night. ali velshi "on target" is next. ♪ i'm ali velshi ii'm ali velshi in le their powers. what it means for america's democracy. good evening and welcome to las vegas, nevada. i'm here for the final republican presidential primary

debate of 2015. tomorrow night nine candidates will appear in prime time in venetian hotel. to try to build support before the iowa caucuses. texas senator ted cruz has taken over donald trump. and first appearance since last week's proposal to ban muslims. it's not what trump says that separates him from every other republican vying for the presidential nomination. trump is a billion air, according to forbes worth $4.5 bill, he says he's worth more, but he says he doesn't need the money. billion ayerbillionaires play a.

a new york times investigation in october turned up 50 billionaires among 150 families that contributed nearly half of all the early contributions to 2016 presidential campaigns. al jazeera is looking at some of these rich americans and the candidates who would like to call them my billionaire. mary snow has the preview. >> they are among the richest of the rich in america, and what they spend can hem determine who makes it to the white house. a siege in political spending, coming after the 2010 citizens united decision. charles and caved coach koch

practically wrote the book. combined their net worth is estimated to be $86 billion. along with ideology, is a push for influence. >> these major donors are heavily invested in american industry and by and knowledge la are lookinlarge arelooking for . >> still isn't backing a candidate but in return for his donations, he's asked candidates to submit their plans for cutting carbons. george sorrows has always been a cash for democrats. he hasn't fully committed money for 2016 race but he's been one of the biggest contributors to hillary clinton since she first ran for office. sheldon adelson will take a gamble?

still hasn't backed a candidate this time around. but the promise of deep pockets soont surisn't a sure thing in h to the white house. president obama won election. >> we'll only look back as far as the 2012 election cycle to see the vast amount of resources spent by the koch brothers and sheldon adelson. money isn't always going to be successful. >> mary snow, al jazeera. >> one of the billionaires that mary mentioned was adelson, a man of great wealth, eager to spend tens of millions of dollars electing candidates who share his support of israel. michael shure says tomorrow's debate is an audition in the house that sheldon built.

>> sheldon is this man, sheldon adelson, the 82-year-old las vegas billionaire. forbes put his net worth at nearly $20 billion and one of the richest americans and ogop mega-donor. >> i'm not sure that sheldon wants to be th the richest man n the world. >> i think he saw romney as too mushy but better than the alternative. >> a former democrat, adelson is actually liberal on most social issues but what he's most interested in is the security of israel. he is vehemently against the creation of a palestinian state. >> he cares deeply and passionately about the history of israel.

everything is secondary to that. >> the best future for israel lies with the republicans. spoke frequently with senator marco rubio. he hasn't committed to rubio or any other candidate. >> he wants to see rubio win some votes in iowa and new hampshire and where we're standing it now. >> some call it the adelson primary. >> he cannot guarantee influence. can he not guarantee that the next president is going to do what he wants. but he will get access because he will put a lot of money into the process. >> he would say this is america. i've made a lot of money. i should be able to spend my money any way i want. do i want to influence the political process, sure i do. >> rules regulating gambling are simply business. >> he wants the government to stay out of his business, right? >> for good reason.

adelson and the sands have been under investigation of the government over possibly bribing chinese officials. the question, does that tainted foreign money seep into american political campaigns? >> i think if you are on the republican side you'll worry about those threats later. the candidates who talk to him are going to talk mainly about israel and mainly tell sheldon adelson what he wants to hear. >> and four years later, sheldon adelson remains poised to listen again. michael shure, al jazeera. >> al jazeera reached out to adelson but did not get an answer. i'm turning now to the man you just met in michael shure's report, john ralston. he's ben covering politics for 25 years in nevada. john joins us from the studios

in las vegas. good to see you. let's talk about adelson, candidates want his money. you just said in that story, the candidates are trying to tell shell don adelson what he wants to hear, except triumph. trump angered many jews the other week. he's not going out of his way to at least publicly court adelson. >> i don't think he wants adelson's money. that was at the republican jewish coalition that he made those comments which sheldon adelson is believed to heavily finance. i don't think donald trump is adelson's guy and not much chance that adelson would support him. some of the things trump says on immigration, sheldon adelson wants to support a winner not just in the primaries but a year from now. >> right and actually that's pretty important for sheldon

adelson, in 2012, he backed newt gingrich and then mitt romney. he wants some return on his investment. >> yes he does. the newt gingrich investment he helped him in south carolina but that is a personal relationship that goes back to the mid 90s when gingrich won the speakership and was strong on israel. i don't think adelson thought gingrich was going to win. giving somebody $20 million is like giving somebody else $20 for us. he found that in his couch cushion he. he is just not a sheldon adelson kind of guy. he wants to be with the winner. he wants a republican administration this time. i actually think he's got his eye on rubio but he's not going to do anything with rubio until

rubio shows that maybe can he do well in a couple of states. >> and this business about wanting a republican administration, this of course, in the face of a word of a meeting that was held amongst republican king pins talking about figuring a way not to have trump as a nominee for fear that republicans could lose congress as a result. this becomes important to adelson. >> yes, sheldon adelson is like most billionaires and most politicians. he doesn't pay attention to politics unless he has to. you don't have to be an expert in politician to kno politics td trump is the nominee, no reasonable person thinks that donald trump is going to be potent nominee for republicans and he is probably going to cause carnage all the way to the bottom of the ticket. which worries a guy like adelson

who wants to have influence on israel, in the white house and in congress. i think adelson would be a stop-trump guy. >> a pleasure to have you on. if you are in las vegas, you should be the only guy we have on. have john appears on pbs affiliates in nevada. you're about to meet a man who says there should be more money in american politics. you heard that right. keep it here. much >> we are scared. >>...have an organized right-wing movement trying to kill others.

>> i've i'm talking tonight about presidential politics and money. superpacs have already raised about $314 million this election cycle and many of you know superpacs are outside groups that can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money in elections as long as they do not coordinate directly with candidates or political parties. and they are one reason some critics say money is perverting american politics. campaign finance lawyer dan backer says there's not enough money in politics. there should be more. lead attorney for db capital strategies where he focuses on campaign law. last year he won a case before the u.s. supreme court that removed a ceiling on how much wealth individuals can donate, during a two year cycle.

he joins me from d.c. dan thank you for being with us. i guess the fact that donald trump is his own billionaire complicates something a little bit. but we're in a position where everybody has got t to have a billionaire or they can't be in the race. >> i don't think that's the case. look add be at ben carson. it's the ground swell of small donors that convinced him to run. he's since got larger and larger funders, but he's not supported that way. he was riding a little high. look at ted cruz as another great example. he has an outside superpac or series of them, and they do have a number of donors, but ted cruz's rise up the polls, having money is great and lets you put your message out and lets your

supporters say why they like you but it's not going to make a difference. this is sort of the heart of the story here. jeb bush who had had the super-superpac eve ever, $100 million, is at 4%. they are not going to vote for somebody they don't want to vote for. >> i hear you on that. you've actually made some good arguments since the last time we talked is bearing out. you and i had a discussion last time i said what happens when they just put out flat lies? which has been somewhat of a characterization of what's going on. when i'm stuck correcting the untruths and the mischaracterizations, it's other news i'm not doing. the money does permit these people to say whatever they want to say and there's no law saying they have to tell the truth. >> no there isn't.

but there's the law of the free market and when candidates get out there and they lie and their supporting organization he get out there and lie they are very quickly called out for it. i think the washington post has the fenochios, love to find the lies and reporting on it. quickly learn this lesson, you need to cite it ant support it. doesn't marine you can't be mean but outright lies are fairly rare. >> i'm not sure i understand, we're seeing a downturn in ben carson's numbers because there are some important issues people feel he's not as well versed at. you've hardly taken a hit for absolute outright lies. he's taken a hit because of his hostile stand on muslims coming to america. >> i think the polling he was at 41% nationally and still in

first place in iowa. so i think what voters are responding to, i think you can categorize what he's saying, what he's saying in a lot of different ways but at the end of the day, voters are not responding they're not looking at this as lies, they are looking at his opinion his values and that's why voters aren't punishing him yet for statements that may not be 100% truthful or full of truthiness. but there's something there that you worry about and i might worry about but voters are seeing that, that's just part of the language. >> do you believe there should actually be more money in politics than there is now. >> absolutely. i think we spend nowhere near enough money and i always love the example of halloween. in a two year election cycle we are slated to spend about $8 billion. one to $two billion is double counted, money into political action committees and out to

candidates. if you count it, we spend five or $6 billion on halloween candidate and all of halloween is over $8 billion a year. i think it's crazy we spend less money deciding who is going to lead our country, this regulatory behemoth athan we do on kitkats and oreos. >> that is creative i'll give that you but we spend more things on everything but politician, beef or milk. it's a strange comparison. i guess you and i won't always agree but i appreciate your position. donald trump's radical ideas, seem to have him riding high in the polls but what about president trump following through with those ideas? coming up. we'll look to see if trump is more of a rabble-rouser than a

serious leader. >> we are scared. >>...have an organized right-wing movement trying to kill others. ali.

>> right after "on target," 9:30 eastern. donald trump continues to lead the pack. seeking the republican nomination. many pundits attribute his plairlplairt withpopularity to e of bombastic. former u.s. senator joseph mccarthy. and michael singer, an author of

a book on demagogues, says trump has become a textbook example of one. becoming madison, the least likely founding father and he has written a book called deam going todemagogue. he fits the definition of demagogue perfectly. what are the characteristics that make a person a demagogue? >> traditional demagogues meet four rules. they posture as a man of the masses a mirror of the common people and that usually means they are attacking elite, they are setting themselves up as against eleads. the second thing -- eleads. they use that emotion for political benefit for their own advancement politically and the fourth one is the most important rule which is that they threaten or they break established rules of governance. and for a long time i didn't

think that donald trump met either the first or the fourth rules but over the course of the last few months i think he's stampeded across both of them. >> right, rules 2 and 3 lots of people meet. the idea of motivating emotion and then using that for politics. but the first one motivating the masses against eleads, a elitess the that necessarily bad? >> to get wonky with your audience. the oxford english dictionary, the first definition of demagogue is actually positive. for centuries those who were doing those things the system that they were attacking was inherently corrupt. that was the case. the demagogue who was using the people and motivating the masses could be a force for good but that is not case when the system

that the demagogue is operating in is a constitutional democracy like the united states and that is what trump is doing and i think that's why it's so alarming. >> isn't there valuatit validato those who, can say we can throw the bums out if we want, yet something is wrong, he's giving voice to something that's going wrong, there's something in the political association that's allowing the birth of a demagogue. >> yes, it's a great question but here's the thing: so demagogues play to our worst emotions. they've been called our appetites are the base emotions we have the lowest common denominator. i think of them in the spectrum of figures you have in any democracy, they are kind of the bottom-feeders so we know they're not good for us. any politician could decide to demagogue. but most of them are restrained

because they see that kind of behavior and appeal as beneath them. the most dangerous demagogues have done throughout time is they basically set up a state within the state of people who are accountable only to them alone. and the really dangerous thing is when that state within a state starts swamping the state itself, when you look at something -- so donald trump he is not only telling lice about the thousands of people in jersey city cheering on 9/11, when they are proven to be lies he doubles down on them. that's worrisome. there was an attack on a man by some of his supporters and he said maybe he circulate have been roughed up, that's voyages. his latest proposal to bar muslims from coming into the country. it violates most of our constitutional rules and probably violates international law. we like in our constitutional

democracy as having limitless future. we don't have government officials talking about them in terms of invidious stereotypes. that is what this is. it invades and manipulates millions of americans that see muslim american as our neighbors. >> i've had responses fra muslims whfrommuslims that say e safety and security of america. they look at what's going on in paris and around the world and says here is a man who is prepared to throw political correctness aside and they believe he is standing up for america and we still got vote and we still have a court and a constitution so how bad can it be? >> i think they hold -- i think they are -- they have

responsibilities as citizens of a constitutional democracy, to stand up for the precepts of our constitution democracy. we have separation of church and state. we think about people in terms of individuals. not classes of stereotypes. we have due process. we don't allow violence in our politics. so yes, you can always have a demagogue who is a bottom feeder who drives people down. i thought one of the most interesting things was there was a focus group by frank luntz this weekend on one of the sunday shows and i watched a lot of the republican voters in a focus group in nevada and they were talking about trump as though they knew he didn't know what he was saying. >> because of that, their favorable responses to him grew every time he said something outrageous. because three liked he was being outrageous. they didn't really think he was

going to do this stuff. >> exactly. i'm going to say that it is on them. it's on those citizens to take their responsibilities as citizens of a constitutional democracy seriously. citizenship does not -- it's not going to have a free pass to just throw all caution to the wind, go with your gut and allow your sentenc citizens and neighe attacked and go against your enemy. i've studied this in history, it's up to ordinary citizens and to leaders to nip dem gogz in the bud. whedemagogues in the bud. >> author of demagogue, the fight to save democracy.

becoming madison. i'll be in las vegas again tomorrow night for the republican debate. thanks for joining us. the news continues here on al jazeera america. >> on "america tonight": the rise of the right. anger at politicians. fear of foreigners, drives the return of vicious hate to the streets of germany. >> people trying to kill others. that's the reality we have again in 2015 in germany. >> maintain's sheila macvicar with a spark that threatens to