understand what's happening in the housing market. it's so important. it is part of the american dream, no question about that. thanks, everybody. that's going to wrap things up for us this morning, but the conversation continues online. please send me an e-mail with your thoughts, your questions to yourbottomline@cnn.com. also, find me on facebook and twitter, @christineromans. we reply to all of these. i want to know what you think about the housing market, confidence, jobs, education, and the american dream. back now to cnn saturday for the latest stories making news. good morning, everybody. i'm t.j. holmes, welcome to this cnn saturday morning, and it's a holiday weekend where minnesota's state government is shut down. that could take a toll on some of the more vulnerable people in that state. we're talking about services for the deaf, child care subsidies for the poor, and help lines for the disabled. none of those services are available because lawmakers could not compromise on a

budget. also, 20,000 state workers are without their jobs right now. cnn's chris welch joins me now from st. paul. good morning to you. and you help us understand just how many people in the state right now are being affected by this shutdown. >> t.j., i'd be surprised if anyone would say they weren't affected, you know, in any way. but first of all, it's the fourth of july weekend and all these state parks and rest stops, they're all closed, and a lot of people are traveling today. that's just a minimal impact on -- with what's going to be happening with this. because you mentioned it in the intro. a lot of serious problems could arise from this. you know, hot lines for seniors, reading for the blind, you know, the list kind of goes on. child care being a big one. child care services, you know, a lot of people are saying -- i spoke to a few with women who said, i may have to put all of

my work check into child care now because these state services aren't here. people are going to be feeling this. and it's very early -- iyou kno, this happened yesterday. i think we will really feel the impact of how hard a lot of people are going to be hit in a few days, when people really realize, after the holiday weekend, people start to realize, oh, geez, my government's not working, i'm not going to get these services after all. and you also mentioned over 20,000 state employees aren't going to be having -- they don't have a job. friday, they were let go, they were told not to come back indefinitely. they will get their jobs back, but this could last days, weeks, we really have no idea. we spoke to one of these employees who had lost their job yesterday. >> a sad commentary on politics. it's turned into a sport rather than working to solve a problem. >> that's the way a lot of people are feeling right now, t.j.

they're upset, frankly, that the republicans, democrats, democratic government, republican-controlled legislature couldn't come together. they had several weeks to come together and then this whole week, they knew the deadline was looming and they couldn't come together. and that's what's sticking in everyone's minds now. >> chris, one more thing before i let you go. and quickly, if you can, you hit more of the important things. some of those services for children, for the poor, for the homeless, even. but also, it is a holiday weekend, so this is going to affect a lot of business this weekend. people won't be traveling to parks and moving around like they thought they would. this could have an economic impact this weekend as well. >> exactly. campgrounds are closed, the minnesota zoo is closed. people will be driving, they may come up to signs on the road that say, you can't visit this place today, you can't spend your money here, the state's not going to get this revenue, so a lot of people are more irritated right now than anything that these kind of things aren't up and running either. >> chris welch, we appreciate

you, live for us from minnesota, where the state government is shut down there, because the two sides are essentially battling over the same things you hear them fighting about in washington, d.c. higher taxes for the wealthy versus deeper spending cuts. joining me now to talk about what's going on in the state, the minnesota republican state representative, kurt zeller, he's in a suburb of minneapolis, st. paul, for me this morning. sir, i appreciate you being here. and are you, the republicans, and also the democratic governor working on this this weekend? >> well, yeah. and thank you, t.j. good morning. we continue to work and i think one of the things in the report that maybe has been missing is that this isn't necessary. it just didn't have to happen. we had negotiated with the governor and come to a lot of compromise. we had made five different compromise offers to the governor, and we were really close, within a few hundred thousand dollars, even, of some of these budgetary areas, that the governor could have signed the bill. he's the only one who can call

us back. in our constitution, the legislature can't meet without a declaration from the governor in special session. so if the governor would have called us back, we could have passed the environment bill and passed the -- >> mr. zellers, let me ask you, though, but are negotiations -- you say work continues, but are you sitting down, any republicans across the table from democrats or from the governor himself this weekend to get a real compromise worked out? >> sure, we remain -- i am not sitting with the governor right now, but we remain ready, willing, and able. our last offer for the governor is sitting on the table. that was a lights on bill. again, something else that didn't have to happen. we presented the governor with a lights on, a continuing resolution, if you want to use the washington, d.c. term. we presented the governor with a lights on bill, with two hours left before the shut down, and he said, no, i'm not going to sign that either, you know, we're not going to have a temporary government. we're going to have -- i need to see all the bills. so we presented him with that

offer. that offer still lies on the table, i'm ready to do that. >> mr. zellers, you say an offer on the table, but i think i'm hearing you correctly, you all are not actually negotiating this weekend. you said there is a deal on the table and you're waiting for the phone to ring or something, but you all are actually not working this weekend, are you? >> oh, no, we absolutely are working. we're not physically sitting in the room with each other, but a number of these issue areas, we're so close. and the point being that it wasn't necessary. >> so what are you doing then? you said you are working. are you on the phone with the governor's people? are you waiting your phone to ring? a lot of people think you just all went home for the weekend. i'm reading everyone and from the governor's office, no negotiations are planned, you went to cool off for the weekend. you've got people out of a job, your parks are closed, got people suffering as we speak, and y'all actually don't have negotiations planned. >> well, again, i think the state parks are closed.

the federal parks are open, the koa parks are open, the roads are open, there are a number of services that are still functioning. the governor submitted a list of what he called essential services that are still being performed. it's not as if all government and all functions have closed down. we had troopers out on the highway to make sure the roads are being properly maintained. this isn't as if everything in the state has closed down. >> okay -- >> and again, it didn't have to happen. >> let me let -- let met listen in now to a democratic response. i'll let our viewers listen to. you're right on that point, certainly, essential services are still open. the state parks are closed. but let our viewers hear the governor's response after no deal was reached. >> but this one basic difference remains, they don't want to raise revenues on anybody, and i believe the wealthiest minnesotan can afford to pay more intax. >> he talked about the wealthiest, and this is the same

debate that's been going on in washington, but we're talking about, and you help me with the number, the "star tribune" there in minnesota reports there are 7,700 millionaires in the state, and is this what we're debating about? the republican side wants to make sure that tax aren't raised for 7,700 minnesotans and that is what caused the government to shut down? >> oh, no, not at all, t.j. for us, it's always been about the spending. the governor wants to make it about taxing rich people, as well as the president does, but for us, it's always been about the spending. we cannot continue -- i have two small kids that i refuse to leave a mountain of debt that they will never, ever be able to afford. i think it's irresponsible. we've got the largest budget in the state of minnesota's history. the largest budget, includes increases for education system. over half a billion dollars increased for our education, for our k-12 system, and our health and human services, over half a

billion dollars. so to say that we've bare bonused the budget and made sure that there's nothing happening in the state is just not true. it's the largest budget -- it's a 6% increase. the governor's original budget was a 27% increase in spending. we simply can't afford that. you look around minnesota, not only are families living with less, but they're making ends meet with what they have. and that's all our budget does, is essentially live within our means. it's the same budget we had from two years ago, going forward, we think that should be enough and we should prioritize within those budget areas. if everything's a priority, then nothing's a priority. >> we're also letting our viewers see something that one of the democratic leaders in the state had said there. i'll read it. it says, "republicans are putting millionaires over minnesotans and drove our state government to shutdown in order to protect a handful of our state's richest residents." sir, how long are you willing to let this go on? it seems like compromise is a dirty word these days. i know you have said your side

has given some. i know the governor's side says they've given some as well, but how long are you willing to let your state shut down, the government shut down, and literally people suffer before you all get into a room again and work this out? how long are you willing to let this go? >> well, t.j., i don't think we had to do it in the first place. >> i agree. >> again, the only person that can call us back, the only person that could have stopped this is governor dayton. we presented ee eed -- you kno if we can't agree on the areas of the budget -- and of the ten areas we have in our budget, you know, hhs, education, transportation, we had seven, eight of those agreed to. why not get those off the table? you're holding the good, you know, hostage to the absolute perfect. so i wasn't willing to shut the government down for one day. i sent a letter to our state workers saying, you're very valuable to us, we don't want to shut down government, we're so close on a bunch of these, and if we can't get to final resolution, then let's at least

have a temporary funding bill so we don't have to go through this. i don't think we needed to do this in the first place. some have said it's political. we have made five compromises with the governor, met him on spending levels on numerous bills, including education, which is a $14 billion section of our budget. that's a lot of money. we compromised and met the governor -- >> well, mr. zellers, hasn't the governor compromised with you as well on a number of issues? i agree. both sides have compromised some, but you're taking all the responsibility, putting the entire onerous back on your governor, it sounds like. this is all his fault, as if republicans and any other in the assembly had no responsibility for this. and you keep telling me, he's the only one who can call you back. i am certain you have the governor's phone number, and if you all want to get on the phone and pound this out over the next several hours, you could do that. >> again, the only reason i say that is because that's in our constitution. as a speaker of the house or a majority leader in the senate, we can't call ourselves back. >> you can call him and you can work this weekend, can you not? >> sure, we absolutely can.

and again, the reason -- one of the things that we had talked about is that the spending level or is it just a tax increase? and we had met the governor at all these spending levels, but the governor just wants a tax increase. and a tax increase for what? it's always been about the spending for us? what are we going to spend all this new money on? and are we getting the most we can out of those tax dollars. our taxpayers are fed up and tapped out, as a small business said to me. and these business owners in minnesota that are the quote/unquote millionaires, they're small business owners that file their personal and business income together. so it sounds good on paper, but when you tax a small business owner, you give him one or two choices. and if one of our small business woman in minnesota decides to leave the state or lay off a employee because of the tax increase, it just kills your economy and we can't have that. >> mr. zellers, uh i'll let you go, but i'm getting some questions from our viewer, and i

want you to tell me what answer i can give them when they ask me, "are my representatives and my governor working this weekend in negotiations to get the government open again?" can i tell them yes, or you're simply working with your people, they're working with their people, you're waiting on a phone call, you kind of blurred the line for me. i want a straight answer here. are negotiations actually going on and is it a possibility in the next few hours, today, overnight, sunday, on monday, you could have a deal reached. >> well, again, t.j., i can only speak for myself. i have remained ready, willing, and able. i don't want to in any way blur the line for you. if the governor called me and said, kurt, come on over, we've got to talk about the hhs budget, i'd zip over there then, no problem. >> so that sounds like a no. negotiations are not coming in. people shouldn't expect there to be a deal -- >> oh, no, not at all.

we remain ready and able, but you can't beg for a call or wait for a call if the other side doesn't want to call. i'd love to have this done. we said on thursday night, let's not shut down government, let's have a temporary funding bill so we don't have to go through this. the governor said, no. that's fine, it's his prerogative. but i would tell most minnesotans if there's a chance that we could get a deal done, whether it's saturday morning, monday night, sunday morning, we will be there. we have all of our members on the house floor thursday night, ready to vote for something. >> mr. zellers, i appreciate you taking the time. our hearts go out to you and the folks there in minnesota. hopefully they won't be hurting for long, but certainly a tough time for governments. i know it's a tough job for you and the governor, really would have liked to have seen something to be done to avoid it, but we appreciate you taking the time to answer the questions for us. >> anytime, t.j. happy to come on. we're at 14 minutes past the hour now. we go from politics on the local level in minnesota to national

politics now. and republican presidential candidate michele bachmann spending the day in iowa. she's riding her bus across the state in an effort to connect with voters. we see time and time again with candidates here, the tour has to stop somewhere and usually that's a diner. cnn political producer shannon travis joins me now from iowa city. where is the congresswoman? didn't i hear -- you sent a note that said she arrived. where is she now? >> she's right behind me, t.j. >> oh, there she is! >> i'm going to apologize in advance to you and our viewers, it's a bit chaotic and crazy in here. remember, we are at a diner, so they're still serving breakfast and coffee and all of that. the congresswoman is right behind me. she's talking with voters, she's meeting and greeting. this is basically the start of a really big day for her here in iowa. she's on a bus tour. she kicks off her bus tour here in iowa with five stops. this is the first stop, here at the blue bird diner in iowa city. later on today, she'll have a tea party rally she'll be

attending in des moines, iowa, at the state capitol, and attending a baseball game for the iowa cubs later on this evening as well. this is a big day. you'll remember, t.j., on monday she kicked off or formally announced her presidential campaign. she came back here to iowa. iowa is a critical state. first in the nation caucuses, and michele bachmann is winning -- >> shannon, i've got to stop you. i'm having a hard time listening to you, seeing the presidential candidate sit behind you eat a waffle five feet behind you. turn around to representative bachmann and tell her that we are live on cnn right now and try to toss a question at her? did she tell you already that she wouldn't take questions? you're live right now. >> reporter: they said they were not, but let's see if we can interrupt her conversation with the kid here, t.j. congresswoman bachmann, we're live right now, actually, what does this mean for you to be

here. >> it is so wonderful to be back home in iowa. i was born and raised in waterloo and cedar falls, so we're here in iowa city. it's such a clean town, a beautiful town, family oriented town, business oriented town and everyone is so happy the humidity broke. so it's just like being in hawaii today. it's beautiful here in iowa. my family and i are here, and we're with the owners of the restaurant and the food is outstanding. life couldn't be better. so we're excited. there's a lot of support today here too. >> reporter: congresswoman, is iowa a critical win for you this caucus? >> i think iowa's very important. we want to do very well here, so we're going to be working towards the caucuses that are coming up in august, and on to january and february and beyond. so we're looking forward to it. >> reporter: and the winner of the iowa caucuses aren't historically necessarily the republican presidential nominee, so why such an emphasis on iowa? >> well, because iowa is the first in the nation. it's very important to be here and have a presence here, because the values and the opinions that people have in iowa count. they count for the nation.

so it's important that we come here. this is the bread basket of the world, for a reason. this is where the food is grown, we have the best farmers in the world right here in iowa. so it's important to come and listen to what people have to say here in iowa and then take that message back to washington, d.c. >> reporter: appreciate your time, congresswoman. >> thank you. >> reporter: so t.j., there you have it. the republican presidential candidate saying that this is a big emphasis on iowa, winning here. this is pretty important for her. of course, she hails from the neighboring state of minnesota, but she's going to be barnstorming this state today and in the coming days ahead, of course. >> shannon, we appreciate that. forgive me for the distraction. it was hard to see the congresswoman there just five feet behind you, eating some waffles, but i know it's crazy in there. we appreciate her hopping on. we'll be talking to you again. our shannon travis, again, getting the congresswoman, michele bachmann, as she does her live event. shannon, thanks so much. a quick break on a fast-moving and news-breaking cnn saturday morning.

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i got my first prescription free. call or click to learn more. [ male announcer ] if you can't afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. hey, you're watching cnn. welcome home. come on over here and let me show you what we've got with your forecast. a chance of storms today across parts of the great lakes, but not only there, also into the north central plains, even into parts of the central rockies. out to the west, heat is the story. a tough time for firefighters in parts of new mexico. that big fire, the within near lost almo los alamos, only 5% contained. today will be rough. strong winds, low humidity. look for hazy, hot, and humid

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24 minutes past the hour now. chicago, notorious, unfortunately, for gun violence. and cnn hero diane latiker knows that. she lives in a rough chicago neighborhood, but it's not stopping her from doing something about the problem. >> guns, guns, and more guns. these are our young people. these stones represent them. we're losing a generation to violence. >> everybody's scared to come out, they get shot at. >> they start shooting, you've got to grab the kids and run in the house. >> people run in the house and close their doors. they don't even talk about it. but there are some people who are not scared to go outside and i'm one of them. my name is diane latiker. we opened the community center called kids off the block. we're known as kob. there are kids that are in gangs, they're homeless. some of them drug dealers. so they got a lot of issues going on. who signed up for youth ready chicago? i tell kids, this is a peace

place. this is a safe place. >> i really want to be a veterinarian. >> we have leadership works, music. it's a range of things that goes on in here. we started off with ten young people, and the next thing i knew, i had 15. then i had 25. at one point, i had 75 young people in three rooms of my house. and that's how kids off the block started, in my living room. we opened the doors to the new kob center in july. last year we served 103 young people. if they knock on that door, they can come in. >> i was 12 when i got in here. robbing people, stealing. miss diane, she done change my life. i love her for that. >> i'm no different from nobody else. i just opened up my door. why can't y'all come outside and see what's going on in our neighborhoods? there are people here who care and i'm one of them. >> get this. last year diane's center helped more than 300 kids stay off the

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all right. we're at the bottom of the hour here on this cnn saturday morning. welcome back to you all. i'm t.j. holmes. glad you could spend part of your day here with us. give you a look at some of the stories making headlines. there's not much of a holiday weekend to celebrate in minnesota. the government essentially closed for business on friday. the state's democratic governor and republican legislative leaders could not break a budget stalemate. many social services have been cut. about 22,000 state workers are out of their jobs for now. also, the accused former head of the international monetary fund is enjoying his first day free from house arrest, at least. the sexual abuse case against dominique strauss-kahn is in danger of collapsing. the prosecutors in new york say they're not sure they can believe the hotel maid who says he attacked her. and also, an idaho company

is recalling sprouts, the recall applies to various packages with expirations between june 22nd and july 14th. for all those details, go to cnn.com. well, president obama may be trying a new approach in his showdown with congress over raising the debt ceiling. shame. >> malia and sasha generally finish their homework a day ahead of time. they don't wait until the night before, they're not pulling all-nighters. they're 13 and 10. you know, congress can do the same thing. if you know you've got to do something, just do it. >> all right. the president also accused republicans of defending tax cuts for, quote, corporate jet owners. well, in a written statement, house speaker john boehner rejected anything resembling a

tax hike. joining me now to talk about this, republican strategist lenny mcallister in chicago, and democratic strategist maria cardona, our favorites here on cnn saturday morning. let's start, as we always do, the political highlight of the week for you, maria, what was it? >> obama urges congress to just do it. republicans continue to just say no. >> all right. lenny, what was your highlight of the week? >> no pst, partisanship, no jbs, job creation from this white house. >> always got to stop and figure yours out. lenny, let me start with you this time around. was this the president getting tough on these budget talks or was this setting up something for later. was this part of the 2012 campaign? >> this is part of the 2012 campaign. let me explain my headline. it's obviously supposed to be

post partisanship and job creation, but there's no "o" in either of this. any time he's been brought into the room to bring the parties together, he's more inclined to use the bully pulpit to beat up the republicans than to get both sides to come to the middle and do something that will benefit america inclusively. when it comes to the job creation, we have yet another sign that job creations not coming around. the unemployment claims, first time claims are around the same levels they have been for the last several weeks. president obama's trying to play for 2012, but he has to save us in twlec2011, or he won't be ar. >> is that the point, maria? does he have to set himself apart by looking like the adult in the room? saying, you have to get this done. my kids know to get they work done ahead of time. is that going to be helpful? >> well, i think it all depends on the republicans, t.j. but the president had a very good point. he was urging all of congress,

not just republicans, to get it done. we saw harry reid respond in the right way, by saying, i'm going to call back the senate to make sure that we actually deal with the nation's problems. the republicans are the ones who are being really recalcitrant on this. what they are saying is that they are not going to spread the pain. they're going to ask seniors, low-income people, middle-class people, working class people, small businesses to pay and to feel the pain while hedge fund managers, ceo corporate jet owners, big oil and gas industry ceos are going to be protected so they can get an additional $200,000 in tax cuts. that's not the way that we get to the deficit reduction and job creation that we need. we feneed to invest in our futu and make sure that the pain is spread across the board. that's what we're trying to do. >> i'm going to leave that there. i'm going to turn to something else. we have limited time this morning, because we have a lot going on, a lot happening. and something we just saw here, weren't expecting it, but we got it. we just heard from michele

bachmann, minnesota congresswoman who is running for president. she was in iowa. our shannon travis happened to be in the room, just happened to turn around and ask her a question. we'll listen to this and i'll ask you guys. >> iowa is the first in the nation. it's very important to be here and have a presence here because the values and opinions that people have in iowa count, they count for the nation. it's important that we come here. this is the bread basket of the world, for a reason. this is where the food is grown, we have the best farmers in the world right here in iowa. so it's important to come and listen to what people have to say here in iowa and take that message back to washington do, . >> lenny, every time i afg you a question about michele bachmann, you have a two-word response. can't win. so here she is now, gaining some traction, it seems, had a couple of good weeks, certainly kind of built up after that cnn debate. but now in iowa where there was a poll that showed she was right behind mitt romney, she's there now. campaigning hard. getting good press.

gaining some traction, gaining some name recognition. you still think she can't win? >> i think a woman could be president. i don't think that this woman's going to win this nomination. she can win iowa, she can win south carolina, she can win the more conservative states. but when it comes to winning the nomination and going against a very personally popular president, she's not going to be the one that's going to be able to do it. i think she'll be well suited to be in that number two right now at this time in american history. i still think she's positioned very well for a romney/bachmann or perry/bachmann ticket in november 2012. >> do you agree with that, maria? she really has, she's gained some traction? >> she really has gained some traction, and i think that makes republicans like my friend lenny very, very nervous. i do think she can win the gop nomination. what you have republicans doing right now is looking around. voters have said in poll after poll that they're not satisfied with this field.

if they see that bachmann is the one rising to the top, she's speaking to that conservative base, she's raising money, she might be the one that they all turn to. and the problem here is that the conservative base has a huge power over who the gop will nominate. if that happens and if michele bachmann is the one rising to the top and she wins the nomination, i agree with lenny that i don't think she can win the general election, and that's going to put the gop in a very, very tough spot. >> i don't know. let's put that picture up of lenny. lenny doesn't look nervous about it. you don't look nervous at all this morning about michele bachmann winning. are you, lenny? >> no, i'm not nervous about it. i think she provides something really strong for the gop. but if she's at the top of the ticket, i think it brings more of a polarizing presence to that ticket, which would make the middle voter, the independent voter, slide back to president obama in 2012. >> all right. >> i agree with that 100%. >> whoa! we'll end on that then, this morning.

guys, always good to see you. a lot of news happening this morning, but i'm glad we were able to get the conversation in with you guys. have a good fourth of july weekend. >> you too. >> god bless everybody out there. 37 minutes past the hour now. michael vick and nike are a team again. i'll tell you about the new endorsement deal they just signed, after the break. one log in lets you monitor all of your balances and transfer between accounts, so your money can move as fast as you do. check out your portfolio, track the market with live updates. and execute trades anywhere and anytime the inspiration hits you. even deposit checks right from your phone. just take a picture, hit deposit and you're done. open an account today and put schwab mobile to work for you.

all right, our friend, ray d'alessio from hln sports joining us now. michael vick back in the news, something you would think is a good thing and a sign that he is moving in the right direction, or rehabilitating his image. >> before all the legal issues hit michael vick, a lot of people remember that he was in partnership with nike. some of his shoes and his clothing, some of the top sellers for nike. well, back in 2007, in august of 2007, nike dropped vick after he admitted to being involved in the dog fighting ring. four years later, nike apparently feeling that vick has done enough to rehabilitate his image, so they came out this week, released a statement saying that they have resigned michael vick to an endorsement deal. no terms of the deal have been announced, but, obviously, you've got to figure, t.j., it's a pretty wealthy deal for michael vick. >> but, again, they're not just doing out of the kindness of their hearts. he had a heck of a year last year. >> he was named the nfl comeback player of the year. every time we do the michael

vick story, anytime there's any michael vick news, there's all kinds of backlash. obviously, there'll be people feeling that nike could have discontinued its relationship with vick altogether, not resign him. very interesting, recently at the b.e.t. awards, vick was named the subway sportsman of the year. that resulted in a facebook campaign started, people trying to boycott subway because of this, because they named vick the subway player of the year, sportsman of the year. so far, it has 19,000 members. >> wow. >> so pretty much no matter what michael does the rest of his life, okay, whether he -- he could safe a mother and a child from a burning car and it still would not be good enough for people. >> and you understand -- >> you do understand that. you understand there are two sides to the story. >> he's done plenty of work with peta as well. >> that was part of his promise when he came out of prison, that he would help them and try to rehabilitate this image.

>> we'll see if he's back on the field with the other guys this season, if they ever get it worked out. ray, appreciate you as always, buddy. we're at 42 minutes past the hour now. england's newest royal couple is a day closer to their visit to the u.s. we'll look at the star power of princess william and the duchess of cambridge. of possibilities. in here, the planned combination of at&t and t-mobile would deliver our next generation mobile broadband experience to 55 million more americans, many in small towns and rural communities, giving them a new choice. we'll deliver better service, with thousands of new cell sites... for greater access to all the things you want, whenever you want them. it's the at&t network... and what's possible in here is almost impossible to say. that's how it is with alzheimer's disease. she needs help from me. and her medication. the exelon patch -- it releases medication continuously for twenty-four hours. she uses one exelon patch daily

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well, the public has certainly embraced prince william and his new wife,

catherine, on their tour of canada, and you can expect the same when the royal couple arrives in los angeles at the end of their first official visit to north america. today they're in montreal. max foster is there as well. max, hello to you, kind sir, what have they been up to? >> reporter: they were a complete hit yesterday. you saw the pictures in ottawa. the carriage and crowds, a massive display of pomp and pageantry, and the couple did very well there. today, they're going to meet some war veterans in ottawa. catherine will meet some military wives, she is a military wife herself. and then they're headed to montreal, an emotion nam visit to a children's hospital. she's very good with children. then they come here to a culinary school, a cookery school. and william is a great cook. he does a lot of the cooking at home, at least in their main home, they haven't got staff. we don't quite know about the duchess, how good she is. we'll see how good they are at cooking. they'll be cooking with the students and eating some of the

food. the other interesting thing about quebec, the province we're in, there's a lot of anti-monarchy feeling, they would rather no have a monarchy here, so we'll see how william and catherine play into that. can they bring their star power? >> well, of course they can, right? and they're heading to los angeles as well. and remind people, what was the idea? why did they take this whole trip in the first place? hitting canada, hitting california. >> reporter: well, canada is realm, so the queen is the monarch here, just as much as she is in the uk. so they had to go to a realm before they went anywhere else on their first tour. and also, william had asked his private secretary specifically to come to canada because he really liked it here and catherine's got some family links. the los angeles trip is organized by the british government and it's all about promoting british interest. so you'll have lots of glitz and glamour there and they're mixing it in with british trade.

so you've got young hollywood's british talent meeting the big wigs from the studios and the big stars. and they're going to be in a polo match, for example, raising money for their foundation. that's really about promoting british interest. but there'll be a lot of glamour there, i think. and the atmosphere's really building towards that. you'll know better than me about the atmosphere in the u.s., but i'm sure it's building. >> well, yeah. los angeles, glamour, kind of goes together. max foster, good to see you, as always. thanks so much. we're getting close to the top of the hour here. thereto royal wedding to tell you about. in contrast to william and kate's affair, this one was almost modest. but not what you're seeing here. this was the arrival of a lot of the people heading to the wedding of monaco's prince albert and charlene whittstock. now they had a wedding yesterday, they had a civil ceremony. now, this is the one today, some of these pictures we're seeing, this is from yesterday, actually. they already had the civil ceremony, but today is the one that everybody's invited to, all

of monaco is invited to show up for. they're expecting maybe some 35,000 people out there. so just different shots here. people trying to make their way. the tiny little monaco, the constitutional monarchy there, a lot of history here. you'll remember the story of grace kelly, who got married there and died in 1942, but it's her son, prince albert, he's 50 plus years old, getting married to the former olympic swimmer. they got married yesterday, so she is now the princess. herrer her serene highness is what she's properly called now. but this is all happening here live right now. we'll continue to dip in and check out what's happening in monaco this morning. but we go from high-profile marriage there to breakup now. this happened yesterday in los angeles, that we saw kennedy heiress maria shriver formally file for divorce from arnold schwarzenegger. the couple separated in may

after the ex-california governor admitted to fathering a child with another woman. the couple has been married more than 25 years now. well, georgia, alabama, arizona, tough immigration laws and those states are scaring off farm workers. one state thinks probationers, felony probationers, could be the answer. >> offenders are just like you and i. they need employment to feed their families and i think this program has given them an opportunity to do that. >> yeah, you heard that right. georgia testing a program to send probationers to farms. the story, just ahead. host: do people use smartphones to do dumb things? man 1: send, that is the weekend. app grapgic: yeah dawg! man 2: allow me to crack...the bubbly! man 1: don't mind if i doozy. man 3: is a gentleman with a brostache invited over to this party? man 1: only if he's ready to rock! ♪ sfx: guitar and trumpet jam

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just get out of the way. >> this was a demonstration in downtown atlanta this week. people were protesting georgia's tough new anti-immigration law. of course, that law went into effect on friday. it went into effect, though, after a judge blocked some key provisions, but most of it is in effect right now in the state of georgia. police did arrest several people there, several of them declaring, saying that they were undocumented immigrants, but they were making a stand, letting their voices be heard. they were saying, unafraid, undocumented. georgia lawmakers will hope that law, in part, will discourage people who are in the country illegally from coming to the state. and it may be working already. and according to georgia's

agriculture commissioner, that may be a problem. >> then we have some people calling and simply say, i have no workers, or i have one third of the normal crews that show up, just simply said, they were, you know, they were not coming to georgia. what i'm focused on is trying to find the solution for georgia farmers and for american producers. >> georgia is trying to help the farmers out, trying to help them make up for a shortage of workers by connecting them with unemployed people. just one thing, those unemployed people also have criminal records. ten-hour days, in 90-degree heat, in july, in south georgia. those are the work conditions, and this is the work. the kind of work farmers say americans won't do and can't do. >> it takes skill to do this. you're picking peaches, you just

come out here, pull them off and that's the end of it. >> you've got to know the ones to pick, the mature ones, the size, and color, so it takes a lot of skill to pick them and know which ones to harvest. >> for every worker you bring in from mexico, it would take how many local workers to match the output of that -- >> it would take at least three to four. >> reporter: robert dickey is a farmer, part of a $68 billion industry in georgia. he's worried the state's new anti-immigration law is scaring away the skilled workforce he depends on. dickey is also a state legislature. he voted for that anti-immigration bill, knowing full well it might hurt his family business. has there ever been a point you kind of second-guessed that vote? >> oh, absolutely. it hurts me terribly to see some of my farmers not being able to harvest their crops and getting the time and labor. it's going to make things more expensive here in the state with the lack of workforce.

>> reporter: georgia farmers report they are 11,000 workers short this season. so the state floated the idea of having felony probationers fill the job. some are already working on farms. >> we're not forcing anyone to take this type of labor. we're simply offering up opportunities for offenders to be employed in the agriculture community where there's a great need right now. it's encouraging, even though a small scale at this point. when we started out, it was the first couple of days, of course, was rocky, in the sense that, you know, you had offenders going into an extremely difficult job. >> reporter: like dickey says, all peach pickers are not created equal. and even with time and training, probationers won't be able to keep pace. >> reporter: you have tried in the past to have local workers out here. didn't go so well? >> it didn't. they just really don't have the patience and the incentive to stay here and do the kind of job we need done. >> now, the workers you saw there on dickey's farm are here

in this country legally through a guest worker program, it's called the h2a program. the probationers, however, are working on only two farms in georgia. but they hope to see that number grow for the fall harvest. we're getting close to the top of the hour. they got a chance to swim with the sharks and lived to tell about it. where a whale shark was spotted and why nobody was afraid. me for your medicine, okay? you ready? one, two, three. [ both ] ♪ emma, emma bo-bemma ♪ banana-fana-fo-femma ♪ fee-fi-fo-femma ♪ em-ma very good sweety, how do you feel? good. yeah? you did a really good job, okay? let's go back to drawing. oh, just booked a summer vaycay. ooo. sounds pricey? nah, with the hotels.com summer sale, you can find awesome deals for places nearby. interesting...

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all right. taking a look at stories making news cross-country. in texas, a marine killed in afghanistan this week has been promoted posthumously and honored for valor in combat. he died tuesday while fighting in helmand province. his family learned this week he had been promoted from lance corporal to corporal and awarded the navy and marine corps achievement medal for valor in combat. meanwhile, in california, 12 children all under the ag