there's not one way to do something. no details too small. american express open forum. this is what membership is. this is what membership does. something weird happen in the capitol today. a genuine real life bill signing happening in our congress. it wasn't a major bill or big ticket reform. just a small jobs packet with small funding for job training. still, though, if you follow politics, if you like the idea of our government working, it's a welcomed sight. it's not what we usually get from this republican house. this is a body that has settled on being against everything obama no matter what. >> this week we're passing two more bills that would encourage businesses to invest and to create jobs here in america. now, compare all this to the president's tone deaf celebration of our struggling economy yesterday. we'll talk about being out of

touch. middle class families continue to struggle with high prices on everything from gas, to groceries, to health care. that's why house republicans passed nearly 40 jobs bills that are currently being blocked by senate democrats. we've seen enough of senate gridlock. the president should join us in pushing the senate for more action. >> nearly 40 jobs bills. wow. there are a lot of partisan republican bills that do die after leaving the house, while even moderate bipartisan bills that pass the senate tend to die over in the house. you know the pattern. so you get a bipartisan immigration reform bill out of the senate and that dies in the house. or you get a party line budget from the house which has no shot in the senate. but after patting themselves on the back for that jobs bill today, house republicans may have hit another different new low. now the house can't even stand by the bills that it has passed in the very same congress.

a year ago this month, house republicans pushed something called the authority for mandate delay act. right there. the bill sought to delay obamacare's requirement that employers provide health coverage by one year. almost every republican in the house voted for that. 9 l% of the caucus going on record with the stance if they couldn't appeal obamacare, they should at least delay parts of it. a year later, houses gop leaders are calling for the exact opposite this week. and this reversal isn't just playing out on the house floor, itself. it's apparently so important to speaker boehner that he's actually suing the president over the delay. recall, of course, conservatives spent months on a very long list of claims about the president overstepping his executive authorities in some way. when the president signed a climate change order, they called it a sweeping takeover. when the president laid out that executive order on guns, the republicans called it a power grab. when he signed that minimum wage order for federal contractors, a pretty popular thing, by the way, they said it was a terrible policy that would hurt workers

by paying them more and outside his authority. there were op-peds detailing the many times this imperial presidency had overreached. some from the very lawyers republicans were consulting with for this new lawsuit that we're hearing all about. now they say he was gutting large swaths of federal laws from immigration, to welfare reform, to education. he's even legalizing pot. >> are you planning to initiate a lawsuit against the obama administration and president obama over his use of executive actions? >> i am. the constitution makes it clear that the president's job to faithfully execute the laws. in my view, the president has not faithfully executed the laws. >> all righty. but in the end, the only thing worth its day in or the, apparently, according to john boehner is the president's delayed implementation of one

piece of obamacare. a delay republicans recently supported. but there is a silver lining to all of this gop self-contradictory phases of resistance followed by acceptance. they did go from trying to stop all of obamacare to voting to repeal all of obamacare, to voting to delay part of obamacare, to now suing to protest that same delay of that same part of obamacare. and that amounts to, yes, a softening of their position. and while it's no surprise that their much hyped lawsuit is hypocritical and you could say, hey, there's plenty of hypocrisy in all politics, i think there's a reason the politics and the message from the gop is shifting here. there have been waves of good news and verifiable progress for obamacare, and that's driving a factual undertoe to republican midterm politics. the fact is obamacare is working. and among people with access to its benefits including republican voters, the fact is it's very popular. the law was designed to reduce the uninsured. it was designed to specifically target groups of americans that struggle to get health for structural reasons.

get health care. poor people. young people. and the unsteady job market. and people facing discrimination. as you can see, the uninsured rate is crashing. a new report from the commonwealth fund finds that the law is expanding insurance specifically to those groups it was supposed to help. and in states where obamacare is actually being fully implemented with the medicaid funding, the improvements are swift. and they are profound. unfortunately, in states where republicans have prevented citizens from getting the available funding, you can see there on the right, there's almost no improvement. how's this all playing out? despite the right's best efforts that we all know about to delegitimize and to stigmatize the very idea of expanding health care, and despite admittedly a news environment that often treats any obamacare glitch as a juicy political scandal while ignoring the more consequential falling aggregate rates of the uninsured, despite all of that, americans who actually experience obamacare's benefits, they like it. again, looking at this new commonwealth report. the vast majority of people with new coverage are pretty satisfied with it.

and unlike so many other matters of opinion in american today, we looked at this today. when you break out those numbers by partisanship, independents, democrats, and republicans, they all overwhelmingly like their new coverage. so while republican politicians and conservative elites may still rail against certain parts of obamacare, they can see in these numbers their own rank and file voters are liking it just fine. and that is the background for this meager, ugly, oddly, unambitious lawsuit that speaker boehner unveiled. the steady plotting and imperfect surge in the health insurance rate in america is not always an easy story to tell. it doesn't always grab attention in washington. but it is having plenty of impact around the nation every day.

that's good news. and it's not because it leaves the republicans on the wrong side of this debate. though that's where they are. some i think are realizing. it's not good news because it proves the president right. it's good news because getting more americans health coverage is good for america. and among people who have it, it's very popular. so why did republicans house this issue of all their complaints about this so-called much ballyhooed imperial obama presidency as the one they want to go to court with? joining us now, ryan grim, washington bureau chief for the "huffington post." ryan, good friday evening to you. what gives? why this focus on this one part of obamacare? >> well, it's an instance where they can look like they're above partisan politics for a second which is extremely difficult given the situation where they are, you know, a partisan part that controls one chamber of congress and they're suing another branch of the government without the other chamber. that's one thing we have to remember. this is not a constitutional crisis where you have congress suing the executive.

you have just one branch of it without any support from the other party. so if they say, well, we're doing it because he didn't follow the letter of this law that we don't even like, then there's some plausible argument that they can say, look, we're kind of above politics here, and what they're saying is that the house of representatives passed this law. it was a democratic house of representatives. so they're trying to stand up for a democratic house of representatives. all that, of course, is getting lost in the reality that it's just pure politics and trying to stave off this palin-led impeachment crowd. >> right. when you talk about the impeachment crowd or imperial presidency, you had these other complaints. why don't you think they made it to the final cut of this much-promoted suit? >> that's a good question. i don't think he wanted too much attention on the particulars of this issue. i don't think he's particularly proud of this.

i don't think he wants this to be his legacy. >> speaker boehner? >> speaker boehner. >> uh-huh. >> if he genuinely did believe that the president violated his oath of office, there is a remedy articulated in the constitution that is available to him and it is the one palin is pushing for. it's impeachment. clearly he doesn't believe that's a good idea. he has said as much publicly. that clashes directly with what he's saying. if he believes he violated his oath, then he should impeach him. it's really as simple as that. and they say, you know, they say in their suit that there's no other option for them that they can take, and that's one of the tests that they have to meet. but that option does exist for them. they just realize that it's insanity, so they're not going to take it. >> yeah, and it's hard to see why implementation scuffling over the timeline would be a high crime, a misdemeanor. walk us through that timeline.

what would happen if they do proceed, if they are found to have standing and get somewhere in the court with this? how does it go down if they progress? >> you know, this is an interesting case because you have different incentives from different parties here. in other words, both parties here would probably just like to see this sit there and languish. you know, john boehner does not want any type of summary judgment on this. he doesn't want this moved with any quickness. he'd like this to last well into 2015 so that by the time it finally does get dismissed, then they can hem and haw about whether or not they're going to appeal that. you know, by the time they finally exhaust all their remedies, you're kind of into the presidential election at which point the hope among republicans is that there's no actually no appetite or realistic ability for impeachment anymore because he's going to be gone any minute so they can move on. you'll notice that's not a very well thought through plan, and that's kind of typical of how the house republicans have been holding on to power over the last couple years. just day-to-day, week-to-week. you know, their famous plan "b" over new year's is probably the best example. >> sure.

>> this is what we're going to do, plan "b" on the floor and a couple hours later they were like, oh, wait, we don't actually have the votes for that. >> right. ryan, at least when the dog chases the car, it's just a dog so it doesn't know whether it wants the car, but if you're, like, a functioning political party, you should figure out whether you want the car. it's the same with the benghazi committee. they set this whole thing up and don't know what to do with it. >> that's the problem. you have to be very careful that you might actually catch the car. you know, they caught the car, so to speak, last october when they shut the government down. and the car backed over them. and it was a bloody mess for them. and so they were able to then buy another couple months and tamp down the sort of conservative insurgency here. but now here they are back on the road, chasing the car again. just desperately hoping that they don't catch it. >> yeah. and i want to do more with the car analogy, but we are out of time. ryan grim, washington bureau chief for the "huffington post." thank you very much. a good evening to you.

>> you got it. a fight everyone in congress says they want to do something about but are they capable of it? first, one more thing about the fallout from the affordable care act. whoopi goldberg and mel brooks surprisingly have something pretty phenomenal in common. they have both e-got it or have e-gots meaning as many of you know, they have won all big four big-time entertainment awards, emmy, grammy, oscar, and a tony. now, believe it or not, president barack obama who has two grammys for the audio versions of his books, this week got a little closer to e-got it. >> i have to know, what is it like to be the last black president? >> seriously? what's it like for this to be the last time you ever talk to a president? >> must kind of stink, though, that you can't run three times. >> actually i think it's a good idea. you know, if i ran a third time, it would be sort of like doing a third "hangover" movie. didn't really work out very well, did it? >> is it going to be hard in two years when you're no longer president and people will stop letting you win at basketball?

>> how does it feel having a three-inch vertical. >> it's a three-inch horizontal. so -- you know what i would do if i were president, mr. president? i would make same-sex divorce illegal then see how bad they want it. >> i think that's why you're not president. and that's a good thing. >> you said if you had a son, you would not let him play football. what makes you think that he would want to play football? what if he was a nerd like you? >> do you think a woman like michelle would marry a nerd? why don't you ask her whether she thinks i'm a nerd. >> could i? >> no. i'm not going to let her near you. >> that appearance you may remember, a stunt for the president to plug the healthcare.gov website, was pretty successful. it was viewed 22 million times to date. and it not only got him a huge boost in signups on the health care website, it also got the president this emmy nod just this week. now only the executive producers of the comedian, but if they win, i thing we can call it a by-proxy win for president

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take them on the way you always have. live healthy and take one a day men's 50+. a complete multivitamin with 7 antioxidants to support cell health. age? who cares. the current congress is bad at passing legislation. the 113th congress has passed fewer pieces of legislation than any other session in modern history. the "washington post" recently noted the inaction is so acute that even annoys some those i hate government members of the government.

as they put it, it takes a law to repeal a law. amen, brother. yet while this congress is terrible at actually doing stuff, they still find ways to do the symbolic stuff. they are politicians, after all. it can make for an awkward combination. there was that well-meaning ceremony in the capitol rotunda a few weeks ago celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 1964 civil rights act. it was awkward in two ways. it was traditionally awkward because i guess, look, see for yourself. ♪ >> don't, don't judge them, you guys. that's what a congressional singalong looks like. but that awkward part doesn't

really matter. let's be fair. the other awkward part is important. it's the politically awkward thing where you can't back up your ceremonial tribute with policy. so while there was time for that photo op celebrating the 1960 civil rights protest, perfectly fine, neither the senate or house has held a vote yet on renewing the voting rights act which many of those protesters marched and fought for. congress is good at doing things just for show, and just stomaching the awkwardness even when it curls into outright hypocrisy. every so often all that symbolism does catch up with politician and can even help drive action, real congressional action. it's the rarest of things. it's happened even in this congress. during the 2012 election, the republicans insists over and over they were the party for women despite legitimate rape stuff and war on woman thing and said that was made up by democrats, a myth, insisted what

women needed to do was stop being bamboozled by democrats and realize the gop would stand up for them. they did all that and there was a shock. after the election, house republicans did follow through on symbolism with real action. shortly after the election, the house did pass the violence against women act. now, it did get a minority of gop votes, but still, speaker boehner brought it to the floor, breaking his much named hasstert rule, and it passed. once in a great while, symbolic congressional action transforms or creates pressure for actual action, for law making. it happens more rarely than ever before. it's happened in this session of congress, and the question is, can it happen again? are we seeing it happen when it comes to the acute crisis that we've all been looking at at the border with those tens of thousands of young children and their parents crossing into this country, many, mostly from

central america, turning themselves over to border guards and begging for some kind of humanitarian assistance? the magnitude of the crisis has overwhelmed our legal capacity. just the nation's physical capacity to detain these children in a humane way and process them efficiently or get them through the system in a legally binding set of rules that have to be followed. all of that has broken down. the white house is requesting a $3.7 billion bill that would provide emergency funds, much for granular and specific purposes. to deal with the surge of people at the border. requests like $116 million for transportation. overtime pay for those overworked border patrol agents. 40 additional immigration judge teams. a media campaign in the countries where much of this crisis is originating to make sure people understand that children are not safe on this voyage and will likely be sent home. now, republicans say they want this crisis dealt with asap, they want it dealt with yesterday and spent the week asking the president to focus on something congress knows all about. another symbolic gesture. demanding, as you may have

heard, that he visit the border. the president's response has been to take a page out of that playbook that helped get the vote on the violence against women act. to invoke the other side's symbolism in the hopes of pushing, shaming this house into holding a vote. so we're at a fork in the road here, and there are some signs this strategy might even work. behind closed doors, house speaker john boehner told his republican colleagues this week they should act on the spending bill before the august recess. republican congresswoman hal rogers, told reporters he thinks $3.7 billion is too much, the house will act on portions of the emergency request before recess. there are pieces that need to be dealt with immediately, he said. what is happening right now on the border is not a question of broad policy debates. it's an emergency which requires congressional funding for things like vans and the overtime hours, and those legal teams we

mentioned. the crisis will not go away with congress ignores it while republicans say it needs to be dealt with immediately. look, there are 12 work days now before the august recess. will there be action here to catch up with all the symbolism? joining me now, john stanton, washington bureau chief for buzzfeed.com. good friday night to you, sir. that is the question here. 12 days and something approaching unity on the idea that this matters, this is urgent, that this is important, does the president get some kind of vote? >> well, the president's plan won't get a vote, but parts of it could see some action on the floor of the house. like you said, some of the money for overtime or some basic stuff going on on the border. there is some talk republicans won't vote on anything but come up with their own proposal they would sort of put out there that would have funding but also have strings attached to that. that would be changes to the 2008 asylum law which made it these children from central

america are automatically put into the asylum process. that could be changed or at least ask for that. other maybe border patrol, border security kinds of measures. so it's a little unclear now. republicans have a little bit of space, because frankly democrats are a bit divided about what they want to do on this. they're in a wait and see pattern i think. >> what would be the problem with altering the 2008 law? that passed on bipartisan lines at a time when there was just far fewer families trying to come over the border. and so there wasn't the kind of pressure we're seeing on the system. >> well the problem, though, for progressives and members of, say, the hispanic caucus have raised is that if you change that law, that means you're going to have these kids going home much more quickly and want to try to find ways to keep at least some of them in the country because they believe

that the circumstances to which they're living in places like el salvador, honduras, or other parts of central america, are so bad that they deserve to get asylum in the united states. they don't want to see mass deportations of the children. and if they change the law, particularly they make it maybe retroactive, we're going to see much quicker deportations which is what the white house would like, frankly, and some of the moderate members, democratic party would like, and republicans are for. you know, and so there is this battle going on sort of behind the scenes between democrats. >> yeah, from a policy prospective, though, you're putting your finger on the most difficult part which i actually don't think is very political. it's the fact that in an effort to do something good in that original bill, as we know is bipartisan, because there was agreement that people are generally eligible for asylum, minors, we have a heart for them. yet at an international level it seems apparent that has created some kind of incentive combined with rumors that has made the

problem worse. >> that's right. i think, you know, there is this longstanding tradition, frankly, with the coyotes that bring people up that will say, oh, if you go at this certain time of the year or get in soon, you know, you'll be able to stay no matter what. certainly this law has, i think, probably contributed to that. certainly some of the talk about the doca and allowing the dreamers to stay has fueled that. whether or not it's true, it's sort of besides the point, frankly. you know, they're saying this to these families. the families are desperate. they need to get their children out, they believe. they're worried they're going to die. so they hand them over to these coyotes. >> right. on the politics, though, as you were saying when we started, if there are literally no votes, that's got to hurt some of these republicans because they've made a big deal out of this. >> well, it depends, frankly. they're going to go into the august recess and start going to town halls and put out a proposal that requires a lot of new strengthening of border security and changes that law but does have the funding in it and kick it to the senate or say web we come back in september, we're going to vote on this. if they're able to take that to their voters, in a lot of their

districts they're going to have a lot of support for that. they're looking at their elections which are different than the national election or statewide election. for them that could actually end up being a bonus. at least in this election cycle. >> right. you're saying that might help them in the short run and in some of these districts. yet there is something so cynical about clambering for the president to do a photo op, asap going to the border and not doing your own job of holding the votes. john stanton for buzzfeed. thanks for your time tonight. >> good to be here. given its pristine record of fair, undisputed elections, how is it possible that anyone would take issue with how the state of florida elects its members of congress? we have the details, straight ahead. ere's a gap out there. that's keeping you from the healthcare you deserve. at humana, we believe if healthcare changes, if frustration and paperwork decrease... the gap begins to close. so let's simplify things. let's close the gap between people and care.

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we don't currently have a draft in this country. the u.s. military, which is deployed all around the world is an all-volunteer force, even though there's no draft, though, there is, of course, still a draft board. all men age 18 to 25 do have to register with the feds just in case the draft might ever be brought back. you're supposed to register with the selective service system. and if you fail to do so, the draft board still will come after you. last month, the draft board came after a pennsylvania man named fred minnick, they said, failed to register for the draft. failure to register is an offense punishable by a fine for imprisonment. if he were still alive would be 120 years old. born in 1894. that letter was received earlier this month by his daughter who's now in her 80s. mr. minnick is one of 14,000 men in pennsylvania alone born in the 1800s, all informed by the

federal government they have failed to register for the draft and are now facing that potential jail time. it turns out when the pennsylvania department of transportation passed along records from their database to the draft board, a computer operator entered 93-97 instead of 1993 to 1997 so it spewed out all males in the database born from 1893 to 1897 and from the '90s. a spokesman for the agency said, hey, we made a mistake. this just wasn't good. we do apologize. among those receiving the draft letters were military veterans, themselves, including some from world war i. but there is one veteran of the revolutionary war who is also now the subject of the federal government's attention. it is for a fascinating reason. and that story's coming up. once there was a girl who never settled for ordinary...

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♪ da-da-da-da-da, bum-da, bum-da ♪ ♪ bum-da, bum-da ♪ the animals went in two by two ♪ ♪ the sheep and the frog and the kangaroo ♪ ♪ and they all went marching, marching in two by two ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] the nissan pathfinder, with intuitive four-wheel drive. an adventure worth sharing. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪ [ male announcer ] if you want to hear how their day went, serve manwich. and wait til they come up for air. [ laughs ] [ male announcer ] hold on. it's manwich. after the 2010 census, it was time to redraw virginia's congressional map. republicans wanted to give eric cantor an edge. packing more republican voters into his district. then the house's number two republican would be in an even

safer ticket. great idea, right? not exactly. as you know, despite republicans' best efforts to pick their constituents to suit their agenda, the voters actually had ideas of their own. they decided cantor wasn't conservative enough and last month they tossed him out of office picking a little known tea party college professor, dave brat. gerrymandering, redrawing a district to shape election outcomes, was a big flop for cantor. but you can see why he tried it. brazen political redistricting has helped the gop keep control of the house. this is important. regardless of what voters might prefer in many parts of the country. you wouldn't know it from looking at the house today, but it was actually democrats who got 470,000 more votes than republicans in 2012 house races. yet republicans didn't just eke out a majority. they won 35 more seats in the house.

this is the kind of thing that turns people off of politics or makes you wonder how's this even legal? the supreme court has largely stayed out of partisan redistricting fights. gerrymandering does not have to be legal, however. it is still up to the states. some have decided that voters should be picking the politicians, which also, as you can see from these examples means picking their districts. citizen committees handling redistricting in states like california and arizona. and when you see congressional districts shaped like this, or this, or this, i mean, these are absurd. you an see why citizens are confident that all on their own, they can draw better and less politicized organic districts than these self-interested politicians. florida voters had the same concern, and they amended their constitution in 2010 to ban lawmakers from using redistricting for partisan gain. in other words, they set a tougher standard than the current supreme court has set. the next round of redistricting would test that standard. gop lawmakers unveiled

suspicious new districts that looked a lot like the suspicious old districts. but now unlike, say, the 4 2 other states that allow this, florida through the new rule had a way to patrol the abuse and legal women voters led a challenge to those republican districts arguing the gop was using a shadow process, orchestrating behind the scenes and using political operatives to make the legislature approve a map that simply favored republicans. and the league won. last night, a state judge threw out two congressional districts completely, ruling that, yes, gop operatives had conspired to manipulate redistricting by drawing maps for partisan gain and improperly packed black voters into certain areas. the judge, terry lewis, said while redistricting may be a mild interest to many observers, it's a high stakes, zero-sum battle that can determine who controls the u.s. government. and that patrolling the process goes to the foundation of our representative democracy. it was those high stakes he found that led florida gop

operatives to conduct an elaborate astroturf campaign trying to make it look like ordinary citizens just happened to back those suspicious district maps that favored the gop and how operatives wrote scripts for people to attend public hearings and said, yeah, they wanted the gop-friendly maps and then later legislators destroyed e-mails and other evidence of communication regarding the redistricting process. judge lewis ruled that because of all this, those two politically gerrymandered districts, district 5 and 10, have to be redrawn, which means other districts around the area might also have to be redrawn. as he wrote, "if there's a problem with a part of the map, there is a problem with the entire plan." he was talking, of course, about florida's map. that is what the case was. when you dig into this backroom process, an electoral fight that can have bigger consequences than our actual elections, you realize he could have been talking about most of the u.s. map. and if we want a functioning

democracy where the side with more votes actually gets to win. when you think back to those 2012 maps, you start to think, hmm, maybe more states need a mechanism to patrol partisan gerrymandering. they need a rule that you can enforce. you know, i never thought i'd say this, but it's one part of election law where we should actually look to florida as an example. gulp. joining us now is deirdre macnab, president of the league of women voters of florida. miss macnab, thank you for being here tonight. >> good evening, ari. it's a pleasure. >> tell me, did you get everything you wanted in the ruling and does it help actually prevent this abuse going forward? >> ari, we were very pleased with the ruling. i would say we were, in fact, thrilled. this is a major win for the

florida voters yesterday. and we think it's also exciting because it sets a very important precedent for the nation and so many other states that are grappling with the devastating impact of gerrymandering. >> what is that precedent? >> the precedent is we were able to get -- this was a citizen-led petition drive that took a number of years. we were able to get two amendments in our state constitution that set very clear rules for the legislators in terms of how the districts would be drawn so they could to longer put into place incumbent protection plans making sure that they were re-elected over and over again. what happened in yesterday's court decision was basically it was very -- it was made very clear to the legislature that those amendments have teeth. and they must, in fact, follow them. so this is thrilling news for florida voters. this has been, i will tell you, a 72-year battle for the league

of women voters. it was the very first issue that our members seized on when we began the organization in the state of florida, and it has been an issue that has been so important. our members have never stopped at any point. and we are just so excited to see these amendments in the constitution and to see the decisiveness of the court ruling yesterday. >> yeah, you say decisive. you say that it had teeth. that really comes through in reading this ruling. a real rejection of what republicans were doing down there. also i want to read more from it. the judge said redistricting was done with the intent of benefiting the republican party, but also importantly, "to enable it usually to defeat the candidates preferred by minorities." it was a reference to the fact that some of these districts were drawn to actually cabin or cage or limit black voters to a certain area. can you walk us through the significance of that? and why if people don't

understand that immediately, hey, why was the republican party trying to push around where black voters would ultimately vote? >> well, ari, when these amendments were drafted, they were drafted with great care and very -- a lot of thoughtfulness with regard to the need to really protect minority representation and not in any way diminish minority representation in the state of florida. the techniques used historically are packing minorities into large mega districts. thereby creates more of, in this case, republican districts surrounding. and that was what the judge identified in his ruling, and he used very strong language as well. and i think the judge is -- i can't improve on what the judge said. he used very strong language including conspire. he said that the legislature made a mockery of their bold assertions. and i was sitting in the

audience when they said this over and over again. this was going to be the most open and transparent redistricting process the state had ever seen. so he very kindly made note of the fact that the plaintiffs and league of women voters and other organizations worked so hard to draw the curtain back and make sure that the people of florida could see that there was a shadow process going on despite all this talk of openness and transparency and public input. >> yeah, and i think in that respect, the state has done something important. the league has obviously been enforcing it which is people feel sometimes helpless with all of the shenanigans, redistricting, gerrymandering. you have a standard, if you can enforce it, then the politicians actually can get these maps thrown out. that seems to be a victory for democracy. deirdre macnab. president of the league of women voters in florida tonight. thanks for your time. >> thank you, ari. the scariest topic in the world now with 85% less armageddon. we'll explain, next. ball yelling c'mon, you want heartburn? when your favorite food starts a fight,

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we all know "nbc nightly

news" is a real treasure, especially classic nbc news when tom brokaw was always happy to land a good pun. >> radioactive steel is a problem in other parts of the country. a big batch of the hot steel got out of a plant in mexico and into table legs among other things. now some of those legs are holding up tables in restaurants. dennis murphy tonight on the nationwide hunt for the hot legs. >> the hot legs. that segment was from february 1984. a few months after a load of junkyard metal in juarez, mexico, sparked a nuclear crisis described as somewhere between three mile island and the chernobyl disaster. >> a florida health inspector swept a miami warehouse with a geiger counter looking for metal table legs emitting radiation. in seattle inspector checked cartons of table parts. across the country from california to boston, health officials are tracking 12,000

cast iron tables. they were sold to restaurants by a company called falcon products of st. louis. the table parts were made of contaminated scrap metal from juarez, mexico. the recycled iron had been exposed to pellets of radio active cobalt 60 which had been scattered about the junkyard. >> thousands of little metal pellets that look like cake decorations than nuclear waste basically ended up in the junkyard in juarez after a handy man hauled old hospital equipment there. that old medical equipment was loaded with cobalt 60. a handyman sold it for $10 and sold it to two foundries which mixed the radioactive material into metal that was used to make rebar and table legs, among other things. 200 tons was eventually fund across 16 different states. back in mexico, 100 homes to to

be torn apart and torn down because they had been built with that radioactive rebar. as a result of that incident, the u.s. installed radiation detectors along the border with mexico. that material goes missing a lot in mexico. just this past fall, a truck carrying an old radiotherapy machine was hijacked on its way from tijuana to mexico city for disposal at a special facility for storing nuclear waste. not knowing what they had taken, they abandoned it in a field in a small farming town outside mexico city. the six men, thought to be the highjackers, were admitted to the hospital with signs of radiation facility. they used a robotic arm to recover the radioactive material. just last week, another small amount of radioactive material went missing from a stolen truck

in mexico city, only to be recovered a few hours later in both of those incidents, mexican authorities followed official protocol. they alerted the a tonic energy agency, notified border patrol. part of the concern when something like this happens is the radioactive material would be harmful to anyone who accidentally or unknowingly comes into contact with it. another major concern is it might be taken by someone trying to get their hands on highly radioactive material. so this week, when the news broke of another incident of nuclear material going loose, this time in iraq of all places, the headlines were understandably panicked. the material could be used for a the dirty bomb. sunni militants got their hands on 88 pounds of uranium compounds. that could fit into a bucket sized container. they took it from mosul where

militants had taken control. it was used for research at that university and it is thought to be low grade. the iraqi government notified the iae under the protocol and officials from the agency were able to determine that the material did not present a significant safety security or nuclear proliferation risk. but that scientific conclusion didn't reach all of america's politicians. congressman peter king of new york warned that the militants could be building a dirty bomb and he said we should be very concerned. when you put iraqi militants and stolen material in the same sentence you can see why many would be concerned. but peter king isn't just anybody but the former chair of the homeland security committee so he ought to understand the point that the militants' grab depleted uranium and as it suggests, it's not uranium at the top of its game. it can't be used to make a nuclear weapon. if circulated it can be a health hazard though most likely to those people carrying it, in this case, those militants. they have seized such a small amount that it would not be enough to even make a

rudimentary dirty bomb. which you would need much more radioactive material in order to construct. if you recall, iraq doesn't have any material that can be used to build a nuclear bomb that we know of since u.n. weapons inspectors carted it away in the '90s. after the first gulf war. not that suggest that they wouldn't like to build dirty bombs, but at least in this instance it doesn't appear they got what they needed. vo: you get used to pet odors in your car. you think it smells fine, but your passengers smell this... eliminate odors you've gone noseblind to for up to 30 days with the febreze car vent clip.

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all right. we are not done yet. we have late developments on one

of the top stories of the evening, those prospects of immigration reform getting through congress. tonight we can confirm for you there is a movement within congress to grant citizenship to at least one immigrant of spanish descent. here he is, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce you to bernardo madrid of new spain. former viceroy of spain. if he were alive today he would be 268 years. during the revolutionary war he recruited and led troops through pensacola. knocking out british naval bases on the gulf coast. he was even recognized for his great efforts by george washington and way back in the day, the continental congress. he is the namesake of galveston, texas. you would think that would be enough recognition, but now, 227 years after he passed, a resolution has passed the house judiciary committee to grant him honorary citizenship for his role in helping america during the revolutionary war.

now, this is sort of funny because republican congressman eric cantor just killed a bill that would actually do the same thing for immigrants that are serving our country right now. do you remember that? it wasn't even two months ago members of congress wanted to attach the enlist act to the national defense act to the national defense act. eric cantor was taking fire from that primary challenger he had for being soft on immigration. so he refused to even bring the enlist act to the floor. he killed it. that didn't save his seat as we were reminiscing earlier tonight. congress still can't get the enlist act to the floor. so apparently, you can't get citizenship for fighting for this country unless it was 200 years ago and you get at least a major port city named after you, preferably in a a red state. if you fought in a war two centuries ago, welcome to the team. if you want to defend this country right now or in the future, this congress is telling you sorry, we're all out.

berdnardo got the last one. that does it for us tonight. we will see you monday. you can see me and the co-coasts weekday afternoons. as rachel would say, you got to week skwrepbtdz with alex witt starts now. air strikes from both sides in the mideast. it could be a prelude to something even better. an escort accused of leaving one of her clients for dead. who is the suspect and why is the investigation broadening? mid-winter flashback. the national weather service is calling for an unexpected but the of cold in what should be the hottest days of summer. the return of an especialpis odyssey.