change the way you experience tv with x1 from xfinity. i am asking for your support. >> we are going to win. let's do it. up, andca is waking their it's a spirit of awakening sleeping this nation. >> and to think i had such an easy life. what do i need this for, right? ♪ >> good evening on this normal,

ordinary, somewhat boring tuesday. while you wait for the post to close, we will talk it over. stay tuned for all of that. some of our colleagues were able to catch up with one voter in happy aboutnot too the way donald trump has been running his campaign. >> i will be today is not the day to do that. i am very concerned. i just saw a commercial i guess it was last night with these comments that were made about women. i have two daughters. i will have more to say about that.

if john kasich is going to is it going to work? it would take him off brand because he is trying to be positive. he is probably outraged by the comments in that ad. if he wins tomorrow ohio will be front and center with a chance to galvanize the establishment and the antitrust movement. that he will have the stomach in the discipline to leave that movement. john: you are wrong. run histo casing has campaign has put him in a position to go after trump in a different way. because he has run his campaign a positive way you are right about the question of stomach. but if he decides to take the

fight to trump, he's in a position that is different from ted cruz or rubio. a kind of credibility and stature. mark: to take on trump who is so strong it will take discipline and stomach to do it. he will be a player in this nomination fight. i think ted cruz has a better chance to be that person. it does take john kasich off message. trump is to to stop offer something different. john: that ad is powerful, the one he is talking about with the women. daughters i think

he can make this argument in a powerful way. k: illinois and ohio and missouri are voting today and those are states where bernie sanders could do well. reporterson spoke to and he seemed to offer a new way to contrast his wife's candidacy with that of her arrival. bill clinton: i think you know the answer to why she is doing well. this should be a race for president. blame candidate and a responsibility candidate. the responsibility candidate should win. is that framing something

we will see more of? john: they have caddick hard time coming up with an effective frame to fight sanders. some of the stuff on gun control has been effective. it goes back to this core weakness she has. it is a gambit. bill clinton is edging his way toward this. is he blaming rahm emanuel for the problems? mark: she has had an inability to drive the economic message. sanders could win anywhere from zero to three states. the difference between zero and three is huge.

john: surety has more delegates. mark: the sanders people seem a little more confident at least based on body language. if they can win three tonight that will put them within hailing distance of winning the same number of states as she did. as you get into this calendar where you can win the lion's share states it becomes a .owerful argument : if she loses to him in her , there is of illinois not a great explanation for why.

portman ande rob campbell brown and more than that coming up after this. ♪

mark: donald j trump and his party's nomination. coming on to talk about it is fellow buckeye senator rob portman of ohio.

thank you for joining us. governor kasich and his team have been extraordinarily confident all week that he is going to win ohio. are you confident he is going to win ohio question mark senator portman: i have been all over the state. i sense that he has the momentum. i do think he will win. it will make a difference. john: if john kasich does win ohio is pretty certain he will be the only he will be the only one that he wins. where can he win next? portman: a bunch of states coming up, pennsylvania. he is looking east to some of those states.

some of the states in the midwest. mitt romney was campaigning with you. he spoke out about donald trump. including the things that trump has said about women. why so fewlain to me people in your party have spoken out as forcefully against donald trump is mitt romney has? senator portman: i can't keep up with what trump is saying. when he says something over the line i do make comments about it. i have done that on a number of occasions. i speak out when i disagree with him. i have also talked about the fact that there is no room in the political discourse in this country for the kind of violence and hatred we've seen at these rallies on both sides.

it is incumbent upon us to figure out how to come together. mark: romney gave a visible and forceful speech almost like unlike anyone else. are other republicans to feel just as strongly. why have so few people been as visible speaking out as governor romney has? senator portman: you have to ask them. i have been extremely visible supporting john kasich. i went to new hampshire for him. john has great town hall

meetings. he tells it like it is. i do think he is best for our party. we need somebody right now who knows how to bring people together. in ohio he was left with some of the similar problems we have in the country. a huge deficit. a faltering economy. he picked up the pieces in ohio and he can do the same thing in washington. john: we've had reports today that mitch mcconnell spoke to donald trump.

and that he should do something to defuse the tension at his rallies. speaker ryan said ultimately candidates are responsible for the tenor of the events. give me your sense of whether there are the kinds of things we know donald trump has said in these events. about wanting to punch people in the mouth. being taken out on stretchers. incitement to violence. you agree with that? senator portman: i haven't seen what speaker ryan said today. by so we set over the weekend and i agreed with him. something is wrong with our hope legal system or you have this kind of violence at these rallies.

we have the right to vote at the ballot box. that is where political discourse ought to occur. we can have peaceful demonstrations of our point of view. mark: bipartisan legislation about the heroine problem. are the american people focused enough on the problem of heroin? is a hugertman: this problem. i have been involved in these drug education programs for many years. a lot of lives are being ruined.

but the government more involved is a better partner. unfortunately many of them are veterans are coming into drug problems because of their ptsd. getting our children away from this terrible choice. the bill passed on a 94 to one vote in the senate. that never happens. every congressional district is dealing with this problem. i call on the house of representatives to get this to the president's desk. it affects every single one of us. you are helping your

friend john kasich. thank you so much. up next to a dose of the evening joe. after this. ♪

john: joining us now from 30 rock is joe scarborough. evening joe. if the goal is to stop donald

trump, would you prefer to see this narrow to a one-on-one race or continue to have multiple rivals? joe: i would want i would not want ted cruz and donald trump to go one-on-one because we are moving into the northeast where ted cruz may not do that well. it is best to have john kasich in there as well. he may get 15 to 20 or 25% of the vote. andcruz can get another 25% you can keep donald trump's numbers down. it all depends on the night. whether john kasich can carry ohio. how difficult would it be if trump has a plurality but not

a majority of delegates to take the nomination away from him at the convention? pre people say it is a impossibility. some people say it is reasonable. those of the rules. you need a majority, not a plurality. that depends on donald trump. three weeks ago i would've said they could never do it. that was before he was asked .bout david duke he sent a message out. he talked about how islam is at war with the united states. friday night cause a lot of concerns. if we see that donald+++

continuing, doing whatever it takes to prey on people's anger and frustration and resentment, i suspect anything is possible in cleveland. a lot of republican leaders would say we would rather blow up this party then let trump be the nominee. mark: does that make it easier from a pr point of view? joe: yes. you can say these actions of donald trump make him unacceptable not only to our party but disqualify him as president of the united states. the alternative theory is that donald trump actually turns a page. he moves from being this primary kind of the whois playing to the lowest common denominator on a lot of different things and becomes the man that a lot of people who know them behind the scenes which is a moderate. is actually a moderate democrat in many ways. movingld trump starts toward the middle and trying to unify and reaching out to republican leaders, then it becomes more difficult for the republican party to reject him if he only has a plurality of delegates. today he contacted mitch

mcconnell. mcconnell said he lectured donald trump about violence at his rallies. if he begins that campaign to reach out to republican leaders that will be a lot harder for republicans to take away from him. john: in your column you made a provocative charge about the rally. outline your theory of the case there. joe: it was a made-for-tv event. anybody the turn on their television set after getting breaking news across their phone that donald trump's campaign

rally had been canceled out of fear of violence. trap, right into the right into what donald trump wants you to walk into which was a made-for-tv protest. they obviously set up. they set it up in a college. hispanic that is 25% and 8% black and 25% asian. town that has not elected a republican mayor since 1931. donald trump knew exactly what was going on. they allow the protesters to stream in. so much so that they had an excuse to cancel it. then donald trump gets to go on about how hisn first amendment rights of the violated. despite the fact he was getting far more air time that he ever would've gotten from that one rally.

how well donald trump knows and how cynically he can play the media. it helps him tonight but it hurts and in the long run. almost anything he is done in the last three weeks helps them in the short run but hurts and in the long run. that's why you were seeing pulling ahead of donald trump. if donald trump locks down the nomination and stops the political daytrading stops playing to the lowest common denominator you will see those numbers start to tighten up. he has a ways to go. for every angry disaffected voter he picks up with events like chicago he loses three or four moderate voters in the suburbs. on the democratic side is there anything hillary can do to end this contest before june?

democrats should rejoice over that. it makes her a better candidate. we all know what a terrible candidate she was six months ago. bernie sanders pushing hillary clinton has made her a better candidate. it looks like hillary can squeak it out in the end. john: candidates was love to hear that. mark: i'm not sure she is getting that much better. the thing that will really tie her in knots is the inability to

fund raise for the general election. she is having trouble now finding time in her schedule. bernie sanders doesn't have to go to fundraisers to raise millions of dollars. why does it matter for bernie sanders to win states? every state he wins, another $5 billion comes in. we do have caucuses coming up where she will be tied up in knots. john: coming up we have the fred astaire and ginger rogers of political power couples. dan senior and campbell brown. right after this. ♪

john kasich: we have to wake up.

a man who doesn't know how to do the job. a man whomp: this is was the managing partner at lehman brothers in almost took the whole world economy down. said oh i am never going to attack. but that his poll numbers sank. that is why he is on the end of the stage. and that is when he got nasty. that was from october when john kasich took a big swing it donald trump. what a night that turned out to be for john kasich. there are two people who've been on this program a lot. but never at the same time. and campbell brown. thank you both for getting a sitter tonight.

i know you are supporting marco rubio. rate the clinical skills of gotten john kasich? dan: one of the myths is that this race is still clearly defined by these lanes. is if you look at who is being drawn to the trump candidacy. they transcend all the lanes. if there is to be a real threat to donald trump, you can make the argument it would be far more credible coming from john kasich that it would be from ted cruz. john kasich profile and style

are far more pro-populist than ted cruz. makes any of us think that the parties going to consolidate around john kasich even if that happens? you could argue it either way. it is not clear right now whether getting behind cruz or john kasich is better. john: your husband does not like donald trump at all. campbell: it has really brought us together. we both dislike donald trump. corey is not telling the truth.

he has done it on multiple occasions. i've heard a piece that was critical of the way the media was giving donald trump so much airtime. said that is coming from the same campbell brown who was begging us to come to her education summit for the presidential candidates. that was not true. after he made the comments about megyn kelly we made it clear we didn't want donald trump there. early on i was one of those people saying donald trump is disqualified. if someone said one of

those things and they were a ceo of a company, why is he impervious to that? campbell: it goes to the economic dislocation and the fear that people are feeling right now. i don't think donald trump should get the job either. i agree. if i hear one more republican say i am appalled by donald trump and i will support him if he becomes the nominee, my is going to explode.

john: how does he get away with that. the forces that in every past cycle would struck down any candidate who said anyone of those things, how can it be that he survives? dan: it is perplexing. ceo is not running for president. in every state about 60% of the voters are rejecting donald trump. he is not winning a majority anywhere. that will continue to be a problem for him going forward. it.s not running away with there is enormous resistance to his candidacy. those people are very

afraid in this environment. they are looking for people to blame. they see these fights for racial equality and women's equality as a threat in this environment. this stuff doesn't resonate with them. donald trump is a sexist, a racist. , to the people in the media who think they don't have to call him out on these things, because he is so good for ratings they are really playing into his whole shtick and enabling him. then and campbell, thank you both. harold ford junior joining us next. you can listen us on the radio in washington. 99.1 fm. ♪

president obama: the longer we allow this rhetoric to continue and passively accepted we create a permission structure that allows the animosity in one corner of our politics to infect our broader society. animosity breeds animosity. we have a choice. we can condone this race to the bottom and accept it as the way things are and sink further or we can roundly reject this kind of behavior whether we see it in the other party or when we see

it in our own party. said a better example for our children. it starts with us. afternoon.was this normally a fun and joyful event. but today the president spoke out about donald trump. we just watched president obama. you think he is enjoying having a role in this race? ford: i think the anticipated having a role. i don't think his role, but he was hoping his role would be this. it is mainly on the republican

side. aspect.l donald trump is a big part of it. he has decided to tap into the vein of where the country is. there are a lot of people in the republican party with a lot of fear and anxiety. candidates get before audiences and get carried away. the media has enabled donald

trump. other candidates who waited so long to challenge him will have to blame themselves if he becomes the nominee. at some level they have to blame themselves for not giving the same speech that mitt romney gave earlier. i think romney's critique of him would've been more effective had he endorsed a candidate. a legitimate argument can be made that the ugliness here is the fact that trump did not take responsibility at least for being a part of creating this beds home that has begun to this rallies. he could've elevated himself and his campaign and hopefully urged his supporters who have every right to support him not to go down in the gutter.

john: hillary said tonight that she is proud to the democrats are waging a race based on issues. i'm looking at the next polls. voters are asked if sayers were nominated 50% they would be satisfied. say 51% oforters them say they would be dissatisfied with hillary. if hillary does go on to be the nominee, how tough is it going to be to put the party back together given the level of dissatisfaction each side is saying it would feel if the other side when? harold ford: those numbers are encouraging. a few weeks ago those numbers given worse. i would love to see more passion

is there. we have a supreme court nomination at stake here. many of the gains that we have made under president obama are at risk. it'll will take real work to get it done. you can't assume anything. i'm encouraged by those numbers. with the general election be competitive? antirepublican republican nominee is going to be formidable. in the clinton campaign is to keep doing what we are doing but to sharpen it. to have an economic message that can appeal to everybody. middle-class americans. none of these republicans are going to be easy to beat. it will be a tough race in the fall.

john: you think donald trump is a sexist and racist? harold ford: i think some of the things he has said indicate that. i don't know him well enough to call him that. john: it is always awesome to see you. a knockoff of ocean's 11 that does not infringe on any copyright starring donald trump & eisenberg. after this. ♪

mark: will probably walk into the convention with more delegates than any other candidate. opening among trumps rivals to lift the nomination out from under this billionaire. sasha eisenberg. : the individual delegates who

go to cleveland to fill those states are the kind of shadow campaign going on right now. even if you didn't win them the saturday idates last always having their county conventions. they were selecting people who have been elected the night of the aisle caucuses. those people going to go to the county convention a multilayer funneling process. they are having congressional district conventions is entirely possible the goal of these other campaigns they're trying to find places where trump won the majority of delegates that they can get people in there who are free to vote their conscience. typically the delegates

are bound on the first ballot. if trump doesn't win on the first valid than many of the delegates become free agents. their loyalty to trump may be nonexistent. eisenberg: they might have their own preferences. and there are other things they vote on besides the nomination itself that could have an impact. john: what happens in april? asenberg: you can't have brokered convention because there aren't any brokers. that is true at the national level. but if the state level the local party brokers are state party chairman, the governor of the state. so you look at a state like south carolina. trump one or 50 delegates there. and yet the people who are getting selected to be the trunk delegates at the convention had two of them delegates to the state convention last may before

trump even came on the scene. so the people getting put on their are more likely to be loyal to nikki haley or lindsey graham, who are very anti-trump. you can see them stacking those slates of delegates. may, you'll have these free agents or double agents. you want them to come over to you. is acceptable the practice that we would normally think of as improper. it is not clear to me that you could actually be prevented from offering cash for their vote. all hands of things go on at the state level. june, the question is who can be entered into nomination. we had a conversation that i .on't nevada caucuses

there could be grounds to challenge the results based on the rules. out,u want to knock estate you have to win a vote in the contest committee. and that goes to the floor of the convention. past, there have been rules changes to make it impossible for the delegates from the state where these contests are being questioned from even voting on this. you could theoretically have 20 trump states and challenge all of them. the majority from the non-trump states trying to exclude them. not get the votes on the first ballot. then you start to see some of these delegations doing some horsetrading. all of a sudden those 50 delegates the trump was counting carolina, they could

go to ted cruz or paul ryan or anybody else. the chairmanl be of this convention. vote.an hold a voice the chairman ruled them out of order. the sergeant at arms is going to be loyal to whoever is running the party. if rents previous wants to use the rules to block donald trump he can do it. a presumptiveve nominee and they get handed control of the convention. if there is not a presumptive nominee they don't get it. will get torman pick who was on these committees.

it will be piecemeal chaos. various individuals understand the process and their own states. but very few understand the big picture. romney was trying to push aside some of the ron paul people in 2012. team areawyers on that incredibly useful now. thisven't had anything on scale in memory. you do have to have some kind of coordination of this effort. john: this is an ocean's 11 highest with no danny ocean. or many denny oceans. we'll be right back. ♪

mark: attention citizens of earth. it is 6:00 on the east during seaboard. we will look at some of the exit polls. theof republican voters in states would be satisfied with donald trump as their candidate. if the general election is trump versus clinton, 36% say they would consider voting for a third candidate.