the public needs to decide whether these programs or policies are right or wrong. >> so is that man a traitor or a patriot? hi, everybody. i'm thomas roberts. the man behind one of the biggest bombshells in recent history ends the mystery and shows his face and explains his motivatives. "the guardian" reveal iing edwa snowden's identity. currently hiding in hong kong. >> i could be reynoldsed by the cia. i could have people coming after me or any of their third-party partners. we have a cia up the road in consulate in hong kong and i'm sure they are going to be very busy the next week. >> a petition on the white house website calling for a presidential pardon for snowden. 11,000 signatures and climbing. here is the reporter who helped him come forward earlier today on "morning joe." >> what we disclosed was of great public interests, of great

importance in a democracy. anyone who wants to say any of these stories have harmed national security i defy anybody to say anything public that does that. >> still the department of justice today confirming it's in the, quote, initial stages of and this investigation into the unauthorized disclosure of classified information by an individual with authorized access. in an nbc news exclusive with andrea mitchell james clapper called the leaks gut wrenching. >> the damage that these revelations incur are huge. and so i hope we are able to track down whoever is doing this because it is extreme damaging and it affects the safety and security of this run. >> on capitol hill in a rare instance of bipartisan agreement are calling for the person behind the leaks to face prosecution. >> taking a very sensitive classified program that targets foreign persons on foreign lands

and putting just enough out there to be dangerous is dangerous to us, it's dangerous to our national security and it violates the oath of which that person took. i absolutely think they should be prosecuted. >> you too, senator feinstein? >> i do. >> joining me is nbc terrorism analyst james. michael, if we just take a look at the leaker, edward snowden 29 years old and didn't finish high school and able to get his ged and discharged from the army after suffering two broken legs and first job at the nsa was a security guard and moved on to this private contractor at booz allen. how did someone with this background get that kind of top security access? >> first of all, this is a reflection of the increasing sprened in which the intelligence community has

outsourced a lot of the functions that it traditionally does. more and more you have contractors such as booz allen performing a lot of the work that the intelligence community used to perform so their standards, everybody has to go through security clearance, but the kinds of controls and also the kinds of mechanisms for raising questions about what is being done are not there when you get into the private contractor world. but i should say, thomas, there are still a lot of questions about exactly what happened here. from everything we know about mr. snowden's job, you can sort of see how he would have had access to those prism documents which did involve interacting with private contractors. it's still unclear how he could have had access to that fisa court order that laid out and showed how verizon was turning

over all its records to the nsa. that is not something, from what we know about his job, you could see why he would have had access to that. so it does raise the questions how he got it and were there other people out there who might have helped get that out. >> you make a great point of the privatization of national security in this country. booz allen makes a quarter of its revenue from work in u.s. intelgs and that is huge and another contract with the pentagon worth up to $5.6. the company put out a statement the other day saying snowden has been an employee of our firm less than three months in hawaii. this individual claims to have leaked classified information is shocking and if accurate this action presents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm. we work closely in the investigation of this matter and say he was only an employee

there for ruffle three months. now the company certainly stands to lose out on a lot here but talk about the political ties, the protection that could come down for a company like booz allen in the type of security climate we live in as a country now? >> loobooz allen is a contracto like many in the beltway and full of patriots who do tremendous work for the country and probably couldn't do it without booz allen hamilton and this is one guy in the company and i'm sure very very upset about it. it's very damage is as the congress has said. one thing we are not talking about a lot is the damage this is going to cause us with foreign governments. that is probably even more damage than cause us with terrorist acts. but that being said, there is no good avenue in the government for people like this who are

id ideolodgeally upset about the process. the fisa court maybe needs to be looked at and allow people to somehow come forward. >> we know that snowden is reportedly holed up in a hong kong hotel room. "the washington post" said they have a report out saying he has checked out. uncertain where he is right now. unconfirmed reports about where he is. here is what he had to say in an interview to "the guardian." >> you can't come forward against the world's most powerful intelligence agencies and be completely free from risk because they are such powerful adversaries that they will find you. >> i lined the door of his hotel room in pillows.

this morning on mother jones he has former whistle-blowers warning him the government will seek revenge and retaliation. technically he is a patriot or a traitor, michael? >> obviously, in the eye of the beholder. i do think this is not going to be quite the slam dunk for the government in terms of the leak prosecution that some people are suggesting today. clearly, he's a symbol right now. he has put his thumb in the eye but let's remember a couple of things. there are leaa lot of people ine congress of the united states and in the country who think he did the right thing. also very -- this is very significant. the government has already declassified aspects of these programs as a result of what he did. so it makes it very hard to bring a criminal prosecution for leaking information that within

24 to 48 hours, the government declassified and, yes, they will be able to make a technical argument but taking that case to the jury could be a tricky thing for federal prosecutors. >> james, what do you think? traitor or patriot? >> i think a little bit of both. i think the u.s. government should look at this differently and reach out and get enter snowden. i think he will be arrested but i think he needs to be taken domestically and debriefed further. a risk of him from foreign powers trying to capture him and debreven him and harm him. he is not any harm to the government other than arrest. i'd like to see him come back. maybe we can get him back in the united states and handle it from there. >> gentlemen, thanks so much. appreciate your time. joining me is indiana republican congressman luke messert. glenn greenwald who broke this

appeared on "morning joe" today. take a listen. >> i want an answer yes or no. isn't it the case that reviewing of e-mails or any wiretapping cannot take place without an additional warrant from a judge and review? i mean, it's not like there is haphazard probing into all will our personal e-mails. can we put this into context so we understand exactly what is going on? >> yeah. i'll put it into context for put. white house talking points you're using are completely misleading and false. >> a lot of push-back there what exactly snowden has done. do you believe snowden has broke the law and what rur thoughts this 29-year-old government contractor was able to achieve such a high level security clearance in just a matter of three months with a private government contractor? >> yeah. i mean, i think it raises a lot of concerns. he very clearly broke the law.

this is a nation law. it's not a good thing and he needs to be prosecuted for that. i think we have to separate that from the information that is now come out. i've been in congress four or five months now. i was not away of this program. i know those that were here in prior years were briefed about it. but i think the american people are understandably skeptical. president said this information can only be used under subpoena. but with what has happened recently with the irs, the department of justice and others, i think the american people understand that sometimes this kind of information with be abused. >> so this morning, though, we heard from house majority leader eric cantor on "cbs this morning." take a listen. >> the administration is phenomenon spoke complementing this program. the congress is responsible for the oversight of this program. the investigations will be very serious. obviously, we will be dealing

with a balance between national security and safeguarding our civil liberties. >> are you as shocked to learn about this since you are fresh to the hill, to realize there is such a catch-22 in place right now, with the fact that to learn about what is going on that our country is doing in terms of national security means breaking the law to get the evidence necessary to challenge what we have now to see what we can figure out what is going on? someone had to break the law to do that. >> yeah. i mean, again, i think most americans are shocked to learn is there a database of over ten years of calls for virtually every american. things in my mind may have been appropriate in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 and weeks and months and years after that may no longer be appropriate today. those of us, as we watched the event in boston unfold after that bombing, there was a lockdown there in the day after. it was appropriate to try to get the criminals who perpetrated

those acts. it wouldn't be appropriate to continue that. it is a difficult ethical dilemma. this young man who leaked this information clearly did it if violation of the law and now the american people and congress and the president have to respond to that. our system of security can't work if folks who have access to classified information are allowed willie ay-nilly on thein what to leak so the man has to be prosecuted and we asbestos lawmakers have to respond to the information we have. >> thanks for taking the time, congressman. >> glad to be here. we are relieved the start of the trial is here with the jury selection, as we seek justice for our son trayvon. >> heavy security at a florida courthouse for day one of george zimmerman's trial. we will take a look at the fight over evidence in this case even as jury selection begins. the gunman behind the shooting spree in a california college. the arsenal the police say the shooter had in his possession and today's big question for you

on our lead story, nsa leaker is snowden a patriot or a traitor? weigh in on facebook or on twitter and find me at thomas a. roberts. [ male announcer ] you know what happens when we take away the late fees and penalty rate? no one misses them. the citi simplicity card is the only card that never has late fees, a penalty rate, or an annual fee. ever. go to citi.com/simplicity to apply. look the samsung galaxy s4. phones it's like what i've got. look how big the screen is! that is big. and, walmart will give you a $50 gift card when you get the phone.

sold! get the latest smart phones on t-mobile's nationwide 4g network, and get a $50 gift card. walmart. otherworldly things. but there are some things i've never seen before. this ge jet engine can understand 5,000 data samples per second. which is good for business. because planes use less fuel, spend less time on the ground and more time in the air. suddenly, faraway places don't seem so...far away. ♪

we also seek a fair and impartial trial we p. we ask that the community continue to stay peaceful as we place our faith in the justice system and we ask that the community do the same. >> so that was the family of trayvon martin making a statement before jury selection got under way for the trial of george zimmerman. heavy security outside the courthouse with 500 people making up the jury pool. zimmer han has pleaded not guilty in the death of maernt last ye

martin last year. nbc kerry sanders joins me live from sanford, florida. >> reporter: normally, in florida if you were picking a jury for a second-degree murder which is charge here it could take a day but both sides say it could take two weeks and maybe longer. they have sent out summons to 500 mares of the community here and those summons are telling people to come on certain days. staggered. today 100 of 500 showed up today at the courthouse and they were taken into a room where they are played a video and told about their civic responsibilities and the duties that they have to the community that they live in. then the judge, along with the attorneys on both sides, and george zimmerman, went down into that room. i believe they are still there right now. they handed out questionnaires to these 100 sprprospective jur.

the state and the defense will look through the questionnaires and then one-by-one, sprprospece jurors will be asked questions. the state agrees that person is fine and the defense believes that person is fine. this is a process that could take a long time because they ask the same questions over and over. they want to know about who these people are. one thing that we will not know is the identity of those prospective jurors. by judge order no names or information revealed about them including the questionnaires that will be sealed from review so we won't know where they were. the goal is get a jury of six, plus alternates. >> kerry sanders, thanks so much. joining me in the studio is attorney and former criminal

prosecution is faith jenkins. explain kerry telling us there that george zimmerman's his attorneys will make eye contact with some of these potential jurors. >> it happens in all cases. the defendant has the right to be there. in this case, they are not going to find jurors who know nothing about this case. so the key question is knowing what they know, can they be open. >> stand by one second. we have just been told that robert zimmerman jr. the brother of george zimmerman is going to be making a statement inside the courtroom and he has just come to the podium right there. let's listen. >> to take questions today. if anybody has any questions. >> do you think george zimmerman has a chance of getting a jury that is going to give him a fair hearing [ inaudible ]? >> as a family member, our family, we are, obviously, concerned about that.

we have been living under tremendous scrutiny and we have been by association to george in danger for a long time. i think that the order, as it stands now, is not obviously sequestering the veneer or the pool and i wonder out that will play eventually having any aanyonity if the judge decides later that the jury should be sequester sequestered [ inaudible question ] >> we are threatened by various formats. phone, twitter. we live at a excluded place. nobody knows where we live. we have death threats directed at us for being george's family. we do not engage people very much. certainly not in any meaningful sense in public. because we have to keep a very low profile publicly. i'm happy to engage the press here because i am safe here.

[ inaudible question ] [ speaking in foreign language ] >>. [ speaking in foreign language ] >> right now, we are listening to robert zimmerman jr. give a press conference while a lapse this morning going on there in court as attorneys, prosecution and defense, along with george zimmerman are allowing prospective jurors to fill out a questionnaire. only a couple of questions taken there by robert zimmerman talking about the family and how they feel they can achieve a fair trial there in sanford and he said that they do consider that and consider whether or not this jury should be sequestered. let's go back and listen in. >> okay. sure. [ speaking in foreign language ]

>> the other thing he was talking about as well the fact that their family, zimmerman family has been threatened and living in exclusion. he said he was happy to engage reporters in this environment because he knows he is safe. we had trayvon family's initially make a statement and now the zimmerman's making a statement while there is down time. how much is this seeing who is grabbing the ball back and forth basically? >> there is two competing interests here. we have what is going to happen in the court of law and then what is happening in the court of public opinion. because we have seen a lot of discussion in this case prior to the trial starting today about trayvon's extracurricular activities. certain things have been made public that jurors probably would not have the opportunity to hear in court but they have probably been exposed to it it through the media and press conferences like this and through statements. definitely two things going on here. the court of law and the court

of public opinion and appeal to that court of public opinion and the potential jury pool. >> kerry sanders is still with us. when you heard about the fact that they live in exclusion, has there been a directive to press to the media that once the zimmerman family leaves the courthouse to basically leave them alone? not pay attention to where they are going? >> no. not at all. this is a decision that they have made personally and they have spent a tremendous amount of money on their personal security. george zimmerman wears a bullet-proof vest and is doing so today. there is a sense that their security is a threat and we have made that assessment along with their advisers. but the judge and the court have not been involved in that. as a matter of fact george zimmerman his location is known to the court authorities because he wears a monitor and has to check in twice a day to advise where he is when he smot here in the courtroom. just as a quick aside. i speak spanish so i listened to

a little bit of what the brother said there. he was saying that their family believes that america has the best judicial system in the world and that they fully support that this process is one that they are on board with. so a little bit of what he was saying. i didn't hear all of it. >> let's go back and listen in. >> family, we are very confident in the outcome of the case and very confident that the state will not be able to meet its burden and it's a twofold burden in florida. not only do they have to prove that this was a murder as they allege, they also have to prove simultaneously it couldn't be self-defense. we are confident the state won't meet its burden and that kind of backs into our confidence in the legal team. as you can see from the past few days, don west thab extraordinary and is the secret weapon in my opinion. going forward depending on how the state bring their case they will show even more of their he

will -- it would have been inappropriate for me to comment about but i will say george has made several statements. some of those statements he made while his voice was being analyzed. he has made statements in his own voice and made statements while they are videotaped and by his own handwriting to police and he made statements to shawn hannity. i think what is available in discovery he has taken the stand and he has been very consistent. he has always told the truth from beginning. he was attacked. his nose was broken and the attack continued and he defended himself. as for taking the stand in any case in this country, the burden is on the state. so before we get to taking the stand, we have to really think about what an appropriate defense would be and juxtapose that to how the state presents the case.

it's my assumption the state doesn't have a case and i believe it's an improper charge altogether. i wish they would just withdraw it seeing that is is not likely to happen now, i'm confident they are not going to meet their burden. >> charge anything? >> no. you don't charge in this country to assuage the concern of masses p.m. i have no dowd the chief of police and the district attorney's office or state attorney's office as it is here would not like to find any amount of shred or probable cause to charge george with any crime. unfortunately, a political calculation was made. around the politics of race and the law was defiled. >> i asked you yesterday and i'm asking again. do you find that during the trial when you led up your own twitters as we discussed and

agreed racist in nature, aren't you fueling the fire? >> i did not discuss nor agree to that. i think it's important to a lot of people who support the family that they have a front row seat. they don't trust the media and i think rightfully so. they have learned that, the media is very good at putting their own spin on what they want the narrative to be. they say it makes it less confusing for the public. but i don't have an implemploye. i'm not employed by cbs or nbc or anyone else so i don't have editors and i don't have boss and i try to be as honest as i can. having said that, when the jury is actually selected after this there is a jury selected, i will not be tweeting any more. [ speaking in foreign language ] >> we have been listening to robert zimmerman jr. there while

the court is in recess right now while the attorneys give questionnaire to prospective jurors. the brother of george zimmerman taking press questions right there. kerry sanders is outside the courthouse. this is going to look weird to people that robert zimmerman jr. stands up during the middle to give a press conference. how is this able to happen? >> reporter: in florida, everything is open. they he knew a tremendous amount of attention here during this trial so they have established what is a rather orderly setup here where there is a portion of the courthouse where a camera is set up and those who want to address the camera can do so as we saw with trayvon martin's parents now and now seeing with george zimmerman's brother. it's sort of an open opportunity for people to speak. of course, it's our choice at

msnbc and other places to determine whether we are going to cover what people are saying but clearly today we are hearing from as close as we can get to the main player here because marco mayer, the attorney, himself is tied up in court. one thing i want to point out and that is what you were discussing with our guest herein and that is keeping the identity of jurors a secret. that is going to be a challenge. while the media has agreed not to show their pictures or reveal their faces, there are spots in that courtroom for the general public. this community has about 420,000 people who live here and when you talk out the kids and consider the adults and talk about the members of the public going in there pretty good bet people know other people in there and they are under no real obligation to tell their friends i saw so and so i saw and do you know joe is one of the people possibly chosen for that jury? in today's internet world with facebook and twitter and everything else, i think the challenge is going to be very difficult to keep the identity

of the prospective jurors and once the trial begins of the jurors a secret. >> our kerry sanders outside of the courthouse there in florida and faith jenkins on the set with me, thank you both. developing any minute now, president obama is about to speak at a white house ceremony commemorating the 50th anniversary of the equal pay act. president john f. kennedy signed it into law 50 years ago today. according to statistics, women are still paid only 77 cents for every dollar men earn. president obama is pushing congress to pay past the paycheck fairness act designed to make wage differences more transparent. we will bring you those remarks as soon as they happen. behind the leak. 29-year-old edward snowden says he is the leak behind last week's bombshell revelations behind the nsa program and says he has done nothing wrong. while some call him a whistlblo

others call him a traitor. i have a panel here with me now to discuss this. gang, it is great to have you here and certainly a lot to talk about since the revelation and the identity of snowden made public yesterday at his own discretion through the guardian who has been out front on this story. now it's been really interesting to see the reaction of our elected leaders. there was rand paul on fox. take a look. >> get a warrant. go after a terrorist or a murderer or a rapist but don't troll through a billion phone records every day. that is unconstitutional and it invades our privacy and i'm going to be seeing if i can challenge this at the supreme court level. >> so when we hear about that, at the supreme court level, obviously, rand paul and other elected are aware of what the patriot act has meant.

is this a shock in the face how far the patriot act has allowed in the name of security and fight terrorism has allowed our country to move in a direction that we may not all be on borped with? >> a lot of the lawmakers are expressing surprise and even the congressman who wrote the patriot act saying the government may be abusing the provision it's using to require phone records to hand over records of phone calls. i think rand paul highlights the great divide in the republican party. he is running for president. this is a message that appeals to the conservative grassroots who can use it to talk about government overreach, obama's big government. on the other hand, you have people like john mccain, lindsey graham defending this program and national security grounds and that is a debate that is going to play out and i'm very interested to see how the conservative voters, what direction they pull their republican elected officials and whether or not they will try to tie this entire nsa story to the

larger narrative of obama scandals. >> so when we hear about the larger narrative of scandals that are going on this has been certainly a bad time for the administration with leaks and then our elected leaders coming out and talking about investigations that need to go on. but the snowden guy has caught everybody's attention because he is 29 and discharged from the army and started as a security guard for the nsa and then moved on to a position with booz allen where he was working in the private national security industry. vivian, so many points here that i think need to be brought up because we are changing as a society when it comes to how baby boomers to genx and y and younger generations think about our society and technology. one of the points that we had to speak about this morning, you say we are having a 1990s conversation in 2013? >> yeah. i think one of the things is, you know, there is a lot of

outrage around what the government is doing and not doing and spying and snooping and ties into the larger government gone wild narrative that certainly we have been seeing the last few weeks in washington. we as a society, particularly younger people, are much more krvel wi comfortable. i require out a lot of fields that give a lot of information just filling out to get an ipad. people are feeling comfortable giving up private information for marketers and now a big outrage what the government is doing with that information. i think the more important question is what is going on with security clearances and private contractors? you've got five million security clearances with government contractors, 1.4 of them are secret and clearly what this has exposed is who has act to this

and what the repercussions of that access can have. >> suzy, let's talk about that. the repercussions of that access bring us to the conversation we are having right now. the fact this person three months under his belt at booz allen was given a security clearance which allowed him access to the nsa leak that we have all discovered now. talk about the clearances. the high security clearances that have now been given almost badges of honor much privatization of national security in this country. >> some people call it the intelligence industrial complex and security industrial complex. either way an industry has exploded since 9/11. edward snowden was just one of more than 12,000 booz allen hamilton employees who evidently had top secret clearance with the government. in fact, he has preferred to himself as a spy but he was working on the i.t. section and

he is basically your i.t. guy who, in his role, he claims had access to all of these documents and so forth. this raises a lot of questions. especially for a firm like booz allen which does almost 93% of its business with the federal government and a good chunk with the intelligence community. i think it will raise questions gnome what the government is looking at but in terms of how they outsourcing it to hundreds and thousands of private individuals. >> igor, this is something that mike rogers committee chair of house intelligence said over the weekend that snowden daeveidn'te the authorization to release anything like this. greenwald said that is my transparency. do you think this will shine a bright light on to the lack of conversations being had in washington, d.c. about transparency?

>> it's certainly time to have that debate and attach another question to suzy's in terms of private contractors, some 70% of our national security program budget goes to these private contractors. there is evidence that they cost a lot more for the government than simply government employees are performing this kind of job. so there are a lot of budget concerns and in an era of awe sist austerity, what rules do they play by? this is a conversation we need to have, in addition to government surveillance and how far the government can go. >> so when we talk about for you hard the government can go, right now, anybody that is in washington, d.c. and that has been in washington, d.c. for a long enough time recognizes the fact that the patriot act is just a way of life now. are we looking at elected leaders who want to say that while transparency is good, so is the fact that we have beefed up our national security forces

to fight terrorism and why we haven't had another 9/11 style attack. is the genie out of the bottle when it comes to the muscles we have developed as a country and the way our intelligence operates? >> one interesting thing to keep track of is how the public feels about all of this. you have folks pointing to fairly recent polls from not that long ago showing that not only do they support what president obama has done in terms of national security, overall that they prefer a tradeoff they feel more secure and they trust the government knows what it is doing in terms of counterterrorism stuff and willing to give up some of their own privacy and civil liberties as a tradeoff. the question is you are hearing outrage from rand paul and some of his counterparts on the level asking similar questions. the question he is whether that is going to is a conversation that will trickle down answer a sense of outrage and the public feels the same way. we are are in a sort now folks raved some questions or

essentially accustomed to giving private companies information about where we are every time of the day. i think certainly something to watch in the week ahead. >> the willingness at which we go out on social media sites and now uncle sam is collecting on us we are holed up which is certainly a contrast. stick around, gang. developing any minute now president obama is speaking at a white house ceremony commemorating the actual pay act that was signed into law by john f. kennedy. we are back with much more after this. does all kinds of cool stuff. and if you buy it here, you get a $50 walmart gift card. man, i gotta have this! get the latest smart phones on at&t's 4g lte network, and get a $50 gift card. walmart. some brokerage firms are. but way too many aren't. why? because selling their funds makes them more money. which makes you wonder -- isn't that a conflict?

search "proprietary mutual funds." yikes! then go to e-trade. we've got over 8,000 mutual funds, and not one of them has our name on it. we're in the business of finding the right investments for you. e-trade. less for us. more for you. the fund's prospectus contains its investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses, and other important information and should be read and considered carefully before investing. for a current prospectus, visit etrade.com/mutualfunds. to support strong bones. and the brand most recommended by... my doctor. my gynecologist. my pharmacist. citracal. citracal. [ female announcer ] you trust your doctor. doctors trust citracal. for all those who sleep too hot or too cool, for all those who sleep and struggle to sleep comfortably together, now there's a solution. the company that individualized your comfort with the sleep number bed is now introducing sleep number dual temp, the revolutionary temperature-balancing layer with active air technology that works on any mattress, including yours. whether you sleep hot or cool sleep number dual temp allows each of you to

select your ideal temperature. so you can both sleep exactly the way you like-at your own perfect temperature. and there's only one place in the world you'll find an entire collection of temperature-balancing solutions-including the revolutionary new sleep number dual temp layer-designed to give you the soundest sleep of your life: a sleep number store near you. sleep number. comfort individualized. visit sleepnumber.com to find one of our over 400 sleep number stores nationwide. accomplishing even little things can become major victories. i'm phil mickelson, pro golfer. when i was diagnosed with psoriatic arthritis, my rheumatologist prescribed enbrel for my pain and stiffness, and to help stop joint damage. [ male announcer ] enbrel may lower your ability to fight infections. serious, sometimes fatal events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma, other cancers, nervous system and blood disorders,

and allergic reactions have occurred. before starting enbrel, your doctor should test you for tuberculosis and discuss whether you've been to a region where certain fungal infections are common. you should not start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. tell your doctor if you're prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for heart failure, or if you have symptoms such as persistent fever, bruising, bleeding, or paleness. since enbrel helped relieve my joint pain, it's the little things that mean the most. ask your rheumatologist if enbrel is right for you. [ doctor ] enbrel, the number one biologic medicine prescribed by rheumatologists. joining me is susan kim a reporter for msnbc.com. igor is also with us and viviana also. as we went to break there, we were talking about obviously the leak revelation of edward snowden coming into full light

now. who is this man? a lot more is going on in washington, d.c. v vivi viviana, haets talk about immigration. an article today saying latinos are the hardest hit. white women earn 77 cents per dollar paid to white men and latinos 55 cents to every dollar paid to men. this is coming on the 50th anniversary of the equal payday when john f. kennedy signed that look law 50 years ago. the president is going to be speaking about it live at the white house in a moment. why haven't we come so far in half a century? >> put into this context what latinos are making which you decided 55 cents on the dollar is what women in general were making 50 years ago when president kennedy signed the equal pay into law. and so, yeah, we haven't come a long way. what you're seeing is that for a lot of latinos women ver

struggling and some maybe heading up fams and ilies and contributing a lion's share to a family's budget. there are a lot of interesting ideas that are percolating here in washington, certainly the president pushing for the more transparency as you mentioned. the republicans also have some ideas about work flexibility. certainly the liberals have pushed back on that but for some, you know, not all women are a like. absolutely we need protections for more vulnerable working class women but there are some women who may be able to take advantage of flexibility in the form of, say, comp. time and not having to be paid. we will see how that ends up percolating again in washington. >> is one of the more, i guess, complicated characteristics of this the fact that women are more likely to be able to find a lower paying job out of the gate

so to speak? a couple of things into play here. one is the course of the recovery as more people have been going back to work, the wage gap has increased and most likely women able to take low wage jobs. men in the car field and women, their wages along with everyone, have been depressed. but one thing that i think is worth noting is the fact that you often hear these statistics bandied about. the 77 cents on the dollar one is most popular. you hear fra that from the white house as well. it's worth taking a closer look at what that means. there have been studies if you control for life choices that people make, the kind of careers people choose to where they choose to work in the country the wage gap is less bad than -- not as bad as that seems. however, the one thing seen consistent across these different studies there is a child-bearing penalty when women

decide to have children, that seems to hurt women across the board and that this is what has spurred lawmakers to push for more things to be able to have more flexible workplace to be able to lessen that impact that this should not be a punishment for women to leave the work force briefly to have children. >> igor, we look at this from a federal level, as it comes down to the state level, isn't it up to states to figure out what they are enforcing within their own boerrders? thesh >> you have congress deadlocked and republicans wouldn't vote for the paycheck act in april. why a lot of this is going on in the states. the governor signing a law employers have to give a real reason why they are paying men

and women less. more flexibility for women of child bearing age because states understand that paying women more is a form of economic stimulus and they have more purchasing power and it stimulates the economy, and it also means that women are not going to be on government programs like medicaid as we know is the largest growth in state budgets. it really makes a lot of sense. it makes sense for states and, i think, also on the federal level. >> one thing we want to point out there. valerie jarrett is about to introduce the president. the president is coming out at a ceremony commemorating the 50th anniversary of the equal pay act. a lot going on. viviana, we touched on what the nbc latino argue is touching on today where latino women fall in comparison to wenmen. where do we stand on nim graimmn

and whether a bill will emerge sometime? i say sometime. because of the fact it seems the wheel have come off the bus on the bipartisan side of the house side. >> sometimes i feel we are closer to immigration reform than we have ever been but, at the same time, i feel we are further away than we have ever been. a lot of pucks flux in washingt the senate, the full senate is going to take up immigration for debate and for a vote. but the wheels are flying off as you mentioned. it seems like for every a news there is b news and cancels it out. ayotte comes out in favor of it and cornyn decides to attach what some people describe poison bills and border security requirements that are so drastic and make it difficult for it to pass. >> it's also to the point marco

rubio wants to step away from it and doesn't think he will vote for his own bill. how much damage is being done to marco rubio through immigration reform should set him up for the national profile needed to advance him to 2016 and a presidential run? >> i think republicans have a real choice to make. a lot of these republicans are from districts there are no hispanic voters. they know if they vote for immigration reform they may lose were seat but they also know if they don't vote for immigration reform the future is compromised because a new election base as we saw in 2012 and rubio you see is now struggling with that kind of catch-22 for him. he is looking at the 2016 field and he is trying to position himself kind of in the middle. backing the bill.

still pushing for stronger security provisions which will ultimately delay the pathway to sitt citizenship for the undoimted. >> [ chainsaw buzzing ] humans. sometimes, life trips us up. sometimes, we trip ourselves up. and although the mistakes may seem to just keep coming at you, so do the solutions. like multi-policy discounts from liberty mutual insurance. save up to 10% just for combining your auto and home insurance. call liberty mutual insurance at...

to speak with an insurance expert and ask about all the personalized savings available for when you get married, move into a new house, or add a car to your policy. personalized coverage and savings -- all the things humans need to make our world a little less imperfect. call... and ask about all the ways you could save. liberty mutual insurance -- responsibility. what's your policy?

all of you could be here today to celebrate the anniversary of the equal pay act. we're not just celebrating the

law, we are honoring heroes that made that law possible. a fierce determination of americans who saw a wrong and worked to right it. there are women who were sick and tired of being sick and tired of seeing the same jobs advertised with different pay scales, women who were tired of being treated like second class workers, women like dorothy hite and congresswoman edna kelly. all who pushed to make the equal pay act a reality. today we recognize the work of those brave women. but, until equal pay truly is a reality, we're also here to recommit ourselves to the work that remains to be done. 50 years ago today president kennedy signed the equal pay act into law right here in the white house.

he said it was basic to our democracy. it's the idea that all of us are created equal. as i said in my inaugural address this year, our journey to equality not complete until our wives, our mothers, our daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. the day that the bill was signed into law, women earned 59 cents for every $1 a man earned, on average. today it is about 77 cents. so it was 59, now it's 77 cents. it's even less, by the way, if you are an african-american or a latina. so i guess that's progress, but does anybody here think that's good enough? >> no! >> i assume everybody thinks we can do better. >> yes! >> we can. >> yes, we can.

over the course of her career, a working woman with a college degree will earn, on average, hundreds of thousands of dollars less than a man who does the same work. now that's wrong. i don't want that for malia and sasha. i don't want that for your daughters. i don't want that to be an example that any child growing up ends up accepting as somehow the norm. i want every child to grow up knowing that a woman's hard work is valued and rewarded just as much as any man's. now what's important to realize also though is this is not just an issue of fairness. this theis a family issue, a mie

class issue. women are increasingly the bread winners for american families. women are now the primary source of income for nearly 40% of american families. 40%. almost half. that's not something to panic about or be afraid about. that's a sign of the progress and the strides that we've made. but what it does mean is that when more women are bringing home the bacon, they shouldn't just be getting a little bit of bacon. if they're bringing home more of the income and that income is less than a fair share, that means that families have less to get by on for child care or health care or gas or groceries. it makes it harder for middle class families to save and retire. it leaves small businesses with customers who have less money in

their pockets, which is not good for the economy. that's not a good example to set for our sons and daughters, but it's also not a good recipe for long-term stable economic growth. so to anyone who says 77 cents on the dollar sounds pretty close to equal, i say your math is bad. you wouldn't like it if your vote only counted in 3 out of 4 elections. you wouldn't like it inn if your daughters or sons went to school but they only got taught 3 out of 4 days a week or 4 out of 5 days a week. you wouldn't like it if you were forced to work every fourth day without pay. men would be complaining about that. they wouldn't think that was equal. or fair. so this is the 2 st century.

it's time to close that gap. that's why the first bill i signed into law was the lilly ledbetter better pay act. that's why as valerie mentioned, i created the first ever white house council on women an girls which is working to close that gap. and valerie's council, this council, is doing a great job bringing the experiences of women into our federal policies as well. it's why i established a national equal pay task force to help crackdown on violations of equal pay laws which, by the way, they're doing at a record rate. and through education and outreach, they're also helping employers develop tools to comply with the nation's equal pay laws on their own. and that's why earlier this year i signed a presidential memorandum directing the federal

government to close that gap for good for its employees. right? we have to set an example. it's also why we're using latest technology to help workers get what they need to figure out if they're underpaid. thanks to innovators like rachel and lequita up here, we can now say -- there's an app for that. but as long as this gap persists, we're going to have more work to do. now is the time to keep up the work that all those trail blazers started 50 years ago. now is the time to -- for congress to step up and pass the paycheck fairness act so women have better tools to fight for equal pay for equal work. now is the time for us to encourage more young women to pursue math and science

education. now is the time for us to hire more stem teachers so all our teachers are prepared for jobs of tomorrow. now is the time to make sure businesses offer men and women the flexibility to be good employees and good parents. i want to commend the ceos who are with us here today. they are creating exactly the kind of innovator workplaces that help our working americans thrive and they're committed to pay equity. when you have a chance to talk to joe, say thank you. ceos who are out there, if you want a first-class company that is tapping into the talents and resources of all your employees, make sure that you're putting in place system so that they all feel like they're being treated fairly and equally. it's a