much. that is "all in" for this evening. "the rachel maddow show" starts now starring a suited and spiffy steve kornacki. good evening, steve. getting a lot of comments on the suit these days. >> looking sharp, my man. >> i'll take it. thank you for that. thank you, chris hayes. thanks to you at home for staying with us the next hour. rachel has the night off. this is san francisco, california. back in march of 1900. there it is. san francisco, california, in 1900. to be specific, this is chinatown in san francisco. if you look closely at this picture, you can see that there's a barbed wire that stretched down the street. it's like a fence. a barbed wire fence that's essentially separating those store fronts and those homes from the main street. and the reason that barbed wire fence is there is because back then, chinatown was quarantined, cut off from the rest of the

city. it was isolated from the rest of the city. the rest of san francisco didn't want anything to do with the immigrants who lived there. they didn't have anything to do with the immigrants who lived there. before chinatown was quarantined, there was a huge backlash going on against the chinese people who were emigrating to the united states. there was the 1882 chinese exclusion act which basically ended chinese immigration for ten years. prohibited chinese people from becoming u.s. citizens. that was passed by congress, signed into law by then-president chester alan arthur. there was a general sentiment back then that chinese-americans were taking over the country. there were too many of them and also a strong sense that they were the source of terrible diseases. diseases like leprosy and smallpox. you name it. when a chinese man was suspected of maybe having died of the bubonic plague in chinatown, in san francisco, that took everything to a whole different

level. that was when they decided to cordon off chinatown from the rest of the city. no chinese-americans were allowed to leave that area. they were locked in. of course, that only fueled the idea that chinese-americans as a whole, as an immigrant group, were carriers of disease. that was back in the early 1900s. that was back over 100 years ago. in 1918, spanish flu started to break out. that pandemic just happened to coincide with another huge wave of immigration into this country. so as the incidence of spanish flu increased, so did the growing belief that the immigrants coming to the u.s. were responsible for it. the irish, the germans, you name it. in colorado the kkk even said italians were responsible for it. and now here we are, almost 100 years later, and some things are still the same. >> i want to ask you about letter you sent to the cdc about the children from central america possibly carrying ebola. where is your evidence on that? >> the border patrol gave us a list of the diseases that

they're concerned about, and ebola was one of those. i can't tell you specifically that there were any case of ebola. i don't think there were, but, of course, tuberculosis, smallpox, some of the infectious diseases of children. all of these are concerns, and, of course, the letter to the cdc in my great home state of georgia, hometown of atlanta, was just to tell director of the cdc to make sure that the people, the public is aware that you guys are on top of this and you're advising -- >> but the border patrol told you that there is ebola, threat of ebola at the border? >> said they were concerned about that, yes. >> at the mexico/u.s. border? >> they did say that. they absolutely did. >> the border patrol said that to you? >> to my staff.

>> okay. >> that's republican congressman phil gingrey of georgia. and by the way, he's a doctor. he's an ob-gyn. he told nbc's luke russert just today, yes, we are under threat from a slew of infectious diseases coming from children across the border. including ebola. we should probably point out that ebola is only found in africa. not in mexico, not in central america. in africa. gingrey isn't alone. a couple weeks ago, it was in riverside county, california, the small town of murrieta, where anti-immigrant protesters got together to protest the arrival of three buses that were filled with immigrants. while many people held signs about things like stopping illegal immigration, or telling the world that murrieta is not a dumping ground, other signs read, "protect your kids from diseases." immigrants and diseases. the thing is, those protesters from murrieta have inspired a slew of murrieta-like protests all over the place.

in vassar, michigan, about 50 people turned up to protest proposed housing plans for immigrant children from central america. protesters showed up with signs, with u.s. flags, and, of course, with rifles and handguns. because if children are coming to town, i guess, maybe you need to stop them with rifles and handguns? a resident in the area who helped organize that protest told "detroit news," "we must ask, we must save america and stand up against this invasion." an invasion. remember, these are children we're talking about. vassar, michigan, isn't alone here. governor terry branstad of iowa says he doesn't want any of the children being sent to his state, to iowa, and today in a small town near tucson, arizona, oracle, arizona, it's called, in that town, anti-immigrant protesters congregated together waiting for a bus load of immigrant children. about 40 to 60 children. it was heading for a boys ranch

that houses at-risk kids. protesters carried signs that read, "return to sender" and "no amnesty," among many others. people in their cars blockaded the road. they were waiting for that bus load of kids. then a strange thing happened while they were waiting. going to play it out for you. it's hard to hear, but it is this weird, confusing moment. take a look. >> okay. here's the bus. >> ymca bus. >> oh. they are tricking us. >> ymca? ymca? >> there's a bus, hopefully it's just -- >> i will, but this is ymca. >> ymca? >> you're going to freak these kids out. >> so what basically happened right there is the school bus full of kids, american kids in this case, was heading to the ymca day camp that's taking place in the area. it's right on the north side of the catalina mountains. the bus was making its way to the camp when it was met by the anti-immigrant protesters. of course, those protesters initially thought, well, it's a bus full of kids so it must be a

bus full of immigrant kids. if it's a bus full of immigrant kids, we better stop it. for a quick moment, they thought it was the bus they were meant to blockade. when they realized -- it was then that they realized it was actually a bus full of american kids. then a handful of people reportedly told reporters who were on the scene, "well, how do we know it's the ymca?" we called the ymca in oracle tonight. they were able to confirm to us that, yes, school bus number 267 is their bus. the ymca's bus. it is not a bus full of immigrant children trying to sneak through. that moment did cause a bit of a stir. editor for "the arizona republic" tweeted, "arizona district 1 candidate kwasman tells the arizona republic editorial board he was among the oracle protesters who stopped the ymca bus thinking it was a migrant bus." kwasman is a tea party candidate who's right now running for congress against congresswoman ann patrick. he was out there today with that ymca bus. he proceeded to tweet this about

the buses. if you read this, it's clear he deleted a tweet. he says, "last tweet not the bus of illegal immigrant children. thank god." he continues, "i apologize for the confusion. that was my error." arizona democratic congressman raul grijalva did say today the buses set to bring the immigrant children did not arrive in oracle today. it's unclear if and when they are going to get there. should also be noted at about three miles down the road from the anti-immigrant protest, about three miles away from where that ymca bus incident happened, there was also a pro-immigrant rally that was going on where people stood on the side of the road with signs that were meant to welcome the children. while these protests are happening on the heels of the introduction of a new bipartisan, bicameral border bill. it was introduced by a republican senator from texas, john cornyn, and by democratic congressman henry cuellar, also from texas.

the bill would essentially rewrite the current 2008 george w. bush law so that minors from central america can be treated like those from mexico and canada, meaning that they can be deported much more quickly. it appears the administration isn't totally against this bill. now, they haven't officially endorsed it, but they have been sending pretty strong signals they're open to it or at least open to something like it. the border bill is being met, though, with a bit of disdain from the president's own party. steny hoyer, he's the second ranking democrat in the house, he told reporters today, "to now consider it, we'll make it a condition for doing what we need to do as a country from a humanitarian perspective we think is inappropriate." steny hoyer is not alone. >> what is it about the cornyn/cuellar plan you disagree with? >> i think that it's too broad. it addresses more than just the border problem. >> republicans have said they're not going to try and move a package forward without changes

to the 2008 law to treat the children coming in the same as we would treat immigrants coming from mexico. is that a nonstarter for your caucus? to have the combination of changing the law and the funding combined? >> i think most democrats would tell you that what we don't want to see is to reduce due process rights. we don't want to find ourselves returning children to persecution, human smuggling, human sex trafficking. perhaps death. and so what we want to do is make sure that due process is followed. anything that undermines due process i think would concern most of our democratic colleagues. >> senate majority leader and the chairman of the house democratic caucus coming out against the cornyn/cuellar bill. while that was happening, house speaker john boehner said today that the house appropriations

committee is set to have final recommendations on the president's request for $3.7 billion to deal with the border crisis and that those recommendations are due to come out the end of this week. so maybe we'll have some answers soon on how that might go and whether or not those appropriations and that proposed cornyn/cuellar bill will get caught up in the do-nothing congress as well. joining us now to make sense of this, jose diaz-balart, as of this week, host of his own show here, weekdays on msnbc. jose, thank you for taking a few minutes tonight. let's start by trying to figuring out the status of the cornyn/cuellar bill. the white house has been sending signals that it would like to see, or at least wouldn't mind seeing that 2008 law about how to deal with children coming across the border. it wouldn't mind seeing that changed. am i right to read this as the white house seeing an opportunity here to get republican buy-in on this $3.7 billion that the white house wants, and to get that buy-in by basically saying we're going to give you this on border security? they won't say it officially, but is that what's going on

here? >> i think it is, steve. you know, there's a lot of nebulous territory here in washington these days because you really aren't getting people to just come forward and say this is how i think we need to be acting, and that goes for the republicans in the house, it goes for the white house. we're not seeing if they are indeed willing to say this proposal -- by the way, there's still no language, specific language on that proposal that i know of. i'd love to see it. what exactly -- when senator reid said it's too broad, i haven't seen any of the language, i don't know if any of the legislators have seen any of the language. so right now it seems as though gray area is where all of the political fish like to be swimming these days. but, you know, steve, let me bring you back to these bus loads of kids that are going to different parts of the country to be processed. and, you know, you can't blame people in a town that don't have any information, and really don't even know where these kids come from, who they are. very little information, and it's easy to misinform people or simply not to inform them.

and, you know, that bus full of american kids that wasn't, thank god, filled with illegal aliens, as you quoted that tweet, well, unless they were native americans, they were immigrants, those kids, in the bus. because, you know, a lot of people in this country come originally from another country. some legally, most legally. some at the time when their legal status was not questioned. but what i find, steve, odd, is why aren't we as a country really looking at this as what it is? it's a crisis. and crisis demands immediate action. and that is, inform the people of the united states of america what exactly we're dealing with. let's know who these kids are. let's know where they're being transferred to. let's know how many. and let's also know what the positions are of republicans and of democrats and of the white house on how we deal with this issue. you can't just by wish it away make it disappear. you know what, the violence in central america is not going away any time soon. the cartels in mexico aren't going any time soon. american drug consumption in

this country is not going away any time soon. the cartels con to prosper and grow and look for new markets. >> let me ask you, obviously this now -- to act on this, treat this as a crisis, to respond, we would need washington to act, a republican congress and democratic president to reach a conclusion. we don't have the language on the cornyn/cueller bill yet. i look at this from a humanitarian perspective. i look at the kids, and the history we stitched together. charges fly around when there are waves of immigrants coming into the country. you had somebody on your show the other day from honduras. i listened to the show and, my goodness, from a humanitarian standpoint, how can we do anything but to make a home for these children temporarily? to send them back means to send them to death. if you say to tens of thousands of children, come in, we're going to spare you from that. what happens to other children down there? do their parents say, do they decide, it's worth making this treacherous journey through mexico, maybe sending up dead on

the way? do we have hundreds, thousands of kids dying to try to get the same treatment? >> absolutely. it's not an easy issue. i had senator menendez on on the morning show, which i invite you on. 10:00 a.m., 7:00 a.m. pacific time. senator menendez said we as a country will take positions, say to the dominican republic, you're having people from haiti cross over your border. treat them with dignity. let's deal with that issue. in countries in africa where people from another country reach another country fleeing oppression, fleeing violence, fleeing warfare, the united states of america takes a position. well, where is the united nations and where is the united states saying maybe this is a problem that needs to be dealt with on an america as a continent? do we have refugee camps set up on the border so that we can process these children, find their cases? you know, steve, it breaks my heart when i talk to maria that we had on on the monday show. she's a 17-year-old girl. her brother was shot in front of her by the gangs in honduras.

and then a couple of years later when she turned of age, they came to her and said, you're going to be our property sometime in the near future, or you can run your brother's fate. so what do you do? and then she comes through mexico and they did to her what no human being could ever think of doing to another human being on that route to the united states of america. they just violated that young lady's integrity to no end. and she got here on her own. she has a sister in the united states of america. shouldn't she at least be listened to? and if we as a country decide that we as a country do not want to accept people like her because whatever, then let's make that determination after we hear her story.

after we decide as a country what we're going to do with these people. and that leads me to how i started talking to you this evening. it's information, steve. it's information. it's compassion. and it's understanding of the world. that's why we need to hear voices. other voices. and we need to sit as human beings and say, what's best for us as americans, and how do we deal with this human crisis? >> jose diaz-balart, telemundo news anchor, host of his own show 10:00 a.m. eastern time on msnbc. jose, that story you just told, that story you brought to us the other day is one of the reasons truly i'd say this about any

msnbc host, because it's my colleague, but i really, really mean it, your show is must-see television. great job so far. good luck on it. thanks for doing this tonight. lots more ahead including news from two bright red states where conservative governance is triggers serious buyers remorse. next, the exact wrong thing to say to potential women voters. stay with us. you know.... there's a more enjoyable way to get your fiber. try phillips fiber good gummies. they're delicious and an excellent source of fiber to help support regularity. mmmm. these are good! the tasty side of fiber. from phillips

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obama won a second term over republican challenger mitt romney, he did so with the help of a whole lot of women voters who provided a gender gap you could drive a truck through. president obama did ten points better among women in 2012 than he did among men. that is one of the largest gender gaps ever recorded in a presidential election. gender gap was so big and so decisive in 2012 that it caught the attention of republican leaders. those leaders pledged to be better about talking to and talking about women in the future. this, of course, was after a 2012 campaign season in which several prominent republican candidates made inflammatory and politically suicidal comments that involved women. most infamously, todd akin's legitimate rape remark. multiple sessions supposedly to train republicans to avoid their own todd akin moments. how's it going for them? the short answer is it looks like it's a work in progress. on sunday the conservative newspaper, "the washington examiner" checked in on process

with a report on one of those recent messages sessions. this one led by female members of the house. below the headline, "the republican plan to change the war on women narrative needs work," the story provided details on something called the conservative women's panel discussion. it was a closed-door event that was held last friday and highlighted in the story were commented made at that event by congresswoman renee ellmers of north carolina, a go-to republican on issues about messages and about female voters. here's what ellmers said at the event on friday. "men do tend to talk about things on a much higher level" ellmers said. "many of my male colleagues when they go to the house floor have some pie chart or graph behind them and talking about trillions dollars of, you know, how the debt is awful and, you know, we all agree with that." a written response, "the quote in question was taken completely

out of context." late this afternoon "the washington examiner" posted the audio of ellmers' comments in whole. here's a bigger part of what she said. >> men do have to talk about things on a much higher level, you know, one of the things that has always been one of my frustrations and i think about this all the time, many of my male colleagues when they go to the house floor, they've got some pie chart or graph behind them and they're talking about trillions of dollars and, you know, how the debt is awful and, you know, we all agree with that. but by starting off that discussion that way, we've already turned people away. because it's like that doesn't affect my life. i don't understand how that affects my life. so one of the things that we have worked with with our male colleagues, and i have to see the difference, i will tell you

i've seen the difference, is, again, engaging individuals on their level. talking about them on a personal level first. we need our male colleagues to understand that if you can bring it down to the woman's level and everything she is balancing in her life, that's the way to go. >> so there's some more context on that. now, whether that changes the impact of the words that were initially reported, well, you can be the judge of that. the democratic advantage among women voters is a very real thing. it's rearing its head as the midterm campaign in the battle for control of the u.s. senate now heats up. in colorado, republican congressman cory gardner is trying to unseat democratic senator mark udall. in colorado, gender is playing a defining role in that race. the udall campaign has gone to great lengths to highlight gardner's record on issues relating to women. that record includes past support for several personhood measures that would have banned

all abortion and arguably would have also banned the most commonly used form of birth control. issue of contraception was amplified by the supreme court's recent decision in the hobby lobby case. udall has been focusing on the issue since the early days of this campaign. now new polling just out today shows gardner trailing udall by seven points overall in colorado and by 12 points among women voters. so just like for president obama in 2012, women right now are making the difference for mark udall and they could make the difference for other democrats in other critical senate races this year, too. now in light of that, democrats are upping the ante. today on capitol hill, senate democrats, a new piece of legislation that attempts to counteract the slew of antiabortion laws that have been successfully pushed by republicans at the sate level in recent years. the senate proposal, place limits on t.r.a.p. laws. given the political realities of

washington these days, the future of the baldwin/blumenthal proposal is uncertain at best. it may have its intended electoral effect, anyway. joining us, senator tammy baldwin. senator baldwin, appreciate you taking a few minutes tonight. let me ask you about the proposal. obviously, you know, we've seen the headlines in recent years about an initiative in this state and initiative in that state. so specifically, what are the laws, what are the restrictions, what are the things you are trying to undo with this bill? >> well, it's been incredible to watch what the states have done just in recent years. in the last three years, alone, over 200 laws have been passed that are serving to restrict women's access to full reproductive care, to abortion services and other services, and these laws do nothing to further a woman's health or safety. and so the measure that we've introduced, the women's health protection act, would basically say that if the underlying law has nothing to do to further women's health, women's safety, it's presumed invalid because this is a constitutional right that we're talking about.

and as we have in the past, it is congress' role to protect those fundamental constitutional rights when states are enacting legislation intended to interfere with them. and so this is just a critical function of congress and something that's screaming for attention right now across this country. >> so, and i certainly take the point that the intent behind a lot of these laws, these are laws drawn up by people who oppose abortion, looking for ways to limit it, restrict it, outlaw it in certain cases. i certainly take that point. when you talk about basically banning laws that don't have a purpose of furthering, i think you said they're furthering women's health and safety. how do you draw that line? because, for instance, i know some of these laws require that doctors who perform the procedures have admitting privileges at local hospitals.

you can certainly make the argument, right, that, you know, all things being equal, wouldn't it be better to have a doctor who has admitting privileges at the local hospital? where do you draw that line exactly? >> well, first of all, i don't think you can make that argument, and we're seeing in federal courts those cases go on trial. and judges concluding that it is absolutely unnecessary. and in fact, i have a lot of firsthand exposure to this issue because wisconsin recently passed such a law. it was admitting privileges combined with an invasive ultrasound procedure that was required of anyone seeking abortion care. and a federal judge has put a stay on this during the pendency of a trial, but it really doesn't. in terms of the precedent for this, i mean, think about the voting rights act around which this women's health approximate act was modeled. the idea is a fundamental constitutional right at stake here, in this case, as decided

in the roe v. wade case by our highest court. and states are trying to whittle this away. the law that i'm talking about in wisconsin would have closed half the clinics in the state. >> so let me ask you from this direction, though, when you look at all the laws that have been passed, are there any that would meet your criteria? are there laws that do further the health limit, do advance the health of women and, therefore, would be okay? >> i certainly think there are, and those all conform to and are consistent with the roe v. wade decision. but one of the things you'll find in this debate in particular is that rather than passing laws that apply to all medical procedures of similar complexity, et cetera, they target this and in these hundreds of laws that have passed in recent years, it seems for almost the sole intent of restricting access in many cases resulting in the closure of

clinics, we have states where there are, you know, 95% of the counties including my own where there is no reproductive health services of any -- available, and this is clearly the intent of these laws. and it is congress' role to step forward and protect constitutional rights. and that's what we've done through this bill. >> all right. senator tammy baldwin of wisconsin, really appreciate the time tonight. thank you for that. backlash, the likes of which seemed unimaginable not too long ago against a once popular governor, and what has become the reddest of red state governments. we will tell you who he is and tell you all about that backlash, coming up. ♪ [ cat meows ] ♪ ♪ 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 ♪ ♪

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party to support the democrat who's running against the state's republican governor. sam brownback. >> we're saying to republicans who are concerned, i don't know that i can support a democrat. we're saying, let's have some courage for kansas' sake. >> and to put things in perspective, how big a deal this is, take a minute to think of how staunchly a republican state kansas actually is. a democratic presidential candidate hasn't won kansas since lyndon baines johnson in 1964 and lbj is the only democrat to win kansas in the last 19 presidential elections. before him, you have to go all the way back to fdr. and this man, george mcgill is his name, he is the last democrat to be elected to the senate from kansas, and he pulled that off back in 1930. that's 84 years ago. so you'd think the last thing a conservative like sam brownback would ever have to worry about would be getting elected in a state like kansas. but you have to look a little bit closer here because as republican a state as kansas is, it's actually made up of two

different republican parties. there's the old school pragmatic moderate kansas republican party. that's the party that, for instance, bob dole comes from. and there's also the more hyper conservative kansas republican party and this is the one sam brownback is from and this is the one that's been ascendant in kansas for the last few decades now. it really has become the dominant wing of the republican party in kansas. under brownback, it's basically tried to snuff out what's left of the moderate ring. just two years ago, brownback led an effort to purge moderate republican state legislators in primaries to drive them out of the statehouse to replace them with right wingers and he got his way. 2012 was also the same year he signed a controversial tax slashing law into effect. that law combined three tax brackets into two. cut state income tax rates and also chopped taxes for businessowners. brownback said at the time that the cuts would create tens of thousands of new jobs and help

make kansas the best place in america to start and grow a small business. two years later, it hasn't quite worked out that way. so far, it's cost kansas a ton of revenue without really jump-starting the hi. moody's, for example, recently downgraded the state's credit rating. in the last year, alone, the state brought in $338 million less than expected in revenue. now the state is locked in, "a mid-sized recession." brownback's tax slashing affected public schools and colleges and hasn't spurred the job growth he promised. all of this is the backdrop for what is one of the biggest surprises we have seen anywhere this year. a dead heat in the race for kansas governor. just last week, the nonpartisan cook political report moved this race from its lean republican category, to tossup, and now, today, we have dozens and dozens of prominent republicans publicly turning on brownback. their own party's governor. declaring their support for a

democrat. so on one hand, the governor's dealing with the fallout from the tax cuts he championed. on the other, he's dealing with backlash from the moderates he's trying to stamp out. even for a native kansan, that's a lot of chickens coming home to roost. joining us now, dave helling, political columnist for "the kansas city star." thanks for being here tonight. help us interpret this nationally. we did the story about the taxes, the tax cuts and fallout from that. also this effort to sort of purge the republican party of the old moderate wing. what's driving what we saw today? are these republicans mad at sam brownback personally or don't like what he's done policy wise? >> steve, a little bit of both as you might imagine. a lot of the people who endorsed paul davis today against sam brownback were people that lost in 2012. state senators, state representatives who were purged, as you pointed out. but they're also -- many of the people who were there today who are genuinely concerned about the outcome of the kansas experiment, as sam brownback

once called it, they're particularly worried, i must say, about education in the state of kansas, particularly in the kansas city area. that's very, very important, and anything that appears to be threatening that educational system in this area gets a lot of people's attention and they did today. they made the statement they made. we've been writing, local press has been writing about the brownback/davis race as a tossup for several months. now i do think national reporters are seeing the same phenomenon. >> yeah, i think people are definitely now -- this is on the radar now. definitely. governor brownback was actually on our airwaves, on chuck todd's show last week. chuck asked him about the promises he made about the tax cut plan two years ago versus what's actually happened. i want to play his response and talk to you about it. let's play that. >> you bet. >> any regrets on your plan, the size of it, the scope, any regrets at all? >> i don't have any regrets. it's really stimulated investment. it stimulated people coming into this state. we've got a record number of new businesses.

we've got a record number of people working in the state of kansas. it's working overall. it's just these things do take some time and it's moving us on forward. >> so, dave, are people in kansas buying that? >> no. no. not here. not across the country. you may have noticed "the new york times" put out an editorial today, "the wall street journal." moody's didn't downgrade the state's debt because the economy in kansas is exploding. the opposite appears to be the case. now, let's be fair to sam brownback. there are a record number of jobs in the state. the state's unemployment rate is low, 4.8%, 4.9%. when you compare the kansas economy to other economies that did not cut their taxes, other states, kansas still lags behind and i think virtually everyone in kansas who takes an objective look at those numbers has come to that conclusion. sam brownback i must say doesn't like it. he called out our newspaper by

name yesterday. because i think all of us are trying our best to sort of measure what has happened in the state. and we're just trying to objectively report what's going on and most of the people in the state have concluded as of now, anyway, that the brownback experiment hasn't worked. >> so what do you expect? i mean, the news today is 100 republicans. there's some prominent republican names in kansas who are part of this group today. is this something you expect to see more of as the campaign goes on? do you think the democrats have other big-name republicans they're going to be rolling out and really pressing that theme of republicans against brownback? >> yeah, they really pushed this one hard. they called us, said, hey, come on down to this news conference. there were fairly recognizable names among the people at the news conference today. former congresswoman jan myers, for example, has endorsed paul davis. you can expect sam brownback to fight back with the tools at his disposal. yesterday rick santorum came to kansas to campaign on

brownback's behalf. now, whether that helps him in the general election isn't clear. most of the people, steve, who support rick santorum are already voting for sam brownback. what he has to do is figure out a way to reach out to moderates, concerned about education. in that sense, you might expect, for example, jeb bush to come to kansas. he's come to kansas for sam brownback before. he would give sam brownback some credibility with those moderates, independents, people in the middle. you're going to see both sides trying to use surrogates, trying to make their case, trying to work on endorsements, that type of thing. we've got a real, real close race and while as you pointed out in your intro, democrats don't do very well at all at the presidential election, or the senate level, the state does have some history of electing democrats. kathleen sebelius, john carlin. democrats have a shot and really think they have a chance in the state in 2014. >> yeah, you look at the midterm climate nationally for democrats. this really could be -- i'm sure this is a victory they'd enjoy more than most. dave helling. really appreciate it. if it's your dream to be inducted into somebody's hall of fame, hold on. there's a new hall of fame.

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now, normally the sign producers here do not encourage breaking creative ground while rachel is away. but today's news left us no choice. ground must be broken. to begin at the beginning, there was republican congressman mike kaufman of colorado. in 2012, he gave remarks to a group of donors and said that president obama "is just not an american." he later apologized but a local nbc affiliate decided to follow up. >> after your comments about the president, do you feel that voters are owed a better explanation than just i misspoke? >> i think that -- as i stand by my statement that i misspoke and i apologize. >> and who are you apologizing to? >> i stand by my statement that i misspoke and i apologize. >> we talk to you all the time. you're a very forthcoming guy. who is telling you will not to talk? >> i stand by my statement that i wrote, as you have, and i misspoke and i apologize. >> was it that you thought it would go overwhelm where folks

are very conservative and you would never say something like that in the suburbs? >> i stand by my statement. i misspoke and i apologize. >> anything i can ask you that you'll answer differently? >> i stand by my statement. i misspoke and apologize. >> thank you, congressman. >> no matter the question, he wanted everyone to know that he misspoke and apologizes. so a certain kind of standard was set for america's question dodging politicians. then came jesse kelly of arizona. while he was running for congress in 201, an anti-immigrant group decided to endorse him. an abc correspondent asked him whether he planned to accept that endorsement. >> my campaign is going to stay focused on lower taxes and creating jobs. >> do you plan on accepting their endorsement? >> our campaign is going to stay focused on lower taxes, and creating jobs. >> is that a yes or no?

>> our campaign is going to stay focused on lowering gas prices, creating jobs, and lowering gas prices using american energy. >> no comment? >> our campaign is going to stay focused on lowering gas prices, creating jobs and lowering taxes. >> then this past may, it was speaker john boehner's turn when congressional committee decided to fund-raise on benghazi. luke russert asked him about his party's decision to fund-raise off what was billed as a serious and fact-based inquiry. >> four americans died in benghazi. should the nrcc fund-raise off of your efforts? >> our focus is on getting the answers to those families who lost their loved ones, period. >> should the nrcc receive their fund-raising right now -- >> our focus is getting the truth to these four families and the american people. >> the campaign committee is fund-raising off of this.

why is that happening? >> our focus is on getting the truth for the american people and these four families. >> so once is an accident. twice is coincidence. three times is a trend. but four sometimes? four times makes the hall of fame. so tonight, with only an assumed blessing from rachel maddow herself, we break ground on "the rachel maddow show." we're going to have the canned response repetition hall of fame. they were simply canned response repeaters. but tonight, they're now hall of famers, thanks to the fourth charter member of this club, and he is republican governor rick scott of florida. last week a complaint was filed. when he was asked about the allegations yesterday, here is what he had to say. >> with the law enforcement who with there are with you, did you think all of those deputies were off duty?

>> i'm very proud we got a police chief endorse me and 40 sheriffs endorsed me. i'm very proud of the support of all the law enforcement. we invite them to our campaign events and i'm appreciative of the ones that came. >> do you think it was a problem to have on-duty law enforcement there? >> i'm very appreciative of their support and those that come to my event. >> you didn't answer that question. >> look, i'm appreciative of everybody that comes to my events. we should be very supportive of our law enforcement. >> do you think it's okay for them to be there on duty? >> i'm very appreciative of the chief's endorsement, 40 sheriffs did. we have law enforcement that come to a variety of events and i'm appreciative of anybody that comes to an event. >> governor, congratulations. here is your totally unofficial

plaque, your award for stick-to-it-tive-ness. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow night. now time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening, lawrence. activists are lining up. >> we're going to take this country back right now. >> to confront buses of undocumented children. >> they have broken the law and