please join me in voting yes on prop e. tonight, a disturbing discovery. the four bolts that should have secured that door plug that flew off during the alaska airline flight were remove and not put back. if you look at this picture sent in text messages between two boeing employees during work on the aircraft, these three circles show where they were missing. the location of the fourth bolt, that's covered by insulation in picture. it comes as patience for boeing is running thin. emirates faced a $52 billion order. they said this is the last

chance is a lsaloon for them to restore their tarnished reputation. thanks for joining us. anderson starts now. tonight, a federal appeals court deals the former president a major blow saying he must stand trial for january 6th and that no former president has immunity for crimes committed in office. tonight, what former presidential can't chris christie makes of the ruling and why he is not endorsing anyone this primary season. a jury's verdict on a school shooter's mom and the unprecedented charges against her in connection with his crime. we will hear from the parents of two of his victims. good evening. thanks for joining us. there's breaking news from the capitol. republicans try to do something which hasn't been done since 1876, impeach a cabinet secretary. their effort and their failure for now just ahead. first, the other breaking story out of washington, today's court ruling, if it stands, will be taught in history classes and

law schools for generations to come. a three-judge panel from the d.c. district federal appeals court rejecting donald trump's appeal. their unanimous decision laying waste to his claim of immunity for crimes he may have committed while in office. especially crimes to help him stay there unless he had been impeached and convicted by congress first, which sounds outlandish, even to say now, absolute criminal immunity, but was chilling to hear during oral arguments last month. >> could a president who ordered seal team 6 to assassinate a political rival who was not impeached, would you be subject to criminal prosecution? >> if he were impeach and convicted first. >> your answer is no? >> the judge's answer to that along with her two colleagues war unanimous and unequivocal. presidential immunity against

federal indictment would mean as to the to the president, they could not review. we cannot accept the office of the presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time. the court put the former president on a time line giving him until monday to file an emergency stay with the supreme court, after which the clock would run again on his trial before judge chutkan. joining us now is professor lawrence tribe, supreme court litigator and author "to end the presidency." just put into further perspective the importance, the magnitude of this ruling. >> anderson, i think today's ruling was historic, to put it mildly. it's the first time an appellate court has had occasion to consider the rather extravagant claim that being president puts

you above the law, enables you to commit crimes, at least when they are within the outer perimeter of your office, but actually in trump's case, he was making even more a remarkable claim that he could commit crimes regardless of whether he was doing it in his official capacity. all of those arguments that he made to put himself above the law were dismembered piece by piece, methodically in this historic opinion, which as you have indicated, is likely to be studied by law students for generations, especially because there's very little reason for the u.s. supreme court to weigh in. >> why do you say that? >> well, the argument is airtight, it's bulletproof. it's not in conflict with the decision of any other circuit. it establishes a principle based

on widely agreed upon ideas about the separation of powers and the proposition that crimes committed by anyone, including a president when in office, especially the crime of trying to deprive the voters of the ability to replace you with someone else, those crimes must result in trial and either an acquittal or a conviction. they can't simply go into the ash can of history. there's nothing the supreme court of the united states could add to that. if there were a gap in the reasoning of the opinion, if it left important issues unanswered, if it was ambiguous, if it was over the top in some way, if it didn't take seriously all of trump's arguments, then maybe there would be reason for the supreme court to weigh in. now, the only reason to weigh in

would be delay. everyone knows that in this case, justice delayed could well be justice denied. >> the ruling also said, i'm quoting it would be a viking paradox if the president who is vested with the sconstitutional off -- if the supreme court can't take up the appeal and there's a deadline for him to appeal, what timing -- how soon do you think -- what happens next? >> what happens next is that the former president rushes to get his motion for a stay accompanied by a petition for review by the supreme court into the court a week from today. the supreme court then proceeds to deny review, probably within a week or at most two or three

weeks. if it were to grant review, that would slow things down, but not necessarily so much as to prevent a trial before the election. but it would slow things down enough to create a real risk that this case would never come to trial, because if trump assumes office in january of 2025, the first thing he is going to do is get rid of the federal criminal prosecutions against him. >> yeah. who on the supreme court decides whether or not to do a review? >> the supreme court will make that decision quite quickly. but there's, as i say, no reason to think it would grand review. most of the experts agree with me that the odds are better than 50/50 that supreme court would just let the remarkably careful,

thorough, respectful decision of this unanimous three-judge panel, let it be the last word. there's no reason for it to review. if it were, as i said, to decide to review the case, it could put it on the accelerated track. either way, we are going to get an eventual decision in this case, unless the supreme court basically disgracefully just lets it drag out. there are people who thought that the three-judge district -- the three-judge court of appeals was acting unfairly by letting it drag out just for this month. i must say, even though i was one of those who was impatient to get the result, it seems to me that it would have been almost humanly impossible to write as careful, thorough, decisive and bulletproof an opinion as this court did in

less than a month. seems to me it did a remarkable job. i can't imagine it having done as well if it had rushed to judgement. >> the former president said in reaction to the ruling that without immunity, the presidency would lose its power and will be, quote, consumed by the other branchs of government. does that make any sense to you? >> it doesn't make any sense to me. it made no sense to this three-judge court. again, they dealt with it respectfully. they said if that were the case, then we would expect prior presidents to have run amok and committed crimes. because they assumed they were not immune, they were more restrained than this president. former presidents assumed that they could be prosecuted. gerald ford certainly assumed that nixon could be prosecuted. that's why he gave him a pardon. same thing in the case of other presidencies. what this court did was

basically say that donald trump is announcing that if he becomes president again, he wants the freedom to commit any crimes that advance his own interests, undeterred by the prospect that he is just citizen trump when he leaves office. he is basically announcing, as this court described it, announcing an intention not just to be a dictator, but to be a criminal in chief. that's not a very appealing position to be taking. >> appreciate your time. thank you. >> thank you, anderson. with more on the reaction, kaitlan collins. the former president had been fund-raising off this. what are you hearing? >> they expected this decision. they didn't think it was going to go in their favor, especially how that day went when the judges were kind of -- >> the seal team 6 argument. >> it didn't go well. they would argue that that argument -- the way he handled that, saying hypothetically,

yeah, that could happen unless he was impeached and convicted by the senate didn't go well. what surprised was how they got boxed in by the timing. that's almost as important as the substance of the ruling from the three judges, including democrat and republican appointees. they say trump's team has until next monday, not very much time, to respond to the supreme court and file that emergency request to basically pause this decision. if they don't take that, obviously, then we could see this case start back up again. they are saying, you only have a few days. they are eliminating this tactic trump and his team have been using to delay, delay, make these appeals. they don't know if they will win, but making them in hopes to delay. >> do they seem confident the supreme court would take up the case on appeal? >> it's interesting, i have been talking to a lot of people about this, lawyers, non-lawyers, previous lawyers. they sounded confident the supreme court before it came out

today would take it up . it's a question whether or not it is -- there's going to be such a sound -- >> he says it's bulletproof. >> they look at it and say, maybe that's what we would write or we wouldn't disagree with that. i think the big question for trump's team, they will appeal this by monday. it's not clear when exactly, but they have to do it by monday. what argument do they make before the supreme court? if you read through this 57-page ruling, they eviscerate every argument that his attorney made in front of the federal appeals court. >> cnn's reporting that the former president is not going to go to the supreme court to hear arguments on thursday. >> i don't think that's totally surprising. the supreme court is a different magnitude for him to go and be there than it was even for the e. jean carroll defamation trial he attended here in new york or the civil trial he attended. i think it's a calculation of how that benefits him and which

attorneys he is listening to right now and how he is balancing their judgment. he is not thrilled after the $83.3 million verdict. it's a question of what the legal maneuvering is here. the sense was they weren't really expecting him to show up on thursday. >> kaitlan collins, thanks very much. we will see you at 9:00. what a one-time ally and now adve adversary, a former u.s. attorney, makes of today's ruling. chris christie joins me ahead.

a stunning defeat for republicans who failed to impeach mayorkas. the white house moments ago called it a stunt. the vote narrowly failed. some republicans said it was unwise of house speaker mike johnson to put the bill on the floor without knowing the vote count. they are good on the other side of knowing that, is it that hard? the number of votes republicans could lose increased when al green, who was thought to be

absent and recovering from surgery, was wheeled on the floor. sources say he wasn't wearing shoes. three republicans joined the no vote. a fourth joined the no side to allow the house gop to bring up the vote again. more on that in a moment. this was the scene when the final vote was announced. >> on this vote, yeah is 214, nay is 216. >> raskin joins us now. he led the case against the former president during his second impeachment. walk us through what happened on the house floor tonight. >> the republicans are just not good at counting their votes. on our side, we got conditioned to a great vote counter in nancy pelosi. i think that hakeem jeffries and katherine clark do a great job knowing who will be there. i imagine they made provisions

for al green to get to the floor. the republicans suffered three significant defections. one was ken buck who has been increasingly constitutionalist in his thinking. more willing to walk on the gop now that he announced his departure. mcclintock also did that. it's been remitted. they said they're not done with it yet. it's a laughing stock impeachment. it's a madcap excursion for them to try to impeach a cabinet secon secretary when he is working to produce the compromise on immigration that the republicans claim to want. >> the timing of it is

interesting. what do you make of the republicans' arguments against the senate border bill? it's very conservative. langford, who was involved in this, sinema was involved as well. it gives the republicans a lot that they have been saying they want for a long time. >> yeah. they're not taking yes for an answer. you had langford out there saying he could not for the life of him understand why the republicans would walk away from the best deal they could get from their perspective. mcconnell was for it. there were dozens of republicans speaking for it. "the wall street journal" editorialized for it. remember, donald trump needs something to run on. abortion is gone as america has been proven to be a pro-choice country thanks to the people of kansas and ohio and all over the country any time they put up one of their anti-abortion bills, it has gone down. next to go down will be in

florida. the florida voters will write a right to choice into the constitution. that's gone for them. immigration is all they have left. donald trump thinks he knows how to demagogue that. he has basically thrown himself in the doorway to say, under no circumstances will his followers let an immigration go through, no matter how pleasing it is to the members. there's also vladimir putin hanging around in the background eager to sink the $60 billion in aid in strategic assistance to the people of ukraine fighting off putin's filthy imperialist invasion. you have putin in his ear. trump knows he wants to run on immigration. at this point, the gop is the maga party. they want to blow everything up. it's a party of chaos and insurrection. >> how does anything change at the border if you have the former president talking about

it has to be a perfect deal. there's no such thing. everything has to be a compromise, even though there's many now in politics who believe compromise is a dirty word. >> he doesn't want a solution. he wants a scapegoat. he think he knows how to run against mexicans and run against immigrants and rapists, other than himself. that's the kind of campaign he wants to run. it's in the gutter. the shocking thing is how much he has dragged the whole republican party down. we're talking about abraham lincoln's party. it was an anti-slavery pro-union, pro-freedom, pro-reason party. it's turned into this authoritarian cult of personality obsessed with conspiracy theory and disinformation. it's playing out every day in congress. it's an embarrassment. everybody is calling them the do

nothing congress. that's on good days. when they try to do something, it's impeaching a cabinet official for doing his job. >> thank you for being with us. >> you bet. my conversation with chris christie about today's appeals court defeat for his former opponent. his thoughts on that as well as the other cases, as well as the campaign that he bowed out on.

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his book is "what would reagan do." i spoke to him just before air. the reaction to the federal appeals court decision. >> i think it's a very tight, concise decision. i don't think there's any grounds for appeal. i don't know why the supreme court would want to take it. i think it's what's going to lead to a trial later this spring in washington. >> you think the trial will take place before the election? >> absolutely i do. a couple -- >> won't he try to delay? >> he will try. when i read the decision, one of the things the circuit court did was say, if he wanted to appeal to the supreme court, he had until monday to do it. usually, it's 90 days. they gave him until monday. if you don't, we're going to lift the stay. he will have some decisions to make regarding how he wants to proceed. i'm sure he is going to try to appeal to the supreme court. >> you don't think they would take it up? >> i don't. i think it's a very tight,

narrow ruling. i don't think the supreme court would be looking to take it up on a 3-0 decision that, in fact, i think is the correct decision. >> do you have confidence politics won't influence the judges on the supreme court? >> i think the other politics is the small p politics of this. there have to be involved this many coulding i-- coming week i hearing the ballot argument. i don't think they want two election cases. chief justice roberts has been clear about that over time in some of his speeches that in the aftermath of bush v. gore, he was going to try to keep the court out of those type of disputes. i think the january 6 will be adjudicated.

it could begin in may. what the trial judge said is she will give them a day for every day that the case has been stayed to prep. if the supreme court makes this decision, let's say, whether to take the case and assume they don't, by the end of this month, which i think is likely, then that's two months. add two months on. may 4th, the trial is probably a six to eight-week trial. it will be done. my guess is that he will be a convicted felon when he gets on the stage to accept the republican nomination for president. >> you put so much time and money into new hampshire. why did you drop out when you did? >> i didn't see a path to beating donald trump. that was my goal all along. by the time we got two weeks out, we had been polling regularly. we just didn't see ourselves within striking distance of him. because of that, i didn't want to continue on in what was going to be a really, really difficult challenge to defeat him.

my view was, it was the right time to do it because i had told my supporters if i didn't see a path to winning, i wasn't going on some vanity exercise. >> was it to help nikki haley or some alternative? >> no. i didn't think it would. in fact, it didn't. >> would it have helped if you endorsed him? >> i don't know. i don't know how much endorsements matter, frankly. that wasn't really the way i made that decision. >> you are still not willing to endorse her. >> no. >> why? >> because she's not running against donald trump. i think that the people who support me in this enterprise expect that if i'm going to support someone, they are going to be as aggressive and honest and direct about donald trump being unfit for the presidency. during the time i was in the race in new hampshire with governor haley, she wouldn't even say that she wouldn't accept the vice presidency from

him. that hardly seemed like someone that would be a natural fit for me. >> what about a third party run? no labels talked about it. >> look, i think -- >> you haven't said no. >> what i think is that if anybody is going to pursue that, they would have to be convinced there was a path to 270 electoral votes. i just got out of the race three weeks ago. i haven't begun to think about anything else except a vacation with my wife. >> where did you go? >> the keys. >> your new book "what would reagan do," what would reagan think of the republican party today? >> he would be appalled. he would be appalled at the cowardice of people not standing up to something so obviously wrong. >> would reagan win a primary? >> i don't think -- ronald reagan running as the ronald reagan i knew and voted for in 1980 wouldn't recognize how to run in a primary like the one we

had. imagine -- i can't imagine ronald reagan would have raised his hand at the first debate, as six of the eight people did, and say, i would support donald trump even if he were convicted. i think ronald reagan, as we saw, would have taken on donald trump directly. >> you write many republicans have jumped into a shabby cult, ignoring facts, promoting conspiracy theories and pledging allegiance to only himself. >> that's pretty good. >> yet, this is the party you want to head. >> look, i mean, what i want to do is change. listen, anderson, if you took those words and you went to any number of leaders of our party, privately, and asked them if they agreed with it, they would say they did. the problem is, they don't want

to do the hard work necessary to lead and change the party. it means if you don't raise your hand at the debate in milwaukee, you will get booed. you have to be willing to do that. >> when lukook at the battle border, the bill dead on arrival, does that make sense? >> it doesn't make sense to me. it wouldn't make sense to reagan. if there was parts he didn't like, he would get in there and negotiate and make it better. then ultimately, would agree on a compromise that if it didn't give him 100% of what he wanted, it would give him a lot and he would move the ball down the field. >> president trump talked about this is not a perfect bill, only a perfect bill is acceptable. there's no such thing as a perfect bill. >> not in my experience of being governor eight years in a state where i presided over divided government with a democratic legislature. we got great things done during that period of time. reagan working with o'neill, save social security. cut taxes.

rebuilt the military. those things can be done if you want to. it's hard work. sometimes you have to make people unhappy. my view of our race and why this book is relevant even more now is that ronald reagan was a guy who lost at times standing on his principles. he was willing to stand up against ford when he thought ford moved too far to the left. he stood up when he thought they were too far to the right. what i tried do in this race was to stand up for the truth. that was not extraordinarily popular with some members of my party. it doesn't mean you stop trying. >> do you have any doubt that president trump is pulling the springs on members of the house to reject the border bill? >> none at all. he said it publically. i have no doubt about that at all. let's add, he is doing it for political reasons. he would rather continue to have people pour across the border and endanger our country,

because he thinks it will help him politically against president biden. >> governor chris christie, thank you. >> thank you. a mom of an oxford, mi michigan, school shooter is found guilty. the father of two victims express their opinion.

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taking on big banks to make housing more affordable. and drug company ceos to stop their price gouging. most politicians just fight each other. while katie porter fights for you. for senate - democrat katie porter. i'm katie porter and i approve this message. in a potentially precedent setting verdict, a jury found a mother criminally responsible

for her child's deadly school shooting. jennifer crumbley was convicted. she faces up to 15 years in prison. prosecutors said she and her husband didn't do enough to properly store the gun they bought for their son just four days before the shooting. the jury forewoman said that, what hammered it home was the mother was the last adult with the gun. they claimed crumbley cared more about her horses and an extramarital affair than getting help for her son's mental health issues. her husband is expected to go on trial for the same charges next month. joining me now are the fathers of two of the victims. steve, i'm wondering what your reaction to the verdict is.

>> it's a combination of surprise and relief. >> the surprise -- you didn't think the jury would find her guilty? >> yeah. as of this morning, i had my doubt. not because of the job that the prosecution did. i think they did a phenomenal job. it was more just a matter of the human factor of dealing with the jury not really being able to read them and have a feel for what they were going to come back with. >> you feel that on the stand she was not believable? >> no. i don't think she was believable. i don't think anything that she said matched with the evidence of her actions. >> buck, how about you?

>> you know, i feel the exact same way that steve feels. the people spoke. to me, that was important. that's our system at work. that's how our system is supposed to work. that felt really good. >> do you want additional people held accountable? >> absolutely. the school. yep. there was a whole systemic failure here. when i think of november 30th, i have always thought about it. there were four legs of failure. the shooter, the parents, our community and our school. when i look at all four of those, we're able to hold the system, which is what i call our

government, is holding the people accountable. they held the shooter accountable. they held the mother accountable. they are going to hold the father accountable. the only thing left is the school. the people aren't allowed to hold the system accountable. so the school isn't being held accountable. >> what do you want people to know about tate? he sounds like a remarkable person. i know he was a wrestler. >> yeah. he was a wrestler, a football player. more importantly, he was a great kid. this happened -- he just happened to be a good athlete. god gave him some unbelievable tools. he was just a very fun kid. he always wanted to have fun. he was a big-time risk taker. >> he was an honor student, too. >> yeah. he was an honor student. he was my wing man for hunting.

>> he was your big wing man. >> he was my wing man for hunting and fishing. he was just an unbelievable kid. he loved to try new things and take risks and have a blast. he had an unbelievable zest for life. >> steve, what do you want people to know about hanna? >> hanna was just a caring person. she tried -- she would try everything. he had got interested in jewelry. she started making her own rings. >> that's cool. >> she would jump from one thing to another. she had a very sarcastic personality. she was the first person to notice when you were feeling down or you were sick. yeah, she just was a bright light. >> buck, i know in your victim

impact statement at the sentencing, you talked about the idea of forgiveness. can you talk about that a little bit? is that possible? >> it's a great question. i don't feel like it's possible. i feel like through this whole thing, you know, us families are the prisoners. we're the ones that are living this life now that you could never imagine, cooper. you just could never imagine it. it's eating our family alive. it's eating me alive. i read a couple books on resilience grieving. one of them was putting the focus on forgiveness. so you don't have so much anger. i'm so angry and so mad right now. you know? i'm my own prisoner.

i have to find a way to work my way towards forgiveness so i'm not so bitter. >> that's not an easy thing to do. >> it's tougher than you could ever imagine. all we did was send our kid to school. >> steve, do you feel the same way? >> yes, basically. it's constant. it's with you all the time. you realize the fact that you have to keep moving forward. that's where i keep my focus is just moving forward one day at a time and helping my family do the same in their own individual journeys. >> there's been a lot of focus on the shooter and the parents' trials. we feel like there needs to be

more focus on the other failure, which was of the school. >> is there a legal remedy for you on that? is there -- >> we filed civil suits. the school is hiding behind unconstitutional legislation called governmental immunity. we're not allowed to ask questions. >> yeah. >> the school themselves don't acknowledge that they did anything wrong. even though they didn't follow their own policies, they don't acknowledge they did anything wrong. there hasn't been a single case of discipline related to the shooting within the school. >> buck and steve, i appreciate talking to you. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you. we reached out the school district to respond to the comments from steve and buck. didn't get a response.

coming up, how firm is the former president's lead in the south carolina primary? john king spent time there talking to republican voters as part of his all over the map series. that's next.

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get a free line of unlimited intro for a year when you buy one unlimited line. plus, get the new samsung galaxy s24 on us. things have gotten better recently, but too many businesses like mine are still getting broken into. it's time our police officers have access to 21st century tools to prevent and solve more crimes. allow public safety cameras that other bay area police departments have to discourage crime, catch criminals, and increase prosecutions. prop e is a smart step our city can take right now to keep san francisco moving in the right direction. please join me in voting yes on prop e. today's appeals court ruling rejecting the former president's claim of absolute immunity is unlikely to dent the lead he has

over nikki haley in the south carolina primary. republican voters show they are still coming to grips with the decision. john king tracks the presidential campaign through the eyes and experience of voters in the battleground states. john joins me now. nikki haley was a very popular governor of south carolina. why doesn't she have more support there? >> think about what has changed since then. she was last on the ballot a decade ago. 2014 is when she won her second term. donald trump won the 2016 primary, 2016 general election and the 2020 election in south carolina. our lesson from our travels is, they like her but they love him. the south carolina shoreline is spectacular. island treats ice cream stop a popular stop. joy cashed in her 401(k) eight

years ago to buy the place, leaving pennsylvania behind. >> god brought me here. i tell everybody, he brought me here. >> she served her first scoop in 2016. nikki haley was governor then. she was impressed. >> yes, she was a very good governor. >> then and now, donald trump is her vote for president. >> i totally believe that god has assigned him to this position. that's my true belief. >> to be the president of the united states? >> yes. he will be president again. i've been saying that for a long time. >> what happened in 2020? >> that was a mess. that was some illegal, some improper cheating happening. >> no judge in any state or federal judge found any evidence. >> i think so many people hate trump that -- >> even judges appointed by trump, trump's supreme court that

>> i just know there was a whole lot of cheating. >> if it was god's plan for trump to be president, why would god let that happen? >> because right now the time happened -- okay. what happened is what happened. and i believe trump's coming again. >> reporter: such trump is best no matter what sentiment is easy to find in south carolina. a big reason why the former president is heavily favored in haley's home state. >> he's even more ready now. >> reporter: mark sanford is out of politics because he has a very different take on trump. sanford was the republican governor here before haley. then he won his old house seat back in 2013. but sanford lost a republican primary in 2018 because he criticized trump's spending and sometimes his tone. >> for trump in this area but against trump in these different areas. but people didn't want nuance. they want are you for or against him. >> reporter: sanford now is in agreement when haley criticizes trump for all the chaos and all

the deficit spending. yet he expects a big trump win here. >> that which has traditionally worked in gop politics isn't so much working these days. yeah, i've seen this erosion, you have too, you go from tea party, sort of perot movement to tea party to trump. it's metastasized in ever aggressive forms. and what started out as a lot of well-meaning americans saying look, we've got to do something about politicians doing what they said they were going to do into something much more strident is their religion. i mean, i don't know how else to explain it. >> reporter: hartsville is two hours inland from the coast. billy pierce here for 70 years except for a stint in the navy is another piece of the trump comeback puzzle. >> the four years he was president, how was your life? >> better. definitely better. we didn't have high inflation. we didn't have high interest rates. >> reporter: not an election denier. not a fan of the toxic tone. >> if he'd shut up -- got off of

twitter and that stuff he'd have made a great president. >> reporter: his 2016 and 2020 votes for trump track his 1992 vote for ross perot. >> i wanted a non-career politician that would run it like a company, run this place like a company, like a xrep. >> reporter: pierce calls himself likely trump in the primary. the border is his top issue. >> shut it down. >> reporter: and on that he trusts trump more than haley. >> he's going in to fix the things i need him to fix. i have no problem -- to be honest with you i have no problem with putting up two rows and mining the other. if you come in, tell them it's mined. put a sign up, says it's mined. >> reporter: like many voters drawn to trump in 2016, craig thomas wanted to send washington a message. >> it was like all right, this is good, let's blow some things up. >> reporter: now he's voting for haley. to send his children a message. >> i don't think there's any sort of crazy conspiracy between the nfl and taylor swift and everything else just showing up for a biden coronation. >> reporter: to end thomas hopes

awkward conversations after his teenage daughter gets home from the stables. >> how do i look at my daughter, who is a huge taylor swift fan, and this guy's just attacking taylor swift just because she's going to support another candidate. right? and other things like that. so having those conversations with them, it does matter and it does matter with who you support. >> reporter: charleston is rich with revolutionary and civil war history. it is more affluent, more educated, less trumpy than most of the state. >> but there is quite a bit of talk about trump. even here. >> reporter: that's a bad sign, thomas says, for those like him who want south carolina to somehow give haley a win and give the republican race a new beginning. >> john king with the magic wall. can you walk us through the polls in south carolina, what kind of scenario haley would need to pull this off? >> it looks bleak for governor ambassador haley at the moment, anderson. a little context quibblingly. trump won one and he won two. he's 2-0 right now.

if he wins south carolina a lot of people think this is over. you mentioned the polls. the most recent polls show trump ahead by 25 points. what haley has to do is change the electorate. there's no voter registration in south carolina. so democrats, independents, republicans, anyone can vote if you're a registered voter in the primary. the problem for her is it's never happened before. it tends to be a very conservative electorate. what do i mean by that? that is from the "washington post"/monmouth university poll taken more than a week ago. forgive me for turning my back. 57% of those who say they are likely to vote in the south carolina republican primary, 57% of them say joe biden was elected because of fraud. that's simply not true. simply not true. but that's what they believe. nearly 6 in 10 of the people say they're going to vote in two weeks say joe biden shouldn't be president. guess what? 85% of those back trump over haley. so if it's almost 60% of the electorate and more than 8 in 10 back trump you can see right there the huge advantage he has in what used to be, as you noted earlier, haley's first state. here's another thing. she needs to change the composition of the electorate. get more moderates, more democrats, more independents to

vote. but right now she's not doing that. in iowa 55% of the voters there identified themselves as white evangelicals. in new hampshire it was only 19%. remember, that's where haley did at least in the 40s. south carolina looks a lot like iowa. 54% of the voters who say they're likely to vote describe themselves as white evangelicals. and look what happens. trump gets nearly 70% of that vote, anderson, to 22% for haley. so she has two weeks but she has to completely change the composition of the electorate. we've heard candidates in past years say i'm going to do that, i'm going to do that. john mccain said it back against george w. bush. it simply has not happened in the past. and remember, she last tried a decade ago, as i said. in 2016 trump won all but two, all but two, back in 2016 when he was brand new, when he was less known, he won all but two of the 46 counties. this state is even more trumpy now. and he did pretty good back then. >> john king, thanks very much. we'll be right back.

that's it for us. the news continues. "the source with kaitlan collins" starts now.