s done is he’s created a precedent so that the totalitarian instinct that they have on the left that we have to listen to, the people who are apparently — allegedly is the better word — in the know, they’re now used to telling us what to do when I’m not sure they know what to do.

And I don’t know why we decided to be locked down based upon the opinion of this guy who was listening to Niall Ferguson, who was the one who talked about the Mad Cow disease in the U.K., which was a disaster.

And so, you know, if this comes up again — and by the way, the good news is, the U.S. is still experiencing a decline in infections, all infections. What we need to do is have a type of Manhattan Project, where we bring in the best and the brightest, where we bring in a doctor who not has been in government and politics for 40-50 years, but who doesn’t have any interest in drugs and pharmaceuticals.

I want someone who’s clean, who’s academically clean, and not someone who’s beholding to politics or the drug companies.

MORGAN: Or somebody you might have extremely uncomfortable questions to answer about the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

PIRRO: Exactly.

MORGAN: And the exact genesis of the COVID-19 pandemic.

PIRRO: Exactly.

MORGAN: because I don’t think that is a sharp book yet. So, interesting stuff. Well, coming up, more fallout four Will Smith’s slap heard around the world. Can his apology save his Oscar? That’s next on THE FIVE.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PIRRO: Jada Pinkett Smith breaking her silence on her husband slapping Chris Rock. Writing on Instagram, “This is a season for healing and I’m here for it.” Will Smith also offering up an apology to Rock saying, he was “out of line and wrong.” But the damage has been done. The Academy could revoke his Oscar during a meeting tomorrow. And check out this exchange with Gayle King and Comedian Jim Carrey.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM CARREY, ACTOR: You do not have the right to walk up on stage and smack somebody in the face because they said words.

GAYLE KING, HOST, CBS: No, no, I agree. I think we all agree on that. I just thought, Jim, that it escalated to that. You know what I mean? That it escalated to that level.

CARREY: It didn’t escalate. It came out of nowhere because Will have something going on inside him that’s frustrating. I was sick and I was sick and by the standing ovation. I felt like Hollywood is just spineless on mass.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PIRRO: What’s interesting about that, Greg, is when the question that Gayle asked, it escalated, suggesting as defense attorneys always do, that somehow the victim had some role in the fact that there was a crime and this was a crime.

GUTFELD: I thought Carrey was right though about the — about the spineless Oscars, just everybody sitting there and not doing anything. That’s kind of interesting to me. I don’t know. Yes, it could have escalated. Who knows? I think that everybody’s looking at this the wrong way.

That slap helped save the Oscars. It’s the second-lowest rating of all time. It would have been the lowest rating of all time. If it wasn’t for everybody texting each other saying, oh, my God, and so on, and so on. So, I think they need to lean into this. I think that they got to make the Oscars more like Real Housewives, right?

Seat the celebrities who don’t get along with each other at the same table. Get them drunk. Have Ricky Gervais hosted after six pints. Let’s — this is the only way it’s going to save the Oscars. No one is watching it because the movies have been — turned into like bumper stickers for political identity. There’s — no one’s — no one’s going to the movies. The great movies aren’t being — aren’t being rewarded because the popular — you know, the population likes them and you can’t be like the population.

PIRRO: Piers, doesn’t violence like this that we saw, he walked up on the stage, no one even tried to stop him, doesn’t that become now normalized? Is there a precedent created now?

MORGAN: Either we got to get some perspective. I mean, there’s a war on. I mean, there’s a meme doing the rounds today and it has President Zelenskyy and he’s on the phone to Will Smith saying well, I just heard Vladimir Putin insulted your wife. And it made me laugh but it also brought back to me perspective.

Like he went up and gave a guy a slap because he thought that Chris Rock was deliberately mocking his wife about quite an unpleasant medical condition, alopecia, which caused her to lose all her hair. Chris Rock has told people, I didn’t know she had alopecia. So, he’s an innocent victim of this. He did a pretty lame joke and he got slapped for it.

But he got a slap. I mean, you know —

PIRRO: So, you think that words are justification for violence?

MORGAN: No, I don’t think — look, you can’t ever condone violence in that situation and I don’t. But I can understand why if you’re Will Smith, and you think that’s what the guy was doing — and bear in mind, he’s got a bit of history with Chris Rock. He took down Jada Pinkett Smith when he hosted the Oscars five years ago quite personally and quite nasally. And that would have been in I’m sure the mind of what was going on.

But you know, I’m hearing now, we’ve got to take away his Oscar. Really? Really? Let’s remind ourselves, you have standing ovations. The Oscars crowd gave Roman Polanski a standing ovation, led by Meryl Streep after he was convicted of being a pedophile. He then went on the run. He remains on the run. And he’s still got his Oscar. Harvey Weinstein in his cell has got his Oscars, right?

The idea we’re going to take away Will Smith’s Best Actor Oscar for a brilliant performance and a great movie — and I feel sorry for the Williams sisters, actually, because their story has been overtaken. But let’s get some perspective here. He said he shouldn’t have done it. I agree he shouldn’t have done it. And I kind of understand this thinking that led him to do it.

PIRRO: Well, you know, Jesse, there’s a reason in the criminal law that we don’t question the motivations of the person who assaults and instead decide a case based upon the facts and whether or not the crime was committed.

He says that, that it’s not indicative of the man that he wants to be. This is what Will Smith says. Do we — are we so in love with the character or is that the real Smith, the real world?

WATTERS: Well, the real Smith looks like a real monster if that’s who he is. And his brand was about as shiny as your diamonds, Judge. This guy was Tom Hanks. He was The Rock. He was Clooney. He talked about a Q Score. There’s no one with more commercial appeal. This guy was about as warm and fuzzy as Christmas besides Gutfeld, the King of Late Night.

GUTFELD: Thank you.

WATTERS: So, he took that — and remember this guy gets slimed on Nickelodeon. Children like this guy. He was a rapper, a TV — everything and he destroyed it with one slap. Now, I don’t think my Jesse Jr. is going to watch him and see that clip and think highly of this guy. My twins are tense —

GUTFELD: What did Jesse Jr. think when he first heard about this, Jesse?

WATTERS: Well, he popped his head out of the crib and he says, listen, sticks and stones will break my bones. And you know, I’m ashamed of what you just said because you have all people should have thicker skin. If someone makes a crack about you, and you’re that successful, and your wife is sitting there and she’s that successful, it’s a roast.

MORGAN: There you go. Hang on. Hang on. OK let me take you back 10 years. I interviewed Jada Pinkett Smith at CNN and Will Smith turned up in New York. He turned up and he sat in the shadows like lurking. And he came up to me before we started he went, Mr. Morgan, don’t upset my wife. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry. I now know what he meant.

But I said to my wife, you’ve mentioned this, what would happen if it was in my situation? I said to my wife, let’s be honest, if that was us, right, and you had a medical condition, and some guy ripped you in front of a gazillion people at the Oscars, how would you felt if I went up and slapped him? She went, I just told her daughter who’s 10, I just said to her, dad would have done exactly the same thing.

Violence is never the answer. And I genuinely think a lot of guys — the polls by the way so the majority of Americans go with Will Smith.

WATTERS: I interviewed Harvey Weinstein an event one time. And we finished the interview and I asked him, do you take any responsibility for any of your vicious violence that you put in your films? And he answered, and then he left and he came back and he grabbed me right here. And he said, don’t you ever dare ask me a question like that again? Those people will reveal themselves in those —

MORGAN: Would you ever slap a man —

WATTERS: Slap a man?

MORGAN: No, would you ever slap a man —

WATTERS: Over a joke? No.

MORGAN: Who humiliate your wife —

PERINO: I’m good. I’m good. That’s OK.

GUTFELD: What if I want to be slapped?

PIRRO: Dana, what do you think —

PERINO: I’ll take care of —

PIRRO: It’s Dana’s turn.

PERINO: You can tease. I’m good. I’m good. Go, go, go.

PIRRO: All right. And his son said, that’s how we do it. All right, straight ahead, Shannon Bream is here to tell us about her brand new book.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PERINO: Shannon Bream’s new book, The Mothers and Daughters of the Bible Speak is officially on sale today. You can grab your copy now at foxnews.com/books. And Shannon joins us to tell us more about it.

Shannon, congratulations on the book. I know it’s a huge undertaking. What is one of the things that you learned about — you know a lot about the Bible and I’m curious what you learned in this process?

SHANNON BREAM, FOX NEWS CHANNEL ANCHOR: You know, Dana, you know what it’s like to write a book and get into the research and get into the writing. And it can be all-consuming along with the other work you have in your life and your family and all the things that you enjoy.

But for me, it really was this labor of love because I was reminded about – – even the stories that I thought I knew about, I learned so much more about each of these women. And I came away really encouraged because the Bible does not sanitize their stories. There are some with real struggle, real destruction, and pain, and struggle.

And I thought, listen, the last couple of years, everybody’s gone through some measure of that some greater than others, but to see how God was working in each of those situations, that he was shepherding and guiding and not unaware of the suffering was really encouraging to me. So, I got to know all of these women better almost — I’m feeling like I know them, and I hope readers will feel that way too. But just the overall encouragement I got from it was the greatest gifts.

PERINO: Judge Jeanine, you got something for her?

PIRRO: You know what, Shannon, I’m so happy that you did this. I mean, your last book was great and this as well. But I was fascinated with the fact that you saw a parallel between the images that you’re seeing in the Ukraine war and what Mary the mother of Jesus went through.

BREAM: Yes. I think sometimes we forget that not long after a little Jesus came along, they were in danger, she and Joseph and little baby Jesus. And God came to Joseph in a dream and said, you got to go. I mean, Herod — King Herod is trying to kill baby Jesus. So, here they are, no goodbye parties, no packing up and saying goodbye to family. They literally in the middle of the night grabbed what they had and took off because a madman was after them.

And I was struck by that and reminded of that in watching these incredibly brave, courageous Ukrainian families, fathers staying to fight, mothers grabbing whatever they could packing up their children trying to get to safety, many of them flooding across borders with just the clothes and the toys that they could grab on the way out the door.

And I love too, on the other side of that, that these Polish mothers in many train stations left empty baby carriages with clothes and supplies in them, just reminding us of the humanity that can come when we are in such dark suffering places. And the courage of these women, just like Mary was on the run with baby Jesus, and God knew every one of her struggles and twists and turns, I’m convinced that he is ever-present in our lives today. And these Ukrainian women are just so inspiring, watching them do what they have to do and being so brave in the process.

MORGAN: And Shannon, I was struck by the fact that Ukraine is I think, is maybe the most Christian country in Europe. I think — over 75 percent I think of Ukrainians identify as Christian. When you read the book back and you thought about the parallels with Ukraine, what message do you think the Ukraine people can take given their strong faith there?

BREAM: Well, again, God is ever-present. We know that what we’re told in the New Testament, Christ walking this earth suffered everything that we as human beings will suffer, and for most of us, even worse. I mean, the torture and death that he went through is beyond for most of us our understanding, but not some of these families that are fleeing Ukraine and suffering enormous personal loss.

I’ve been struck by hearing from missionaries and different NGOs and people that are working in that region to help on both sides of the border. And we’ve gotten videos and texts from missionaries there showing people gathered in subways and in basements singing hymns together, trying to encourage each other in their faith, and finding great comfort and strength in that.

And what an inspiration to the rest of us that they’re clinging to the most important thing in their lives when everything else is just completely unsettled and unstable.

PERINO: All right, Evil Shannon Bream, I’m going to turn you over to Greg.

GUTFELD: Oh, I was just going to say what’s up, ESB?

BREAM: Oh, no.

GUTFELD: How are you doing?

BREAM: I’m good. And just today I was asked on a radio show, what is this all about with you being so evil? Greg must know what we don’t.

GUTFELD: I think — I think it’s time for you now to tell everybody why you’re evil, Evil Shannon Bream.

BREAM: Listen, I will say this. I am flawed. I am very open about the fact that I’ve done things I regret.

GUTFELD: Very bad things, Shannon.

BREAM: And I’m a sinner saved by grace.

GUTFELD: You’ve done some very bad, dark, evil things.

BREAM: And listen, we all have stuff, right?

GUTFELD: This is all a front.

BREAM: We all have stuff —

GUTFELD: You’re writing these Bible books as a front. We know what you’re up to.

PERINO: Shannon, thank you.

BREAM: Redemption, that is the message.

PERINO: Congratulations.

PIRRO: We love you.

BREAM: Thank you. Good to see you, guys.

PERINO: Well, be sure to get a copy of her new book The Mothers and Daughters of the Bible Speak. It’s a great book. “ONE MORE THING” is up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUTFELD: OMT, Jesse.

WATTERS: Jesse Jr. took his first steps yesterday. Let’s see the videotape. There we go.

GUTFELD: He looks like me on a Saturday night.

PIRRO: Oh, that’s fantastic.

WATTERS: And now, he definitely see you on a Saturday night. I’m so very proud of Jesse Jr. walking like a champ.

PIRRO: Yes.

WATTERS: That’s very, very cute. And tonight, “JESSE WATTERS PRIMETIME” we have Piers Morgan, Kayleigh McEnany, Dana Loesch. And Piers hits a man on the street and he lived to survive it. So, we’ll be tuning in for that.

GUTFELD: Dana?

PERINO: Well, I want to give a shout-out to Justine Rolland. She served in the Women’s Army Corps in the Pacific during World War II. She was the first of 25 WACS to land in the Philippines. She was on the Intrepid at Leyte Gulf with MacArthur, excuse me, and was awarded the Philippine Liberation Medal.

She just turned 100 a couple of weeks ago. She has three children, eight grandchildren, and 12 great-grandchildren. Congratulations, Justine. What a life.

GUTFELD: There you go. Judge.

PIRRO: OK, a 14-year-old boy by the name of Jackson Williams has his eye on the prize. He’s running for governor in Vermont.

GUTFELD: Comb your hair.

PIRRO: Because he can’t, he doesn’t live in Vermont, he’s only 14, but the law allows him to.

GUTFELD: There you go.

WATTERS: He has my vote.

PERINO: Donate.

GUTFELD: I know. And you know what — and I like the — I like to plant in the back too. All right, that’s it for us. Coming up, “SPECIAL REPORT.” Hey, Bret.

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