In 2004, Michael Moore released his documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 about the run-up to the Iraq War. This September, he will premiere his latest film: Fahrenheit 11/9.
As the liberal filmmaker told Stephen Colbert on The Late Show Thursday night, that date represents the night Donald Trump was elected president. “This is about how the hell we got in this situation and how we’re going to get out of it,” he said.
After playing a clip from the film in which he tries to infiltrate Mar-a-Lago, Colbert asked him if he was “civil” to the people there. “I was as civil as any Eagle Scout Catholic altar boy could be when confronted with the devil,” Moore answered.
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Speaking to the great civility debate happening in America right now, Moore continued, saying that Democrats have traditionally been “so wimpy and weak” but now “a few people want to stand up and say, I’ve had enough, that’s it.”
“We don’t have to be violent, we have to remain nonviolent, but if the worst that happens to anybody in the Trump administration is that they don’t get to have a chicken dinner in Virginia, I mean, I don’t know,” he said. If it were just basic political differences, Moore said he would not be in favor of throwing Sarah Huckabee Sanders out of a restaurant.
“But that’s not what’s going on now,” he said. “We’re not talking about political differences. We’re talking about thousands of children being kidnapped and put in jails.”
Given how divided the nation seems to be at this moment, Colbert wondered what kind of “endgame” Moore had in mind. “Because you don’t want to end this in violence or any sort of really revolutionary confrontation, you want a political change at the end of this,” he assumed. “Do you have any hope for that?”
Moore, who said he cries every single day when he watches the news, says he has to hold on to some shred of hope. But at the same time he wonders, “When are people going to get off the couch and rise up?”
“Sadly, Trump is not going to leave,” he said. “He plans to be re-elected, he loves the term ‘president for life.’ The only way that we’re going to stop this is eventually we’re all going to have to put our bodies on the line. You’re going to have to be willing to do this.” Moore then turned to the audience and asked them what they would do if “they snatched your child from you.” Because “that’s how we all have to start responding.”
In an attempt to end on a positive note, Moore said, “The majority of Americans are very liberal. They take the liberal position on most issues. They believe women should be paid same as men, they believe there is climate change, they don’t believe people should be thrown in jail for smoking marijuana.”
“The majority of Americans are liberal and we the Democrats have won the presidency, popular vote, in six of the last seven presidential elections,” he continued. “The Republicans have only won once since 1988—in 2004, with Bush, that’s the only time they’ve won the popular vote! The country we live in doesn’t want the Republicans in the White House! They don’t want them running this country! We’re the majority!”
