it was historic and heated less than 24 hours after our ABC News presidential debate the issue of race is creating quite a conversation after this moment my producer Diana Paulson actually captured in the spin room via her cell phone right after the debate take a listen president Trump I'm youf Salam one of the exer sir a m the C Park five I'm youf Salam one of the exera five you're on my side I'm not on your side Donald Trump actually confronted right after the debate by Yousef Salam you saw right there one of the members of the so-called Central Park 5 the group of teens who were wrongfully imprisoned for the assault and rape of a jogger in 1989 at the time Trump called for them to get the death penalty but the group was later exonerated Yousef Salam is now a New York city councilman and came face to face with the former president as you saw right there in our spin room last night joining me for more on this and of course more on the presidential debate and wacp president Derek Johnson great to have you in studio good to be here what a night it was last night it was interesting to say the least oh yeah all right and we're going to dive deep on that but first of all what did you think of that moment right there with with uh councilman Yousef Salam it furthers seems in my mind that uh former president Trump have some mental health issues here he didn't even recognize who he was as as much of a topic this has been during this campaign cycle I think he has serious cognitive decline and we need to pay attention to that uh it demonstrated itself during the debate and people who've been around him are also saying the same thing he's angry he's easily agitated and he talks in a loop he repeats the same thing over and over not to mention some of the nonsensical things that's coming out of his mind you know we should point out that clearly we don't know anything about his his mental state right now we do know that he gets angry we do know how he lashes out in in times like this when he gets angry um but with that said uh you know we did see what happened with Joe Biden as he got older and and there were concerns about his mental acuity um and then he stepped out of the race uh further more well a lot more to see as time moves on but again we we we haven't uh we haven't talked to Trump's doctor of course these are all uh just sort of perceptions from from folks like you and others but I do uh want to ask you about Harris um let's get back to the debate she accused Trump of using race to divide the country uh citing the Central Park 5 and we just heard from Yousef uh Salam uh also the lawsuits against him for racial discrimination Trump called it old news what's your response well if people are still being impacted and affected as a result of Prior behavior is not old news is current reality for those individuals who are affected n ACB with nonpartisan so we've been monitoring this debate from the perspective of what are the public policies that are being Advanced and what we heard from Trump was more nonsensical statements in rhetoric the fact that he would go to talk about people eating cats and dogs out of the blue something that could easily be verified and he used that in a response to something brings us real serious questions we want to hear what would the next president do in terms of quality of life how could people be improved or their station be improved as a result of the public policies but what we heard what I heard was more rhetoric nonsensical attacks and that's unfortunate because this country cannot be a leading Nation if the a candidate cannot discern facts from fiction the verify information that he's seen or says he's seen on television it's pick up the phone and call you know a city official in that City I have serious concerns well and the not only did the president uh talk about uh this in the debate claiming that Haitian immigrants in Ohio are eating people's pets his vice president JD van also doubling down on that they're putting it all on media reports saying that they saw interviews with residents um but I'm just I mean look you're you're tied in with the the Haitian Community have you ever heard anything of this nature is this a concern to the NAACP and and President Johnson it is one of the most offensive statements political tactics that I've ever seen it plays on fear race and xenophobia there is no verifiable account that human beings are eating pets in any of the 50 states in this country and so either is a cognitive decline or a strategic approach to use race xenophobia and fear to try to get voters we cannot continue to prosper as a country if we use those tools of division to D to try to drive votes and that's unfortunate appreciate your response this is the first time actually we're hearing you on this and it is a story that's been making a lot of news and we just made news right there so I appreciate you responding to that Joe Biden was able to eek out a win uh you know by turning black voters uh to the polls do you think kamla Harris can do the same thing and I guess it's a twofold question do you think she can do the same thing and what is the NAACP doing to support uh KLA Harris and get you know black folks to vote for her so first of all we're nonpartisan so it's not about KLA Harris it's to making sure that people have access to cast an effective ballot and that's our job we are recruiting volunteers to impact 14.1 million voters uh we have a text program where people text to work volunteer to the number 20707 and we don't tell people how to vote uh President Biden You' been clear about your concerns about Donald Trump that is for sure oh absolutely sh support for kamla Harris and things that she has said to support we we support the public policy not the political party or the people right our board actually have both Republicans and Democrats on our board you will not see an endorsement but we are concerned with public policies that impact the quality of life for African-Americans we speak to it and we Al also concerned with public policy that impact all citizens because equal protection of the law is something we should all be uh working towards as well as making sure we are a true democracy and not create barriers to the poing place and so for us when we look at that debate so what is this policy of project 2025 really mean and are is either one of these candidates actually embracing it and although we're hearing no we're not he he's not but we know the history has shown that he did embrace it and there is a move to sub subvert democracy and supplant the ability of citizens black white and others to truly appreciate all that this country have to give so I am curious uh about the black vote what are you hearing Democrats Republicans um within the black community are they excited about this election are they fired up about this election what's what's the energy like what are you hearing we've seen a 180 degree turn people were frustrated the negativity that was coming out of of one side the lack of energy from the other side we begin to see momentum pick up over the last three weeks that really feels like 2008 or 2012 than it did it uh did this I mean now more than any other time you know in 2020 people were voting out of fear because they seen what happened on January 6 they seen what happened in charlotteville Virginia they realized that in a week's time there was a mass shooting in El Paso targeting the Latino community in in Louisville Kentucky targeting africanamerican community and in Pittsburgh targetting the Jewish community that level of hate and division would destroy this country and now this year we're seeing momentum because there's messages of hope there's joy there's smiles and there's the potential to Pivot away from the divisiveness that we've we've witnessed during this campaign cycle you know I have to ask you this before we go because she's not talking a lot about it um she's just saying I'm going to let my work speak for itself what's it like to see a black woman on the ticket I going to tell you what it is like to see somebody giving a positive message that's talking about how we move this country forward we need to be looking towards 2030 not 1930 and so as many people are listening for public policies they're getting more excited because they hear a vision that's looking forward not a US versus US Paradigm Americans versus Americans uh men versus women we should not be in this space we should be talking about how do we maximize all the talents that our communities bring to bear and a way in which we can continue to be a leading democracy on this globe because if we don't and we fall backwards we would cease to exist as the America unite grew up with Derek Johnson Mr President good to see you thank you for your time all right