higher principle. i'll have to leave on that. have great weekend. thanks for watching. i'm al sharpton. hardball starts now. >> mitch's pitch. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. let me start tonight with this. the propaganda war for 2014 has begun. the man who wanted to destroy the obama presidency is out there with the first big fire bomb of misinformation. it's about the irs problem. mitch mcconnell who set his heart publicly on limiting president obama to a single term is now declaring that the -- well he's declaring there was a

coordinated campaign out there out of the white house to use the levers of government to target conservatives and stifle speech. this language which sounds like a rico prosecution is based on nothing. there is no evidence of any white house involvement with the actions over there at the irs. if there was, don't you think mr. mcconnell, the senate leader would be dancing in the moonlight? don't you? if there were a scintilla of evidence that the president or one of his people by the current standards of loose talk do you believe that the head of the republican party in the senate wouldn't be using it to nail the president into a little coffin right now? give me a break. this is a cheap charge the kind a politician makes when he's out of political ammo and all he has to throw at the other side is his shoe. joy reid is managing editor of the grio. and june feehery is a republican strategist joining us tonight. let's take a look at this right now. mcconnell spoke to conservatives today. his speech was a rabble-rousing

25-minute unloading on the obama administration entitled "the continuing assault on the first amendment." focusing heavily on the irs. before the show we showed you the tape. let's first run through facts about the controversy. here's what we know and everyone else knows. no conservative group that was scrutinized for its political activity had its tax exempt status denied. not a one according to the ig report and that's nonpartisan. we know it was a republican irs manager who was in charge of the division in question here. and it was a screening manager under him under the republican who came up with the improper targeting criteria on his own. we know this thanks to transcripts released by representative elijah cummings from the interviews that he had with those people at the irs. like i said, all the evidence to date shows the white house has no involvement in the irs controversy. that didn't hold back mcconnell. take a listen here. >> what matters isn't whether they were doing it in washington or cincinnati. that's not what matters or duluth. what matters is the culture of intimidation.

the culture of intimidation this president and his allies created around any person or group that spoke up for conservatism. so no, i don't believe that the president ever picked up the phone and told somebody over at irs to slow walk these applications or audit anybody. but the truth is, he didn't have to. he didn't have to do that. the message was clear enough. >> let me go to you on this john. i don't know where you stand. but i cover this every day. i read the papers in the morning starting at 8:00 in the morning. yet, i had elijah cummings on here. he's ranking member on that committee. he has given us all the evidence he's been able to collect. maybe not enough.

of course, we've listened to everything darrell issa and i have yet to hear one piece of evidence that anybody from the president's campaign, anybody from his team or camp broadly defined, anyone, male, female, had anything to do with the screw up over at the irs. why does mcconnell now blame him for that an as if he was somehow a puppeteer sending the messages -- you know doug shulman, republican holdover and lois lerner, all these other people, they're all au totally nonpartisan people. a lot of them happen to be republican, at least the pain guy was. why would anybody accuse the president of intimidating president of intimidating them into screwing the right wing? what evidence have you got? how about the answer to the question first. let's start with the -- i know this is a heat-chasing show. i love heat. let's start with facts. do we have a fact of a connection? >> well, as mitch mcconnell himself said in the speech, there's no evidence that the president called over to the irs. >> let me go to the further quote so you're fully informed here.

he talked about it being a coordinated campaign that led to this happening, coordinated to use the levers of power from the preds. now, what are you saying here? the president was involved in the irs mess or not? >> well, i think what mr. mcconnell is saying, mitch mcconnell, he's been a fierce advocate for the first amendment since the beginning the campaign of campaign finance reform. he's fought fought against the idea of cracking down on political parties and believes in the idea we should have a political system that has a strong political party system. i do think that he believes and i tend to agree with him, that the president has done his best to demonize his opponents especially going after the koch brothers, all of these tea party groups. with the irs and all these other groups. >> mitch mcconnell is accusing someone on the other side of demonizing? he's the most personal attacker in politics. it's always about obama, it's about exterminating him from washington. that's how mcconnell operates. it's always personal. is there any personal

connection? connect the dots any way you want between the president and his people and these bureaucrats, i use that term neutrally over at the irs. why would these bureaucrats respond to anybody? they're in there for life. they're headless nails. why would they will do what the president said in some speech? >> we have plenty of evidence of intimidation of people asking these. >> when were they intim dayed? >> i don't have the -- >> you said they were intimidated. >> this came up at the hearings. these groups were asked. >> no, no, you said the irs officials were intimidated by the president. >> i said the irs was intimidating >> why did they do wa they did? >> i don't know why. >> that's where i want to go. you don't know. it's fair. i don't know either. i don't know why they screwed up. they could be stupid or trying to do something that's hard to do. no, delineate when this political activity end and when does propagandizing stop? i think it's a hard job. i've been reading about this in politico today. it's hard. you're paid gs-12.

you're trying to figure out whether a group that clearly has a political intention has crossed the line into what is illegal behavior. you have to figure out a lot of things, who gives them money. you can't run out and do an investigation out in the street. you've got to go with the paperwork at hand. go ahead. i don't think there's any evidence these people did anything more than trying to do their jobs and messing up. >> and chris, i think you got to a lot of the points i would have made. look, barack obama does have something to do with this. this is this. his election created this intense reaction on the right. such that a tea party was born that hated bailouts so much when barack obama was president, didn't really mind them when george w. bush started them. their reaction was intense such that you had not 1700 the average number of 501 c4s applying for tax exempt status, had you something like 3750 of these groups coming at the irs whose sole purpose was to rinse barack obama out of the fabric of the united states. go back and remember what the tea party was.

remember when they were ma marching, be what was on those signs. he's a kenyan, he's a witch doctor. >> john says the president does that. you're sounding like the mitch mcconnell actually demonizes people. >> mitch mcconnell said his top priority, we were in the midst of a depression nearly and his top priority was to deny barack obama a second term before he had even completed one-fourth of his first term. you had a republican party whose young guns in the house met on inauguration eve to plot the total full spectrum obstruction of anything this president tried to do. i just want to play some more of mitch mcconnell for our

edification. mcconnell was asked by a member of the crowd today at that meeting a conservative group about impeaching obama. here's his answer. >> i'm pretty confident the house of representatives controlled by the opposition is going to have a thorough investigation at least two committees that i'm aware of, the committee headed by darrell issa and the one by dave kemp are pursuing this in a methodical way. i don't think we ought to jump to any conclusions. we ought to let the facts take us where they take us. >> well, wait a minute here. what is he saying? it's again this clever conflation and intimation. the two the committees on oversight and reform and the other is ways and means. judiciary committee is the committee that handles an impeachment proceeding. if you were an average person listening to that stuff, you might get the conclusion in your head, hey, they're working up a paper on impeachment. that's what you just heard him say.

he said i'm pretty confident the house is going through a thorough investigation. what is he talking about? is that a game he's playing? >> i would have answered it differently. >> do you think he's suggesting there's a proceeding under way? >> i think he's suggesting we have committees with jurisdiction that are following the facts as best they can. we'll see what happens. >> that's an answer to an impeachment question. >> that's the answer. i think that's his answer. my answer would have been, that esnot going to be any impeachment. >> is there anything in in that might by any stretch you know the seven degrees of kevin bacon, whatever, any going around the corner 50 times, any connection between what you know about the irs mess and the president being guilty of an impeachable offense? any connection to that possibility? >> listen. >> why did mcconnell just say, look, ladies and gentlemen i'm a partisan leader. i want to get re-elected. this has nothing to do with an impeachable offense. >> he's a smart politics let me say something to joy's point. >> i love the way you change the standards. i bring you on the show to give

me logic. >> what did i say? >> and he goes. >> what i said was, i would say this president is not going to be impeached. what joyce said earlier about his talking about the president obama's he's being a one-term president. i remember when denny hastert was sworn in as speaker and dick gephardt said i want to make sure he's not speaker next time around. i think all this belly aching about him being against president obama is crap. he has a completely different agenda than president obama and mitch mcconnell wants to beat him. >> i believe there used to be a thing called a honeymoon. >> we're talking about the presidency. isn't there a sense when the american people as a whole, not a bunch of politicians in washington electing a speaker, but the american people as a whole pick a president. don't you think they should have their day like a month or two where you sift through and see what the new woman has to say? that's an american principle, it's not about congressional politics. >> chris, i promise you after the 2000 election was decided in the supreme court, democrats

wanted anything in the world but to have endure george w. bush for four years let alone eight. you did not see the full spectrum opposition to literally anything the man wanted to do. he was able to work his will through the congress. now back to the other point. >> what do you think would have happened if w. had won by 600,000 votes? and had lost by one state in the electoral college. >> do you think the republicans would have said good work, congratulations. >> to be clear, the president had all levers of power with the democrat party. >> wrong. >> they had 59 votes in the senate. >> wrong. >> they are overwhelming majority in the house. >> wrong. >> they had 60 votes, sorry, john. >> mitch mcconnell had no choice but to -- >> you and i both know that al franken's seat was not decided till the summer. they did not have the 60 votes required to pass mitch mcconnell's new standard. he created a new standard which isn't anything that went through the united states senate, if they wanted to do a resolution

to go to the restroom, it had to have 60 votes the new standard just for this president. >> there was no resolution going to the bathroom. >> the period when they finally got 60 votes they got the affordable care act because mitch mcconnell had a strategy which was they get nothing through. going back to the tea party for a second, what happened is you have the tea party the base that wants to hear about things like impeachment. now that this irs scandal has sunk back into the terrarium where they only listen to their own media and each other, mitch mcconnell has to play in their game. >> both of you -- >> you know how much i dislike the tea party. >> i've got a great solution. if everybody would take a night off, you can take over together. dead serious. i just thought of something here. thank you, joy reid. you're fabulous. john feehery. coming up, one of the leading proponents and practitioners of this debunked idea that you can

change your sexual orientation doing some sort of therapy session, he's apologized to the gays and lesbians he's hurt. don't worry, other organizations have emerged to take his place. plus, we wouldn't normally pay much attention to the collapse of a farm bill. but what happened in washington shows just how dysfunctional the republicans have become in running the house of representatives. what are the chances of something difficult like immigration making it through this house? difficult. and joe biden charges republicans with talking about, i love this old time language, a bunch of malarky. this guy is pretty old school. let me finish tonight with the need for free medical clinics for those that have no alternative. we're having something to do with that. this is "hardball," the place for politics. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] for dad's first job as dad.

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people voicing spors for marriage equalitity and other issues. we have seen hillary clinton put out a video declaring her support. >> they are full and equal

citizens and deserve the rights of citizenship. that includes marriage. >> that's the way most of us think these days. jason collins made the cover of sports illustrated when he came out as the first openly gay athlete playing in a sport. alen chairmans is one of the proponents for gay repairtive therapy. the idea that therapy can help turn a person straight. he posted an apology. he said i'm sorry that jouchl spent years working through the shame and guilt you felt when your attractions didn't change. he addressed members of the group itself to tell them it was closing down. >> while there has been so much

good at exodus. there's also been bad. there have been people that we've hurt. there are horror stories. i'm not telling you this for any other reason than to be honest and tell a true story about this ministry. in 37 years we haven't done everything right because we're a bunch of humans. we've hurt people. we've helped people, but we've hurt people. they told stories of abuse and pain, missed opportunities, awful words that were spoken to them. stories of abuse and pain from the church and even from exodus. >> joining me right now is wane. he's executive director of truth wins out.

this is a sensitive subject. and i can only imagine what it's like to be a young boy or girl and realize your orientation may not be the same as the majority of your classmates or your family members and you live with that secret for a long time and wonder who to confide in and maybe you find someone to confide in and to be told there's all that time there's something basically wrong with you. and then to be told if you pray enough or you go to the right therapist, you can get this thing fixed because it is something wrong that is a problem. let me ask you this. wayne, what is the hurt done by these organizations like the one we just talked about? where they basically bring you in as patients. that you're going to be cured. >> that's exactly right. they demean people. they dehumanize and tell them that they're not whole, not complete, not good enough. there's a threat for many young people of being thrown out of

their house, being rejected by every part of their community they grew up with. it's devastating. they go to groups like exodus and they're told that they can change. and it inevitably fails because it always does, then the victim is blamed for this failure. we have seen everything from suicides. we've seen people who have been horribly depressed or kill themselves through alcohol and drugs because they believe they're ininferior. it's refreshing that exodus is closing down. you can't pray away the gay i'm glad he finally agrees with that. >> i'm concerned about the phrase pray away the gay. >> that's exactly what they do. they go and ask and plead on their hands and knees to jesus to cure them of their attractions to the same sex. and they do other things such as fasting and also they are paid to wear rubber bands on their wrist occasionally. they see somebody attractive, they snap it.

it's an obstacle course of idiocy that makes the person feel worse when it doesn't work and again, it never does. >> dr. berman, can someone -- we have people who have dangerous proclivities, child molestation and things like that. we could go through the whole range of things you want to change about yourself. you have straight people, gay people, something we are born that way i believe. i think it is nature. is it nature the way you believe? if it's something you're born with, it's probably less likely to be dealt with by modification and therapy? >> right. repairtive therapy is based on the is this that being gay is a choice. and it's not a choice. and the fact that. >> really, a choice? wait a minute. let's stop right here. attraction is not a choice. >> right. >> that's the fallacy. >> you're attracted to beautiful sexy people of either gender. that reaction is impulsive. what do you mean by choosing is it.

>> that is the assumption. i am telling you that would be like me telling you i'm going to put you through repairtive therapy to help you learn you cannot be a man, you can be a woman. you know you're a man. >> does it ever work? >> it does not work. this is something it the american psychological association has been talking, 15 years ago they came out in opposition to this establishing this does not work looking at study after study. the people who go through it as you heard, first of all, just being as you mentioned, chris, being gay or lesbian still today in 2013, the sentence especially among younger people who haven't come out yet and don't have a community of support, the incidents of drug addiction, suicidal thoughts and actions of suicidal acts is significantly higher. then you put them through a religious group like this and not only do they have feel like they're a failure but have a crisis of faith, as well because they're god and the god they believed in has betrayed them. so they have nowhere to go. >> that's common sense.

>> i've been working with people who have been through the process and still dealing with the shrapnel. >> i think we're all god's children. last night on oprah's own network, lisa ling hosted a documentary in which allan chambers met with some of the people who had been through his program. this is shaun's story. a guy named shaun. let's listen. >> i was told more than once as a teen that i'm demon possessed because i'm gay. >> shaun served three tours in the navy. he didn't ask, he didn't tell and he barely survived. >> when i left exodus, i had joined the military and i was just at my end. i didn't realize i was going into such a deep pit of despair and anger. i woke up one day, my friend had gone to work. and he had a loaded gun in his closet. and i was so happy about dying it felt like i was opening a christmas present.

that's honestly how i felt. i went over to the closet and i stood there, and i prayed that prayer that i had prayed probably a million times. i said, god, why will you not change me? and i can't describe it but something from the outside, alan, told me not to take my life. and i said, god why won't you change me and it said to me, because there's nothing that i need to change about you. >> let me go for some positivenous here. i love to leave people on friday with some hope here. you've got hope i think, wayne. the country i grew up in, i'm in my 60s. the country i grew up in is very different than the one i live in now. the words like queer thrown around 20, 30 years ago, today could be used as somebody who's gay might say the it for campy reasons. today i think acceptance has gone beyond tolerance to acceptance. not quite the celebration yet but certainly full understanding and acceptance in a positive

way. what do you think the difference is for a young person today who at the age of 1 or 13 says i think i'm that way? how is it different? i want hope here. i hope there's some. >> there's a lot of hope. i think equality is an unstoppable freight train. somebody who's young today knows they can do anything they want, they can be anybody they want. and there is no limits on succeeding in this country today. there's a good chance if they come out, they're going to be loved and accepted by parents, their friends, perhaps even their churches. so i think that the world has changed dramatically even from when i came out in 1988. it's incredibly refreshing. i think it is only going to get better. >> keep it up, buddy. wayne besen, dr. laura berman, we'll have you back. >> up next, now on a lighter note, here is joe biden, he wields his signature line. charging the republicans with a bunch of malarky. isn't that healthy? anyway, this is "hardball." place for politics. malarky. [ male announcer ] i've seen incredible things.

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back to "hardball." now to the sideshow. the late night comedians take on the week in internationalnous this week. first steve colbert says farewell to mahmoud ahmadinejad's presidency in iran. >> we're finally saying good-bye to president mahmoud auma, nananana, hey, hey, hey. >> mahmoud is known for a number of questionable choices. most offensively never wearing a tie with a suit. evidently, they don't have the father's day over there. of course, my rivalry with mahmoud goes all the way back to 2006 when i was promised the

cover of "newsweek" magazine and the axis of stubble over here evidently got wind of that so he starts developing nukes just to get himself on the cover and push me up to the golden corner. seven years later, mahmoud's gone,newsweek's gone, and look who's still here. >> david letterman takes on putin for possibly pocketing a super bowl ring back in 2005. >> are you aware of the fact that vladimir putin stole a super bowl ring from the owner of the boston patriots? here's what else he's been up to. take a look at this. >> violence and we are continuing to strengthen our cooperation on this issue including as we welcome russia hosting the winter olympics in sochi.

>> actually, i really do think that vladimir putin clipped robert kraft's super bowl ring. i do think he grabbed it. next the godfather meets reality sort of. remember robert duvall's character in the first two godfather movies? he played a lawyer for the corleone family. the trial of james "whitey" bulger is going on in boston this week and guess who showed up at the courthouse to see what was happening? there's robert duvall leaving the courthouse this morning according to a.p., he sat in the back of the courtroom with other spectators. he's in the area shooting a movie with billy bob thornton and robert downey junior. next joe biden uses one of his signature words to sum up his disagreement with opponents of immigration reform. >> all this stuff you heard the last six months about the astronomical cost of immigration reform, it's a bunch of malarky. >> a bunch of malarky. that got a lot of play during the vice presidential debate this last election, getting over

30,000 you mentions on twitter after biden's response to paul ryan regarding the benghazi controversy. >> with all due respect, that's a bunch of malarky. >> miriam webster.com reported thanks to biden, malarky was a top searched term for 2012. finally, it's been a big week for hillary clinton, of course, even though she personally has done nothing to indicate her future political plans. missouri senator claire mccaskill has become the first sitting member of the congress to endorse clinton for president in 2016. it turns out the negativity has begun, too. enter stop hillary 2016, a new campaign from the republican super pac america rising. that campaign was launched by matt rhoades, the former campaign manager for mitt romney's presidential bid. for now it's them against the pro-hillary super pac ready for hillary.

up next, more proof of just how dysfunctional the republican party has become in the house especially if john boehner can't get the farm bill passed, how is he going to deal with something really tough like immigration reform? that's ahead. you're watching "hardball," the place for politics. she promised them... a tropical paradise. but the mutiny is already in full swing. just wait till they tell everyone back home... how she totally booking nailed it! now the only issue is: who gets that? planet earth's number one accomodation site: booking.com booking.yeah! as soon as you feel it, weigh you down? try miralax. it works differently than other laxatives. it draws water into your colon to unblock your system naturally. don't wait to feel great. miralax. take the miralax pledge to feel better sooner.

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federal propertiers have filed espionage charges against edward snowden. officials are in the early stages of the extradition process trying to bring him back to the united states from hong kong so he can stand trial. president obama nominated comey as the fbi director. back to hardball. welcome back to "hardball." as if we needed another example

of just how dysfunctional the republican caucus and maybe washington generally is, yesterday offered a perfect example. speaker of the house, john boehner, had predicted this week that the republican drafted farm bill, for example, would pass with a broad bipartisan majority. but when the votes were tallied, the bill failed 227-198. eric cantor and other republican leaders quickly blamed democrats for falling off. but the embarrassing fact is that 62 republicans an quarter of the republican caucus voted against the bill supported by the leadership. and groups like jim demint's heritage action group cheered its defeat. here's how nancy pelosi responded to criticism from the right. >> you know, it's always interesting to me when people blame other people for their own failures. if we ever came to you when we had the majority and said we didn't pass a bill because we didn't get enough republican votes, well you know, that's really -- it's silly. it's sad. it's juvenile. it's unprofessional. it's amateur hour.

>> it's a lot of things. there are only 24 democrats voted for the bill because a last-minute republican amendment turned off the democrats. it's a hugely embarrassing episode for john boehner. it doesn't bode well for the prospects of the house passing immigration reform. everybody thinks it's it's up to the leadership to push the bill through. steve israel is the chairman of the democratic campaign committee. you are a smart guy. i'm going to appeal to you to look across the aisle and tell me who's calling the shots over there. is it boehner? is it cantor, mccarthy or some guy or woman we don't know their name who somehow speaks for 80 or so rambling uncontrollable tea partiers? >> well, thanks for having me on, chris. the answer to your question is it's a small cadre of extremist right wing republican who have hijacked their party and

hijacked their caucus. you know, we had what should have been a noncontroversial farm bill that should have passed with a bipartisan majority. they managed to take a noncontroversial farm bill and turn it into a partisan mess that failed. i cannot imagine what they're going to do with a controversial immigration bill. it shows that they continue to be incapable of compromise, incapable of solutions and incapable of progress. >> the question i do and i'm sure you try to divine this all the time politically as well as in terms of policy, what i'm always trying to divine based on latest evidence of boehner not running the show over there, is there a 50/50 chance or what kind of chance under the hastert rule, do you think there's going to be a house bill -- will there be a conference report they can get through the house, something that has a pathway to citizenship in it? >> first of all, i hope so. we need a compromise, a solution on immigration. democrats are prepared to compromise. the problem is, you've got a

republican caucus that does believe that they should have it all all the time. we need a compromise. i hope we can get there. i was optimistic till yesterday's farm bill. if they can't even get a farm bill passed on the floor of the house when they are in charge, how are they going to get an immigration bill passed? john boehner is a tactic without a strategy. he lives to survive with the gavel on a daily basis. >> i agree. >> but he has no long-term strategy to govern the country and it is why we have this political partisan mess on our hands. >> he's not a nut. he doesn't fit in. yesterday, eric cantor blamed democrats for the bill's defeat. let's watch that. >> what we saw is today was a democratic leadership in the house that was insistent to undo years and years of bipartisan work on an issue like a farm bill and decide to make it a partisan issue. >> well, what do you make of

that? was it about the food stamps, the fact that there was a poison pill thrown in here? >> you know, i love the finger pointing from the majority leader who's in charge of getting a majority to pass bills. here's what happened. when the democrats were in the majority, we passed a farm bill with over 300 votes, democrats and republicans because it was based on compromise. compromise was we support assistance to farmers and also support supplemental nutrition assistance programs to poor people. democrats voted for it and republicans voted for it. what did eric cantor and this tea party do? they cut supplement nutrition assistance for poor people and threw in poison pill after poison pill, treated poor people as if they are guilty of committing a crime and said to the democrats you help us pass this. that's not how it works. compromise works. poison pill dozen not. >> thanks so much. i love having you on all the time. steve israel the head of the democratic congressional campaign committee. for more, we're joined by march

margie o 'maher. go back to the farm bill that should have passed. they lost 62 republicans. if they had held 20 of them, they would have gotten this thing through. they couldn't even hold off the erosion there. >> i mean they lost some republicans because republicans felt it didn't go far enough in these cuts to food for hungry people. i know the farm bill is not sexy to a lot of people. what the difference was between this house bill and what passed in the senate is these cuts to families. we're talking about 2 million families who can't afford to eat. >> so nothing's passing. nothing's passing. >> school lunches for 200,000 kids. yeah, nothing's passing. i think it's easy to look at this and throw up our hands and say it's just another example of congress that has become

completely dysfunctional. it doesn't necessarily mean that the immigration bill is going to have a hard time in the house. you're talking about at least a plan there that has gotten a lot of republicans in the senate on board. you have a bipartisan committee working on it for a long time. so it seems like there are a lot of republicans getting on board with what the gang of eight plus the additional border security negotiations are producing. i don't know if there's a direct line between the farm bill and immigration. >> if you were a republican member of the house, would you vote for -- would you have voted for the farm bill? >> that's a hypothetical. it's very hard for me to entertain. >> i wonder what is so wrong with the bill. >> i would have been against $20 billion in cuts for helping people who cannot afford dinner for their families. >> let's talk about what it says about the leadership. the question looking on the hill, do you think that the republican party is being led by john boehner or led by the tea party? if it's led by the tea party, why would you ever believe an immigration bill would pass? >> look, i mean john boehner, look, a majority of americans, a majority of republicans even are

dissatisfied with the current republican leadership. so i think that this is -- this dissatisfaction with leadership is going on around the country. immigration, there's this myth that republicans need to get on board with immigration. >> they've got to the get on board with it. that's my belief. >> it's a majority, even a majority of republicans want to see a path to citizenship. according to an nbc poll. >> latino people a lot of them are very american. even if they're not legal. when this bill gets passed, it's got a 13-year path to citizenship. even take longer than that in some cases. who are they going to blame for how tough it is, the democrats or republicans? they're going to blame the republicans even if they sign the bill. you guys made this had bill too onerous. they'll never blame latino members of congress. they'll blame conservatives. >> i think that's a fair point. it's not just about the

specifics of the immigration bill. do they feel welcomed by the republican party. >> if you wait 20 years, i might think about it. margie omera, you're too nice. we'll be right back after this. thanks for coming on. what makes the sleep number store different? what makes the sleep

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if we stay focused, by next year tens of millions of americans will have better access to health care. that's why we need you to help more americans help understand what this law means for them, to push back against the lies and misinformation and to tell people why it's important to sign up if they don't have health insurance. we're back. that was of course to those not following the news, president obama talking about progressive activist yesterday. and just over 100 days the key

component to what is known as obama care is set to take effect. another key component, a major expansion of medicaid will kick in and working poor, kicking in january 1st. it will help expand health care to 20 million more americans. some legislators try to block the effort to medicare, and tens of millions of americans will still be without coverage in america. and that's where the clinics come in. on july 3rd, msnbc, we are partnering for a one-day free health clinic in new orleans. here is the story. you basically open up a window

and let people know somewhere in town, new orleans in this case, there are going to be doctors and health care practitioners. >> we set up the world's largest doctor's office for a day, and we set up a whole medical clinic so people can get those physicals that they need. can't tell you how many people need a physical to go back to work, construction workers and substitute teachers, and we get so many substitute teachers, we just need that physical and that's what we do for them, ekg machines, and pregnancy testing and diabetes, and we give three free months of medication for patients, and most importantly we connect them to the local resources there. there are clinics that do this work every single day, and many people don't know who -- >> who shows up? >> 83% of our patients come from

a working house. >> it's not like the people that don't pay attention, they know they need testing and have health challenges, so they alert and responsible but don't have a way to get it? >> over 52% of our patients had not been to a doctor in five years, not because they didn't want to go but because there are so many limited avenues of access to care for them. we have diabetes in the 400 range. >> how did they know they had diabetes? >> i have diabetes, and i am taking care of it -- >> thank goodness. >> and these guys are going around with type 2, and they are going to have serious problems. >> we had to get so many in the ambulance and get them over, but if you take care of it in the beginning, and you get the education and diet and exercise -- >> well, i am almost there.

thank you for coming on. and the best demonstration of a need is when people come out and say i have a need and go to the trouble of showing up and waiting in line. thank you for that. if you want to do help here, visit the national association of free and charitable clinics. nafcclinics.org. you are watching "hardball," the place for politics. a talking car. but i'll tell you what impresses me. a talking train. this ge locomotive can tell you exactly where it is, what it's carrying, while using less fuel. delivering whatever the world needs, when it needs it. ♪ after all, what's the point of talking if you don't have something important to say? ♪ vo: i've always thought the best part about this country

is that we get to create our future. you get to take ownership of the choices you make. the person you become. i've been around long enough to recognize the people who are out there owning it. the ones getting involved and staying engaged. they're not sitting by as their life unfolds. and they're not afraid to question the path they're on. because the one question they never want to ask is "how did i end up here?" i started schwab for those people. people who want to take ownership of their investments, like they do in every other aspect of their lives.

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we finish tonight with this. the fact that so many people show up to these free clinics and doctors they do not know and go to a place they may have never been and go to all that trouble is something that we cannot ignore. it's something that shows these people are starving for medical care. secondly, it says they lack a local way of meeting their medical challenges. they need it, and that's why they are showing up at these free clinics like the one on july 3rd down in new orleans. it's a statement. and for the possible talk of putting the obama health care bill in action, think about what the republicans are offering to the lines of people heading to

every free clinic they hear about, the republican side on health care is offering nothing. nothing. and "all in with chris hayes" starts right now. good evening. i am chris hayes in new york. the u.s. government filed criminal charges against former national security agency contractor edward snowden. he worked as a security analyst for the nsa and leak add trove of classified documents to reporters at the guardian news paper and the post. for more details, we turn to nbc news justice correspondent, pete williams, with the latest on the story. what do you have for us? >> you know, everybody is po