MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript: Ferguson, Missouri

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KORNACKI: Let me bring Congressman Cleaver to this. Obviously, Congressman, you represent a different part of Missouri, sort of more the western part we`re talking about, St. Louis area here. But obviously, this is your home state. This is your -- this is your home region.

When you`re looking at the crowds gathering in Ferguson, to a lesser extent at the courthouse here about 10 miles away, just -- I`m curious what you`re thinking right now and what you`re expecting to see tonight.

REP. EMANUEL CLEAVER (D), MISSOURI (via telephone): Well, I was in Ferguson a week ago. And I think one of the things that has to be emphasized over and over again, and that is that there are a lot of very educated, very socially minded young people who have gone through all kinds of training in order to present their case through direct action, through non-violent direct action, in a way that delivers the message and as clearly as possible, and that is that they are angry over the fact that we have not only Michael Brown who has been gunned down, an unarmed African- American teenager, but it`s happened repeatedly. We just had one yesterday in Cleveland with a 12-year-old shot and killed with a toy gun.

But one of the things that I think that needs (INAUDIBLE) I think it`s been somewhat left out of the discussion, and that is, no matter what the grand jury does tonight, the FBI and the Justice Department are, in fact, conducting a parallel investigation. So a grand jury doesn`t mean that this police officer won`t be indicted. It means that the grand jury is not going to indict.

Now, the prosecutor doesn`t need a grand jury in order to indict. The FBI doesn`t need the grand jury in order to present information or evidence to the Justice Department for an indictment. So this is not necessarily the end, no matter what the grand jury does tonight, whether they say -- issue a "no true bill," which means that they will not recommend indictment, or if they say that it`s involuntary manslaughter, which is probably the only charge, I think, they would probably do.

KORNACKI: Congressman, also, I`m curious of your response to -- we just heard the press conference from the governor. Even before tonight, the governor had already called up a state of emergency. In terms of the preparations, in terms of the public statements that governor`s made, how he handled himself tonight, how he has prepared the government in Missouri for the decision tonight, what is your assessment of that?

CLEAVER: Well, I would have preferred that the governor not necessarily called out the National Guard. However, it`s difficult to know exactly what to do if you`re in the governor`s seat. And so I think he`s looking at, you know, the possibility that something could go wrong, something could go badly wrong, and he would end up being blamed.

Now, I think the governor`s comments tonight -- I would like to have been involved in helping him or his staff craft what he said because I think one of the things that is extremely important, and it is that young people understand that their pain is not wrong. And so we need to let them know not only that we understand their pain, but I think all decent Americans, black or white or brown, should also feel the pain of a family and a community of a young 18-year-old kid shot down.

And so I think, you know, if I had been involved in the drafting of his comments, it would have been along the lines that, Look, I understand you`re hurt. I understand that there`s a litany of these kinds of things happening around the country, and we got to make sure that we deal with law enforcement at the same time that we deal with the anger that young people are feeling.

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