but in close encounter between a textter and nature, oh, geez, best new thing in the world today. now it is time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. thanks for being with us tonight. have a great night. today, rick santorum quick the race and george zimmerman's lawyers quit the case. the killer of trayvon martin seems to think that the only friend he has to turn to now is sean hannity. breaking news tonight. george zimmerman's defense team quits. >> step back, use your cool head, and lesson to the facts. >> you're entitled to use force including deadly force to protect yourself. >> this was confirmed. his nose was broken. >> the media has absolutely destroyed him, unfairly. >> i have only spoken to him by phone. >> we are confident that we will prevail in court. >> we're going to try this case in court. >> as of now, we're withdrawing his counsel for mr. zimmerman.

>> late this afternoon, the attorneys for george zimmerman quit the case. >> we've lost contact with him. i'm not sure what he's doing or who he's talking to. >> the lawyers have lost contact with their client. >> the killer of trayvon martin is unaccounted for. >> this is a huge development, folks. >> quit the case? >> quits. >> while this presidential race for us is over, we will suspend our campaign effective today. >> quits. >> rick santorum is suspending his campaign. >> it appears all but certain that mitt romney is the de facto republican nominee. >> he got out at about as good of a time as he could have done. >> the name you did not hear in those remarks was mitt romney. >> you just don't have credibility, mitt. >> he's been on both sides of almost every single issue. >> he is the worst republican. >> how much damage did he cause to mitt romney? >> well, if you don't run chris christie, romney will be the nominee and we'll lose. we have a series of breaking

news developments tonight in the killing of trayvon martin. the office of the special prosecutor in the case released a notice to the media at 8:15 tonight that some time when the next 72 hours that the prosecutor will, quote, hold a news conference regarding the case, end quote. that news conference could be special prosecutor angela corey's moment to announce that she has concluded her investigation and reached a decision on filing charges in the case. that means the subject of the investigation, george zimmerman, now has less than 70 hours to find a new defense lawyer after his team of lawyers abruptly quit the case this afternoon because they have completely lost contact with their client. >> we're withdrawing as counsel for mr. zimmerman. we've lost contact with him, up to this point. we've had contact every day.

he has gone on his own. i'm not sure what he's doing or who he's talking to. but at this point, we're withdraw as counsel. >> benjamin crump, an attorney for trayvon martin's family, responded with alarm earlier tonight on msnbc's "politics nation." >> we are really worried about him being a flight risk. again, the killer of trayvon martin is unaccountable for. nobody knows where the killer of trayvon martin is. >> zimmerman's lawyers said that sunday was the last time either of them had any form of contact with zimmerman, but after zimmerman stopped communicating with his attorneys, he did reach out on his own to at least two other people, special prosecutor angela corey, who refused to speak with him, and zimmerman's tv best friend, sean hannity.

>> eventually the two newest developments are that we learned that he had called sean hannity of fox news, directly, not through us, and we believe, i can't confirm this, we believe that he spoke directly with sean, off the record, and he's not even willing to tell us what our client told him. >> within the hour, sean hannity said this. >> i want to set the record straight about a couple of things. now, for a few weeks, we have been pursuing an interview with mr. zimmerman to give him a chance to tell his side of the story. now, yesterday i was contacted by an individual that we, in fact, believe was george zimmerman. he reached out to me. we spoke on the phone about his case, and i agreed not to report on the contents of that conversation. that's it. i know nothing about his relationship with his now former attorneys. >> in the zimmerman defense team's unprecedently strange

45-minute press conference today, they said not one word to reassure authorities that george zimmerman has not fled the country. >> in this case, i will not tell you where george zimmerman is, because i don't know. but for those who are engaged in the late easter egg hunt looking for him, you can stop looking in florida. look much further away than that, which is also a reason why we didn't meet with him, because it was simply not reasonable. >> joining me now is charles emblow, "new york times" opinion writer, natalie jackson, attorney for trayvon martin's family, and joy-ann reid, msnbc contributor and managing editor of the grio. natalie jackson, i want to go to your legal experience on this. i have never seen a press conference by defense attorneys like this ever. they have no idea where their client is. it seems to me that the reason they had to do this press conference is that they are now

worried about protecting their own licenses to practice law in where are state. that they need to make sure that if this client has fled the jurisdiction and fled the country, that they are making it very clear to the special prosecutor that they have had nothing to do with that and have not been a party to that. >> it does seem as though they are distancing themselves. this was a very strange press conference. when we heard about it, we speculated about all the things this press conference could be, and it turned out far different than we thought it would be. you know, this is a -- this press conference, basically, confirmed what we thought about george zimmerman. that he's a nonconformist and that he has a defiant attitude about this, and about this case. >> let's listen to what one of the lawyers, craig saunders, said just last week about what would happen if an arrest warrant was issued in this case. let's listen to this. >> we're keeping track of him.

law enforcement is keeping track of him. he's not hiding out, he's hiding out from law enforcement, he's hiding out from the people who are trying to kill him, actually. >> charles blow, turns out absolutely no truth to that when it really had any meaning, which is this week. >> i'm so happy that you started with natalie to get the formal legal opinion, because i think this whole thing is nuts. that's just my opinion. it is so ridiculous at this point. no one -- when you get down to brass tacks, the big question is, where is george zimmerman? if his attorneys or his ex-attorneys, who never seem to have had a retainer with him never actually met him face to face, do not know, because they have seen him in whatever place he is, where he is, don't know where he is, and if the special prosecutor has not met with him face to face, and it would be hard to imagine that the special prosecutor would meet with

george zimmerman without his attorneys present. and if they haven't seen him, that means that the special prosecutor is very likely to have not have seen george zimmerman face to face. that means that we are -- we do not know, we have no assurances that anyone knows where george zimmerman is. i am hoping that the state's attorney will step to a mic within this 72 hours and say how it is that we as the public can be assured that somebody is keeping track of george zimmerman, because the man is not charged with a crime at this point. so he's free to move as he pleases. they haven't heard from him in two days, and they want to break up the relationship that they never really had, because they never really seemed to have known this man in the first place. his father should be giving him some advice. he's supposed to be a retired judge, and he's giving all kinds of interviews and behind a screen, like he's a character from the golden child.

well, why don't you talk to your son and tell him how to behave when you are being investigated for homicide. something is really off the rails here. and it does not make sense. and it's just crazy. >> roland martin reported today that he contacted joe oliver, who had been working as a spokesman for george zimmerman, kind of up until charles and i interviewed him, and he didn't perform too well on it. but he told roland martin that he texted george zimmerman today, did not get a reply, but texted him saying, i think you're making bad decisions. we also have, i think, some tape ready to go on the lawyers today, talking about what they think george zimmerman's current state of mind is. they think he may be in some way mentally incapacitated at this point. let's listen to that.

>> shaken babies. when you -- you can't shake me, i'm too fat. but if you get me on the ground, you can accomplish the same thing, which is to smack my brain around inside my skull. that would put any reasonable person in reasonable fear of serious physical injury. and under florida law, that entitles you to use any force including deadly force to defend yourself. >> okay. that was not the clip i was looking for. we have so many clips from this news conference, but there is one i'm going to try to find here, where he talks about -- the lawyer talks about his state of mind, zimmerman's state of mind, and they think he's got posttraumatic stress syndrome and he's in a condition where they do not trust his judgment in any way. but natalie jackson, i want to get back to you on one league point. what do you make of what is being reported now, that zimmerman tried to contact the special prosecutor directly, tried to get her on the phone, and she refused to speak with him. legally, why would she do that?

>> because he's represented by counsel. as far as she understand, he was represented by counsel. and you cannot speak to a defendant who's represented by counsel. she did the ethical and proper thing by not speaking to him. >> joy ann reid joining us from sanford, florida, tonight. you've done a lot of great on the ground reporting there. are there any developments, is there any kind of notion about where george zimmerman is? is there any word coming that there might be other lawyers lining up to represent him at this point? >> well, lawrence, we certainly haven't heard that. and i did ask craig saunders during that press conference, if he, in fact, has lost track of george zimmerman, how he can then assure the public, the press, and the prosecutors that if he were to be asked to turn himself in that he would even do it. he didn't really have an answer

for that, other than to say, well, he knows his phone number. as was previously stated, they've never even met george zimmerman face to face, the two attorneys. i did tell you, lawrence, that i did check george zimmerman's website. the website he put up on his own without the lawyers getting involved. they were working on getting a website for him. that website was updated today at 1:30 this afternoon. so a few hours before that press conference, we did have someone update that website. so if george zimmerman is doing his own website, then he has internet access, and that's about all we know. he did indicate he's not in florida. >> and joy-ann reid, that update on the website was just a very simple thank you to supporters, and as i understand it, the website also took down a photograph that was of some graffiti that was on a black student center at a college, a graffiti -- >> at ohio state university, correct. >> yeah. that's been the only activity on this website. >> that is all that has changed.

but other than that -- >> and the lawyers acknowledged to us that that website is actually maintained by george zimmerman. charles blow, we heard these lawyers spend over a week, very bombastically, very confidently asserting to this country exactly what the facts are in this case, asserting without any actual evidentiary support for it, beyond they word, that george zimmerman's nose was broken, his head was wounded, making all sorts of bold assertions about the fact base of this case. and they were doing that, we now know, without ever having met their client, without ever having had an opportunity to evaluate from him the credibility of any of this information that they were selling to any tv interviewer who they could get to accept it. and here we are today, discovering they really had no idea what they were doing all along, and ultimately, tonight, have no idea where their client is.

>> it is the most outrageous thing that i have seen in recent memory, as it relates to a kind of criminal trial. so you -- for a whole week, you told us that your client was completely credible. and then today you stand up in front of a microphone and say he might be crazy. what are we to believe? and do you have any basis for either one of those judgments? i think not. i have never fully believed anything that was coming from these attorneys. and in fact, what it seems to me is that they are a little bit kind of hungry for the limelight. because at the end of the press conference, they said, if george were to reach out and contact us, we've come back. fame is a monster. and they have been bitten by that. they want to be part of this big case. and they are kind of throwing george under the bus in order to get him to come back to them.

it's a very odd situation, but i don't believe that with we can really take what they say, which is what some people were doing, taking what they said pretty much as the voice of george zimmerman and them having some credibility in being able to make the assertions that they were making, and i do not believe that they were valid, because they have never laid eyes on this man, and now with your telling us. you just told us, you think he's suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder? you're basically saying that he's losing his mind, but up until that moment, you believed everything that he said? something does not add up. both of those things cannot be true. >> well, i've got to say, if george zimmerman has been watching his lawyers' appearances on television, i think from a rational perspective, he had ever good, solid reason to fire them. natalie jackson, charles m. blow, and joy-ann reid, thank you all very much for joining me tonight. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you. coming up, we're going to have more on the breaking news on the killing of trayvon martin

with jonathan capehart and former federal prosecutor from florida, kendall coffey. and later, rick santorum is dropping out of the presidential campaign before a possible humiliation in his home state of pennsylvania. that means the obama re-election campaign can no longer count on republicans to attack the now-inevitable nominee, mitt romney. that's coming up. [ male announcer ] considering all your mouth goes through,

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with the special prosecutor saying she will make an announcement in the case of the killing of trayvon martin soon, the lawyers representing the target of that investigation, george zimmerman, have dropped out of the case today and they told the world they have no idea where their former client is. jonathan capehart will join me in our breaking news coverage of the case along with former

florida prosecutor, kendall coffey. and later, rick santorum surrendered to mitt romney today, but if he's going to endorse mitt romney, rick santorum will have to etch a sketch everything he has said about romney being the worst possible candidate to face president obama in the general election. according to the signs, ford is having some sort of big tire event. i just want to confirm a few things with fiona. how would you describe the event? it's big. no,i mean in terms of savings how would you sum it up? big in your own words, with respect to selection, what would you say? big

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a person who still has and can still get a weapons permit and for all we know may still have a weapon. >> that's darryl parks, one of the attorneys for trayvon martin's family upon learning today that george zimmerman's lawyers quit the case and they don't know what state or what country george zimmerman is in. but we know george zimmerman's website had a new posting at 1:30 eastern time this afternoon, saying, "i am attempting to respond to each and every one of my supporters personally. the support has been overwhelming in volume and strength. i thank you all and ask you that you permit me the time to respond to each one of you personally. once again, with thank sincerely, george zimmerman." this is the same website that "long live zimmerman" was spray painted on to a building.

joining me now, kendall coffey, former u.s. attorney for the southern district of florida, and jonathan capehart, "washington post" opinion writer and msnbc analyst. kendall coffey, i give up. these are the craziest, strangest lawyers i've ever seen handling any case, putting themselves out there publicly, asserting facts about the case without ever having met their client, and then having to tell the world today, we have no idea where he is, just at the moment, where the special prosecutor has said, within about 70 hours from now, i will be making what is probably a conclusive announcement in this case. i've never seen anything like this with lawyers. >> well, it's certainly one of the most remarkable press conferences we've ever seen any defense lawyers provide. i can't help but be a little sympathetic, because this is such an overwhelming case from a media standpoint.

these kind of cases take on a life of their own. the press conference took on a life of its own. but at the end of the day, they didn't need to say anything about the reasons why they were withdrawing and they certainly didn't need to announce to the world that they didn't have any idea where their client was, because what's coming across is a picture of somebody who's in hiding, a picture of somebody who's asking desperately, certainly erratically, and that kind of behavior, frankly, is more consistent with a person who's guilty rather than a person who's innocent. all bad news for george zimmerman today. >> jonathan capehart, one of these incompetent lawyers said that if you're looking for him, look far beyond florida. and look, his mother is from peru. i think, kendall, you'll confirm that when you're looking for people who are flight risks, you look to places where they have potential connective tissue of some sort, especially foreign countries that might be able to take care of them.

jonathan, this just can't get crazier. and for it to be coming, as we seem to be now, about 70 hours or less away from the special prosecutor making her announcement on her findings, it just seems -- it just seems like it just couldn't be crazier tonight. >> right. well, from the very beginning, i've been writing in my pieces, you know, nothing makes sense about this case. nothing. and today, those two lawyers stepped out to the microphone to prove me right once again, that nothing about this case makes sense. nothing. you have two lawyers. one, craig sonner, who volunteered himself to be george zimmerman's legal adviser. and then this other guy comes in, and you know, comes in on the case, and the two of them out doing media interviews, speaking on george zimmerman's behalf, to find out today that they haven't spoken to him since sunday. they have not seen him face to face. i think it was charles blow in

the previous segment talking about the fact that they've never sat down face to face with george zimmerman to make a face-to-face judgment as to whether this is someone they should -- someone they should counsel and someone they ought to counsel. so i think in the next 72 hours, what we're -- well, what is my hope is that we will get, if not answers to most of our questions, at least answers to some of the really important questions. one, does the sanford police department have george zimmerman's gun from that night? where is george zimmerman? and, more importantly, and most importantly, i think for a lot of people, is there enough evidence for probable cause or whatever is needed to arrest george zimmerman so that he and this case can be brought to a court of law and out of the court of public opinion, so that he can be held accountable for killing an unarmed 17-year-old trayvon martin?

>> kendall coffey, one of the lawyers said today that he was so far away, wherever zimmerman is, it's so far away that it would be impractical for them to have attempted to meet with him, given even the air travel that's available out of the orlando airport. what does that mean to you when you hear a statement like that? >> well, again, a remarkable statement. a completely unnecessary statement. something that suggests that george zimmerman is panicking. and what does that add up to, other than somebody who thinks they're in a lot of trouble, which, of course, is going to be equated to guilt. it suggests that unless they have absolutely no idea and that they're guessing, just as you say, he's far away, is he in peru? we don't know that? and we're speculating just as much as i suppose his lawyers were speculating about his location. but the thing that's clear is that angela corey is now hearing that the person she's been

studying, the person she's been trying to make a very difficult decision on, is taken off and is hiding. and if this case had been infin test mally close, we know which way that would be going. >> this call to the prosecutor, put yourself in that seat, where you get the word that george zimmerman's on the phone and would like to speak to you, as the special prosecutor. how would you handle that? >> well, of course she did the right thing, which was not to speak to him. because at the time she got the call, she had every reason to believe that he was represented by lawyers. so neither she nor any of the police agents were in a position to speak to zimmerman. but i sure as heck would want to do everything i could having received that call, if she doesn't know where his whereabouts are, that's something that they've got to try to track back on. because it's going to be a colossal question of the hour, wherever she makes her announcement of her decision, if she doesn't know where he is as well.

i suspect she does, even if his lawyers don't. >> let's listen to what trayvon martin's mother had to say about how she and the family are getting through this. >> we appreciate the support of everybody. everybody that's showing us so much love and support. we appreciate the support. as we're trying to be an example to remain calm and to let this case play out, let the evidence be gathered, and let them do a thorough investigation. and it's hard and it's difficult for us to remain calm. and we just ask the supporters to remain calm with us. >> jonathan capehart, you've met her, you've met trayvon's father, you've met this family at "the washington post" when they came to visit. they have maintained dignity throughout this, and as these kinds of developments occur, where we can just sit here and

throw up our hands and go, wow, this is really crazy, it is quite striking to see the dignity that she's able to maintain. >> right, and from the very beginning, from the very beginning they've talked about how they want george zimmerman arrested and held accountable. that's all they've asked for. that's all they've wanted. and they see, you know, through the rallies that they've attended and participated in that this has galvanized a lot of people in this country to what's going on, both with them and getting justice for trayvon martin. but in the larger issues of racial profiling and what african-americans and african-american men in particular have to deal with, just to live their lives. so for her to call for calm and let's see what's happening and go through the process, it's in keeping with this sort of dignified stance that they've taken from the very beginning. >> that will have to be the last word in tonight's coverage of these shocking new developments in the case.

kendall coffey, former florida federal prosecutor and jonathan capehart, "washington post" opinion writer and msnbc analyst, thank you both for joining me tonight. >> thanks, lawrence. >> thanks for having us. coming up, the good news for mitt romney -- rick santorum is out of the race. the bad news for mitt romney -- george w. bush is back. and that turned out to be really, really good news for president obama today. that's coming up.

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george w. bush said today that he thinks the only problem with the bush tax cuts is that they are named after him. so much for mitt romney's trying to pretend that george w. bush doesn't exist. and rick santorum dropped out of the race for president today and will presumably have to wait until america forgets everything he said about mitt romney before he endorses mitt romney. that's coming up.

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helping assure victories for republicans across the country in november. >> santorum's spokeman, hogan gidly, told tamron hall here today on msnbc that mitt romney requested a meeting with rick santorum to discuss an endorsement and that santorum is open to having that meeting. during the campaign, santorum did all he could to devalue an eventual santorum endorsement of romney. >> this is someone who is -- who doesn't have a core. he's been on both sides of almost every single issue in the past ten years. >> and tonight in america, right wing extremists are not happy. >> they had their candidate, which was romney, and then all the others, which were conservatives, who ended up splitting the conservative primary vote. the republican establishment made no effort to secure the support of the tea party and

instead stayed within itself and opted to secure the nomination with a strategy that emphasized moderate candidates over conservative candidates. and that was frustrating -- i can't tell you how that frustrated a lot of people, who had such high hopes. >> joining me now is national press secretary for santorum for president, alice stewart, and former pennsylvania governor and current nbc news political analyst, ed rendell. alice, with rick santorum said so many things about mitt romney being the worst possible outcome for the republicans here. how long do you think he's going to have to wait before he can do his mandatory endorsement of the nominee, presuming romney is the nominee? >> well, lawrence, as you know, part of the primary process is to show the contrast between the different candidate.

and that's what ripple was doing the past several months, was showing the contrast between he and mitt romney and all the other gop candidates. but now the time has come for conservatives to rally behind the presumptive nominee, and clearly it looks as though it will be mitt romney. and what rick has vowed to do, what he said today, is while he's suspending the campaign and while this journey is over, the long-term goal is not over. he will continue to fight for conservatives, he will continue to fight in order to beat barack obama. and what that means and what that entails is doing what he can to coalesce conservatives behind the nominee and helping mitt romney, as it appears he will be, to beat barack obama, and that's job number one. >> ed rendell, give us the shape of things in pennsylvania. was rick santorum on his way to a humiliating defeat in his home state, if he stayed in there to face mitt romney in the pennsylvania primary? >> well, i'm not sure a humiliating defeat, but i think he was going to the lose.

and look, rick santorum did incredibly well this year. if you had said last december that rick santorum was going to be one of the last two candidates standing, that he was going to win ten primaries, lawrence, not you or i or anybody would have given a snowball's chance for that scenario. he did very well, he have a happy warrior, until he got tired and angry at the end, but he knew he risked an awful lot to wipe away all that good if he lost in his home state. romney was coming on, santorum had the advantage, there had been about 100 thok republicans during the last decade that had become democrats and those were mostly moderate republicans. but he was likely to lose. romney was greeted this week in delaware county in the philadelphia suburbs with tremendous enthusiasm among republican voters. so i think santorum was going to lose. i think it was a wise decision, and i think what he has to do now, lawrence, is be honest. when the time comes for him to endorse mitt romney, he's got to

look in the camera and say, look, i expressed my doubts about mitt romney during the campaign, and to be honest, i still have some doubts. but one thing i'm clear about, for those of us that don't want taxes increased, for those of us who want federal spending slashed dramatically, mitt romney sure is a better choice than barack obama. i don't agree with that and neither do you, but that's the way you're going to do this if you're to have any credibility at all. >> alice, if he does endorse mitt romney or when he does endorse mitt romney, would you advise him to not look in the camera at all and just put out a one-sentence written statement, since he lives in a world of regret about having endorsed mitt romney four years ago. romney made him regret that. he regrets having found himself bound to endorse arlen specter in pennsylvania. he's got a history of endorsements that he wishes he could take back. does he worry that in 2016, endorsing romney, if romney goes on to lose to president obama, will be something else that he might regret? >> well, the most important thing from here on out is to do

what must be done to defeat barack obama. and he had a nice conversation with governor romney today. they're friendly toward each other. they disagree on some political matters, but he vowed to do whatever he could to help secure this nomination. and that's what he intends to do. the key here is to coalesce conservatives, both social and fiscal conservatives, and rally behind who the nominee is, because more importantly, over anything else, the reason rick got into this race, he and his family sat around the kitchen table and decided now is the time, in order to help his children and his grandchildren's future, we need to defeat barack obama. we need someone who will get in there and will repeal and replace obama care. we certainly don't know what is coming down the pipeline now in d.c., the buffett rule, which is more class warfare. that's not the way to go about reducing the debt. we need to go about cutting spending. these are the issues that people want to see someone go toe to toe with barack obama on.

that's what rick's going to do. he's going to coalesce conservatives to stand behind mitt romney. he's going to convince him that what we need to do is stand up to barack obama, repeal and replace obama care, but certainly show the democrats and the huge organization that we're going to go against in november, the huge money machine, that it's not about money. it's about doing what people in this country what romney has seen and gingrich and all the conservatives have seen. people do not want obama care. people do not want big government. they do not want government taking over every aspect of their life. we need to coalesce behind the conservative or the republican candidate who's going to restore power to the people. and that's certainly what they want. >> ed rendell, it looks like the obama re-election campaign will be getting no more help from rick santorum in attackingmitt romney to it's all up to them in handling romney from this point forward. are they ready to go as of tonight on that mission? >> i think they've been ready to go for some while. but by the way, don't

misunderstand for a minute, david axelrod has all the previous rick santorum sound bites about mitt romney, and they're in the can ready to go if need be. but, look, i think the president cannot only attack governor romney's position successfully pip mean, governor romney put out a budget that would add dramatically to the federal deficit. because he cuts taxes, he doesn't raise revenue, he does the exact opposite, he cuts taxes. that is a solution that would just bloom the deficit dramatically. and there's plenty to attack mitt romney on, but i think the president's got to make the case that what he did was inherit a slew of problems and no one in our lifetime, no president has had those problems, and he's made significant progress on all of them. not to where we'd like to be, but a whole lot better than where we were. he's got a good case to make in his own right, he'll do it. he'll be ready to criticize governor romney's positions when necessary, but he's ready to go, and so is the obama campaign team.

and having fought against him in the '08 primaries, lawrence, i can tell you, they're awfully good. >> alice, as you know, i was always cheering for your guy to hang there, because i love seeing the republicans fight with each other, but i have to tell you, i was always troubled, in many ways, by the situation with his daughter, bella, and to see her be in the hospital recently and come out, i have to tell you, i'm very, very happy that bella's father is going home tonight and that he's not going to be out there on that presidential campaign trail anymore and please convey my best wishes and hopes to the santorum family for bella's health. and i just want them to know and you to know, you may be out of a job right now, but bella has her daddy back, and i think that's more important. >> that's most important. thank you, lawrence, i certainly will. and we just want to say, we appreciate all the prayers and thoughts that went out to bella and her family and prayers were answered and we're grateful for that. >> me too, alice. >> national press secretary for

-- thanks, ed. the national press secretary for santorum for president, alice stewart, in her final appearance with that title on this show, and former pennsylvania governor and current msnbc news political analyst, ed rendell. thank you both very much for joining me tonight. >> thanks, lawrence. >> have a great night. coming up, former president george w. bush decides to come out of texas and talk taxes on the very same day that president obama wants to talk taxes and does talk taxes in florida. president bush has one really big regret about the bush tax can cuts. that's coming up. real fit briefs, and today we are surprising pro football all stars. there's wes, clay and demarcus.what's up guys. now i know you don't need one, but would you try these on for charity and prove just how great the fit is? seriously? no way for charity? let's do it! yup... they're doin it. the best protection now looks, fits and feels just like underwear. let's go drive, use the legs...

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i publish a book and now the bush institute's publishing a book. they didn't think i could read, much less write a book. >> yes, he's back! the man who mitt romney tries to pretend doesn't exist appeared in new york, of all places today, and helped remind the country how he piled budget deficit on top of budget deficit and dramatically increased the national debt.

>> if you raise taxes -- in other words, if you let the -- i wish they weren't called the bush tax cuts. if they were called some other body's tax cuts, they were less likely to be raised. but if you raise -- if you raise taxes, you're taking money out of the pockets of consumers. >> but they are not called the some other body's tax cuts, and as it happened, former president bush perfectly teed up the tax issue for president obama today in florida. >> we've got to choose which direction we want this country to go in. do we want to keep giving those tax breaks to folks like me who don't need them, or to give them to warren buffett. he definitely don't need them. or bill gates. he's already said, i don't need them. or do we want to keep investing in those things that keep our economy growing and keep us secure? that's the choice.

>> joining me now, karen finney, former dnc communications director and msnbc political analyst. karen, you got yourself one lucky president there today. >> it's luck of the irish, lawrence! >> trying to get attention to taxes, which is not america's favorite subject to hear politicians talk about, and there's president bush, reminding everybody where we got in this fiscal trouble, because i started it, with these gigantic tax cuts, especially the tax cuts at the top end, for the very richest taxpayers. helps really underline the point president obama's trying to make today. >> absolutely. anytime president bush is out there, it helps underscore that point. but today he really did tee it up on a silver platter, by even admitting, like, i wish it weren't even named after me. the other thing, when you talk about trickle-down economics, who does that make you think of? the other bush. it sort of makes this point that president obama has made, that time and again, when we've tried it their way, it didn't work. now we've got to try something different. when we tried it bill clinton's way, things worked out a little

bit better. so why don't we try it this way and things will work out a little bit better. >> karen, i want to play for you something that candidate romney said tonight about the war on women. let's listen to this. >> there's been some talk about a war on women. the real war on women has been waged by the obama administration's failure on the economy. if we're going to get women back to work and help women with the really issues that women care about, good jobs, good wages, a bright future for themselves, their families, and their kids, we'll have to elect a president who understand houses how the economy works and i do. >> oh, mitt. >> karen, i know we've all heard this before, but i've got to play what senator lisa murkowski says in response to that kind of talk. let's listen to her. >> if you don't view this as an attack on women, then you need to go home and you need to talk to your wives or go talk to your daughters.

ask them if they feel that this is an attack. >> karen, i don't see how mitt romney -- who's advising him to go out there and take on this phrase, war on women, and think he can somehow win some points with it. >> well, look, as we know, the crossroads gps folks yesterday when that poll about independents came out admitted, frankly, that president obama, team obama is making some traction on their economic arguments. obviously, the polls show they're making -- getting some traction on the arguments about the war on women. again, this feels, though, like another one of these strategies that says, just tell women it's not true. just tell those little ladies they're just crazy and making it up in their heads. now, the other piece of this, though, shows. if you listen to what he was talking about. a couple things. number one, clearly this is the message frame we're going to hear from him. this president obama doesn't understand the economy and i do. that plays into his, he's a nice guy but he's in over his head. we know that's his theme. but also this idea that he

doesn't understand how women feel about the economy. if you threaten my basic health care, you're threatening my family's economy and my economy. so clearly he still doesn't get pinpoint >> karen finney, msnbc political analyst, sorry, we're running out of time tonight, because we had to devote more time to the breaking news on the trayvon martin case. karen, thanks for joining us tonight. >> no problem! got my taxes done! >> oh, good. we'll be right back. stay with us. [ male announcer ] considering all your mouth goes through,

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the special prosecutor in the case of the killing of trayvon martin may announce her findings as early as tomorrow. we will certainly have more on the cay here tomorrow night and we will have more in the presidential campaign tomorrow night. you can have the last word