Bill Ayers Downplays His Association with Obama, Reaffirms His Belief in Violence in Ideology

In part two of Fox News Channel’s “The Kelly File” anchor Megyn Kelly’s interview with Weather Underground ringleader Bill Ayers, Ayers discussed his relationship with President Barack Obama, which in 2008 became a campaign issue for Obama.

Ayers downplayed that relationship, saying he was just as anyone Obama had known over the years and that he wished he had a closer relationship with Obama.

Partial transcript as follows:

KELLY: President Obama, let me ask you this, how much ideology did the two of you share?

AYERS: Zero.

KELLY: Good friends, not good friends?

AYERS: I knew him as well as he knew 10,000 other people, and today I wish I knew him much better, and I wish he had listened to me.

KELLY: Did he ever contact you once you became the story in his presidential race?

AYERS: Absolutely not. And I didn’t contact him.

KELLY: The entire time he’s been president, you haven’t been in contact —

AYERS: No. Although I wish I were, because I have a lot of advice for him.

KELLY: You want him to go further to the left.

AYERS: Oh, I want him to stop drowning people. I want him to close Guantanamo, I want him to, you know, universal health care. Don’t you think we deserve universal health care? Seriously. Medicare for all.

Kelly also asked Ayers if he would ever resort to acts of terrorism again as he did in his Weather Underground days. Ayers didn’t say no and added that although his age might be a factor, he isn’t committed to nonviolence in ideology.

“Well, you know, you’re staking that sentence saying in a funny way,” Ayers said. “But what I’m saying is, it seems so long ago, what I’m saying in that passage is, it seems so long ago and so far away, like another world. On the other hand, as violent and nuts as we can be as a country. I can’t completely say no, I would never ever rise up in opposition in a very militant and serious way. I can’t say I wouldn’t. I doubt it, I’m 70 years old, so it’s unlikely. But I think, I want to say there exactly what Bernardine said on tape, which is, no, I’m not committed to nonviolence in ideology. And frankly, neither are you, because we live in the most violent society around, and we commit war crimes day in and day out, and often as a matter of policy, and yet that seems perfectly fine with you.”

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