Best of The Axe Files: Rep. John Lewis
The Axe Files with David Axelrod
CNN
4.6 • 7.7K Ratings
🗓️ 13 July 2020
⏱️ 68 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week we revisit our July 2017 conversation with civil rights leader and Georgia Congressman John Lewis. He joins David in Atlanta for a special televised edition of The Axe Files to talk about his activism during the Civil Rights Movement, his relationship with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., his foray into public service, and more.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Music |
| 0:06.0 | And now, from the University of Chicago Institute of Politics and CNN Audio, the Axe Files, with |
| 0:12.5 | your host David Axelrod. |
| 0:20.1 | The term Great American gets thrown around a lot and often too loosely, but Congressman |
| 0:26.1 | John Lewis is truly a great American. |
| 0:29.5 | As a young man, he risked his life to advance the cause of civil rights and he's raised |
| 0:34.6 | his thunderous voice again and again against injustice wherever he's seen it. |
| 0:39.6 | I had the honor of sitting down with Congressman Lewis a while back for my Axe Files TV |
| 0:44.8 | show and I thought given the tenor of the times and the issues we're facing, it'd be great |
| 0:49.8 | to share that with you again. |
| 0:51.9 | I also want to wish Congressman Lewis who is battling cancer all the best he is in our |
| 0:57.7 | thoughts and prayers. |
| 1:07.8 | Congressman John Lewis, so good to be with you and especially here at the Center for Civil |
| 1:13.3 | and Human Rights in Atlanta that a museum of history, so much of which you are right in |
| 1:19.1 | the middle of. |
| 1:20.1 | We look over here and here's a mural, a photo of the march from Selma to Montgomery. |
| 1:26.2 | This happened a few days after you and hundreds of others were savagely beaten and gassed, stomped |
| 1:33.3 | on by horses, trying to cross the Edmund Pettis bridge in Selma. |
| 1:39.7 | Tell me how you feel we're doing today, how far down the road have we gotten from that |
| 1:45.8 | bridge and are we still moving forward? |
| 1:48.2 | David, I'm honored to be in your presence, to be here with you. |
| 1:54.5 | I must tell you we have come a distance. |
... |
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