>> thanks for starting your morning with us. 'inside politics" with john king starts? just a moment. stay right here. the supreme court rules against the obea ma white house again. hobby lobby a policy setback but is it a political win for democrats? >> hobby lobby wins! >> plus mark the president down as frustrated. he can't even get congress to help him fix a bridge. >> it's not crazy. it's not socialism. it's not the imperial presidency. >> reporter: and star four on the 2014 campaign trail. mitt romney stumps for old friend scott brown. >> the people of new hampshire have a chance to vote aat what they think about the president's agenda. >> reporter: while elizabeth

warren tests her appeal in reliably red kentucky. >> you send us alison grimes instead of mitch mcconnell and you change the world. >> reporter: "inside politics," the biggest stories sourced by the best reporters, now. welcome to "inside politics." i'm john king. thanks for sharing your sunday morning especially on this big holiday weekend. with us to share their reporting and their insights the atlantic's molly ball, man manu raju, peter hamby and peggy haberman. strong jobs report for june, the unemployment rate dropping again and the dow soaring to record highs. >> this is also the first time we've seen five consecutive months of job growth over 200,000 since 1999. >> but for most of the week you could see and hear the president's frustration, his health care plan took a big blow at the supreme court. he decided to give up waiting for congress to act and now promises new executive actions on immigration. and listen here, the most powerful man in the world

lamenting he can't even get the republican house to help him build roads and bridges. >> it's not crazy. it's not socialism. you know, it's not, you know, the imperial presidency. it's not like they've been busy with other stuff! no, seriously. [ laughter ] i mean, they're not doing anything. why don't they do this? >> you can see there a mix of frustration and attempted humor from the president. well, there's zero humor and plenty of hostility when it comes to immigration and the crisis now playing out at the border with the influx of thousands of young children. look at these angry demonstrations in southern california late last week. some of those caught trying to cross the border a bust to makeshift detention centers. house committee hearing near the border in texas, republican

governor rick perry says the president should visit the border lays the blame squarely on the white house. >> my message to president obama is to secure this border, mr. preside president, finally address this issue and secure this border. invest sufficient resources to put an adequate number of border patrol agents on the ground permanently, utilize existing technology, including drones and other assets that we know, we know how to do this. >> the white house fires back, molly, saying if rick perry is really serious, why doesn't he pick up the phone and call the house republicans and get them to work with the president? if we have a serious policy challenge like this, what the mayor in that california called an invasion of people coming across the border and all's they can do is go off into their political corners and spar, can we have a policy consensus or is that ridiculous to think about? >> it's ridiculous to think about at this point frankly.

republicans really do believe that the white house has in part caused this crisis by incentivizing these children to come here making it seem they would have a chance to be legalized if they came here doing the action on the dreamers that the president did back in 2012. the administration now considering more executive actions but probably will never go as far as the immigration reform advocates would like, and so he's never going to satisfy either side on this issue and has to try to chart some kind of course. >> if the politics of immigration are raw in a midterm election year, is there any dispute that likely at the grassroots level, turnout level benefits republicans? >> it absolutely benefits republicans. democrats hold out some hope it will help them on the margins in certain places for 2014. >> colorado, for instance. but other states i don't know where it would actually help democrats. arkansas not really a heavy latino population there, even louisiana is below the national average, alaska, another state where a democrat is up for re-election. it's not a real clear-cut winner

for democrats, immigration, this year, but they know it helps them nationally in 2016. >> much of the senate term is playing on the republican field. >> we have the immigration front and center and contraception or the democrats call the war on women because of the hobby lobby ruling. the supreme court throwing out a piece of obama care, a christian-run family that runs this private company, they did not want to provide some contraceptive coverage to their employees because they thought those four specific means amount to abortion. it took just moments for hillary clinton to decide she wanted to speak out and speak out strongly. >> it's very troubling that a sales clerk at hobby lobby who needs contraception, which is pretty expensive is not going to get that service through her employers' health care plan because her employer doesn't think she should be using

contraception. >> back to the point, peter, who is making the previous conversation, i don't think there's any doubt the democrats think this helps them in 2016 with suburban women, unmarried women, with younger people perhaps, don't want the government mandating their choices about sexual reproduction and freedom. what about 2014 when you look at the senate map and where the races are, is it as clear-cut? >> i think this is obviously the ruling was a policy setback for the obama administration but i think it actually is a political win for democrats in 2014, and what hillary clinton just said there is interesting. she kind of framed it partially as an economic argument. the cultural issue of this is evident that democrats are going to say a bunch of old white men on the supreme court are trying to dictate your health choices, but when you look at the bigger picture message from democrats on equal pay, minimum wage, paid family leave, and then this, i think you're going to hear from democrats that this isn't just a cultural issue it's an economic

issue. >> why democrats think it's a win or they'll probably try to do something legislatively, even though it's not going to pass, put it on the floor of the senate, force republicans to vote against it and use it in the races in places like colorado where mark udall is runing aggressively on this issue, and forced the republican to moderate in that race could, cory gardner. >> we saw abortion discussed very plainly in 2012, from the democratic national convention. democrats believe they saw an advantage with women on this. they believed the same thing is true now, and i think there are certain places where it's more true than others but they are expecting especially with single women this can be a winner in the way hillary clinton framed that argument regardless of the fact that it contains some inaccuracies and lack of a mention about her own husband's administration and the role there, but that is the argument the democrats in washington were hoping will be executed in the next couple months. >> there are so few issues driving democratic voters out to

the polls, they think they could possibly neutralize obamacare for republicans. >> if you listen to hillary clinton, whether you agree or disagree you knew crystal clear what she thought of the decision. the same question was posed to another prospective 2016 candidate, chris christie. >> why should i give an opinion whether they're right or wrong? at the end of the day they did what they did, that's the law of the land unless people in the elective branches try to change it. this is the way you get bogged down in these things. >> can chris christie stand on a debate stage in iowa with probably marco rubio, rand paul, ted cruz, maybe rick santorum. we haven't heard yes or no from mike huckabee, say i'm not going to get bogged down talking about what the supreme court says is pivotal to the republican case? >> hillary talked about democrats like this issue so much more than republicans. it's so telling that christie does not want to take a position on this. you see that with so many republican candidates, back in 2012 a lot of republican

candidates thought they had a winning argument in this idea of religious liberty. religion is popular. turns out birth control is more popular and democrats have become very skilled at putting this argument on their terms and convincing people that republicans are trying to take away your birth control and we have seen republicans from cory gardner in colorado to chris christie becoming very uncomfortable getting anywhere near this subject. >> this isn't the first time chris christie's used that argument on a social issue. last fall when they declined to move forward with the state challenge to the same-sex marriage in new jersey, he said well this is settled law now, the state supreme court made this decision and it crystallizes the tricky dance that chris christie in particular has like you said navigating iowa, south carolina, new hampshire, florida, wherever, but also maintaining that kind of general election audience. >> it crystallizes something else. the answer that hillary clinton gave got a ton of media cover annual. that speaks to the fact that he has so sunk from public memory as a major 2016er.

he will come back at some point, because i do believe he's running but his status among the chattering class and conventional wisdom has taken a hit. >> is that an okay place to be right now? >> it's not terrible. >> better to go up. >> we'll see. >> he needs a better answer, the politics are complicated. if he wants to be president he needs a better answer. this is the president of the united states giving a radio interview in the oval office. this is something we've all talked about how demographics, changing cultural opinions especially among younger voters as a presidential party the republicans are in trouble. mitt romney proved that. listen to how the president put it. >> i think over time, the republican party will move back to the center, mainly because if they don't, they'll never win the presidency again. >> there are a lot of republicans who think they need to move back to the center, maybe if president obama says it, it won't happen because they don't do anything he wants? >> it's always amazing the moments when obama gets down into sort of political consultantland.

he did it last weekend saying why he didn't think clinton clinton's wealth comments were going to hurt her terribly. this is something a lot of obama advisers have been saying and saying this to reporters to a while. the republicans have really damaged themselves going forward for a long time. that remains to be seen. >> you connect the argument that president obama damaged democrats also. >> but that's also the central debate the republicans are having. >> exactly right. >> should you be super conservative and stick to your principles and convince people to come to your side or moderate and win over democrats, a debate they've had since the tea party rose. >> you might get a different answer if you ask in the 2014 context or 2016 context. up next we map out the 2014 senate state of play including two races the 2016 presidential hopefuls will be watching extra closely. but first, this week's installment of "politicians say the darnedest things" suggest just maybe colorado isn't the only place to get shall we say uplifting baked goods. >> here is the problem. we call bill the crustmaster because of his pies, i don't

know what he does, whether he puts crack in them or -- [ laughter ] but -- >> no, he doesn't. there is no crack in our pies. un car insurance. yeah, everybody knows that. well, did you know that playing cards with kenny rogers gets old pretty fast? ♪ you got to know when to hold'em. ♪ ♪ know when to fold 'em. ♪ know when to walk away. ♪ know when to run. ♪ you never count your money, ♪ when you're sitting at the ta...♪ what? you get it? i get the gist, yeah. geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.

welcome back. control of the senate as you all probably know is the biggest midterm prize at stake this year and our puzzle today maps out the state of play as we mark 121 days, that he's four months to election day. here's the state of play heading in. 55 democrats in the senate, including two independents who caucus with the democrats. 45 republicans. you can do the math, tells you right here the republicans need to pick up six seats and that gain of six in november to get

the majority in the senate. where are they confident? they feel pretty confident about south dakota, i got to turn this on i guess, there we go, they feel confident about south dakota, confident about montana, they feel confident about west virginia and it gets more dicey but they think they can win in north carolina, they think perhaps arkansas and louisiana and alaska is the other top target. that would get them there. what do the democrats feel about the races? they're increasingly confident about new hampshire, although that's a good race to watch. they think michigan but it's very close. they feel confident about minnesota but some republicans say that could be a sleeper. oregon is a democratic health state, watch that one, the democrats feel okay right now. then you see some other ones is a great competitive race in iowa, a great competitive race in colorado, democrats feel reasonably good about virginia. this say republican health seat. mitch mcconnell the republican leader, alan grants his democratic challenger a red state, they haven't sent a democrat to the senate since

1992 yet manu, alison grimes calls on help from the massachusetts liberal elizabeth warren this week. how does elizabeth help in a reliably red state? >> it's motivating the base. she speaks to the younger voters, the people that alison grimes needs to get out to the polls. this state overwhelmingly rejected barack obama last year and even though this is conservative state, this is the majority democratic registration state. there's still a lot of democratic voters in pockets like louisville and lexington, where elizabeth warren does speak to the crowd and she speaks to younger voters, people she can talk about populist issues, railing against the big banks, things that are not super controversial and she's being used in red states this year, places where she can go where the president clearly cannot. >> is that a sign of her strength or is it a sign alison grimes' first ad was "i'm mad at everybody in washington. i'm mad at the democrats. i'm not going to be in the

president's back pocket." is this a strength with elizabeth warren or aical lags i'm probably going to lose unless i gin up the entire democratic base? >> grimes has to turn out in luizville and lexington with the base democrats. i was talking to a pretty high ranking democrat in kentucky after the warren trip was announced and told me grimes had to change the subject from the coal regulations which are hurting her and find a way. not to inject a 2016 comment or a 2014 conversation i also talked to democrat donors in a fund-raiser at the 21-c hotel with elizabeth warren who were very impressed by her, hadn't seen her up close before and thought she did a good job framing her biography around her issues. >> she seems to like it. she's relatively new. when they travel she seems to like it. >> she likes it a lot. she's basically come out as a big surrogate overnight but she really is filling a void to go back to 2016 that hillary clinton is leaving until the

fall, doing her book tour and that say contrast. elizabeth warren is helping other democrats, clinton clinton ostensibly helping herself and that is something you'll hear privately, you may hear it more overtly from democrats who want her help depending on what clinton clinton does. with are rehn to make one more contrast point here, the book tour that hillary clinton has been doing has not drawn the level of contrast i thought it would to elizabeth warren's book tour which warren is exactly as you said, enjoyed it, interested, engaged in lots of q were awere aas with the audience, stood the entire time, when i saw her walk back and forth, gesticulated wildly with his hands, made fun of herself for it. it was a revealing contrast. >> big crowds showed up for the campaign events and book tour events. >> more on elizabeth warren, mitt romney a prominent republican is trying to come to the aid of scott brown trying to be the republican nominee in new hampshire, running against gene shaheen. harry reid was asked about new hampshire and he laughed.

he said ha, ha, ha, at the prospect gene shaheen could lose to scott brown. could mitt romney help make a difference? >> i know that the president is not on the ballot this november, but the people of new hampshire have a chance to vote at what they think about the president's agenda, and they'll do that by saying what they will about the president's number one supporter, gene shaheen. >> scott brown still runs well behind in polls against gene shaheen. in essence if he keeps raising a lot of money and makes the democrats play, is that enough because it stretches the map? >> well, not if he loses. what harry reid was saying was that democrats to not take the race seriously. so far the polling show there's not much reason why they should. mitt romney lost new hampshire, despite being as much of a resident of the state scott brown is, people believe he had the cultural neighborly connection with the state that he'd win over the historically conservative voters of new hampshire but new hampshire is increasingly a blue state.

there's not clear evidence that jeanne shaheen has done anything specific to offend voters so most democrats don't think this is in play unless the climate changes. >> exactly. if scott brown wins this race, this is a wave election. then we're looking at a 53-47 republican/senate, 52/48, maybe they take colorado, michigan, too. >> if you look beyond the top line horse race numbers in that race and look on the fav on favs, scott brown is badly underwater, unfv is 15%. shaheen is above 50% so that's a real hurdle for scott brown to overcome. >> the harry reid does not do many things by accident, and this part of the strategy all along has been treating scott brown like a joke. this guy is a carpetbagger, not from the state, he switched states to run here. precisely. >> a quick observation from me, joins to you adding 2016 to 2014 conversation. correct leeif i'm wrong, i don't

remember when you have competitive senate races in iowa and new hampshire in the cycle before the presidential cycle. if you're a democrat or republican think being running for president you'll watch how immigration and the economy and hobby lobby, all of the decisions essentially a cheat sheet. >> you'll go into the states and stump for those candidates, pretend you're not doing it for yourself. >> if we're talking about the warren/clinton contest, it's only a matter of time before elizabeth warren goes to iowa and new hampshire and gets -- >> just for 2014 though of course. >> of course. >> hillary clinton has a connection to shaheen. she has no connection to braley. >> everybody sit tight. tomorrow's news today next as our reporters get you ahead of the political stories just around the corner. ups is a global company, but most of our employees

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let's close by going around the table, have our great reporters share some nuggets from their note pooks. molly ball? >> i'm going to talk about far, far down ballot the state legislative landscape for this year, democrats have really gotten their butts kicked in state legislatures for the last couple of cycles. lot of complaints on the democratic side that the party did not put enough resources

into these ballot races and that led to the redistricting gains that the republicans were able to make because of course it is the state legislature who draws those maps. currently republicans hold 57 state legislative chambers, democrats only 41. democrats managed to lose state legislative chambers in 2012 despite president obama winning the election. their flip targets looking to take back a lot of the chambers, a lot in blue states like michigan, pennsylvania, wisconsin, and try to turn that tide, their fund-raising is up about 25% over the last cycle. they think they can finally turn the tide. republicans of course saying in a midterm election not so fast. >> best way to build a bench, win at the state legislature. >> mississippi fallout hitting kansas. i was just there last week. milton wolfe, the republican tea party candidate taking on pat roberts, has a really tough chance of winning but what he's doing is riling up the

republican base about the mississippi results. he's saying that the establishment went to war with the conservatives and we now need to take this out on it pat roberts and not only is he going after watt roberts, he is going of ajerri moran, who is the junior senator from kansas fen if wolfe loses the race he may be moran's challenger in 2016. >> we'll keep watching that one. >> hillary clinton the person i can't stop talking about has been in europe for the last few days. she was there july 4th in britain, she was getting mocked mercilessly by republicans. she's has a few more interviews where her allies suspect she'll continue cleaning up the fallout from the dead broke gaffe and some of the other missteps she's had and then going to basically disappear for most of the summer. she's going to be in the hamptons and the hope from her allies she learned some of what went wrong in the last couple of weeks and will demonstrate that in the fall. >> we'll watch and learn a lesson or two. peter? >> an alliance of democratic groups including the dnc and a

couple super packs are starting a big voting rights push in a couple weeks, this includes voter registration efforts but also includes a push to elect democratic secretaries of state in key states like ohio, colorado, iowa, new mexico. the goal here obviously is to protect what they see is the rights of voters but also those are all very important states for 2016 to have friendly secretaries of state running elections in big battleground states next year. >> nice to have friends in the right places. manu mentioned the senate race. since eric cantor lost the primary people are scouring the maps and calendar saying which house incumbent will be next to fall. i was checking with sources in fwoet parti both parties this week democrats think they don't think any incumbents will lose closely, except in massachusetts john tierney faces a republican challenge. if you think there's a huge anti-incumbent wave out there,

you're probably going to have to think when it. that's it for "inside politics." thanks for sharing your sunday morning. "state of the union" with candy crowley starts right now. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com fear and desperation along the u.s./mexican border, angst and defiance on a city's main street. today live from the texas front lines, congressman henry quellar pleading, demanding solutions for the thousands of children and teens caught in the political cross-hairs of america's immigration struggle. and -- >> we're not going to stand for it. that's just how it. >> the california town that said no. murrieta mayor alan long joins us from city hall. >> separate church and state! >> then -- >> president owe pa ma believes women should make personal health care decisions for themselves, rather than their bosses deciding for them. >> birth control, religion and the