Fox News "The Story with Martha MacCallum" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Josh Hawley

Interview

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MACCALLUM: Thank you very much. Thanks, Mark Meredith. So here not with more tonight Republican Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri. Good to see you, sir. Thank you for being back on THE STORY tonight. What's your reaction to Twitter's move on that account?

I mean, they're going to say it's just their algorithms and it got tripped by the language and all of that. Do you believe that that's what happened?

SEN. JOSH HAWLEY, R-MO: No, I mean this is all too typical from Twitter at big tech. I mean, you've got Congressman Castro out there actually calling for retribution against Trump supporters, against Trump donors posting their names. Twitter doesn't do anything about that.

But when Mitch McConnell who has been threatened -- his life is threatened, that he exposes what these left-wing wackos are doing and Twitter shuts him down. They censor him. I mean, this is crazy, Martha.

MACCALLUM: I mean, with regard to the Castro list of Trump supporters, it also shows you even if you believe that these are all just algorithms that you know, that trip the wires so to speak, to pull down things from Twitter, then they need to be -- they need to be broader.

They need to be -- have a better understanding of what's going on out there because these people, several of them are harassed because their names were posted as Trump supporters by Joaquin Castro, member of the House of Representatives.

HAWLEY: Of course they were harassed, and that was the whole point in posting their names and posting their Twitter handles. That's exactly what Congressman Castro wanted.

MACCALLUM: He said it wasn't. He said, that's not -- that's not what I wanted to happen.

HAWLEY: That's absolutely false. Why else would he make a point to call them out and say that they're basically racists? I mean, inviting retribution.

MACCALLUM: I mean, he didn't think that was going to happen at the very least.

HAWLEY: But let me just make -- let me make a point about the algorithms, Martha. And that is that Twitter has told me in testimony before the Judiciary Committee that they don't just rely on algorithms, that they have actual people who review these things, who make these decisions.

And that's why I've said, you know what, you should open your books and open your operation to a third-party audits to actually show us how you're making these decisions. If you have nothing to hide, open it up.

MACCALLUM: Let me ask one more question which is a very important one because it was behind the reason that those people were protesting and they used you know, really terrible ways of expressing their opinion, but they would like to see action on the laws that pass, to tighten the -- to tighten background checks that passed in the House. Would those pass in the Senate and would you -- how would you vote on them?

HAWLEY: I think it depends on whose proposal, Martha, and what's actually in it. I know Senator Toomey, for instance, has a background check bill that he has introduced in past congresses, hasn't introduced it yet but says that he might.

In the Judiciary Committee, we've heard testimony on so-called red flag laws. There are lots of different ways to write those laws. But I look forward to reviewing any proposal here at my -- I think of the principles, it has got to actually be effective.

It has got to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, out of the hands of the mentally unstable, and it's also got to protect the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens. They haven't done anything wrong. Law- abiding citizens should have their Second Amendment rights protected.

MACCALLUM: No, understood. But how optimistic are you that there's going to be anything? Because you know, I look back at what happened at Sandy Hook. Everybody said this is the moment. Enough is enough. We need to see some change. We need to see something tougher come from Washington on this. And now everyone says this is the moment. Is it or does it just go away after a few weeks like it always does?

HAWLEY: Well, I already see Chuck Schumer saying that oh, we won't accept a red flag legislation. That's out of -- that's off the table before we even get out of the gate on it, so I don't know. But here's, Martha, what else I think needs to happen. We need to have a serious conversation about the culture of violence, about the culture of depression, about the culture of isolation that is engulfing these young men in particular.

We've got a serious problem with this in this country and it is leading to this terrible violence and also to the radical extremism we're seeing.

MACCALLUM: You're absolutely right. We talked about that a lot here with a number of psychologists over the course of this week, and I think that that's what you know, that -- I don't know if that's in the grasp of Congress but some of these other things might be so we'll see what action is taken. Senator Hawley, thank you. Good to see you tonight.

HAWLEY: Thank you. Thank you.

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