the only thing i can think of is brown briefly said some people at the hospital told them they're not huge fans of trump, but even those people showed respect to the office of the president. so there is no basis for this claim that they were somehow misrepresenting how he was treated. they said he was treated well. >> i watched several interviews. i saw the live thing with the sherrod brown and the mayor. and i saw several interviews, daniel, with the mayor later on in the day. no matter how the person interviewing her tried to goad her into saying something negative about the president, she just would not fall into the trap. she wouldn't do it. i didn't hear her say one thing negative about the president. she was i thought she was what's the word, not articulate. but -- >> decent? >> that's a good word. decent. kind. smart in her language. she was being delicate. i could see she was dancing

around. but she also said i think that democrats and republicans in this moment need to come together and do something different. i didn't think that was a bad thing. >> right. >> but then, what got to me, daniel, is other members of the president's team and his allies joined in on this lie and joined in on this attack. >> yes. so we know that trump is a frequent liar. he's a serial daily or nearly daily deceiver. what is striking is that he ropes in people around him into the dishonesty. we're not just getting it from the president. but there is this entire sort of executive apparatus that begins to lie or deceive for him. we saw that today with press secretary stephanie grisham playing the role that sarah sanders used to do when she used to do the deceiving for trump. we saw that from social media chief dan scavino, and we also see it from vice president mike pence when he repeats claims like getting the veteran's claim passed which was actually signed into law by obama.

>> what is this really about. is this because he thinks they're critical of the rhetoric or requesting gun legislation? why falsely attack like that? >> you know, i can't get into trump's head, don, and thank goodness, because it's not a pretty place to be. it's clear to me he's a seething mass of resentment, and he is ready to unload on his adversaries for slights that are real or perceived and just incapable of doing what we want him to do. daniel just mentioned president obama. i can't help thinking in this ordeal the way president obama behaved in 2015 after an earlier white supremacist shooting, a mass murder, an act of terrorism in charleston, south carolina. and remember, of course, how he went down there to the african methodist church and sang amazing grace and delivered one of the most beautiful speeches any president has ever

delivered. and we can wait from now until kingdom come and you'll see see one tenth of that intelligence. one tenth of that grace. one tenth of that humanity. from president trump. he is who he is. and he simply cannot change, and who he is utterly inadequate and a damaged individual who is doing more damage as president of the united states. >> maria, this is -- it's unbelievable. right around the time the president landed in el paso, his twitter feed put out a campaign-style video of his hospital visit in dayton. and i'm going to point out, we have no idea of what actually happened because press wasn't allowed in, but what does it say that they are promoting it like this? by the way, philip bum predicted this on our air last night. go on. >> yeah, i saw that. it's par for the course for him. the only thing he cares about is his image. the only thing he cares about is how he is seen on the medium of tv. which is why he lashes out so

much when he sees people on tv criticizing him. the only thing he cares about is what people will think of him going into 2020, especially his base. and this is what i think is the focus and the reason for all of his actions and his rhetoric, because he knows that this also is something that really riles not everybody. not everybody who supports trump feels this way. in fact, i think he is losing support with the exact same people that voted a -- a lot voted for him in 2016. so i think he is doing himself a lot of damage. >> thank you, all. i appreciate it. we'll be right back. >> thank you. own little world. especially these days. (dad) i think it's here. (mom vo) especially at this age. (big sister) where are we going? (mom vo) it's a big, beautiful world out there. (little sister) woah... (big sister) wow. see that? (mom vo) sometimes you just need a little help seeing it.

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president trump called for unity during his prepared white house address in the wake of the deadly mass shootings but that didn't last long. he's now back to wedging a partisan divide both on twitter and in front of the cameras. joining me now is joshua dubois, the former religious affairs director under president obama. thanks for joining us. you advised president obama following the mass shootings at sandy hook and charleston. did president trump squander any opportunity in el paso and dayton?

>> he missed a huge opportunity here and the challenging and the sad thing is, don, president trump cannot help but make everything about him. i mean, he started off fine. you know, he's going out to meet with and mourn with hopefully these grieving families, but then come the tweets. you know, he's attacking beto o'rourke. he's meeting with the families and then he's walking out of there and attacking the senator from the state where the massacre occurred and the mayor as well. and what's tough about this is he's making it about himself. he's bringing the attention back to him instead of where the attention should be, which is these families that are grieving at this unimaginable time. so, you know, the number one rule in moments like this is humility. it's not about you. it's about the people who are impacted and it's about the country and donald trump just can't seem to wrap his mine around that. >> you know, joshua, at a campaign speech today the former

vice president joe biden talked about how other presidents have responded to tragedies. here it is. >> american presidents have stepped up in the past. george h.w. bush renouncing his membership in the nra. president clinton after oklahoma city. george w. bush going to a mosque after 9/11. president obama after charleston. presidents who led, who opposed chose to fight for what the best of american character is about. there's deafening silence now. sadly we don't have that today. >> you know, i was going to say, is it possible? but how hard is it? how hard is it for a nation to heal without a concealer in chief? >> it's very difficult. especially when the only sound you hear is the click of a keyboard typing out some angry tweets. you know, i was there with

president obama in newtown meeting with those families who were just dealing with the unimaginable. it wasn't just president obama. i was there with first lady obama when she went out to oak creek, wisconsin after the sikh temple massacre there. the anniversary of that is this very week. so it was a whole family who knew about putting others first. but donald trump, again, it all comes back to him, his brand, his reputation. he talks about making america great, but ultimately isn't he just really trying to make donald trump the center of all of these things? and it's hard to mourn, it's hard to grieve and it's hard to come together when the president continues this sort of divisive approach. >> josh, you know, biden mentioned charleston and i can't help but look back to what president obama did after the shooting which killed nine at the mother emanuel ame church. watch this.

♪ amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me ♪ >> that was such a powerful moment. i remember being there and live as it was happening, being on the air. what goes through your mind when you watch and you remember that day? >> man, it was -- it's a lot. so i had the honor of working with president obama. i left the white house, but they called me back in to help on that speech with him and cody keenan and others, and specifically on the part about grace and about faith. i'm an ame myself so i went down with my dad who is a pastor in the ame church and was friends with the pastor that was lost, so i was sitting right there behind the family and i knew he was going to talk about great. we had worked on that in the speech, but i did not know he was going to sing it. and, you know, we just all in that moment, sort of our spirits

and our bodies rose to greet him and we were just enveloped in this moment of grace together. it wasn't a republican thing or a democrat thing, a black or a white thing, it was people coming together to say that hate will not carry the day. so it was a really, really unique moment in american history, but it takes a leader to lead in moments like that. >> you -- you know, that's what the president did publicly for that and then also you know what he did for mother emanuel and for sandy hook. but you write in your book about what happened privately with parents of the victims. you said person after person receiving an engulfing hug from our commander in chief. he'd say, tell me about your son. tell me about your daughter. then he'd hold pictures of the lost beloved as their parents described favorite foods, television shows and the sounds of their laughter. i think specifically you're talking about sandy hook there. you say president obama never really talked about those

private meetings. how does that compare to what you saw today? >> well, i saw today a bunch of tweets, a bunch of attacks, a bunch of attacks on the mayor of the city who is now going to have to go to 20 some-odd funerals and wade her way through hundreds of family members who are impacted. attacks on the senator from that state. and what president obama did, you know, he gave a public speech, but all the private moments were between him and those families. we weren't tweeting photos, you know, even i didn't share that passage until years later because i thought folks should know about the character of our president at that time and our former president now. it's a character issue. you know, something has got to change in donald trump's heart. it's not a -- it's not a republican thing or a democratic thing, it's a matter of character. is he going to censor himself or is he going to do the right thing and finally censor people who are going through tough times. >> joshua dubois, thank you so much. >> thank you. this is "cnn tonight." i'm don lemon. a cnn exclusive. the mother of the el paso shooting suspect called the allen, texas police department weeks before the shooting because she was concerned about