great, thanks. >> thank you. >> and thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. just after 4:00 p.m. today, there was a major development in the ongoing chris christie investigation scandal out of new jersey. since the scandal first came to light, five christie administration appointees or staffers have stepped down or been fired in relation to this scandal. two of those people, the governor's former deputy chief of staff and his former campaign manager, they have been fighting an effort by the state legislature to investigate the bridge scandal, the closure of access lanes under the george washington bridge back in september. bridget anne kelly and bill stepien had invoked their rights and said they would not hand over documents to the investigation in fear of incriminating themselves. well, today a superior court judge in new jersey agreed with bill stepien and bridget anne kelly and said, in fact, they do not have to comply with the subpoenas from the legislature. they do not have to hand over any documents.

the judge ruled that their fifth amendment claims, basically, were legitimate, because it is reasonable, she said, for them to fear that they may face criminal prosecution related to their roles in the bridge lane closures. the judge in her ruling today said they could, feasibly, be criminally liable under new jersey's official misconduct law. and according to the judge, quote, it is reasonable for mr. stepien and miss kelly to fear that they currently face the hazard of prosecution in the federal investigation into these matters. and that is the whoa basis of invoking your fifth amendment rights, right? pleading the fifth. if there is a reasonable likelihood that you could be criminally charged and prosecuted for something that you did. the government can't force you to say things or hand over things that will incriminate you. so, on the one hand, this is really good news today for bridget anne kelly and for chris christie's former campaign manager, bill stepien. because they do not have to hand over their blackberries and hand over all their e-mail records

and their text messages to this investigation by the legislature. on the other hand, the judge says that the reason they don't have to do that is because federal prosecutors might be coming after them. so imagine this sort of feels like a bit of a mixed blessing. the other really important part of this ruling today, which we knew the committee was waiting to hear about with bated breath, the other part of this ruling today is the question of whether or not the committee can offer people immunity from prosecution in exchange for them testifying. david wildstein, the man who shut down the bridge lanes, you'll remember that he pled the fifth to the committee. he refused to answer questions, and his lawyer said, if the committee was willing to grant him immunity, mr. wildstein would tell all he knew. bridget kelly, who worked in governor christie's office when she sent the "time for some traffic problems in ft. lee" e-mail, her fifth amendment claims not to have to turn over documents, those claims were, today, upheld by this judge, but for the last month, bridget

kelly's lawyer has been hinting, and then just explicitly saying that she, too, would be willing to tell all she knew if the legislature was willing to give her immunity. well, that committee and the legislature has maintained either that it didn't think it could grant immunity or that it was pretty sure that it couldn't grant immunity. but this was settled today. this was the other issue that this superior court judge in new jersey today ruled on. and the judge said, in very clear terms, yes, this committee and the legislature can give people immunity. and if the legislature gives people immunity, then presumably, they can also compel all the testimony and all the documents they want from those people who they have immuneized. but they better think twice before they do that. because the legislature may really want to give bridget kelly, bill stepien, may really want to give these people immunity. but according to this judge's ruling today, if they get

immunity, that immunity applies to all subsequent potential prosecutions on these issues in any venue. and that means that it includes the federal criminal inquiry underway at the u.s. attorney's off in new jersey. it means that the federal prosecutors in new jersey could never, for example, prosecute bridget anne kelly or david wildstein or bill stepien or anybody else who the legislature decided to immunize. quoting from the judge's ruling today, thus, in these cases, the committee may compel the production of the requested documents by promising immunity to mr. stepien and miss kelly. protecting them from the future use of any incriminating evidence that they may produce. if the committee chooses this route, mr. stepien and miss kelly would have to comply with the subpoenas in their entirety to avoid being held in contempt. mr. stepien and miss kelly would then be immuneized from the use of any evidence that's incriminating in any subsequent prosecution, including any prosecution resulting from the

ongoing federal grand jury investigation. this is kind of a moment of truth, right? is it worth it for the legislature to do this? is it worth it for the legislature to get all these folks to testify and turn over their documents, to force them to, if the price of doing that is that those folks can never be held accountable in what may end up being a federal criminal case. i mean, in not so many words, the judge ruled today that the legislature in new jersey can keep investigating this thing if they want to, but if they want to, it's going to be at the expense of the federal prosecutor's investigation. this is not the way it was supposed to go in new jersey, according to the people running these investigations. we've got the chairman of the investigation in the legislature here in just a moment to react to this judge's ruling today and to tell us if this basically means, game over for his investigation. but, remember how this came to be in the first place. when the christie administration took office, shortly thereafter,

there was a huge toll hike that was floated and ultimately announced from the port authority. and by huge toll hike, i mean like crazy huge. it would have $114 to drive a truck like this across the george washington wrinlg. that would be the toll. later, a reporting emerged detailing some real shenanigans around the toll hike decision and the whole process around the toll hike getting sort of rigged, maybe sort of faked in a way that was designed to apparent make new jersey governor chris christie look good in the process. so the new jersey legislature was looking into that scandal last year. that's how they got subpoena power in the first place, for their transportation committee, in order to look into that other unrelated scandal at the port authority. and in the course of looking into that other unrelated scandal, this strange thing happened with the access lanes on to the george washington bridge. what happened on that bridge was a consequential thing. it gridlocked that town for days on end including school buses

and first responders. the port authority had obviously done it on purpose. the reason why they had done it, this traffic study idea, had seemed bogus from the very beginning. it was called bogus by the executive director of the agency. that seemed pretty clears that there was something weird going on there. so the committee had these subpoena powers already, and they used the subpoena powers they already had from that previous investigation into the port authority to compel a few people involved in this bridge issue to hand over documents about what happened. that is how this whole thing happened. that is how the whole thing blew up. ryanlyza wrote about it at great length for the new yorker this week. how on the night of december 26th, the night after christmas, assemblyman john wisniewski from new jersey was alone in his office at home poring over these hundreds of pages of documents that had been turned over to his committee from the port authority and he was the one who

found that e-mail, late at night, on the 26th, alone in his office, the one that said, "time for some traffic problems in ft. lee," that e-mail from governor christie's deputy chief of staff. and he saw the response from the man inside the port authority, "got it." the legislature and its investigation how anybody learned that what happened here wasn't just some traffic screwup. it was actually a scandal. and it was one that went all the way to the governor's office. there never would have been federal prosecutors looking into this matter in the first place had the investigation in the legislature not turned up these documents, this evidence trail that led right into the office of new jersey governor chris christie. and when the legislature released some of those documents that john wisniewski had been poring over, and when they released those documents and the story blew up and people like bridget kelly started getting fired in trenton, and the governor finally stopped mocking

people for covering this story and finally started apologizing for it instead, then the legislature constituted a new committee, a bipartisan committee from both the senate and the house and they hired the a pro chief counsel to try to make sure they did it right, to liase with federal prosecutors, so they could both go on without stepping on each other's toes. but apparently they have been stepping on each other's toes. john wisniewski, he has been defending the existence of that investigation and the importance of that investigation ever since the investigatory committee was first formed. >> let me remind everybody that our team had a genesis in the port authority, its lack of transparency and accountability. it is only because of the meticulous work that was

patiently done that we followed the evidence that led us into the governor's office. having arrived there, it would be a disservice to ourselves is and to the people of the state if we did not pursue this investigation to its conclusion. >> can they still do that? did this judge's ruling today in new jersey, telling two top chris christie staffers that they can continue to refuse to hand over documents to that investigation, did this judge's ruling today baf neuter the legislature's ongoing investigation? if so, will the legislature appeal? and if so, will they prevail? joining us now is assemblyman john wisniewski. mr. chairman, thanks for being with us tonight on what i'm sure is a very busy evening. >> rachel, thanks for the opportunity. i appreciate it. >> what was your reaction to judge jacobson's ruling this evening? i'm sure you were hoping that bridget anne kelly and bill stepien would have been compelled by the judge to hand over the documents you had

requested. what's your reaction to her saying no to that? >> well, it's not the decision that we had anticipated. clearly, we felt very comfortable in the advice our counsel had given us and the arguments that were made. judge jacobson wrote a very thorough hundred-page ruling that very narrowly construed the rights of the legislature to seek documents through compulsion when witnesses such as bridget kelly or mr. stepien fear federal prosecution. so while this is something that we would prefer to not have happened, it by no means signals any change or interruption in the investigation. >> she suggested pretty explicitly that you could, in fact, compel both testimony and the production of documents from these witnesses, who are invoking their fifth amendment rights, that you could get them to testify and give you everything you wanted, provided that you gave them immunity. whether or not you could give them immunity felt like an open question before this ruling. what's your reaction to that?

>> we, i think what our opinion was before this ruling was that while there is the statutory authority for the committee to give immunity, i think it was an open question by those who would receive it, whether they would be comfortable in just simply having a grant of immunity from the legislature, and not also want to see some kind of affirmative sign from federal authorities, that they would also grant immunity. what we have to look at now is whether it makes sense for the committee to consider that. the federal authorities essentially give that grant of immunity a thumbs up. i think we're not at that juncture yet. we still have to examine all of the words in judge jacobson's decision. we have to consider all of our options. we're going to be meeting with our counsel and our staff over the next day or two, to make those decisions. but i think it's important to

understand, and i've said this all along, that this is an important issue, but it is not a dispositive issue. the investigative work of this committee can continue, notwithstanding judge jacobson's ruling. obviously, two important individuals with regard to the subpoena we had issued are now set back a step, but the judge did say that the subpoena was overbroad, so clearly opens up the opportunity to perhaps redraw that subpoena. as you pointed out, there's the opportunity for immunity. there's also the possibility of an appeal. and we still have documents we continue to receive from individuals who continue to comply. and there's also, now we've talked about, at the last committee meeting, about bringing people in actually for testimony. >> in terms of that issue of whether you might appeal, do you have a personal opinion on that, or are you going to wait to talk to your committee members about that? >> i think we have to wade through the decisions. obviously, we have see whether there's an appealable issue, whether there's an error in law. the judge did a very good job in

crafting her opinion. it was a very narrowly construed opinion. i don't want to give an opinion right now of whether we have grounds. whether or not we appeal, whether or not we consider the issue of immunity with kelly and stepien still gives us plenty of opportunity to continue the investigation. there are a number of individuals the committee would like to bring before it for oral testimony. we now have a foundation of thousands of pages of documents in which we can ask significant questions of some of the individuals who watched this happen. they may not have been the people who orchestrated it. they may not even have been the peep who authorized it, but they are the people who were involved in watching the meetings take place, the conversations take place, and that would be very constructive for the committee. >> is that something that you would expect to happen within the next few days or weeks? >> i think we would start that process in may. right now, the legislature is on a, what we call, a budget break.

so the budget committee is working very hard on crafting a budget. but when we come back into session in may, i think it's an opportunity for the committee to start bringing individuals in, one by one, to start asking substantiative questions about who knew what when, and to really develop the body of information even further. fundamentally, rachel, what we need to know, beyond the fact that bridget kelly sent this e-mail, we still don't know why she sent it. the gibson report tries to create this image of a woman scorned, which is absolute hogwash. we know there's some motivating factor, we don't know what it is, we need to get to it. >> john wisniewski, cochair of the investigation in the new jersey legislature into the chris christie investigation and the bridge lane scandal, thank you for clearing this up tonight and helping us understand it, thank you. >> rachel, thank you very much. >> it's interesting, this will be reported in the next 24 hours as sort of a devastating blow to the committee's investigation. this will be closing up the legislative investigation that

told us all we knew about christiegate so far or bridgegate so far. from talking to john wisniewski there, it seems if they're about to move on to taking testimony from witnesses at the legislature, it does not sound like they are closing up shop. there is one more development to bring you in this story tonight. some reporting earlier this week suggested that a second federal prosecutor's office had become involved in this case. that in addition to the u.s. attorney in new jersey, the office of the u.s. attorney in amanda, preet bharara, had also become involved in investigating part of this scandal, the part that relates to the port authority, and specifically to its recently resigned chairman, david samson, who has a lot of alleged conflicts of interest hanging over from his time as port authority chair. well, the port authority has offices in manhattan. several weeks ago, there was news of a subpoena going to the port authority, from that second u.s. attorney's office in manhattan, so this did not seem like totally implausible news. but i can now report, we have now learned, conclusively here at msnbc, that the u.s. attorney

for the southern district of new york is not currently involved in investigating david samson. doesn't mean they won't ever be involved in investigating david samson or any other aspect of this scandal, but they are not now investigating him. so this case is all in the hands of the u.s. attorney in new jersey right now, paul fishman. more so than we ever knew before, and more so than we knew even at the beginning of the day today. watch this space.

the name of the governor of ohio is john kasich. he's been there since he got elected in 2010, and he's not that popular. if you ask ohioans whether they like their governor, 42% do say they like him, but 30% say their opinion of him is unfavorable. now, obviously, he's doing better than some folks with numbers like that, but he's not in great shape for a guy who has to run for re-election this year. one of the ways you can tell he's not in great shape is that in that same poll, this incumbent governor, john kasich, is leading his democratic challenger by only five points. and that is despite the fact that freaking 70% of ohio voters don't even know who his democratic challenger. they don't know who the person is who's running against john kasich. 70% of people in ohio have no freaking idea who ed fitzgerald is. they do not know enough about him to form an opinion on him, they say. but even though, this guy no one has heard of is polling within five points of this serving governor. imagine how it might go in ohio

if people actually figured out who this guy is and they decided that they liked him. ohio's always a big national battleground state in every election, obviously. in the 2012 election, you might remember that john kasich and ohio republicans tried very hard to cut early voting so people, in particular, could not vote early in the presidential election on the before election day. that's a very popular time for people to vote early in ohio, particularly minority voters and other democratic constituencies. and the kasich folks and the people in ohio tried to get rid of it. well, the ohio election campaign sued the state of ohio to try to make them not cut those early voting days. and the re-election campaign was successful in their lawsuit. they blocked ohio republicans from out canning the last weekend of early voting. and in ohio, in the 2012 election, turnout was strong, both in general and for early voting, including on that weekend before the election they had to fight for. and in the end, president obama won ohio by two points, and that

was the tipping point. that was the state that put him over the top to win the whole country and to win four more years in office. however, since that 2012 election, john kasich and state house republicans are still in charge of the ohio state government and they have been going hammer and tongs to make it harder to vote in ohio, ever since they lost that big one in 2012. first, they voted to reduce the number of voting machines that counties have at their voting sites. then, if you get forced to cast a provisional ballot, they made it harder for your provision ballot to get counted. then john kasich cut a bill cutting a total of six days out of the voting period. he also cut what they called the golden week in ohio, which is a week where you can register to vote and vote on the same day. then the republican secretary of state announced there would be no early voting anymore on the sunday before election day, or, indeed, on any sundays before

election day, so so much for the fight that the obama campaign had won back in 2012. the republican secretary of state also announced that there would no longer be any early voting in ohio on weeknights, so no early voting after work hours. then, they passed another new law that bans ohio counties from sending out absentee ballots. the new law says only the secretary of state, only republican john husted, can send out absentee ballots around the state, and he only has to do that if he wants to do it, and if the legislature appropriates specific money for him to do it. counties have always done that in the past, but the new law bans the counties from doing that anymore. and apparently, that was the last straw for old ed fitzgerald. he is the democrat who has almost no statewide name recognition in ohio, even though he's trying to run against john kasich. he is also, though, the county executive for the most populist county in ohio, cuyahoga county. and ed fitzgerald first announced he was going to sue

the state over all these cutbacks that the republicans have instituted against voting rights in the state over the last year and a half. and then, beyond that, he went the civil disobedience route, sort of. he had the county council, in his county, in cuyahoga county, vote for a local measure that he wrote, which said the county wouldn't comply with this new law banning them from sending out absentee ballots. the county voted on this measure that he wrote, which said, regardless of this new law that john kasich signed, cuyahoga county was going to keep sending out those absentee ballots just like they always had. and that's where it got really interesting, because the republicans in the ohio legislature decided to retaliate against him. they introduced legislation a few days ago which would punish any county in ohio that sent out absentee ballot applications. it would withhold 10% of state money from that lix election if any county did like ed fitzgerald said they were going to do.

in response, ed fitzgerald said, oh, yeah?! he called a press conference saying that cuyahoga would not back down, would not change its plan, would not be intimidated. then he wrote to the u.s. attorney in ohio and to the attorney general of the united states, saying, please investigate the attacks on voting rights here in ohio by the republicans in state government. this is unconscionable what they're doing and what they are now threatening us with. and you know what? the republicans in ohio blinked. they backed down. they pulled their bill that would have punished the counties by taking that money away. and governor john kasich and the republican secretary of state both said, yeah, okay, republicans in the legislature probably shouldn't do that. we won't go ahead with this bill. so, cuyahoga county, your county executive apparently just saved one part of your voting rights, by fighting really hard for it. and if you're just learning this about him, because of this fight, that he picked and he won with republicans in the state capital, and if you like that he

picked that fight and that he won it for you, then he would probably also like you to remember, now and at least for the rest of this year, that his name is ed fitzgerald and he is a democrat and he is running for governor against john kasich. and that is the story of name recognition the earned way.

the governor of south carolina, in 1802, published this book, "a view of south

carolina as respects her natural and civil concerns." one of the natural concerns the governor wrote about are these fossils that were dug up in 1725 by a group of slaves outside of charleston, south carolina. he describes these fossils as the grinders of an elephant. turns out those grinders were the very first fossils found in north america, and they did not belong to an elephant, they belonged to a mighty, mighty woolly mammoth. and that has new, eye-popping relevance to some news out of south carolina tonight that you probably will not believe, but i swear, it is true. and that story is coming up. stay with us. [ aniston ] when people ask me what i'm wearing, i tell them aveeno®.

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before i came here today, i stopped at zingerman's, which is the -- which is the right thing to do when you're in an arbor. i stopped for two reasons. the first is, the reuben is killer. so i ordered like the small, and it didn't look that small. i so i gave half to valerie jarrett, who's traveling with

us, and then after i finished the half, i wanted the half back. but it was too late. it was too late! all she had left was the pickle. so i took the pickle. >> that was president obama speaking last week in michigan, having a really good time, apparently. that was the day after the house republicans introduced the newest version of the paul ryan budget. and the president was not only delighted about that, he was very, very eager to talk about it that day that he was in such a good mood. >> if this all sounds familiar, it should sound familiar, because it was their economic plan in the 2012 campaign. it was their economic plan in 2010. it's like that movie, "groundhog day." except it's not funny.

if they tried -- if they tried to sell this sandwich at zingerman's, they would have to call it the stink burger, or the meanwich. >> he's like, did somebody really put that in my teleprompter. a mean burger, a stink burger, a meanwich. president obama, and all the democrats, frankly, loved running against the paul ryan budget in 2012, even before mitt romney delighted the democrats by choosing the actual paul ryan to be his running mate for that election, democrats, even before then, were already running against paul ryan's budget for the 2012 elections. and since mitt romney and paul ryan did not win the 2012 elections, and therefore paul ryan kept his seat in congress on the house budget committee,

he is still, now, year over year, introducing new versions of what democrats have long reveled in calling some version of a meanwich. among other things, like it always does, mr. ryan's budget would cut taxes for millionaires, it would cut food stamps by over $100 billion over the next decade. that's why democrats look forward to paul ryan's budget every year. it's not just that they dislike it, as policy. they think it is a political nightmare for republicans. that it makes republicans who vote for it look very bad. and that's why democrats enjoy it when he enrolls it out every year. but here's thing, though. the overall point of the stink burger and meanwich speech, that president obama gave last week in michigan, it was not just to make fun of the paul ryan budget and to try to make republicans embarrassed to vote for it. the overall point of that speech was to make the case for raising the minimum wage. that minimum wage speech in michigan was on wednesday, then a few days later, on monday of this week, he was back again before another young audience, this time at a high school in maryland, talking about that

same suspect, this time the minimum wage. and in a remarkable bit of timing, after the president gave that maryland speech, praising maryland democrats and the maryland democratic governor, martin o'malley, for trying to raise the minimum wage in that state. after the president encouraged him to keep at it and give maryland a raise, in a remarkable bit of timing, as the motorcade was rolling out of maryland after that presidential speech, the maryland legislature did, in fact, do exactly what he was telling them to do. they did pass that raise. and so they are going up to $10.10 an hour over the next four years. the first rise will happen in eight months and the rest will happen after that. maryland's the second state to have raised its minimum wage in recent weeks. connecticut also raised their minimum wage to $10.10 three weeks ago. lawmakers in hawaii and minnesota and massachusetts are right now hammering out the final details for raising the minimum wage for their states. those arguments are all but done in those three states.

and this is all just in the last month. there is movement on this issue. and, yeah, these are all blue states. at least bluish states. connecticut, maryland, hawaii, minnesota, massachusetts. but as republicans in these states are not going along with what democrats are doing in this effort. and as republicans in washington are not going along with what democrats are doing for this effort, federally, either, while republicans in washington are voting to cut food stamps instead, turns out that one great way to actually cut what we spend on food stamps, one way to cut food stamps that democrats would enthusiastically agree to, would be to raise the minimum wage. because these two policies are related. democrats want to raise the minimum wage, republicans want to cut food stamps. turns out that doing one accomplishes the other. and it makes sense, right? people getting paid poverty wages qualify for food stamps because they're getting paid poverty wages. if you raise the amount of money they get paid, they get paid more and they no longer have to use food stamps to get by.

they analyzed raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, to what maryland just adopted and what the president wants for the whole country. they calculate that raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour would cut costs on food stamps for nearly $50 billion over the next decade, so we wouldn't have as many poor people in this country and they wouldn't have to get food stamps. so $50 million over the next decade. and the paul ryan budget wants to cut more than that. but here's a way for them to get half the way there. and nearly every democrat in the country would be on board with it. and no one from either side of the aisle would ever have a reason to call it a stink burger or a meanwich or to use that policy to beat up on each other ever again. is that too easy? of course that's too easy. joining us now for the interview is the man who heads the federal cabinet level agency, in which the food stamp program and a lot more resides.

he's been our nation's secretary of agriculture in both terms of the obama administration, secretary tom vilsack. thank you for being here. >> rachel, it's good to be with you. >> what do you make of this emerging argument that if we did raise the minimum wage, that there would be less spending on food stamps? does that seem right to you? >> absolutely. when you raise the minimum wage, you raise wages for 28 million americans. about 50% of those americans make less than $35,000 a year. a substantial percentage of those folks live in rural communities that i care deeply about. you raise those wages, you are absolutely going to move people out of the need for s.n.a.p., or as much s.n.a.p. as they've been currently receiving, the food stamps. so absolutely, it's going to save $46 billion, as the american center for progress indicated. it is a no-brainer and it is the right thing to do. you know, the purchasing power of the minimum wage has been diminished considerably over my lifetime. to the point now where every single year, we lose a percent or a percent and a half of purchasing power. that's 250 bucks for each family.

if you don't raise the minimum wage this year and do it next year, they will have lost $250 of purchasing power this year. that's a month worth of groceries for many families. >> in terms of food stamps and its role in the overall debate in washington, one of the reasons i wanted to talk about paul ryan introducing a similar version, at least, of his same budget every year and that becoming the republican template, is because he aims really squarely at food stamps, as if food stamps is a scandal. and obviously, that budget doesn't pass. i mean, republicans always vote for it, but it never becomes law, as long as democrats have some control. but has he succeeded by being so insistent about it, in moving the debate to the right about food stamps? is the defense of food stamps getting wobblier as the republican attack on it is so sustained for so many years? >> i don't think so, because the recent farm bill, there was a conversation about potentially reducing food stamps by $40 billion. that didn't go anywhere and it ended up being a very small reduction and many governors around the country are figuring

out how to avoid that reduction. it's not very successful and 63% of people receiving food stamps are either a child, a person with a disability, or a senior citizen. add the 7% that are veterans, and you have nearly three quarters of the people receiving food stamps, not any politician is going to want to cut support for children, for senior citizens, for people with disabilities and very veterans. and 42% of food stamp recipient families are earning some kind of wage, that only 8% of all food stamp recipients are receiving cash welfare, this is really about the working poor. that's why raising the minimum wage will help move people out of s.n.a.p. and out of dependence on that food assistance program. >> the argument about that wouldn't make sense if everyone getting food stamps were employed. let me ask you about another deadlock standoff in washington that you're right in the middle of, and this is immigration. the agriculture industry,

farming industry, uses more labor by people who are here illegally, people who are here without working illegally, without documents, than any other industry in the country. how does the agriculture business, and farmers as an interest group, how do they factor into this debate? >> they are very much for comprehensive immigration reform. there has been an historic agreement between those who represent workers through the farm workers' union and agro business to advance the need for comprehensive immigration rmp. look, you want to talk about a no-brainer, how many people on the republican side of the aisle want to reduce the deficit? this will reduce the deficit by $800 billion over 20 years. how many folks want to shore up social security? this will actually extend the life of social security immigration reform. how many people want to secure the border? how many people want to make sure that we fully realize all of our potential from agriculture?

today, people are not growing what they're capable of growing, not harvesting what they're capable of harvesting, because they simply don't have enough hands to do the work. immigration reform is one of the top priorities for farm bureau, for the national farmers union, for many of the western growers association. a lot of these commodity groups realize, it is absolutely essential we get this done. >> and from the outside, we just think of, we think of the farming community, rural interest more broadly, but the farming industry and agriculture business as being such a republican key constituency, but their views on this issue are something the republicans felt very comfortable ignoring. >> not just those folks, but also the evangelical church leaders understand that there is a biblical responsibility from their perspective so take care of folks who are in need. and they see this as a moral issue. so it's an economic issue, it's a deficit reduction issue, it's an agricultural issue, and a moral issue. >> secretary of agricultural, tom vilsack, thank you very much

for being here tonight. always nice to see you. >> thank you. >> thanks. we'll be right back. stay with us. i will light up every room i walk into.

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okay. this is an amazing story. washington, d.c. is divided into quadrants, from the u.s. capitol dome at the center point, the city streets are divided into southwest, northwest, northeast, and southeast. and in southeast washington, d.c. on the corner of 1st street and f street southeast, someone found a fossil.

january of 1898, they think it was a potential ancestor of the tyrannosaurus.

menu that feature the state symbols, state spider, plaid, striped bass. the official beverage is milk. official state hospitality beverage is tea. but olivia looking at the menu, noticed there was no official state fossil. and so, this science interested 8-year-old, olivia mcconnell wrote a letter state law makers asking them to sponsor a bill to make the wooly mammoth, the official state fossil of south carolina. she came up with three reasons for that. wooly mammoth teeth were dug up in 1875. all but seven states have an official state fossil. why shouldn't south carolina? number three. quoting olivia, quote, fossils tell us about our past. yes, olivia, that is true.

well done. signed, please work on this for me. your friend, olivia. both south carolina lawmakers did work on it for her. introduced a bill on her behalf in the south carolina legislature to in fact make the wooly mammoth south carolina's official fossil. the bill passed in the house. introduced a bill on her behalf in the south carolina legislature to in fact make the wooly mammoth south carolina's official fossil. the bill passed in the house. moved off to the senate. in the senate things went horribly awry. one republican senator decided that the state fossil bill was offensive to him. so senator kevin bryant pro posed amending the bill to make the bill not about fossils

telling us about our past but more about fossils telling us about senator kevin bryant. the official bill basically said wooly mammoth will be our official state fossil. amended it, adding three verses from the book of genesis in the bible. the law would say wooly mammoth would be our fossil, let god bring forth a creature after his kind, cattle and creeping thing, and so god made the beast of the earth after his kind and cattle after their kind and everything that creep on the earth after his kind and god saw that it was good, and god saw everything that he had made. it was good. and the evening and the morning were the sixth day. so, the wooly mammoth is our state fossil. from where the woolly mammoth came from. and the book of genesis does tell the story like that. and senator kevin bryant and many other people believe that

that is not an allegory, but the literal truth of the creation of animal life on this planet. it is everybody's right to believe whatever they want to. but this is also state law. and the local paper of the state. and so if you believe that the book of genesis is literally true and not an allegory and the earth is only 6,000 years old, then you do not believe in the woolly mammoth. you do not believe what was dug up in the 1700s was a 10,000-year-old thing. you don't believe there are any 10,000-year-old things. you don't believe in fossils. and, if you've don't believe that fossils are real things, then what on earth are you doing writing the state law about establishing the official fossil of your state? i mean there are people who believe the earth is flat. that's awesome. more power to you. you would not hire a person who believed that to captain your sailing vessel for an around the world trip. the dude was be flipping a turn at the end of the world, right. this is, this is the flip turn

at the end of the world. state legislature. olivia has to work with. this is her home state. the original amendment adding those three verses from the book of genesis, that amendment did get pulled out of the bill on a procedural technicality. the senator who wanted the language didn't give up. he revised his language. the colombian mammoth created on the sixth day with beasts of the field is designated as official state fossil of south carolina. and must officially be referred to as the columbian mammoth which was created on the sixth day with the beasts of the field. that's what passed the south carolina senate. this science interested third grader wanted her state to have a fossil. found up with legislatures trying to enshrine, the wooly mammoth wiz created by god on the sixth day of the week. along with the beasts of the field.

at least 4,000 years earlier than any of this could feasibly have happened. aren't you glad you got involved in politics? when this whole thing started apparently, she wanted to grow up to be a scientist. we pray. are you ready grandma? just a second, sweetie. [ female announcer ] we eased your back pain, you turned up the fun. tylenol® provides strong pain relief while being gentle on your stomach. but for everything we do, we know you do so much more. tylenol®. we know you do so much more. [ female announcer ] some people like to pretend a flood could never happen to them. and that their homeowners insurance protects them. [ thunder crashes ]

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[ female announcer ] neutrogena® pore refining cleanser. alpha-hydroxy and exfoliating beads work to clean and tighten pores so they can look half their size. pores...shrink 'em down to size! [ female announcer ] pore refining cleanser. neutrogena®. programming note, this show will not be seen on friday night. this coming friday night so we can bring you something that we are very, very, proud of. on friday night we'll air our documentary called why we did it. you may have heard liz cheney a few days ago snarked, rand paul gets his talking points on war on rachel maddow. hope you will watch it.

we worked on for a long time. now time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. kaufman. good thursday morning everyone. right now on "first look," stabbing rampage. a 16-year-old boy is charged with stabbing 21 at his pennsylvania high school. we're live on the scene. day care nightmare. a driver cuts off another vehicle that slams into a day-care. one child dead at least a dozen injured. a medical helicopter's harrowing accident and an invisibility cloak for greater visibility beneath the hood of your suv. thanks for joining us, i'm betty nguyen. a random and horrific