targeting conservatives. my question isn't about who will resign. my question is who's going to jail over this scandal? >> the president has to come forward and share why he did not alert the press they were going to do this. he has to tell america, this national security question. you just can't raise the flag and expect us to salute it every time. >> washington gone wild is whatten kansasens are thinking. it makes us miss the days of harry truman when the buck stops at the president 'office. taking a beat for the justice department's seizures of associated press phone records. the "new york times" editorial board writing -- the obama administration which has a chilling zeal for secretly combing through the phone records of reports and editors.

the doj is defending its actions, saying the phone records were only subpoenaed after the department conducted over 550 interviews and reviewed tens of thousands of documents. yesterday afternoon attorney general eric holder emphasized the stakes. >> it is within the top two or three serious leaks i have ever seen. it put the american people at risk. that's not hyperbole. it put the american people at risk. trying to determine who is responsible for that i think required very aggressive action. >> the leak in question dates back to last may, when the a.p. reported a foiled cia bomb plot in yemen. the operation involved a man on the inside, a british agent, who posed as a member of al qaeda's branch in yemen, and volunteered to carry out the bombing. intelligence officials tell nbc news that britain was furious about the leak and claimed it put their operative at risk. the a.p. reported the story amid a cascade of high-level security breaches.

that same month "new york times" reported on an alleged white house kill list, and the following month the paper published details of american cyberattacks in iran. while the obama administration is currently being scorated to determine the -- it wasn't long ago that the white house was criticized for exactly the opposite. on june 7th of last year, four top lawmakers on congressional intelligence committees held a press conference demanding action from the executive branch. >> this has to stop. when people say they don't want to work with the united states because they can't trust us to keep ra secret, that's serious. >> the candid leaks that have been coming out in the last few weeks have put lives in danger. >> this is one of the most serious breaches in the last couple articles that i have come out that i have seen. it puts lives at risk. >> to have all four of us come forward today and talk about the

severe weath severity of these leaks i hope sends a clear message about how dodgeries this has become. >> at the same time the right flank skewered the administration. >> all these leaks make the president look good, supposedly. >> so now that double agent is in jeopardy. he could be dead. don't toss -- unfortunately the rest of the world doesn't understand you can trust us when a rep is in the white house, just not when a democrat is in. >> the administration finds itself between a rock and a hard place, their position is even more uncomfortable given this week's assertion by the a.p. when they publish their report on the foiled bomb plot, the white house itself was preparing to announce the very same thing. joining mess today "new york times" frank bruini, health th heather mcgee. >> katty kay, and georgetown university professor and analyst

michael eric dyson. katty, there was a hue and cry about leaks, and everyone was fanatical about being more aggressive. you may disagree how they pursued the leaks, but it seems into hypocrite cal saying this is outrageous. >> the the job of journalists to find out as much information as they can, and it is the job of the administration and people on the senate intelligence committee to try to protect national security. there will be times when those two jobs come into conflict. this is a tendency in administrations, and true in the bush administration as well, to cite national security concerns when they were prosecutes leaks. the a.p. says the white house was about to release this story, cooperating with the white house on not releasing this story earlier, and they didn't feel

national security interests where are valid in this particular case. we don't know all the details of how this will pan out, but we are journalists, therefore journalists are bound to say they are outraged by this, and there is a certainly amount of validity in wanting to make sure that freedom of the presses protected, even when it's inconvenient. >> i think we should draw a difference between the press being outraged and elected representatives being outraged michael, because it's one thing for congressional republicans who were more pushing to be more aggressive to now say how dare you. i think it's a totally different thing for press to say this is an infringement on the first amendment. >> of course that's right. to katty's point, we don't know the whole story, but the reality is there has to be a hard and fast distinction to aggressively pursue knowledge that is in the public's interest to balance

that against the national interests. and if the national interest is at stake, i'm glad you replayed this, because the hue and cry, the strum on the drum that was there, my 2k3w0d, in every other latin and german phrase you can invoke, it was horrible, devastating, and when they jump on the other side and saying we're going to check out what's ghg on here, for me the press gets the comeuppance, now you know how it feels, you're on the other side of that, and the media reported there were not that many people of color in this, and i want to say, wow, who is really at stake when it comes to media's oversight. it can't even control the border and proprity. there's a lot of stuff on the table here, and i think we have to be careful before wet get outraged at the president and understand we need to have or -- for -- >> i think, frank, i want to focus on the media's relationship here, because to

some degree, it's, i guess, almost expected that the media would be up in arms about the media being monitored, right? i think compounding that is a relationship the white house has with a media. it's a white house not particularly transparent or forthcoming with information, not exactly granted a ton of sit-down interviews to major newspapers. >> you see obama on the soft formats -- >> on "the view" and "the daily show" answering about drones, which is not the typical format. and the white house has also used leaks to its advantage in the past. i will read an excerpt from "the national review" online. they do not certainly -- we learned of the classified details of the obama-ordered bin laden raid, in other words when the administration wants the public to appreciate the unheralded and successful accomplishment, it leaks classified information that imperils national security. so it's compounded by the notion that, it was for national

security. >> i don't want to make this about us whining that somebody invaded our privacy. the value of a free press to our society is you cannot state boldly enough what it is. and this is really going way over the line. we set up a false choice s. he's being complained about too many leaks. are we putting the administration in an impossible spot in i don't think so. you can be vigilant and you cannot invade the phone records of the associated press. i mean action that's a line you cannot cross. you can do both things at once. it's not a false choice. >> it is a false choice. >> you may think it's a line we can't cross and i may agree, but let's be clear, it's perfectly legal. >> well, well, well -- >> in terms of the third-party doctrine that says basically i don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy when i enter a phone number in the phone. >> but things were done here that weren't standard procedure. the associated press was not alerted that the subpoenas had been --

>> it's not standard procedure, but it's not illegal. i think we should have a real robust conversation about this. >> i think there's a whole debate about what hasn't been had about what we should do, and what we should do to protect civil liberties. i feel like that discussion actually isn't happening. that's one i think that many people on the left have been sort of -- have shirked their duties in terms of we talk about drones, gitmo, we talk about surveillance, and these are questions that need to be answered when we have a democratic president in office. the other thing -- and to your point, frank, about the gravity of this, how do you protect whistleblowers, because they have been sort of unduly, quote/unquote targeted by this administration "u.s. today" writes when the justice deposition it insulates the administration from the scrutiny that the free presses supposed to provide. who will want to talk to reporters if they fear that feds will learn about the calls? certainly not whistleblowers that want to remain unidentified. >> so how do we perform or

function in the checks and balances system. how do we perform as watchdogs if an environment that chilling, how do we perform a role that society, whether they realize it or not, really does want us to perform. >> you only have to spent a bit of time in countries where there are restrishz. if you were in moscow, this conversation would seem arcane, because there's almost no free dom of the press. >> and we have to protect this. >> the converse is true as well. we don't live in a country where our immediate safety is at stake predicated on what we reveal in the press, so the close relationship between the terrors we abhor and the society in which we exist somehow are ameliorated through the press, but the press doesn't understand in other countries, the stakes are much higher. we are spoiled. that's the beauty of democracy, but also the consequence of living in an exist inchal where we are not exposed almost

immediately. they're like, dude, we don't need to know everything on tv or in the press as long as we're trying to get the bad guy. >> to alex's point about how much americans have been prepared basically since the attacks of 9/11 to surrender freedoms in the interests of national security which can be a broad and unknowable commodity has been astonishing. >> we don't know who the enemy is. is it a lone wolf jihadist. >> the boston bombing brought that question to the fore again. we talked about a trifecta. he's also dooling with the irs scantal. to some degree in the long lens of this year and next, it may come back to be more of a political issue for him in the long run than this other argument about freedoms and national security. and katty, we know that eric holder will be testifying this asp in front of the house judiciary committee. the question i have is what

happens to eric holder. "the washington post" raises the question, holder hag dogged by questions over how long he intends to remain. those requests are likely to be rekindled by the latest controversy. >> as one journalist said this morning, what does it take to get fired around here? i think that's you have been's question. what does eric holder bring to the administration when he's become such a lightning rod for problem with this administration. the irs scanned add, and they recognize this in the white house, is far more serious politically, because it has the potential to incite the conservative base, and for everybody out there in the country who feels that government has overreached or government is too big and obama is a symbol of big government, which is exactly the problem, and whether or not the president or anybody else in the white house knew something about this is already irrelevant politically speaking. >> it's a thing that lisks those two things. >> whether justified or not. >> applying for a government

benefit, which is, you know, nonprofit status, it's not like big government was coming into people's homes. >> but the government was subjecting them to a kind of question based on what -- >> the government was wrong -- >> no, no, no one is saying we're right here. >> i beg to differ. i think -- i don't think that they should have unduly scrutinized conservative groups. i think they should have been scrutinizing everybody. >> that's fine. it has to be evenhanded. >> but i see these controversies are fundamental questions about the way we work as a country, and i think underneath the irs scandal is, if you are engaging in political activity as most or many of these 501s are -- >> with the name "party" in its name -- >> should you be exempt from taxes? >> we probably dole out way too many exemptions, but we need to do it in a nonpolitical fashion.

>> the question is what snags your attention? we had a fierce debate about who could vote and not vote? what is more fundamental a right in america to exercise the franchise than the ability to walk to the dimple that chad or pull that lever and register your pin about democracy, but know, that wasn't taken up as the same kind of referendum. and eric holder has defended that, so before we put him off into the pasture -- i'm here to hold on to hold are, hold on, brother. it's hard at the top for two brothers. >> it's also worth noting that the irs has been used as a political tool throughout history. it wasn't that long ago that they started naacp, so this ain't the first time the tax man has not been exactly the dude you want -- >> brian williams interviewed me on television after hurricane katrina -- >> i would have been

impressed -- >> and then they asked me about president bush, he playing it to bush the next night, and bush says he didn't know me, and then i was audited by the irs. i'm sure it's coins dents. i got the right shave -- >> we're all going to get audited after this, for sure. after the break, the a.p. and i.r.s. scandals underscore the balance between the government and fourth estate. alex gibney joins us next on "now." [ male announcer ] this is betsy.

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the irs scandal may pack more political punch due to its targeting of political groups, but the scandal cuts deeper to the media's able to hold those those in power accountable. eric holder defended the investigation on grounds of national security, saying the leak put american people at risk. of course governments always defend their actions on the grounds of national security, and the press usually defense that americans have the right to know what is being carried out in its name, but the ap notes a pattern -- the obama administration has brought six cases against people suspected of providing classified information, more than under all previous presidents com combine. when it comes to leaks, it doesn't come any bigger than

wikileaks which released diplomatic cables on the wars in iraq and afghanistan. wikileaks is the subject of the documentary "we steal secrets" which chronicles the war by julian assange against the u.s. that was followed by the release later that year of thousands of classified afghanistan and iraq war documents exposing previously unknown civilian casualties in both conflicts. the unsanctioned releases led to calling him a danger to national security and a man with, quote, blood on his hands. >> the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potential severe and dangerous for our troops, our allies, and afghan partners,

and may well damage or relationships and reputation in that key part of the world. >> mr. assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing, but the truth is they might have already have on that you are hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an afghan family. >> back to today, the doj's monitoring of the ap goes beyond -- "new york times" public editor explained the stakes, writing this is about the right of citizens to know what their government is doing, in at atmosphere of secrets -- that's getting harder every day. joining the panel now is the director of "we steal secrets" filmmaker alex gibney. i'm a huge fan. >> thank you for having me. >> it seems like the right conversation to be having about transparency and national security. in your expert opinion, how much did wiki leaks lace the

foundation for a white house that's ever less transparent and in dogged pursuit of leakers. >> i don't think wikileaks laid the foundation, but 9/11 laid -- and now the obama administration is kind of ratcheted it up in terms of prosecuting leakers. >> are you surprised at sort of the broad consensus in an around assange and/or manning, as seen as enemies, or at least not champions. at the beginning, there was some sense that here was a real sort of fighter for freedom and transparency and an openness in government. these days they have been increasingly ville i filled. >> that's right. look at the beginning, the administration was embarrassed, i think properly so, because a lot of materials we are leaked. i think the administration was looking for a way to remove wikileaks and assange from the cover of "new york times," the

guardian, and the german magazine. and they found that way by looking at the fact he didn't properly redacted some names on the website. >> you know, it's interesting, katty, the notion stef blood on his hands, which is a distraction from the fact there are actually people in the u.s. military who do have blood on their hands, and the notion that somehow the leakers have been implicated as the villains here and we aren't asking tough questions about what we're doing overseas, whether through drones or having indeterminant detention at gitmo, what we need to do to actually avoid having blood on our hands. partly because of the casualty. i don't know what alex would say, but this sort of self-agrandizing, it's been very easy to vilify him. rather than asking what is it do we expect our men and women to do on the front lines? what is happening to civilians

that get caught up in battle? is there more the military could be doing to avoid scenes like we just saw with the reuters camera men? those have gotten lost in the character of this guy who is so easy to dislike, frankly. whatever good he may or may not be doing, i think he himself has done a disservice, unfortunately, perhaps to the cause of the freedom of information. >> the problem with assange is he became too associated personally with wikileaks. >> but he wanted to. >> he did. there was a brief moment where it allowed wikileaks to become more famous, but ultimately had a terrible down side, because it wasn't so much about transparency as it was about julian assange suddenly. that was too bad, because in point of fact, when the reuters -- i mean, when the video was released, and when the

after garn war logs were released, suddenly there was a transformation of discussion about these wars and what had been hidden from us. that was where the focus should have been, and unfortunately too much focused on assange. i think in part the administration wanted to shift the focus. they're looking to find a way to scapegoat manning. >> make him an oddball. if we focus on the messengers, focus on these people, we don't need to have the big heart discussions. >> there are these moments. gitmo is one, we'll have a conversation about that later on in the show, but heather, we go through these periods where we talk about the national security concerns, most recently with drones, but it sort of nymph leads anywhere. in the meantime the administration continues onward. i wonder to what degree it's been to actually have, hey, begin the conversation, and also

is it hold those in leadership accountable. i will read an excerpt from an interview with jonathan mclandry. and they -- he says -- i can tell you that people who normally would meet with me are on pins and needles, landy says, of the reporting climate. he says the crackdown on leaks seems deliberately intended to have a chilling effect. there is that word "chilling" again, but we are talking about the obama administration and someone who came into office with promises of a more transparent administration. >> we are talking about a constitutional lawyer who came in -- who did in the senate and still does support a shield law to protect reporters from prosecution when they received classified information, and yet i think the president has been

hemmed in on the one side by republicans looking for any excuse to paint any democrat soft on the war on terror, and the urgencies of what information that i will never be privilege xwr to, what is facing him and the administration every single day in terms of threats. i'm not at all excusing the basic sort of lack of nod just the bully pulpit, but some basic measures that he could do to have moved the agenda forward, the agenda he carried in the senate up until he became a candidate for president, then i think we could see some movement on that. i'm really glad we're talking about. we must see the closing of guantanamo. >> i think it's important every once in a while to pull back and realize whether we're talking about bush or obama, we ask something of the government that's impossible. we ask them to keep it safe, but do it without anything that would embarrass us our

compromise or integrity. i'm not sure that's an order that's executable. >> we ask them to do it in a hyper partisan environment and we're seeing it right now today. the president is accused on the one hand of coddling terrorists, and owner accused -- republicans are accusing him of stepping all over the first amendment. in some ways if he was more sympathetic, and, you know, they didn't vilify wikileaks, perhaps he would be getting attacked as being soft on security and terrorism. >> i think he is in a tough spot. all presidents are. it's not an easy job, but the fact of the matter is that doesn't mean anybody should stop talking about it. it's a natural tension. i would say -- i would define it differently than the national interest. national security and the need to know certain things. statistic distressing thing action though, about the obama administration is he's great,

president obama is great at talking the talk, but really he hasn't been so good at walking the walk, both on civil liberties and things like closing guantanamo. he's used the threat of, you know, sort of a hyper-partisan republican congress to say this is why he needs to do what he needs to do, but we're learning he has all sorts of exec tif powers he's asserting because he can and spinning off things that the bush administration did that i think are disconcerting. i think as journalists, we have to fight back to say the executive is taking too much power. >> to say that president obama is in a bind and was pushed by partisanship into adopting the approach to the war against terrorism that he has done is slightly letting him off the hook. he is the one that's aggressively stepped up -- is still outsourcing terror suspects to third parties who may or may not be treating them

in line with the way -- i mean, his approach to the war on terrorism -- this is a white house that does not want american boots on the ground that has pulled them back, and the convenient way, therefore, to prosecute the war is to outsource it to drones and to other people doing your dirty work for you. that's definitely the choice of this white house. >> we have to take a short break, but when we come back, we'll have more on alex's new film and the complicated questions concerning freedom, morality and security. that's next. alex garza of dallas runs four pizza patron franchises. he says latino customers are attracted by the friendly bilingual staff and its unique flavors.

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visit celebrex.com and ask your doctor about celebrex. for a body in motion. you are looking live at the las vegas courtroom where o.j. simpson is now testifying. since it is challenging a sentence for armed robbery, kidnapping and other charges that could keep him behind bars for the rest of his life. let's take a quick listen in.

>> -- particularly to the dinner mr. simpson just mentioned, certainly there was a time and place of the dinner, and most likely other people present. >> just asking about the phone calls right now. >> with respect to the phone calls, what kind of advice was mr. glaalanter giving you? >> the overall advice is you have a right to get your stuff. he gave me an example, that if you were walking down the street, and you saw your laptop with your name on it in a car, you can use the force to break the window of the car to get the laptop. he told me not even then, but the night before, i don't go in a person's dwelling, because that would be trespassing. >> excuse me, your honor. >> that was o.j. simpson

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[ female announcer ] you trust your doctor. doctors trust citracal. the behavior of the united states was also exposed as the cables revealed coverups and a systemic policy using diplomats to spy on foreign governments. >> look, everyone has secrets. some of the activities that nation states conduct in order to keep their people safe and free need to be secret in order to be successful. if they are broadly known, you cannot accomplish your work. i'm going to be very candid, all right? we steal secrets. we steal other nations' secrets. one cannot do that aboveboard and be very success form. >> that was a scene from the new documentary "we steal secrets." that is an amazing quote. that's michael hayden, former cia director saying we steal secrets from other nations.

this film does a great job of exposing the very shadowy world of intelligence-gathering, as much as raise questions about national security and terrorism. >> one of the staggering facts is that the national security agency is sucking up 60,000 e-mails and phone calls per second. you know, this is the big net into which all of our stuff is falling. and then they scan the stuff later on. so, you know, this is a massive surveillance operation that our country is conducting on us. >> let me follow up on that. the justice department would say we got these phone records from the a.p. only after an exhaustive sort of review of other documents and given the size and scope of the missions, domestic and international. were you surprised at the outcry around it? or given how much we're doing elsewhere? >> well, i -- i wasn't surprised, i was glad. if there wasn't an outcry, i

really would be worried. there are supposed to be rules about this stuff, but i think you'll find in practice the rules get blurred. >> when you have something like 850,000 people in this country who have top security clearance, who have classified access -- >> i think it's more, in i think it's in the millions in the broader classification. >> during the boston terror incident, they said they went back and got telephone calls, because they want every call made on the cell phone is somewhere stored. is that true? >> yeah. to my knowledge, that is true. >> okay. and full stop. everyone is throwing their cell phones in the river. i want to talk about specifically in the film, the characters of assange and bradley manning, because bradley manning, a lot of people said that what happened to bradley manning amounted to torture. he was arrested in 2010, transferred to quantico and held for eight months, long periods of confinement, stripped naked, his reading glasses were taken

away from him, the aclu has said such treatment is clearly forbidden by our constitution, and yet the conversation around bradley manning seems to have quieted down. julian assange is sort of seen as the evil character in all of this. what's your assessment? >> i think bradley manning is the forgotten character. assange has become famous over this, but manning was the leaker. the focus of the government is on manning. the way he was treated was abysmal. it was tantamount to torture, in fact p.j. crowley raised a big ruckus and had to resign as a result. >> for basically criticizing the way he was treated. >> correct. >> and, you know, he's supposed to be a trial one 90 days. now it will -- i think it will be interesting when bradley manning goes on trial to see just how people react to him.

he's been the invisible person, but he's a fulcrum, kind of an interesting character from whom we can learn about this tension from national security and the need to know. i think he'll end up being a much more simp they sick character. >> and one connotes a certain amount of heroism, the other seems to be a violation of some sort of privilege. it would be interesting to see how bradley manning is treated. >> it's interesting to reflect that the degree of clearance was much higher when daniel e. lsburg. and now we regard him universally as a hero. >> times are a-changing. "we steal secrets" is in select theaters beginning may 24th. the producer that worked on this segment thinks it's one of the best films he has ever seen and he is a very intelligence person. >> i think so, too. >> alex, thanks for coming.

>> alex, thank you. after the break, since it opened in 2002, very few outsiders have set food inside the facility, but after a decade-plus of controversy, unif you filled promises and now a massive hunger strike. carol rosenberg has seen more than most. she joins us live, next on "now." i'm here at my house on thanksgiving day,

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what we're going to try to do is close guantanamo. the president has indicated it's too expensive, it's a recruitment tool for terrorists, it has a negative impact on our relationship with our allies, so we're going to make a renewed effort. >> that was eric holder renewing the administration's vow to close the prison, where a six-man hunger strike is now in the 30 straps to restraint chairs and force-fed. yesterday there was a code yellow medical emergency at gitmo, a regular occurrence at the prison. according to the a.p. medics were called to the cell after a prisoner was reported nonresponsive. the prisoner was examined and determined to be okay. only six are facing active charges.

86 have never been charged with a prime and approved to release three years ago. two weeks have passed since then, the house has still not appointed an official to oversee the closure of the prison and oversee the transfer of detainees. when asked about it yesterday, attorney general holder replied that the administration was in the process of working on that. joining us is carol rosenberg who's been reporting since the first detainee arrived there in 2002. thanks for joining the show, and thanks for your continued reporting from gitmo, which is massively underdiscussed. since you have covered it for an extensive period of time, can you give us a sense of what it is like there now, with 86 detainees who are not charged with anything? >> well, the vast majority of them aren't charged with anything, as you said, only six are. right now it's pretty grim.

the vast majority of the 166 men are under lockdown. that means single-cell detention inside their own cell 22 hours a day, 24 if they choose not to go to recreation and they're not being force-fed. there's 30 -- there are 100 men on hunger strike, and 30 of them are brought twice a day to a restrain chair where they get these naso gastric feedings which have been described in pretty grim terms. for all detainees, except for very few, life is inside a cell, single solitary confinement with the guards on the outside looking in so they can keep track of who's unwell, who may be fainting, and make sure there are no suicide attempts. this is a very different guantanamo than during much of the obama administration. it was during the bush years

they were during this lockdown. during the obama administration it was mostly communal, they lift attorney general, prayed together, ate together, would be able to go inside a closure and kick around a soccer ball, but since the protests began, the prisoners say in february. -- >> how did the hunger strike spread? it's now grown to encompass almost 100 inmates. how did this transfer of the strike happen? >> well, they live primarily in two buildings where they actually have great contact with each other. they're right across the way, separated by barbed wire. they do shout across the recreation yards, but what happened is there were about 80 prisoners in this camp 6 when something happened on february 6th. it's still a bit of a mystery. the prison said they did nothing wrong. the prisoners say through their

lawyers that there was an aggressive search of the ko rans, and everybody in the prison heard about it and the hunger strike began. in fact, the detainees have been telling us through their lawyers that 130 men have been hunger striking since early february. the military counts them differently. they keep track of who eats meals, and they weigh people action and they tell us that there's 100 hunger strikers and they arrived at that figure of 100 hunger strikers more than two weeks ago, as they built it up. but word of mouth and frankly frustration has been building over their inability to leave. >> and understandable frustration. frank, we talk about the difficult questions. i mean -- >> this one is easy. >> this show is dedicated to difficult questions, but this seems like urgent -- action is urgently needed. amy davidson has a great observe -- there are undoubt

think terrorists, but he's one of the six that's getting a commission hearing. it seems the less you have done the more trapped you are. >> this isn't a compromise we need to make. this is so shameful. when you are the number of people -- six of them and there are all these people considerable cleared for release? i don't know how any of us can live with this. i think this is a great shame. choose your literary metaphor, there aren't ones good enough. this is really just awful. >> the president would seem to have some limited option. the first is assigning someone to oversee the transfer of detainees. is there a sense that the ball may be moving forward on getting some of the -- getting some of these guys out of there, or at least reassigned to cunning where they are no longer behind bars? simplts the first step definitely is assigning someone in the administration to be the point person.

in the absence of someone whose responsibility it is to figure out how to transfer people and who to transfer, and for negotiate it, it's hard to imagine this stalemate, this standoff, this hunger strike will be resolved. >> it is worth noting that 70% of americans say they approve of president obama's decision to keep gitmo open, 24% disapprove. the more we cover the hunger strike and the actual conditions and exactly who is in there, i think the more that dynamic changes, and a huge amount of that lift is with "the miami herald's" carol rosenberg doing some great reporting. thank you for your time today? >> thank you. and thank you to all. i'll see you back here tomorrow at noon. "andrea mitchell reports" is coming up next. [ female announcer ] from more efficient payments. ♪

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right now on "andrea mitchell reports," holder in the hot seat. live pictures from capitol hill, where the attorney general is set to face questions about the i.r.s. targeting of conservative groups, as house speaker john boehner says he wants those responsible behind bars. >> the irs hat at mitted to targeting conservatives, even if the white house continues to be stuck on the word "if." now my question isn't about who's going to resign. my question is, who's going to jail over this scandal? can the pentagon solve its sexual assault crisis? for the second time in two weeks, a military member is accused himself. and honoring heroes, president obama pays tribute to police officers killed in the line of duty. >> as tough as