>> that the all for now. i'm lester holt, thanks for joining us. >> from nbc news in , the world's longest running television program, this is "meet the press" with david gregory. >> and good sunday morning. all eyes on new jersey, of course, but it's not just today's super bowl at metlife stadium that has people focused on the state. new jersey governor chris christie, it could be a big moment for him, obviously, with the super bowl there. instead he's also in the fight of his political life. he's got new charges he's facing now that he knew about the lane closures at the time they were happening. but there's been no evidence provided to backup those claims. is this truly a bottom shell or is it nothing? how much fight does president obama have left in his second term? dpard to last year, his state of

the union speech had less agenda. how much of his presidential power does he have to go it alone? and on this be super bowl sunday, the biggest threat to the future of football. why 40% of parents say they won't let their kids play. and why some nfl players from brett favre to joe name act say they're having long-term problems. doris kearns-goodwin is here is, robert gibbs, rich lowry, gwen ifill from pbs, chuck todd. chuck, the tabloid treatment of christie over this weekend has been tough. look at it on the screen, christie new. your lying gov. is this more hype than real? >> christie obviously believes it's more hype than real. you do have david wildstein with his own motivations, legal bills. this is the advice that is chris christie is in, he's got three people that essentially were

thrown under the bus in some form or another is, wildstein, bridget kelly and his long-time campaign guy. all of them, if forced to pick between their own survival, this becomes a game of survival, that's where christie is in trouble. that's what wildstein has been hinting on this. this story is no longer whether chris christie kk survive to become a viable presidential candidate. it's about whether he can save his own governorship. stop thinking about the presidential race. >> before getting through this. gwenn, one of the things they're doing in the governor's office is hitting wildstein hard. putting out five things you should know including as a 16-year-old kid he sued over a local school board election. >> that didn't strengthen my faith in their argument, the idea you're going back to high school to make the case. his big mistake in his press conference was attacking wildstein saying he was a loser in high school. we've all been through high

school and remember what those feelings were like. it seems like a distraction when the more serious question at hand is what he knew and what he was going to do about it and whether he was creating a culture among the people who worked for him who would do this even if he didn't know about it. this is supposed to be his big weekend. he was supposed to be in new jersey presiding over the super bowl everybody thinks is in new york. >> that could be a whole discussion itself. >> and instead, he's back in the corner again. >> i want to get more comment on this. kelly o'donnell is up in new jersey today closely following the bridge scandal. i want to have you bring us up to date what we're dealing with, who david wildstein is. what have you got, kelly. >> good morning, david. for governor christie, this really is a multifront media plan. governor christie has been trying to be visible with the super bowl-related events but his team had two responses to these latest claims. on friday, a pretty standard low key defense, but by sat this more personal attack on the

former port authority appointee who has been making waves. despite being the host governor -- >> good afternoon, arf. >> knowledges's chris christie did not appear to get the home field advantage saturday as noticeable boos came from a super bowl crowd in new york city's times square. >> and we look forward to hosting everybody. >> late saturday nbc news obtained a christie office memo being sent to his supporters that aggressively pushes back against both "the new york times" which first reported the allegations made by former port authority david wildstein and then takes on wildstein's personal character concluding that? >> david wildstein will do and save anything to save david wildstein." a former christie ali, wildstein and then took the fifth in january. >> i respectfully assert my right to remain silent. >> dangled hints that christie

may know more about the bridge traffic scandal. >> i had no knowledge or involvement in this issue in its planning or its execution. >> reporter: wildstein's attorney wrote "evidence exists can tying mr. christie to having knowledge of the lane closures during the period when the lanes were closed contrary to what the governor stated publicly." >> would you reconsider? >> wildstein's central role in the scandal makes his claims intrig intriguing, but he offers no specific evidence. >> well, david wildstein claims that evidence exists but what's left unanswered is what kind of evidence, who has that evidence and does it say anything about whether christie knew the motivation behind the lane closures. >> reporter: and the context of thisler is important, too. . wildstein's lawyer was sending the letter to the wildstein's former employer, the port authority and making the argument that that agency should reverse its decision and actually pay wildstein's legal

bills and indemny phi him against lawsuits. of course, like so many things in jersey politics, this has become oh, so personal. >> thank you so much. rich lowry, look, wildstein provided 900 pages of information and communications to the legislature. none of it mentioned that he didn't seek the whole truth will about this. what's the big thing that could come out of this? >> the facts really matter, and if christie wasn't telling the truth, he's left so many hostages to fortune here, the truth will come out. just the turn about in his fortune is incredible because the whole strategy was to win a huge re-election and then bragging about that all around the country and use that as a launching pad for his presidential campaign. now he's having to accepted out press reeses basically accusing one of his former associates of sticking gum under his desk to discredit him. >> he's saying there's evidence to suggesting that christie

wasn't being truthful when he said i only found out about this after the fact, after the lanes where is reopened. so he may have known about the closures while they were happening. >> right. so that's the -- that still doesn't get us to whether he planned the thing. >> the big danger has always been from the moment chris christie uttered the words that he had absolutely no knowledge of this and when he walked out from behind the podium after the two-hour press conference, he had entered into the record basically his testimony. if anyone could call into question the veracity of that testimony in the months ahead with lawyers and an investigation, this would crumble completely for chris christie. i agree with chuck. the notion that we're talking about this as what is this going to do to his presidential campaign, the largest newspaper in the state says if this is true, he should resign or be impeached. i think the clock is ticking on whether he's the chair of the rga. why wouldn't they get rid of this now and whether or not in a year we'll still call him

governor christie. >> big leadership moment, that's what you think about his leadership over time. >> it certainly was a bravura performance when he made the two-hour press conference. he made it so convincing, that he left himself little alone. it seems the shadow of the presidency only falls on a few people and it fell on olympian christie after he did so well with sandy and the big election. that was the time when he had to evolve into i an different kind of leader. if he had done petty payback things, you have to say i'm on a bigger change, i've got to change my way being. what the whole thing calls into question even none of this gets further than it is is the culture he created that allowed aides to think i can do this thing, i can play without telling the guy. either he didn't know which says something bad or if he did know, it says something far worse. >> i'm going to speak to the man leading the bridge scandal investigation. i'll talk to him later from the

new jersey legislature. now i want to talk about president obama and what he's calling his year of action. he went on the road this week to make his case for the initiatives he laid out in the state of the union case. >> the question i posed to kong dress yesterday is whether folks in washington are going to help or they're going to hinder the progress we've been making. whether they're going to waste time creating new crises that slows down our economy or they're going to spend time creating new jobs and new opportunities and i don't know what their plans are but i choose a year of action. >> joining me now denis mcdonough, are welcome back to "meet the press." here's my question. he's got more than 1,000 days left. to a lot of people, it seems like a smaller state of the union, that his agenda is smaller. a shrinking presidency. last year he talked about gun control, talked about climate change. remaking the health care system. has he gone small? >> if you think about the things he laid out on the table this week, $10.10 an hour minimum

wage is not going to be small for the hundreds of thousands of people who lift from that. long-term employment, the president bringing in 300 of the country's biggest employers to say to them, hey, let's resolve this issue that's dogging our economy and when those guys get a fair shot at a job and in fact, a new job at some point, that's not going to be small to them. later this week, you'll hear the president talk about connect ed, an opportunity where several private american companies will commit over a half billion dollars to insure our schools across the country have the kind of technology so that your 0 kids can compete in this economy. fcc says it's going to wire 50,000 schools, get 20 million kids online in the kind of learning not the way you and i grew up which is you had a computer science lab where you went to once a day. they sit at their tables all day, the laptops with tablets. that's the kind of education he wants kids to have.

>> i'm not saying these issues are unimportant, but this is a president ho had big apple big after a very tough year, do you conceive that he looks at washington and says, maybe i have to be a little less ambitious about what we can actually achieve here? >> no, i don't. i concede that the president doesn't spend a lot of time looking at washington. he spends a lot of time looking at what families across the country want. they want clear discernible concrete actions that he can take so that he can move this thing forward, not wait for congress which you've said many times on this show and during the course of this week as you commented about the speech, congress has not lived up to its past experience and in fact, one that's been quite slow. >> yeah. the issue of the economy is a big one. do you ever wonder why the president doesn't get more credit for an economy that is rebounding? ing >> i don't spend a lot of time wondering about credit for the president. he doesn't. i don't wonder about anything other than how do we make sure

that people want a fair shake. the fundamental it will premise of the country which is you play by the rules, work hard and you get a chance to get ahead. >> here's a few newsy items. one has to do with the keystone pipeline, the ability to move all of that oil down through the middle of the country. republicans have been calling for this. they say it's big for jobs. a report from the state department says there's no real impact on the climate. is this thing ready to be green lighted by the president? what would hold him back from saying the pipeline should go forward? >> he laid out his view on this last summer. if this is to go forward, it should not exacerbate the climate crisis in this country. >> didn't the state department say it won't? >> the friday report is the an important input into the process. we'll hear from other cabinet secretaries. think about this for a second. this year for the last three months of last year, october, november, december, we produced more oil than we imported for the first time. >> you didn't answer myquette. >> another thing. this morning in the "new york

times," terrible drought in the west including california as a result of climate change. we're going to resolve the keystone question, but that's one in a much bigger issue. >> but i'm focused on it so indulge me. what would stop him from saying yes at this point given his own state department saying there's not a big impact on the climate from doing this? >> he's been very clear he's going to insulate this process from politics. washington loves politics. >> you got a state department study. >> we have one department with a study. now we have other expert agencies. the epa and many others, the energy department, who had an opportunity to look at this and make their determination. the president wants make this decision based on the most sound science. >> where is the sweet spot on immigration? do you think you have a deal that can provide a pathway to legal status, and if it falls short of citizenship, could the president live with that. >> the president's principles on immigration have been out there for some time. the bottom line, he does not

want to see an in irk where we have two permanent classes, citizens and noncitizens as we proceed. that's his principle. nevertheless, the principles that were laid out by the republican leadership towards the end of last week, we think that's a pretty good step, pretty good progress in this debate coming from are with they were to where they are now. our job is to step back, let the debate happen in the house. we'll continue to press for our principles. the house democrats will, as well. we feel pea pretty good we'll get a bill done this year. >> you assume obamacare is here to stay. what's one thing the president could live with if the republicans said here's a change we want to make? >> i wish they were talking about it, but their position is fundamentally let's epeel this. a bill introduced earlier this week by several republicans in the senate all great people including doc coburn. you know what the first provision was? repeal obamacare, the affordable care act. if that's what they want to do --ings. >> harry reid said there's

substantive changes you can make. >> we're happy to look at all sorts of changes to make this better and trying to meet with democrats and republicans to do just that. >> is the health care law as strong as it could be. >> no law is as strong as it could be out of the block. when you've seen big changes in social positions, congress tinkers with it, identifies problems. a very interesting situation earlier this week where a person called her congressman asking for help on the law. . the congressman didn't decide to try to help use the marketplaces, use technology to fiend a cheaper more affordable quality health care plan. they just let that person toil under the plan they had developed. and that's not the way we should work. we should take the law, improve it where we can, help constituents where we can to get quality affordable health care. >> are you persuaded, is the president persuaded the olympic games will be safe? >> we're following this very, very closely, we're in close touch with the russians.

as we get new information, we're sharing it. >> is there any information you've got that disturbs it the president. >> we're always looking for more information. you're going to see different threats at different times. when we will have new information, we'll share it. we ask american people to go to the state department website, check in with the state department when the they travel. we'll make sure we share information when we get it. >> is the president an asset or liability to democrats in this campaign year? >> the president is an asset to democrats, the president is an asset using the great power in this office as you'll see later this week when he talks about this opportunity to wire schools. you know, 15,000 of them, 20 million students getting access. >> so it would be a mistake if democrats don't want the president to campaign with them? >> i'll leave it to democrats to make their decision how they want to run their campaigns. they're very good at that. we're good at focusing on the economy, getting the kind of clear attainable goals laid out that the president put in the speech the other night. that's what we're focused on, an

methat works for us. >> speaker boehner said he wants to see the republican party as a party of alternative ideas. is that what the party is now? >> is the republican party? i'll let them characterize themselves. they introduced the s.t.o.p. act this week. if there was ever a fitting bill for them to introduce after the last several years, surely the s.t.o.p. act is one. >> you're a football player. >> i am, i was. >> would you let your sons play? >> this is a subject my wife and i talk about quite a bit. so they're young guys now. weigh see what happens pap they're great soccer players, great swimmers. >> do you have doubts whether it's safe enough for them to play. >> you look at science and all the things we see. these are tough questions. families are struggling with them across the country. a lot of the science we know about came from the department of the army. we spent billions of dollars over the course of the last ten years looking at the impact of concussive events on troopers,

soldiers and fair families. that's important and a good addition to the national interest. we're thankful to the army for doing that. >> broncos or seahawks. >> i like is the broncos. >> thank you so much for your time. joining me now is tim scott, republican of south carolina. this is his first sunday interview since being sworn in as senators in 2013. he's one of two african-american senators is. the other cory booker. senator, welcome. >> good morning. >> i want to begin with controversy about you as an african-american senator from south carolina. you had to deal with comments from the head of the naacp in north carolina. he said the following, a ventriloquist can always find a good dummy. the extreme right wing finds a black guy to be senator and claims he's the first are black senator since reconstruction, then he goes to washington august and articue lates the agenda for the tea party. what do you think of that? >> you can't respond to someone

who's never taken the time to know me. he wasn't there when i was growing up in a single parent household. he wasn't there when i started my business working 85 hours a week. he wasn't there when i was running for congress against long odds. for him to have comments about me, i don't get it. number two, when you look at my opportunity agenda, you this i about what i'm focused on. i'm focused on something called the choice act where creating hope and opportunities for individuals and communities through education. i'm not sure what part of that agenda he doesn't like. perhaps he doesn't like the fact that we're focusing on kids with special needs and giving them more flexibility so they can find the education best for them. maybe he doesn't like my skills act that says that there are 4 million jobs today that go unfilled. here's an opportunity for us to bring more skills to the average person so that they can have not a debate about making it, but having a debate about real opportunity and real prosperity or maybe he doesn't like the fact that i believe that we can

create hope and opportunities in our inner cities by making them centers of excellence and an engine of nick activity and 30sing for those kids who grew up in ways that i did. >> colin powell on this program said there was a dark vein of intolerance within the republican party. do you believe that's the case? >> i don't. the gop has become the great opportunity party. i look at how i became a republican and the messages that i heard and received very early on as a kid running for county council in my 20s. one of the things that changed my life was meeting amen tore, a conservative republican at the time. i didn't know, didn't care whether he was republican or democrat. but he took the time over four years to start talking to me about there's a way out of poverty that doesn't include athletics or entertainment. that you have an opportunity through thinking, through business ownership, having a job is a good thing. if you create jobs, you be better and your community gets better. and so the first blush i had

with politics as a kid at 16 years old, 15 years old was a conservative guy who thought that the future could be very bright for a kid in a single parent household if he had the right tools, the right equipment. he didn't convince me on one side of the aisle or the other side of the aisle. he convinced me to look in the mirror and see the best and brightest future that i could create for myself. >> one of the issues is that the republican party does appear divided. you're a conservative. affiliated with the tea party. speaker boehner has said this week he thinks the party should stop being the party of opposition and should be a party of ideas. here you have the president's state of the union and four different responses from the republicans about the state of the union. is that division or is that unity on the republican side? >> well, david, so often people look at the republican party and say we don't have multiple voices with different perspectives on the issue. the fact of the matter is when you saw after the state of the union is that there are many

people in our party able to voice their concerns. the reason the party continues to grow is because we like the diversity of ideas. when we have that diversity of ideas, it helps us to build the best party for the future. certainly i'm a part of the conservative aspect of the party, and we have found very great success by partnering with folks who make our party better. so at the end of the day, what america needs is a party that is as diverse as the republican party. that is why account great opportunities for our future comes out of the gop. >> so agenda items after the state of the union, is obamacare here to stay? >> well, that's a great question. certainly i have voted at least three or four dozen times to eliminate obamacare. i've had no success. one of the things i hope we would have on the conversation about obamacare is we could look at a couple facets of the bill and find a way to restore hope and opportunity. if we think about the decimation of the 40-hour workweek as a

part of obamacare, i took a bus ride throughout the city by cities in south carolina to figure out what real people were saying in their environments. and what i learned was that too many people are stuck now working 30 hours a week because obamacare eliminates a 40-hour workweek. if we had an opportunity to eliminate that aspect of obamacare, i think we could find more money in the take home paychecks of many americans. another aspect of obamacare that we should address very quickly is the medical device tax. here's another $29 billion leaving the pockets of small business owners which makes it more difficult to create jobs. as a small business owner myself, here's what you cannot keep asking us to do, pay higher taxes as we did january of last year, $630 billion of higher taxes, more regulations, obamacare takes another $800 billion out of the pocket oz of small business owners through higher taxes and more rev to

yous and hire more people. we can't do all three. we can do two of the three.i'd like to see more jobs created in the private sector. >> we're out of time. senator scott, thanks so much for being here. i appreciate your time. >> thank you, david. coming up here, can the president keep his own party in line? i'm going to ask our roundtable that question. but jay leno had a solution if they can't stay in line after the president's state of the union speech. >> this was a very important speech for the president. he gave it in a time when he's losing support from his own party. in fact, congressional democrats warned tonight if they didn't an proud the president's speech, he would go out and campaign for them. >> plus big developments in another upcoming crucial decision for president obama. why the solution to the keystone pipeline is going to be a battle to the bitter end. and more on the christie bridge scandal as new charges fly, i'll speak to the man leading the investigation. and on this super bowl sunday, we'll talk about the future of the game. is safety an issue that makes

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for 1.99% financing during our certified pre-owned sales event through february 28th. roundtable is back. with me here chuck todd, glenn isle, rich lowry, robert gibbs and doris kearns-goodwin. by the way, it's ground hog day. punxsutawney phil did see his shadow this morning. what does it mean? it means more winter is here. it means bad things. poor punxsutawney. we'll talk more weather later. doris kearns-goodwin, we talk about the power of the presidency. you think so much about this. a thousand days left for president obama. here was the headline back in 2009 of the inauguration. historians say he, meaning

obama, could redefine the presidency and with no disrespect to this policy, here's denis mcdonough the chief of staff talking about broadband connection, getting more kids connected. is that what you envisioned. >> when you think about 1,000 days, some people might think that seemed short. that was the entire span of jfk's presidency. why is he remembered in part not just for the cuban missile crisis, he set things in motion for the future, civil rights that lbj was able to get through. medicare, lbj was able to get through. what obama is saying i think through executive orders and there's a triumphant history of executive orders, harry truman' desegregation of the army was an executive order. lbj did discrimination ending in federal hiring and contractors. there's been bad executives. fdr's presidency was forever scored by the executive order incarcerating japanese americans. what he was saying in the state of the union, i want to go along with you, but if i can't, speak

softly, carry a big stick. there's my big stick. more importantly he's saying my presidency will be remembered in part for what i began. he accentuated gay rights. we're getting energy dependence. he ended two wars. these things may take awhile to get into the history, but if he set things in motion that show a forward movement in social justice and defining inequality as the issue of our generation, then he will be remembered. >> how do you see it, rich? >> i thought the state of the union was a banal speech in the service of pick cue you know agenda. big clinton played small ball with strategy in the mind as part of an effort to associate him with middle class values. this to me feels different. it feels is much more like exhaustion, and doris kearns-goodwin can cite all these historic executive orders over the decades. none of the things they're talking about at the white house are anything like that. i would say it's a nod to the

reality that this term is not going to finish with some flourish of legislative accomplishment as we saw in 2009 and 2010. it the white house had an unsteady and unfocused year and needs to give the american people confidence that they have an agenda that speaks to them and they can get it done. and i think that the speech went a good ways towards laying that out. now, the impetus is also on the republicans to be part of that change. >> yeah, that is -- >> at some point in 2015 and 2016, we're going to have a race to be the next president. if the republicans aren't prepared to appear to the american people like they are a governing party, able to do that in the country, they won't be elected. >> john boehner is concerned about that, gwenn. he's saying look, we've got to be a party of real ideas and not just go through the meat grinder of opposing the president all the time. >> people like tim scott like to oppose the president. that's kind of the whole idea,

but listeninging to denis mcdonough, he said two interesting things about two issues. the big issues which the president can do something about, one is immigration. he said we're stepping back and getting out of the way. we're out of this. house republicans you figure it out. if something good happens, we get the credit if nothing happens. the other is the keystone pipeline. it was interesting to hear him say we'll see what other cabinet members say. this decision is putting john kerry between the rock and the hard place, long-time climate change advocate now in the position of trying to make a decision which will anger people on the left who think that this is a major environmental hazard and will anger people on the right. in fact, some democrats like mary landrieu and mark begich running for re-election in oil rich state who won't be happy if he doesn't approve it. these are big issues the president has. >> i know the left can be upset

with the president. but there's a real opening to say to republicans, hey, you said this is a priority? i studied it and i think it's a priority, too. we'll go ahead and do it. >> you know. >> it could be a big moment for him. >> it could be. i was surprised, you do get a sense the president didn't like the statement that he got because now they're, the white house is emphasizing other agencies have to weigh in. >> for months they've been saying it's all about the state department. >> it does feel as if politically, they're in a advice. look, the politics of this with arkansas where the pipeline might be going through, mark pryor, democratic senator. at some point, you do figure the politics is going to sort of impact where the president comes down here. but on the big picture legacy, the other thing that the president was elected on was changing politics as we know it in this town. that's what has stunned me from the david remnick interview to the state of the union which paints the picture that he's resigned to the constraints of

the office and the constraints of the politics of this town. he's given up on trying to break the polarization addiction that this town has. some will say he added to it, but he's given that up, and to me, that's going to be something that i think historians are going to be writing down as the great disappointment. >> historians are going to say the problems with the culture preceded him and they had to do with redistricting and the poison of money. of course, he came in hoping to do that. >> did he attempt it? my sense is i don't feel like in the last 1,000 days he's even. >> so much of this debate too is does this fever only break when we get to the 2016? >> that's what we said in '08 and in 2000. >> we've talked about christie in 2016. hillary clinton still such a focus. polling came out. big surprise from the "washington post," abc news that hillary clinton is trouncing any opponent she might have in the

party is, joe biden or elizabeth warren. very interesting last week here with rand paul, really amping up kind confident republican response and raising bill clinton, raising monika lewinsky, maureen dowd rights in her column this morning the times that he had something of a point. here's a portion of what she wrote this morning. it's not so simple to cast hillary as a victim. she was also part of the damage control team to vouch for her husband and vouch for his mistress. they spread the word monika was a troubled young woman with stalking tendencies. she was distressed that the president was being attacked for his ministry of a troubled person. is this groundhog day in politics too? >> such great memories. >> david wildstein while all this was happening >> gwenn, you go forward. is this deft on the part of the republicans? >> watching that last week, i had the feeling he was -- this

was something that occurred to him as he was defending his wife who had raised this question. people who live through this had for whom this was an important part of their political life and formative issue will be happy to write about it again. but as we spend all of our time obsessing about the clintons again and about hillary clinton again, i think there's a lot less time being spent aside from the chris christie who the republican nominee is going to be. there's got to be a republican nominee and they don't know at all. is it just me? >> is that so bad though? >> first of all, i think you're right. >> hillary clinton in a way is waiting in the wings in a way maybe no republican could be. >> she's been an overwhelming front-runner about before and that didn't work out well last time. maybe it works out this time. rand paul, he was being asked about his wife's comments. i get the sense the republicans don't. >> for a riff, that was pretty -- that was pretty well played. >> they're not sitting around in

back rooms figuring out how to bring up the '90s again. i don't think they fear hillary clinton. it's probably not going to be a status quo election. is she going to be able to brand herself hope and change 2.0? i doubt it. >> the backdrop of these comments and the state of the union are that the american people want to see positive action from this town. >> go forward, not back into it has slowed down everybody. >> this it is barbara bush's point. if it's clinton busch again how are you going forward? >> watching developments around hillary clinton, you know, i hope the message that they got from the '07 and '08 was we didn't do inevitability inevitably enough. >> that's pretty good. >> i spent time thinking about it. >> he's just riffing >> i didn't write this. what i mean by that is, democrats and americans want to see not that you can get a super pac to align with you and not that you can get big donors aligned with you, but do you

have an american vision, a vision for how america fits into the world and what the role we want to see ourselves play. >> all right. >> at home and abroad. i think that's the reen onus on her. >> we're going to take a break. i've got an interesting conversation about the future of football coming up. coming up next here, the investigation into the bridge scandal. will new chajs by a one-time close christie ali be a game changer? i'll speak with a man leading the investigation. and the threat to the future of [ park sounds, sound of spray paint ]

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a lot more to get to as we continue here on this super bowl sunday. are head injuries threatening the future of football? america's most popular sport? that conversation next.

>> i had no knowledge or involvement in this issue in its planning or its execution. and i am stunned by the abject stupidity that was shown here. >> we are back. that, of course, new jersey governor chris christie denying that he had anything to do with the lane closures of the george washington bridge. the man leading the investigation into the bridge scandal is here with once again. assembly man june wisniewski. welcome back to "meet the press." >> thank you. >> now you have david wildstein as we have been talking about this morning saying that evidence exists that christie is not telling the whole truth. what do we actually have here? >> well, that's the question. we don't really know what the evidence is. he submitted over 900 pages of documents in response to the committee's subpoena. apparently what he's talking about must be something other than what he's.

>> 900 pages, nothing implicates christie. is that right? >> nothing that says the governor knew contemporaneously. >> if he had this, why didn't he give it to you. >> that's a great question. >> doesn't that undermine his credibility? >> it really raises questions. >> this guy wants immunity. he wants his legal bills being paid and he's raising a charge that you should have known if he turned over 900 pages of information. >> the use of the words evidence exists supposed to saying i have documents or i have an e-mail, it's a curious choice of words which may be he knows somebody else that has information. maybe this is a conversation he had. maybe this is something else that is not within the scope of the subpoena the committee issued. so it raises questions about what does he have and why doesn't the committee have it. >> do you any reason to not believe chris christie on what he said publicly? >> i have a lot of questions

what the governor said and what mr. wildstein is saying. the only way we can answer the questions is to get more information and more documents. >> to that point, are you getting more information as early as tomorrow? >> tomorrow we hope to be starting to get responses to the subpoenas. some attorneys have asked for leeway in terps of the production dates. we've granted some. >> there's a criminal probe by the utah attorney in this district, paul fishman. is he going to shut down what you do so he can do what he does? >> no, our counsel met with the u.s. attorney. they've had a conversation. he's very comfortable, our attorney is very comfortable that this investigation can proceed on a parallel track. >> what's the end game here? i ask that because you've talked about some of it and i've made this point clear before. you were the state democratic chairman. okay? you are a democrat who actually was responsible for the political arm of the state. you've been asked about what crime might it be involved here. back in january you said on "nbc nightly news," let me play it on the screen. >> sure. >> using the george washington bridge, a public resource to

exact a political vendetta is a crime. having people use their official position to have a political gain is a crime. and so if those tie back into the governor in any way, it clearly becomes an impeachable offense. >> so what is the crime that is an impeachable offense? >> well, the question is, did the governor commit one of these acts? is the governor responsible for this? we don't have any proof right now that the governor said go and close the lanes. we know that somebody who was in his office, bridgette kelly, ordered the lane closures. so the hypothetical was asked, is this a crime? in well, using a public resource for political mr. purposes -- >> but let's be clear. people are going to come forward, people who want immunity are going to turn on governor. this is how this works when you're a potential target, you turn on the governor. you're making it very clear that the bar is high. you need very clear proof that the governor ordered this. is that right? >> absolutely.

we don't have any proof. we need more proof. remember, we're a legislative inquiry trying to change the way the port authority operates. our end game is not any law enforcement action. our end game here is to change the culture of the port authority to make this agency more accountable, more transparent which it's not right now. >> you're not after governor christie. >> that's not our goal. our goal is to fix the authority. >> would you like to see him stay in office? >> that's up to the people of new jersey whether he copies or whether he is going to -- it's up to him. >> do you have a responsibility as a democrat to seek more republican voices, to stand next to you to say let's be truly bipartisan about this, and let's make it very clear that all the shots that might it be taken at the governor only are valid if they can establish that he ordered this? otherwise, this thing can grind on and eat at him politically. >> but this isn't a probe about the governor. let's make it clear. >> if he is in trouble, it's absolutely about the governor. you just told me.

you would have to problem he ordered. it's everything about the governor. >> the steps led us to the bridge, to the governor's office. now we're in the governor's office who told bridgette kelly to close the lanes? under what authority? that's what we have to find out. the bar has been set high because the governor has certain ambitions and people are talking about him in a national context. but the fact of the matter remains. we want to get answers how this could happen. >> you've scoured e-mail, text messaging. you've looked at a lot of communication within this administration already, haven't you? >> we've looked at all of the documents we've gotten from wildstein, baroni. we haven't gotten responses back from the governor or other individuals we subpoenaed. we don't know what this will lead us to. >> nothing yet implicates the governor. >> not directly. >> david, thank you. >> up next here with everybody talking about football, on then super bowl sunday, i've got a different question. what is the future of the game given the concerns about

concussions and player safety? we're going to discuss it next with nfl legend tony dungy and ♪ [ male announcer ] if we could see energy... what would we see? ♪ the billions of gallons of fuel that get us to work. ♪ we'd see all the electricity flowing through the devices that connect us and teach us. ♪ we'd see that almost 100% of medical plastics are made from oil and natural gas. ♪ and an industry that supports almost 10 million american jobs. life takes energy. and no one applies more technology to produce american energy and refine it more efficiently than exxonmobil. because using energy responsibly has never been more important.

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coming up, we're all talking about football today. my question here about the most popular sport in america is, what is the future, given the health concerns, concussions? the future of the there's a saying around here, you stand behind what you say. around here you don't make excuses.

you make commitments. and when you can't live up to them, you own up, and make it right. some people think the kind of accountability that thrives on so many streets in this country has gone missing in the places where it's needed most. but i know you'll still find it when you know where to look. hi, are we still on for tomorrow? tomorrow. quick look at the weather. nice day, beautiful tomorrow. tomorrow is full of promise. we can come back tomorrrow. and we promise to keep it that way. driven to preserve the environment, csx moves a ton of freight nearly 450 miles on one gallon of fuel. what a day. can't wait til tomorrow. we've all met bill. he shows up once a month asking for money. you can't avoid him, but you can stop him from wasting 150 million pounds of paper every year.

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you're looking live, metlife stadium in the meadowlands in new jersey, the did he ever wrong keenz seattle seahawks get ready to play super bowl xlviii. everybody's talking about football on the biggest day of the year. but the less popular question is whether the future of football is in doubt because of the growing number of concussions and lasting head injuries to the players. to help me go deeper on this issue, i'm joined by alan schwarz of "the new york times" who has covered the concussion story from the start and "nbc sports" analyst, the terrific tony dungy, the head coach of the indianapolis colts the last time peyton manning won a super bowl. welcome to you both. i'm very glad to have you here. >> nice to be here, david, thank you. >> i want to make a disclosure before we start our discussion. my wife beth is an attorney that represents the nfl.

she was part of the legal team that negotiated this agreement between the nfl and the players over concussions. so with that out of the way, lets me talk about that settlement. let me put it up on the screen what it represents. it is a concussion settlement worth $765 million covering current retired players for conditions that develop over the next 65 years allen, a lot of the commentary is this was a great deal for the nfl and now it risks being unrabled by the judge who may conclude there's not enough money here to pay for all the damage that's been done. >> well, it's a question really of, is it enough morally, should these men be given more money because of the injuries they sustained, but the way i looked at it and the times looked at it the other day, is it enough air arithmetically. you're promising an unknown number of players sometimes up to $4 million for their developing conditions such as dementia, alzheimers, als,

parkinson parkinson's, things like that, but you don't know how many of the currently retired players will develop these conditions. and so you can't put a hard cap of 765 and it's it's actually 712 when you cut it down, you can't do that if you don't know how many players there are going to be. >> tony dungy, one of the big questions as we move forward, however the settlement shakes out, is whether at any point, even if the nfl didn't tell everything that it knew about the dangers to players, that had players back in the day known, would they have done anything differently. >> i don't know that they would. i played in the '70s. i had a couple of concussions while i played. and it was part of the game. and i think the nfl has done a lot to make the game safer. we're trying to make it safer. and i think that's the case. but yeah, as a player, your idea was to play. and that's what a lot of us did into but allen, the question is, did the nfl do everything it should have done for those

players at the time? >> well, i think that's obviously very debatable. did the teams know that will much prior to 1994 when they formed a committee in order to look into the issue? i mean. >> clearly the science did change, it evolved in terms -- the quep is whether the league's handling of the science facilitated that or impeded that. tony is frankly, one of the retired players who if he develops any problems as his age gets higher, you know, he will be eligible or his family will be eligible for 500, $600,000, $700,000 if he registers for this settlement. there's a lot of money going to a lot of men even if the problems had nothing to do with football, they will receive compensation. it's a deal people should take very seriously. >> tony, as you look at the future of the game, this is an issue the president has talked about, we did some of our own polling. the question in our nbc news "wall street journal" poll,

would you encourage your child to play a different sport because of concussion concerns? 40% say yes. do you as a dad, as a former coach and player, do you see danger ahead for football? >> well, i this i it's something we have to address, and the league is doing what they can to address it. we had a study that came out from the nfl health and safety committee that concussions were down 13% last year. so we're working on that. i think we've got to the convince the general public that we are. i have boys now. i have a son playing football at the university of oregon. i have five boyce in my home. i would not discourage them from playing the game. i think we are making it safer. we know that there are risks. but i would not discourage my boys from playing >> cris collinsworth said look, there could be real damage to the ranks of high school football with the high number of concussions. do you share that concern? >> well, i this i we have to do things to lessen that. and we have. i mean, if you look at when i was playing, if you had an acl

injury, many times it was career-ending. now we have guys getting hurt, acl injuries and they come back and play in that same season. so we've made progress in a lot of areas. we've got to make progress in this. no one wore mouthpieces when i played. now we understand that mouthpieces can go a long way to help toward preventing concussions and young people are wearing mouthpieces now, better helmets. we have to continue to do that. but we can make it safer. >> here's what the president said, alan, in his interview with the new yorker. he said i would not let my son play pro football. at this point, there's a little bit of caveat emt tore he went on. these guys know what they're doing. they know what they're buying into. it is no longer a secret. it's sort of the feeling, i have about smokers, you know, in other words, smokers know it can kill them and they still smoke. it's not so helpful that the president said it's no longer a secret because that suggests at one point maybe it was.

to you, danger ahead for football? >> i don't think so. even if participation declines 10 or 20% in the youth and high school ranks, that's still tons of players. tons of enthusiasm. tons of small towns and friday night lights. if the next tom brady's father in fact does not let him play, tom brady was a fantastic baseball player. maybe he would have turned pro if baseball. but then somebody else is going to lead the new england patriots. i think football is going to be just fine. they will slow down the game, make it a little less reckless. hopefully actually enforce the tackling rules that have been in place since the early '70s. these kinds of things can change the sport into something that is far less dangerous. >> but tony, to me it's a culture issue, right? i mean, look, there's plenty of fan who's say let the guys play the way they play and don't try to diminish the sport in that way. but here's the example i think of as a fan. alex smith playing for the 49ers, gets a concussion.

what happens? he loses his job. that's what happens. they went on to colin kaepernick who is now a superstar. smith is still doing great over at kansas city. this is a culture thing. these guys know how tough it is, but until they buy into the idea they've got to protect themselves, it gets very hard, doesn't it? >> we have to get that across. that is one of the things the nfl has worked on, getting guys to report or getting more people looking at them and making sure that when a player does have a concussion, that it it is dealt with and treated. i can tell you in my 13 years as a head coach, i never had a player tell me, boy, i don't feel great but the doctors say i'm okayen an i can go back in there. no, they do tell you. the doctors are holding me out, i can play coach, let me in. we have to work on that part of the culture. i think we're doing that. i think the nfl is doing things to make the game safer all the way up. >> are they not getting it in any respect in the nfl? do you think they're still missing something that's

important? >> players want to play. there's no question about that. i do think the educational process, we are getting things across. it is getting better and players do understand that they have to look out for their future. >> yeah. >> real quick. >> i think the league has a lot of influence over youth football, high school football. they make a big thing about usa football and all the efforts that they're making. perhaps there can be a rule that will ultimately develop that you can't crush a chide in the head just because he's holding a football and just because the helmet met the standard at the time of manufacture, perhaps they should make sure it still has safety properties two years later. they don't do that now. >> alan schwartz, tony dungy. thanks so much. will peyton win it today, tony? >> i think so. i'm pulling for him. that's it for us today. the 22nd winter olympic games kick off this thursday on nbc. we'll have coverage on the ground there. that's it for us today. if it's sunday, "meet the press."

good morning. coming up on "early today," bowl blowout. the seattle seahawks soar over the denver broncos for their first ever super bowl championship. highlights from the game, and, of course, the commercials. tragic end. remembering philip seymour hoffman, one of the most talented actors of his time found dead inside his apartment. plus, more tles in sochi. with the olympics now just days away. is spring just around the corner or six more weeks of winter? an emotional farewell to seth meyers on "snl." it is monday, february 3rd. "early today" starts right now. good