stormed the hill last year, because of a lot of hard work from veterans and their family members, it's been cut in half. they say by next year, it will be eliminated. >> progress. >> great news. if it's way too early, it's "morning joe." stick around, here's chuck todd with "the daily rundown." thank you for being with us, and as always, thank you for your patience. some developing news right now. actually. that tsunami advisory that you saw in the pacific rim, it's actually now in effect for the state of hawaii. after last night's 8.2-magnitude earthquake in chile. aftershocks are still expected, and right now all hawaiians are being warned to stay away from the water. at around 9:30 this morning is where things will get the most problematic for hawaii. also this morning, after tough testimony to the house, now it's the senate's turn to grill general motors' ceo mary barra about a decade-long

slow-walk to a recall. we'll talk to the senator running today's hearing, missouri's claire mccaskill. with the deadline behind us, and 7 million people on the roll, what happens to the health care program without the drumbeat of repeals. good morning. it is the "the daily rundown." we'll start with the developing new this is hour and check in with all of the territories out there in the pacific. hawaii is under a tsunami advisory this morning. the city of honolulu is urging everyone to stay out of the water and away from the shores. this after a major earthquake struck chile overnight. [ sirens ] folks, it was a big one. magnitude 8.2 quake struck northern chile last night. it touched off landslides, forced 900,000 people to be

evacuated. six people have died so far. more than 300 prisoners, by the way, managed to escape during the confusion. only 26 of them have been recaptured. the quake started several fires. someone posted this video of a fire in tive, chile, reporting a 6.0 aftershock around the time that this video was recorded. in fact, the u.s. geological survey said it's recorded three dozen aftershocks, all over 5.0 in magnitude. the chilean government has called off the evacuations. it's reopened three airports. as for the tsunami alert for chile, that also has been cancelled this hour. but this is still a concern for hawaii now. this powerful quake off of chile's coast is pushing strong waves toward hawaii's shoreline. so to explain sort of how all of this works, i want to bring in our nbc meteorologist bill karins with more. and just, when you see -- you hear the word tsunami, let's get something clear.

the hawaiian islands are not being washed away, or not under the threat of being washed away, but they're calling it a tsunami advisory. explain, bill. >> well, even though hawaii is 12 hours away, by the time -- that's how long it would take the wave to travel. the first waves are expected to reach in the next 20 minutes. if it had been a big, huge tsunami wave, that would be moving into the whhawaiian islands. the one heading for hawaii, estimated one foot. if you're standing at the beach, you may not even notice it, but what you don't know that's happening is under the water, and the wave is going to mess with the currents and the rip currents. and that's why they want to be extra careful. they're telling people to stay out of the water until at least noon today in the hawaiian islands with that advisory. i mean, this was a huge one. this could have been so much worse. i mean, this was an 8.2 magnitude quake. we only get one of those on this entire planet every year. think about the one off japan, the fukushima, think about the one down in the indian ocean,

indonesia. so thankfully, it's not dealing with anything like that. the frequency, i mentioned, the aftershocks have only about a 6 or so, not causing additional damage. by noon today, local hawaiian time, chuck, thing will improve there. we're lucky. every earthquake is different. notal of them produce huge tsunami waves, and this one did not. >> all right, bill karins, thank you very much. if you're like me, going, there's a lot of quakes going on. so this quake that hit northern chile overnight is almost one of a dozen that have hit just in the past seven days. should we read anything into this? let's go to somebody who knows a lot more than we do on this, kate hutton, a seismologist at cal tech. she joins me now on the phone. kate, so, again, you know, we watch this. we've had these, you know, l.a. got hit by one. it feels like the entire pacific rim, there's a lot of movement going on. is any of this related? or is this all coincidental? >> well, i think it's probably

coincidental. i mean, we're always looking at that. but when we do statistics on earthquake activity, we find that the most obvious aspect of it is it's random. you know, if you sit there and throw coins for an hour, you could -- every once in a while, you'd get five or six heads in a row. that's pretty much what you're seeing here. >> what is it that you -- >> that's the most likely explanation. >> what would you be looking for, kate, to double-check that this isn't connected and this idea that sometimes it's out there, oh, does this mean the big one is coming, type of thing? >> well, unfortunately, you know, we've been working on earthquake prediction for decades, and we haven't figured out a way to do it. unless there's some kind of breakthrough somewhere, i can't really answer that. because we don't understand how there could be a physical connection, like how an earthquake in california could trigger an earthquake in south america, it's just too far away.

>> well, i wanted to be sure to clear that up, because that is one of the social media topics of conversation that we're developing -- >> oh, i'm sure. >> -- let's get an actual fact, an actual expert on here. kate hutton, thanks for getting up so early this morning for us. >> okay, sure. >> all right. moving on to this morning's top story here in washington, in just about an hour from now, the gm ceo mary barra will face questions again. wasn't very good yesterday. she might have a tougher time today. this time, from senators who are just as skeptical the company was merely incompetent and somehow did not cover up a problem with their cars that's now been linked to at least 13 deaths. on tuesday, barra was grilled by angry lawmakers on both sides of the aisle about why it took gm over a decade to tell customers about problems with their car's ignition, which turn off go they are bumped, which shuts off the engine and disables air bags. >> why in the world would a

company with the stellar reputation of general motors purchase a part that did not meet its own specifications? >> do you think there was a cover-up, or it was sloppy work? >> gm knew about this problem in 2001. they were warned again and again over the next decade, but they did nothing. and i just want to show how easy it is to turn this key in this switch. >> do you take responsibility? is the company responsible? >> we are -- >> you're new to gm, is it responsible? >> barra dodged specifics again and again about why gm failed to fix the faulty ignition switch on cobalts and other of the compact cars. and even though the company conducted multiple internal studies of the problem since 2001, they didn't seem to make the connection. >> i need to get the results of the study to make all determinations.

i want to know the answers to the questions you're asking. congressman, those are the questions i want to answer. you're relating specific incidents that happened -- >> you don't know? >> -- our entire investigation -- >> you don't know about that? >> barra has been gm's ceo for less than three months, but she'd been with the company for 30 years. still, she insists, she knew nothing about the compact cars until she became ceo. >> it came to light to me on january 31st, 2014. >> i mean, that's totally irrelevant. to the people who lost their lives. >> lawmakers also focus odd on why gm twice approved ignition parts made by delphi that fell short of company specification. in one 2005 memo, a gm official estimated a new switch would cost the company just 90 cents per switch. barra apologized to victims' family members who came to washington demanding answers

from gm and lined the back of the hearing room. displaying photos of loved ones that have died. senators richard blumenthal and ed markey's bill would require lawmakers to submit accident reports to nhtsa, when they learn of a fatality, and it would require the agency to make the information available to the public. congressman henry waxman wants every car sold in the u.s. to come with a $3 fee that would fund nhtsa's operations and increase the civil penalties the agency can levy, up to $200 million. well, joining me now, democratic senator claire mccaskill of missouri, who will chair this morning's hearing. senator, i assume you watched the house yesterday, looked at mary barra's testimony. i assume you still have questions unanswered. what's the biggest one in your mind? >> there's a number of them.

the notion that there's an old gm and a new gm. it's important in the hearing to actually understand that what had happened at gm since the bankruptcy in terms of this issue, they had one of their lead engineers lie under oath last april and was confronted with the clear evidence that there had been a cover-up, and he had lied. he is still working there today. it took them almost a year to issue a recall. and that's all the new gm. so i think there's tough questions that need to be answered that she's not going to be able to avoid by just saying, "i'm waiting for the investigation." >> you feel like there's a cover -- i'm struck by the fact that she says she didn't know about this until 2014, basically the day she took over in january 2014. that seems mind boggling. it does sound like if only a small group of people knew about this, doesn't that scream cover-up to you? >> well, i think that's exactly what happened here. i think -- the interesting thing is, mary barra came from the engineering sector.

she is an engineer. and what this appears to be is circling the wagons within the engineering department, and not letting this get out. and just assuming that they could fade the lawsuits and that would be better than acknowledging publicly -- i mean, the notion they would fix this part and give it the same number, that unique no other proof that there was a cover-up, other than the fact they wouldn't let the parts suppliers know, wouldn't even let the dealerships know, that they were dealing with a different ignition switch. >> you know, i can't help but think -- it's not very long ago that all of us helped bail out gm with taxpayer dollars. during that bailout process, when the government was essentially running the company, getting its hands into this, is there any way the government dropped the ball on this and should have been digging even deeper into sort of gm's business dealings and how they handled things? clearly, the company was a mess, that's why they were facing bankruptcy problems. but i guess we're finding out it

was even worse than we thought. >> well, i think it's hard to indict the government for not finding this problem when gm's own executives didn't know about this problem. and the bottom line is that we've got to figure out about the air bag deployment in the hearing today, too. if air bags are not deploying when power goes off, that's a problem. across the industry. i think that's something we need to look at. we need to look at whether the federal agency -- here's what really, chuck, people need to realize -- the only reason we're dealing with this issue right now, the main reason this recall happened, was because of a trial lawyer. it wasn't because of federal regulators. it wasn't because the company came forward. it was a trial lawyer who hired an engineer and nailed this company. >> right. i was going to say, so learning that, do we need to embed -- you look at sort how the faa works with the airlines. it's more of an embedding so that there is a sense of we know what goes on with these airplanes, crashes, and things like that. that doesn't happen with car companies. does that need to change, the

relationship between nhtsa and the car companies? >> the bottom line is, nhtsa's budget for this portion of their responsibility has been stagnant at $10 million for a decade. $10 million to keep up with the engineering challenges in the automobile manufacturing industry? i mean, that's ridiculous. so, you know, we can blame government for not getting the job done. but most of the time around this building, everybody's wanting to cut government. there are some places that these investments are very important for public safety. >> all right. and this clearly seems to be one of them. claire mccaskill, democrat from missouri, chairing this hearing today. we'll be watching. >> thanks. >> you got it. up next, we'll speak to the father of a young woman who was killed in a crash caused by these gm ignition issues. and we're going to be keeping a close eye on hawaii, where we're minutes away from the first waves triggered by the massive earthquake in chile, will be hitting. the good news, it looks like hawaii will be fine as long as people stay out of the water. first, a look at today's

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it made me more upset. she was scripted. no answers. no answers were given. it's a cover-up, total cover-up. it's obvious. the fact that everyone from gm is still there, to me, is amazing. >> that was renee trautwine, whose daughter sarah was killed in an accident involving her chevrolet cobalt in 2009, and ceo's mary barra's answers, she said, weren't good enough. and many families, as we said, are in d.c. for these hearings. >> it's got his ashes in it.

my daughter had it done for me. i wear it every day. when i close my eyes, i see my son's face and imagine the worst, what he had to go thro h through. that's all i can see -- see. >> why wasn't this done sooner? this is now six years. you know? why didn't they say this sooner? why didn't they get a hold of anyone? why aren't they doing anything now? we see the cars -- same cars on the road, every day. every day. >> barra announced that gm has hired ken fineberg who handled compensation for victims, to look at what steps to take, but gm has not yet committed to establishing a compensation fund, saying they would announce the 30 to 60 days, but the hiring of feinberg -- some

lawmakers are asking why the agency declined to investigate after reports that the air bags in the cobalt failed to deploy in a series of these accidents. >> nhtsa panel decided there wasn't a trend here, and decided not to investigate despite the number of complaints of fatal crashes and the warranty claims -- >> the cobalt did not stand out. it was a little above average, but several vehicles that were significantly higher. there were some vehicles -- >> i understand. but twice employees of nhtsa raised a red flag on this. it wasn't just once r once. >> in 2006, 18-year-old natasha weigel and her friend, amy rademacher were killed. the car lost power steering and braking. the air bags could not deploy. and the cobalt slammed into a telephone pole box and two trees. doug weigel, natasha's father,

is a plaintiff in a lawsuit against gm. what did you think of ms. barra yesterday? >> very scripted. i don't think she answered any of the questions that the senator has for her, the house of representatives. either she doesn't understand a lot of their questions, but it was very, very scripted. >> did you feel like congress was asking the right questions? >> i think they did. i think they asked straightforward questions with what i thought required simple answers. >> what do you want to hear today, the senators, what you didn't hear yesterday from her? what are you hoping the senators do today in today's hearing? >> well, i think they're asking a lot of similar questions, and some of them are different. but i'm afraid they're going to get the same answer that it's going to be in their investigation, and she wants the same answers. but a ceo of a company like that should be able to go anywhere in her company and get the answers she needs, and not page through a book that was given to her and not have answers. >> when you heard her say that

she didn't know about this until essentially the day she got the keys to gm, in january 2014, that was just -- what did that tell you? to me, it sort of screamed, "wow, this was kept in such a close circle." if that's taking her at her word, they were trying to make sure a lot of people didn't know inside of gm. that's the definition of cover-up. >> yes, it is. and i'm not sure i believe her. you know, i've tried cases for 30 years, and i know that a jury would have looked at that and said, "oh, really? you've been in management position for 30 years, and this is something that you had no information about?" i'd sent her an e-mail two weeks ago saying you have 2 million vehicles on the road right now with this defect, and you need to take them off the road. i hope what the senate does today is they show her her own recall letter where it says the recall letter sent to the clients -- to the customers, where it says if you lighten up your keychain, it doesn't

matter, you hit a rough patch of road or a pothole, this could still happen. >> look, i have a niece that drives a cobalt. this is the -- an affordable car that parents get their kids as a first or second car. this is -- these cars shouldn't -- you believe the cars shouldn't be on the road at all right now? >> absolutely not. >> going back at all. tell me about your meeting with her on sunday. how was that? >> the evening meeting? >> yes, with ms. barra. >> again, i think it was very scripted. she went around the room and said her condolences to each and every person, shook her hands with -- >> was it polite in there? that had to be -- >> it started out as polite, but you can only hear "i'm sorry" so many times, and i think halfway through the room, after an hour and a half, the parents started to say, "sorry is not good enough." and i feel the same way. "sorry," you can hear it only so

many times, and it's just redundant. it doesn't mean anything. there needs to be action. and she said with the new gm, the old gm, no one's been fired. no one's been held accountable for any of that. so i don't know if there is a new gm. i don't think there is. >> you're putting together a lawsuit, you represent all of the families here that are -- that have been here in washington. and your lawsuits at gm, there've been questions about how nhtsa handled this, questions in your mind, are the questions enough that you would direct a lawsuit at the government? >> no, no, in my view, and this is true with the pinto exploding gas tank cases, with firestone, nhtsa is basically a chihuahua garden a dragon. they don't have the manpower. they don't have the money. and if an international car manufacturer decides they want to challenge nhtsa on a regulation or a fine, they simply throw lawyers and money at it for years at a time -- >> so you think nhtsa is

undermanned, they don't have the power they need. you think they need to be more embedded with the car companies -- >> you have to give them teeth. if you want to blame nhtsa, then you give nhtsa the weapons to go after the car company. you don't blame them afterwards when they never had the weapons. >> mr. weigel, tell me about natasha. >> she's pretty free-spirited kid. she played hockeys since she was 8 years old, and a lot of energy. she's a pretty free spirit. and for me and all of the families, all these kids in these accidents, mostly young kids. >> everything was ahead of them. she'd be 24, 25? >> close. it's cut short. and this is tearing her mother apart. that was her only daughter, and many other families, it was their only child. so there needs to be responsibility somewhere. it's their -- i hope congress will end it. >> well, i appreciate your sharing your story here. hopefully, you can get some satisfaction -- some

satisfaction today. >> thank you. >> in watching this hearing with gm's hearing, mr. weigel, thank you for coming on. msnbc will have live coverage of that hearing, ceo's mary barra's testimony, in the next hour. and tea parties. i'll have more awkward conversations than i'm equipped for, because i'm raising two girls on my own. i'll worry about the economy more than a few times before they're grown. but it's for them, so i've found a way. who matters most to you says the most about you. at massmutual we're owned by our policyowners, and they matter most to us. ready to plan for your future? we'll help you get there. when folks in the lower 48 think athey think salmon and energy.a, but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. thousands of people here in alaska are working to safely produce more energy. but that's just the start. to produce more from existing wells, we need advanced technology.

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as you know, if it's wednesday, it means we've usually got some election results, since people voted somewhere. and there's an upset in today's "data bank." the number 44, the percent saj of votes that muriel bowser took in the d.c. democratic primary. the council member bowser, beat the incumbent mayor vincent gray by several thousand votes. mayor gray becomes a lame duck with nine months left in his term, and faces possible criminal charges over fund-raising for his last election. full disclosure here. my wife was an advisor to the bowser campaign. by the way, this is the second-straight incumbent mayor in d.c. to be ousted in democratic primary. pretty much the old guard/new guard.

new guard won, now the new guard is back. today's next "data bank" number comes in the form after snackdown for rick scott. 2-1. a decision by the three-judge panel of the 11th court circuit of appeals that ruled tuesday that scott's administration violated federal law by trying to purge noncitizens from the voter rolls before the state primary in 2012. federal law bans those kinds of purges less than 90 days before a primary or general election. all right. coming up on tdr, one of the quirks of new york that can put candidates on the same ballot multiple times, and it once had really -- rudy giuliani officially listed as a liberal. but before we break, the tdr 50 trivia question, new york style. since 1900, how many republican presidential nominees have won new york but lost the white house? you have to figure out who the two nominees were. tweet your answer @chucktodd.

one winner gets the on-air shoutout. by the way, have you ever wished you could rewind history? well, maybe dewey actually defeat truman? round two of the near-misses contest. it's loaded with new yorkers. he is one of the mid-20th politicians that could go on to the sweet 16. it's up to you. and this is the bracket with the highest seed still in the running. 14th seed and write-in candidate henry cabot lodge is facing off against stevenson. forget basketball. those brackets are done. have more fun with this. hi dad. she's a dietitian. and back when i wasn't eating right, she got me drinking boost. it's got a great taste, and it helps give me the nutrition i was missing. helping me stay more like me. [ female announcer ] boost complete nutritional drink has 26 essential vitamins and minerals, including calcium and vitamin d to support strong bones

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so is the american government planning to release a spy in an attempt to save the mideast peace talks? this morning, that's just one of the developments making the

prospect of getting the israelis and palestinians back to the negotiating table seems further and further out of reach. remember, they're negotiating to start the negotiations. let's always keep that in mind. this isn't the actual negotiations themselves for the two-state solution. in the past 24 hours, mahmoud abbas announced he would seek international recognition of the state of palestine, regardless of the peace talks. an israeli watchdog group says israeli is moving ahead with the plan to build new settlements in jerusalem, a further obstacle to talks. john kerry has cancelled a mideast trip he was expected to make today, but he'll still be in north africa. it follows kerry's attempt to get the talks back off the ground, suggesting the release of jonathan pollard as a potential bargaining chip. pollard is a civilian navy intelligence officer arrested in 1985 after spending nearly a

year delivering classified u.s. information to the israelis. in that time, he handed over more than 1,500 intelligence memos, suitcases packed with documents on israel and its arab neighbors. pollard spent the last 29 years in federal prison and is scheduled to potentially be released -- or scheduled for parole next fall. the theory is if pollard was released, israel would free palestinian prisoners, which would in theory bring abbas back to the negotiating table. but the heads of the intelligence committees in both the house and senate say this idea of using pollard as a bargaining chip is just a bad idea. >> i think this is a serious mistake, and it tells me that the administration is at wit's end here and believes that netanyahu is the sole problem in this equation. i think this is a horrible idea. i think it sends a horrible message. >> i have very deep concern that

he be released. i think if it's a part of a settlement that produces two states, that may be one thing. but i think to do so before there is some agreement, is something i am not the least supportive of. >> pollard's release has been an obsession for prime minister netanyahu for nearly 20 years. in fact, he raised it as a bargaining chip back in 1998 with president clinton. but after clinton's then cia director george tenet threatened to resign if clinton decided to do it, clinton decided instead to keep pollard locked up. over the years, some of the resistance has softened, but even supporters like john mccain say this is the wrong way to go about it. he said, i think releasing john pollard is the right thing to do. however, releasing him to keep israeli-plan talks going is

totally misguided and would be seen as a desperate attempt to avert failure. david is currently a vice president with the woodrow wilson center, and he joins me now. picking up on senator mccain using pollard for what feels like a small development in the mideast peace process. it seems like a wasted use of a bargaining chip. what do you say? >> just a word of perspective for you, ronald reagan, h.w. bush, bill clinton and george w. bush, all forced with israeli entreaties to release pollard over the years. they all push for power. and the reality is these presidents have said no. said no on national security grounds. you mentioned, i was at wye river in '98, and tenet was quite emotional, and said it would undermine cia morale. clinton was basically inclined to do it.

no u.s. president has done it. now we are hearing -- >> there does seem to be -- bush was sort of -- and clinton, and obviously president obama. you know, it would -- the idea that an israeli spy gets special treatment, that doesn't help american government, does it not? >> no, it makes us look weak, frankly, and desperate. the fact that pollard, an american jew, makes it even more complex. israelis -- >> you want to talk about freed feeding the crazy conspiracy theories. >> dual loyalty, it raises all of it looks bad. the fact the peace process is broken, the suspicion between abbas and netanyahu is fundamentally deep. the gaps on the core issues are huge. and the idea that somehow getting -- or releasing pollard for an extension of talks or even settlements freeze that is likely to be observed in the breach more than practice doesn't add up. it's bad for america, and it's bad for the american peace

process. >> it's fascinating. the israeli press -- we get the translation of the "hebrew press," and optimism overnight. they thought netanyahu would agree to a partial freeze, full freeze in east jerusalem. and abbas would, in exchange to the 400 prisoner release, although he wants a thousand, was going to stop the u.n. attempts. but apparently, the israelis think pollard's going to happen. so -- >> well, either the white house has not yet decided on what to do, or abbas and netanyahu aren't happy with the actual demand. i suspect prisoners is a terrible issue. it's confidence in answer on one side, confidence in a story on the other. abbas is objecting to israeli dictates on where the return prisoners could actually live, gaza or the west bank. so the basic point here, chuck, i think these are the appetizers of the process. you're not even ready to sit down -- >> the negotiations to talk, right? these aren't negotiations for the plan. >> exactly.

so at the end of the day, you want to train pollard for an agreement on jerusalem borders, fine, i'll be there to break out the champagne. but the reality is, barring that, we're getting very little in return. >> all right. aaron david miller at the wilson center. thank you for your blunt talk this morning. >> always a pleasure. >> appreciate it. next up in today's "data bank," we're marking world autism awareness day. you'll see a lot of the blue puzzle pieces. the number is ten. that's how many years the group autism speaks has been raising money, raising research. u.s. centers for disease control announced last week that autism rates have climbed nearly 30% since 2008. autism speaks is helping to find the cause of this increase and eventually, hopefully to find a way to prevent it. before we break, today's tdr 50 new york soup at the original dinosaur barbecue in syracuse, we should tell you they're serving up smoked brisket

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back now with our tdr 50 look at new york and a closer look at the unusual political process that exists in the empire state. it's called fusion voting, or cross-endorsement. in short, it allows candidates to run on multiple party lines. for example, they can be endorsed by both the republican party and the conservative party. then, you add up votes from all the lines into one final total, there you go. for third parties, it gives them a chance to endorse major party candidates, increasing their influence at the ballot box, and with the lawmakers that get elected. back in 2010, for example, governor cuomo was on the ballot in three different places. last week, he met with labor unions affiliated with one of the groups that endorsed him, called the working families party. it was an attempt to secure their endorsement again. not only does he want the votes,

the wfp can provide, he wants to make sure they don't go to his opponent, or more importantly a third party, somebody else on the ballot line that siphons boats away. back in 2010, andrew cuomo -- it is -- it has had an impact before, 1970. james buckley, won a u.s. senate seat outright, running only on the conservative party line and was a republican before, that he was able to defeat, and a democrat. in 1993, rudy giuliani was endorsed by the liberal party line as well as the republicans. liberals made the difference delivering about 62,000 votes for giuliani, more than his official winning margin over david dinken at the time. according to the swing state parties, working family parties, one of three parties that pull weight in new york, have provided the margin of victory in five house races in the past 12 years. how unusual is this system? it only exists in seven states. it's only practiced in five.

new york, of course, is the biggest one. and the other 43 states, it's not only off the table, it's actually banned outright. so the question is, is this healthy for political parties or not? joining me now a little bit of a coalition of source, syracuse mayor, stephanie minor, and dan cantor, the executive director of the working families party. so, let me start with you, mayor, about whether this is a healthy system. is this good for the democratic party or bad for the democratic party that it dilutes the coalition? >> well, you know, when you have a state that is as diverse as new york, we have urban, we have rural, and we have suburban, we, as democrats, are a big tent party. but what is inevitably happened is there's a struggle between how big that tent should be. and so, you have minor parties who come in with their own -- they want to push their own agenda. i happen to think it's healthy. but this is an ongoing debate every year among democratic

party leaders, among republicans, among everyone in the state. so i think all debate is healthy. ultimately, i think it's healthy for our state and our government. >> well, what is it for the working families? let me go to you, sir, about the working families party. >> sure. >> why endorse democrats? why not have your own candidate? why is it more -- it is as important to you, you find a democrat you like, or frankly a republican -- i'm not saying it's definitely -- >> sure. >> -- why is it better for you to endorse a major party candidate? >> sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. in general, working families leans towards the democrats. we've occasionally endorsed republicans and sometimes run our own candidates in a stand-alone race, if we don't think the major parties are putting up someone who shares our values about the issues that are important to us -- good jobs, fair taxes, you know, society in which life chances are not determined at birth. so it's a way for the minor party to avoid the spoiler or the wasted vote dilemma that otherwise plagues third parties in the american system. fusion voting was once legal in all of the states in america.

it was banned by the major parties about 100 years ago. and it's practiced -- where it's practiced, especially new york, connecticut, oregon, gives minor parties a real influence and a good one. it's not whether it's good for parties. it's whether it's good for voters. it's silly to think there are only two answers to any problem -- democratic answer or republican answer. there are a lot of other good ideas. if you look at history, many of the good ideas started on the fringe -- abolition, women suffrage, eight-hour workdays. they migrated into the mainstream. that's what we think we can do with the working families party. >> mayor miner, do you think this is a version -- an american version of a parliamentary system? >> no, i don't, because ultimately you are seeing major parties -- their candidates win. but what i do think it does, as dan said, it encourages a healthy debate about policies and about where we're going. so the more that we have a

marketplace of ideas -- and i always think the democratic party has the better ideas. and if we have to take those ideas or share them from the working families party, or from others, and through part of our process in order get candidates the most votes to win, we sit down and work through these things, i think it's good. but ultimately, this is not parliamepa parliamentarian. >> dan, why did you start with the working families party and not the liberal line? >> the liberal line, in a sense, had abandoned its value when is it went over to mayor giuliani. listen, we think there's a big audience, a big market for sensible -- common sense progressive ideas. they're very mainstream ideas, the things we talk about -- we should not be giving enormous tax cuts to the banks and wall street and so on, and we should be investing in infrastructure, education, culture, transit, all of the things we want. we proudly endorse democrats

like mayor miner and stood against others when we thought that they weren't being, in a sense, in favor of the middle class and working class and poor. >> dan, very quickly, are you going to endorse governor cuomo moe again? >> we have a process, we endorse at the end of may. we'll have to trust the process. >> i assume the deals he's made on pension stuff has got some of your members upset? >> i think people are upset about some aspects of what he's done, particularly big tax cuts to the 1%, as it's sometimes called. he's been a liberal on marriage equality, on guns, on some of the economic things that really animate us. there's a lot of concern. >> all right. dan canner, we'll be watching that, stephanie minor from syracuse, sorry syracuse is not in the final four. >> we are, too. >> that's right. >> fair enough. thank you both with the fusion voting 101. >> turning to washington state. mudslide victims, got easier

overnight, but the death toll increased again. rescuers are getting access to areas they haven't been able to search since the mudslide struck almost ten days ago. here's the official death toll, it's sitting at 28, but there are 20 people still missing. governor inslee's office says search and recovery costs have topped $2 million so far. since 1900, two presidential nominees have won new york but lost the white house, charles hew in 1916 and duey. congratulations to today's winner. send trivia suggestions to us, we'll be right back.

take away time. yesterday in the rose garden, you heard a very animated president. he announced as of march 31st

deadline, over 7 million americans enrolled in health care exchanges under the affordable care act, but it was the president's speech was more than just a victory lap. it also seemed to be an attempt to lay out a blueprint for democrats running for re-election on how to defend the law in this tough political environment. take a listen. >> and those who've based their entire political agenda on repealing it have to explain to the country why jeanne should go back to being uninsured. they should explain why shaun and his family should go back to paying thousands and thousands of dollars more. they have to explain why marla doesn't deserve and feel like she's got value. >> by the way, those arguments sound familiar, medicare, social security, same type of arguments that are made over time. will democrats, though, make those same arguments and borrow the language used by the president yesterday, or do they prefer that health care simply fade away? one thing seems clear, even as

the administration continues to tout the benefits of the law leading up to the midterms, don't expect to see the president leaving washington to sell it. for instance, the president is already shifting the focus to the economy today. he's leaving washington, he's going to michigan, a state with a very hotly contested senate race. not talking health care, he's talking the minimum wage. today, 3:00 p.m., msnbc's going to have live coverage of the president in ann arbor talking about the minimum wage, but i have to be curious, does he slip in some health care into the speech? that's it for us, coming up, chris jansing, talking to the mother and brother of another teenager killed when that chevy cobalt slammed into a tree. mary barra continues her testimony on congress, this time on the senate side. that's all this hour. i'm meteorologist bill karins, and over the next two days, we're going to be tracking

severe weather in the middle of the country. today it's going to be areas from arkansas to missouri, through illinois. we will see a potential for isolated tornados, then as we go into thursday, that same area is going to have a much greater impact as the storm system gets even stronger. we'll watch you closely in the middle of the country. travel safe.

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>> it angers me that we had a situation that took over a decade to correct, and i am working day and night to make sure we correct this issue, we learn from it, and it never happens again. >> testimony part two set to start on capitol hill. can mary barra satisfy grieving families and a skeptical congress? we'll talk to the mother and brother of a woman killed in 2009. we know how he feels about obamaca obamacare, but what will he say about paul ryan's latest budget pass? the big one, 8.0 quake off the coast of chile and the sound of tsunami sirens. we'll have the latest video as the sun comes up in south america. pushing ano