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"on target" tonight. mike huckabee is struggling in the polls but is not giving up his fight to be the 2016 republican nominee for president. i'll ask him how long he'll stay in the race and why he still has faith that evangelical voters will still have faith in him and reject ted cruz. the 2016 election proirnl season officially kicks off with the avoid caucus on february 1st and on the republican side there are still 12 candidates, vying for the party faithful but if parties to be believed, ted cruz and donald trump are running neck and neck in iowa. marco rubio is running a distant third and most others are barely registering. mike huckabee swept the iowa

caucus in 2008. won seven more states before bowing out to the eventually nominee john mccain. wooing the popular voters, from strang supporstrong support from evangelical christians. but now, meanwhile evangelicals in iowa appear to be throwing their lot behind ted cruz who may win as a result. what does that mean for huckabee? he's going to have to reassess his run for the because it's too crowded ahead of the iowa caucuses. sooner or later more candidates will bow out, around top contenders, donald trump and ted cruz. i asked

huckabee, what cruz said about his right to be president because cruz was born in canada. here is what huckabee told me. >> i'm not getting into that, that's not an issue for me. i i was born in hope arkansas, i'm pretty sure i'm eligible. >> governor, you have the strongest support in evangelicals what happened. >> well, first of all, i don't think that this election has been decided yet. you know, i know what the polls say but the polls have been so wrong in elections. the kentucky governor's race is a good recent example. polls don't always reflect where things are. i still think there's going to be a big surprise on the night of february 1st. we're doing 150 events in iowa. this month just in the month of january, and quite frankly, not one person in america has voted yet. so let's wait until february 1st.

we'll see how things really shake out. >> it's a punishing schedule. the 150 events in iowa. have you given some thought if the polls reflect reality on february 1st. are you staying in the race beyond that? >> well it all depends on how things, you know, cluster. if we're up near the top then certainly we keep going. i mean if we're in single digits and we just don't get traction then it's hard to keep going. but we're not anticipating that and that's why i mean -- look if i honestly thought those polls were reflective of where we are and where we're going to be three weeks from tonight, heck i'd go home. >> i hear yah. >> i'm still committed to this. that's why we're doing 150 events in january. you only do that one or two reasons, you are committed to winning or you're stark raving nuts. that's the only reason would you

do that many meefnts th events . >> governor, you've been quoted as saying these are your words if you reward people who play outside the rules and punish people living within the rules pretty soon no one is going to play within the rules. you're talking about immigration here, we are a nation of immigrants but we are also a nation of laws. i want to just sort of move away from immigration on that one. you do believe we are a nation of laws but you gave a pretty g big embrace to kim davis, deemed to be in direct contravention of the law. i'm just wondering how that squares about you viewing the nation as a nation of laws on immigration but not on same-sex marriage. >> well i hold to the view that the constitution expressly says that the courts can't make a law. kim davis didn't violate a law, all she had was the kentucky

constitution. the law the people speak of is the supreme court ruling made by the nine supreme court justices or five unelected lawyers. the court can't make law. that's been evident since the beginning of the constitution, jeffersoning affirmed that, madison, jackson, that makes the supreme court the supreme branch and overrules the other two. so congress can make a law, that's their constitutional duty. the courts can't. >> so in fact unless you see an affirmative law about same-sex marriage you don't believe that's the law of the land? >> well, there's nothing in the constitution that even speaks to marriage period. not just same sex marriage. there's nothing in the constitution that speaks to marriage at all. >> right. >> so how do the courts reach out and create a right that is

never defined in the constitution if the limitation of their review is in fact the u.s. constitution? and that's what they're responsible for doing and they reach beyond their responsibility. i mean if you read kennedy's opinion he virtually indicated that, that they to reach intoout thin air. they picked ds reach out into thin air. jufght justice kagan when she was going through her confirmation hearings to be solicitor general, led me remind you under oath that there is no constitutional right in united states law, for same-sex marriage. so what change between 2009 -- assemble by that extension there would be no constitutional right to opposite sex marriage, right? >> to what kind of marriage? >> to a man and a woman getting married. if there's no coverage of it in the constitution that works both ways. >> well, it's a matter the states have always held the

jurisdiction of that. and you know there's i think every reason to believe that that's the way it was intended. the founders expressly said in the 10th amendment if it's not in the constitution it is the purview of the states and that's where it should have been left. >> so when it comes to these social issues, if there are people who wish to make same sex marriage legal, wish to make abortion legal and they went through congress to do that and congress passed such laws you would then accept them as affirmative laws that are not otherwise spoken of in the constitution? >> well what you do if congress passes it, the president signs it and agrees to enforce it, you may not like it but you enforce it, you create a process that sir couple vent circumvents the constitution should have rejected the process by which they supposedly and i say supposedly, i don't think they got what they wanted, i don't think there's such a thing

as automatic same sex marriage because of the constitution, but there should be very, very wary of allowing this process to be decided by courts rather than the people's elected representatives. because just remember if that's the weapon they choose then some day if there is a court that decides the other way, then i guess they've certainly set themselves up to say well, there's nothing we can do about it. it's the law of the land. so i just want to ask you this: do you think the left would have reacted in the same way had that been the ruling, 5-4 in favor traditional biblical marriage and if it some day it changes will that be the reaction of those on the left in support of same-sex marriage, there's nothing we can do, it's the law of the land. you and i know the answer to that is no. >> but the history is that people who are in favor of change or against change do the same thing. they try get legislation passed

in states. they try get legislation passed in congress and if there's a test in the supreme court they try win that too. people try come out on sides that works for them. i guess i'm trying to determine if there's a law passed by congress that guaranteed same-sex marriage would you have had the same support of kim davis? because i suspect davis ohave done the same thing one way or the other. >> i think then she would have the right to say look, i can't do that in violation of my conscience. remember kim davis was an elected official. the kentucky constitution expressly said marriage was a relationship between one man one woman. now the relationship comes you can't do that because of your conscience. should there be an accommodation for people's faith? i've been to gitmo.i see the accommodation we make to people

who are there. we paint lines on the cell floors that point to mecca, we give them the opportunity to practice their faith, these are people who are being detained for either murdering americans americans. are you telling me that it's okay to accommodate people who are in gitmo under those kinds of circumstances, but we can't accommodate an elected county clerk in kentucky? i find that hard to believe. >> right but we're not accommodating the gitmo prisoners, none of that breaks the law, what kim davis was doing, in the meaning of some was breaking the law. >> the differences though, it wasn't that people couldn't get a same-sex marriage license in kentucky. the question was whether she had to personally sign it. if a couple is interested in marriage more than they are

making a point, why do they care whose signature is on the certificate? shouldn't they be less interested in the signature of the clerk and more interested in their signatures? that's why i thought this was so disingenuous. not make sure they could be married because they could be. were they going to force a person of christian faith to go against her conscience and force her to do something and then the judge criminalized her christianity by putting her in jail because she could not bail bow to that particular practice. that's why i feel this was so disingenuous for people on the left. they want no one to be able to legally and even ethical ly just say okay, you goat do your marriage but i'm not going to have to personally approve i.t. or applaud for it. that's not good enough. they want you to be forced to

accept it and to sign the certificate. i just think that's a little bit evident that it's not about the marriage, it's about forcing those who oppose it to have to accept it. and even to accommodate it. and support it with a signature. >> coming up mike huckabee says evangelical voters in iowa may like ted cruz right now but that won't last. the former arkansas governor says he still has faith had a major surprise on february 1st. that's next.

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