Pete King, Bill O'Reilly: Michael Jackson (Video)

Rep. Pete King is not backing down in any way from the extremely harsh statements he made about Michael Jackson, calling him a "pervert," a "child molester," and a "pedophile." He did, however, clarify that what set him off was the saturation coverage of Jackson's death.

Last night, King discussed his remarks with Bill O'Reilly.

Video.



Transcript

BILL O'REILLY: Now the top story tonight -- the growing racial controversy over Michael Jackson. While millions of Americans have watched the coverage of Jackson's death, millions of Americans are also fed up with the glorification of the man. Leading that charge is Congressman Peter King of New York.

(video clip)

PETER KING: This guy was a pervert. He was a child molester. He was a pedophile. And to be giving this much coverage to him, day in and day out, what's it say about us as a country? I just think it's too... We're too politically correct. No one wants to stand up and say, 'We don't need Michael Jackson.'

O'REILLY: Well, joining us now from Washington is the controversial Congressman King. All right now, ...Congressman Bobby Rush from Illinois, and Hazel Dukes, and NAACP officials imply you're a racist. What say you?

KING: That is absolute nonsense. I stand by everything I said. There's absolutely nothing racist or racial in any of the words I used. You know, Bill, I was on your show over seven years ago. I was the first Catholic politician in the United States to call for the resignation of Cardinal Law as archbishop of Boston because he had failed to go after the child molesters in the clergy in Boston. This past weekend Bob Herbert of the New York Times, an African American columnist, said that behind the facade of Michael Jackson is the horror of child abuse.

I don't see how pointing out a person's horrible record when it comes to misusing and abusing children, how that becomes racial in any way. And also, I'll say this, there's an ironic point. On Sunday, the New York Times editorial, which it's very seldom the Times has something good to say about me, where they praised me and John McCain because for five years we've had a bill in Congress, which looks like it's going to go through this year, to give a presidential pardon to Jack Johnson, the first African American heavyweight champion. And we're doing that because his prosecution was racially biased against him. It was racism. And John McCain and I have spoken out against that. I certainly get no votes in my district for that. So I think, you know, my record is clear. I just think that people raising this issue are absolutely phony. And it's really, it's wrong.

O'REILLY: It is wrong. I agree. I've know you for a long time. You're not a racist. And Mr. Rush and Ms. Dukes are cheap for playing that race card against you. But the timing of what you said, what you said was harsh. It was harsh, and you know, the man has died. He has people who love him. In hindsight, might you have waited a week?

KING: No, Bill, because this had already gone on for nine or ten days. And I guess what put me over the edge was I spent the whole Fourth of July with veterans, and cops, firefighters at different parades in Wantagh and Massapequa Park, as you would say, being with the folks. And there was such a resentment building up, people saying, 'Why is this guy getting all this adulation?'

OK, he was a good singer. He was a good dancer. But why, why is he getting all this coverage? Why is the nation stopped for Michael Jackson? So I went to the American Legion hall on Sunday. I was with somebody on my staff. We had a video camera, and I said, 'Hey, I'm gonna say what's on my mind.' We posted it, and the reason I was harsh, if you want to call it that, is I had to cut through this ten day cacophony of glorification, this onslaught, where he was being made out to be a saint or a hero, whatever. So I wanted to get right to the point. That's why I said strip aside the psychobabble. This man was a child molester, and he was, by his own admission, he slept with young boys. I mean, you know you walk to a neighborhood and you say to someone, 'If a grown man sleeps with young boys in his bed, is he a pervert?' 99 out of 100 people will say yes.

O'REILLY: All right. Let me play devil's advocate here. Let me play devil's advocate here, because I want to be fair and I think that you know that we are fair here. Jackson was acquitted of child molestation charges. He did settle a civil suit, but settling something doesn't mean you're admitting anything. It just means you wanna get it out, all right? You want to get rid of it. The people who know Jackson well say he is the product of an arrested development, that he is a child, or was a child, in his own mind. And I think that speaks to the way he conducted his life. He was not an adult in an emotional way. He himself says that he slept with children. He admits it, only because he loved them and wanted to be close to them, and that there was no sexuality involved. That's what Jackson is on the record as saying. So is it fair to say if he's not convicted in a court of law, is it fair to say he was a child molester?

KING: Bill, I would say an adult male who sleeps with young boys is a child molester. If nothing else, he's molesting and abusing their psyche. How are those children going to possibly grow up normal after spending nights in bed with Michael Jackson?

So, I would say also there's not a daycare center in the United States that would be allowed to hire him. Would anyone, and even of my critics, would they allow their child or their grandchild to be in the same room with Michael Jackson, to be alone with Michael Jackson?

You know, again, we have to strip away a lot of it. There's a difference between a criminal conviction and admitted conduct. I went back and I read all sorts of columns, those articles by Maureen Orth, detailing the way he had all these alarms in his bedroom in his mansion. And he had those alarms on when he was with these young boys. It was a deviant lifestyle.

And to, listen, if Michael Jackson had died and he got one or two days of coverage, that would have been fine. But the way it went on and on, with this wall-to-wall, round the clock coverage, and the same time we have Americans dying in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have the president in Russia trying to negotiate arms control, nuclear arms control.

To me, it was a real reflection on the culture of our country. And I really, you know, you talk about a culture war, Bill. This to me, I think the media and the political class and the elite class failed. They have... our culture... Pat Moynihan's book about defining deviancy down, there can't be much more down than what Michael Jackson did with young boys and yet we exalted that over the last ten days, two weeks, and it was wrong.

O'REILLY: Why do you think the media played him as a hero?

KING: Perhaps it was political correctness. They get caught up in this Hollywood swirl, and it just sort of fed on itself. And I guess no one wanted to just acknowledge the fact of what his record was all about. And so I just think that it was really a terrible failure by the media, by the elite. And I was saying what millions of Americans really felt.

O'REILLY: All right. Thanks for being a standup guy and coming in, Congressman. We appreciate it.