think ebola. let's play "hardball." good evening, i'm chris matthews in washington. the nurse's name is nina fong. she took care of america's first ebola case. and now she's the second. and the man-made virus called voter suppression. this weekend in north carolina i asked kay hagan whether republicans are out to cut the democratic vote or simply screw the black vote. here's her answer. >> so is this based on racial -- racism or partisanship? why are they trying to screw the

black voters, because they don't like blacks, or because they don't like democrats? >> i think they are trying to suppress democrat voting. >> the african americans think they're being targeted because they're african americans. >> i tend to agree with them. >> so it's both. the ebola scare is front-page news. "the washington post," dallas nurse tests positive for ebola. "the new york times," dallas nurse contracts ebola virus, elevating response and anxiety. and "usa today," texas nurse contracts ebola. tonight, we'll give you the latest, including the 911 call that alerted the dallas hospital as to what was coming. >> hello? >> yeah, is this fire department? >> i'm calling for ambulance,

please. i say my daddy is throwing up -- [ indiscernible ] >> what's the address? >> all right, and you're hurting all over? >> huh? >> no, i said my daddy is throwing up -- [ indiscernible ] >> the director of infectious diseases at the national institute of health and the judge in texas join us. tell us about the protocols that failed to be used, people were failed to be trained. how do you explain this to an average white person right now, what went wrong? how does this person contract ebola? >> well, there was a breach in the protocol, but we don't know the precise breach. we continue to investigate by interviewing every health care worker who had anything to do with the care of eric duncan.

and we brought in two infectious disease specialists from the cdc and a host more epidemiologist to try to get to where that breach was. we have improved over the last 24 hours some of the infection control protocols there. but there was a breach, we don't know whether it was isolated, or whether it was something that affected more people. that's what our focus is on now. >> thank you, judge. less than a month ago, president obama said it was unlikely ebola would reach our shores, but it has. when the first case landed in dallas two weeks ago, center for disease control director thomas frieden announced they were stopping it in its tracks. today the tone of the conversation is different. we have the first ebola infection in the united states and the cdc assumes more cases are on the way. >> we're concerned and would not be surprised if we did see additional cases in the health care workers who also provided

care to the index patient. we're concerned there could be other infections in the coming days. >> would not be surprised if there are more cases, especially of those who cared for the first victim here. cdc director frieden called for an elevated level of readiness at hospitals around the country. here's more of what he said today. >> we'll work with hospitals throughout the country to think ebola, in someone with a fever or other symptoms who has had travel to any of the three affected countries in the previous 21 days. >> so, anthony, thank you very much. you're very used to this, but most people are not, infectious diseases. >> right. >> what do you think we know and what we don't know? what's the known unknown here about whether it could be -- this person apparently did follow the rules, they thought. >> right. >> -- nina fong, and caught it. >> first of all, when we say breach, we better be careful that we don't give the impression that it's her fault or she did something wrong.

breach is a public health terminology. it could possibly be that she may not have been actually trained or practiced in what she was doing. so she tried her best, and then you have to look at more proactive training, making sure there's good supervision there. so a breach can be a lot of things. it's that catch word for "something went wrong." i think the important thing you just mentioned, there are things that did go right, despite the tragic event. one, this person was being monitored because she was self-monitoring. soon as she got a fever on friday night, she reported it the next morning, went into isolation, and that's what tom frieden was talking about, when he said, there won't be an outbreak, because when you do contact tracing and do the isolation, you're not going to have an outbreak. so americans should not be concerned about an outbreak, but that's different than a significant serious situation,

about making sure you protect our health care workers. we've got to make sure they get the best of equipment and the best of training so that we don't have an unfortunate incident. >> but dr. frieden also said he would not be surprised if there were more cases coming out of people who were in contact with the first victim? >> right. health care workers, because if in fact what was going on in that intensive care setting allowed a single health care worker to get infected, none of us would be surprised, we hope it doesn't happen, but we wouldn't be surprised if we saw another one or more health care workers, that's why they're being monitored extremely closely. >> what's the atmosphere like in texas? are people concerned he's wouldn't be surprised if there were more cases of ebola? >> the vast majority of our

people are calmly concerned for these health care workers and are praying and thinking about nina and her family. and let me say this, i consider her to be a hero. she is a person who knew when she went into this field that there's always a risk of getting the very disease you're treating. it's happened to her. and she's dealing with that, with grace, and with dignity. and she has a brave and heroic family, and they're giving her great support. and i'm pleased -- >> but the president said it was unlikely that there would be cases in this country. and now the implications seem to be in the first couple days here, that we would be unlikely to see any more cases develop because of contact with this first patient, mr. duncan. and then here we are, is there any way to spread the news that it's possible, it's unlikely, but it's possible and throw in that word possible so people

retain their authority to speak on the matter? judge? >> well, yes. here's the situation. if you didn't come into contact with the bodily fluids of eric duncan, you don't have ebola and you're not going to get ebola. but in this situation, we have a new area of concern for health care workers who we believed were following protocols sufficient to keep them safe while caring for mr. duncan. there was a breach, which is a term of art, but there was a breach that allowed her to get sick. it means that we are focused on those other health care workers. of the 48 people outside of those health care workers that are contacts, they're asymptomatic and have no fever and we're now well past the most likely time for them to get sick. they'll be fully in the clear on october 20th. but now we have a new concern, and that's the protocols and the health care workers.

>> the united states has been without a surgeon general now for more than a year. in july of last year, surgeon general regina benjamin resigned. in november, president obama nominated a replacement, dr. vivek murthy. then democrats passed a measure to make it easier to confirm. only a simple majority is needed. but then they moved to block the nomination. including comments where murthy said guns are a health care issue themselves. the confirmation vote was called off that same month. what do you think of this? i'm looking at a pack of cigarettes right now. i don't smoke, haven't in 25 years. but for an authority figure, we look at this, surgeon general warning, smoking by pregnant women may result in fetal

injury, premature birth and low birth rate. it talks about cancer. so the surgeon general is the big daddy of the country who tells us what we should be afraid of. we don't have one. we have you, dr. frieden. do we need a surgeon general to come on television to do psas and say, here's what you shouldn't be worried about. this is what you should do? >> well, it would be nice to have a surgeon general, but the problem right now, chris, is not not having a surgeon general. >> i think it's a problem with the american government. i'm in a different field. politically, we can't even do the basics, like approve a surgeon general. >> that's a different story. i think there's a bit of a non-sec witter. we're not in the situation we are now because we don't have a surgeon general. that would be making some majestic leaps. >> but we need somebody to talk to the american people. >> sure. health officials and i have been on the air almost continuously, as has tom frieden and secretary burwell. there's a lot to be done. we're in an epidemic of fear,

and we need to break that -- >> so we don't need a tsar? >> i don't think so. we have good coordination from the white house, from the national security council. we have the division in labor, in country, it's usa i.d. here it's health and human services. the military are doing a great job helping with logistics. it's working smoothly. we need to get more resources. right now, the thing that people forget when they see the headlines that you just showed about a single case, which is tragic, that should not have happened. but the way we can stop this from ever happening is to get rid of the epidemic in west africa. if we do that, we wouldn't be talking about this right now. >> we'll send 3,000 guys over there. the question is, will they get it? >> we must stop it in west africa. >> the lack of a clear-cut personage, for the president to say, this person is in charge. when he was asked who was in charge of the rollout for health

care, he said it's the coo are the -- someone he never met. but that's a problem. but he knows you. thank you judge clay jenkins. coming up, my interview with senator kay hagan. she's holding strong in north carolina, where republicans have tried to take away the vote of minorities and young people. guess what? it's driving people to get out their vote in reaction. they might vote more in greater numbers because of this effort to keep them out of voting. anyway, this is "hardball," the place for politics.

place for politics.. coming up next, will the republican effort to screw the minority voter in north carolina and elsewhere work? or it will backfire? looks like it might backfire in north carolina where kay hagan could be one of the big stand-out victories for the democrats this year against what looks like could be a sweep this year. and we'll be right back.

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welcome back to "hardball." just three weeks from now, in fact, tomorrow, a handful of crucial states will determine whether democrats keep a majority in the united states senate, or whether republicans get control. among the battleground states, north carolina, where the race to finish line is intensifying even as we speak. we were there this weekend and here's what we found. >> with control of the u.s. senate in the balance, "hardball" took to the road this weekend to check out the race in north carolina. it's where democrat kay hagan is in a tough fight with thom tillis, her testy republican opponent. >> usually races that are this close bounce back and forth, but she's maintained a two to five-point lead non-stop for the last six weeks or so. >> the latest polling has hagan up two points 47-45. >> i think voter turn-out is the key. it's certainly the key in my election, in an off-presidential election year. we know voter turn-out goes

down. and i have put together one of the biggest voter turn-out operations we've ever seen in north carolina. >> but new voting restrictions passed by the conservative north carolina legislature, might affect turn-out on election day. >> the intent was to suppress democratic turn-out. it's wrong. people have fought and died for the constitutional right to vote. they took away a number of early voting days, they took away same-day registration. we allowed in civics classes as a senior in high school, that students could register to vote. you want to ask yourself, why? >> hagan's republican opponent is the speaker of the house in the north carolina legislature. he pushed for the new voting restrictions which he must have known would weigh heaviest on his democratic rival. >> did he do this to suppress the vote? >> yes. when you look at these barriers to the ballot box. there are two states in the nation that he brought suit in,

north carolina and texas, because of the egregious violation of the constitutional right to vote. it's 2014. why are there barriers to the ballot box? that's what they've done. >> the restrictions are going to hurt the african americans the most. the naacp has been leading the fight to inform voters? >> what do you think voter suppression is about? partisan or racist? >> i think it's both. the people who are going to be affected, it's african americans. >> there are people who don't want to see progress. but these folks here do want to see it, and they're leading the nation. this is where the action is. this is where the leadership is right here. >> among those leaders, a civil rights advocate in the tar heels state. >> when you talk to republicans and i think you do, about why

they push for the new voter laws, do they admit it's suppression? >> thom tillis admitted on msnbc, where he said it wasn't about fraud. he admitted that. >> why is this a legislative priority? >> we call this restoring confidence in elections. there is some voter fraud, but that's not the primary reason for doing this. there's a lot of people who are just concerned with the potential risk of fraud. in our state, it could be significant. >> reverend barber gained wide recognition for leading moral mondays in north carolina, a weekly protest movement with civil rights and voting fairness at the top of its agenda. >> we talk about what's constitutionally inconsistent. we've had republicans and democrats stand on the stage and say, some politicians that will get elected and then use their power to keep from voting, is wrong.

>> senator hagan has for her partade voting rights a key component of her re-election fight. >> we need to have a huge turn-out on november 4th. with your help and support, we are going to get out the voters. we are going to inform them, tell them what the rules of the road are. this election is that critical. >> so is this based on racial -- racism or partisanship? why are they trying to screw the black voter to put it bluntly? >> i think they are trying to suppress democratic turn-out. >> so it's partisan? >> sundays to the polls, done away. the whole early voting concept, people have busy lives. they want to go and vote early. and to think you took another week of that away, that's wrong. that is really wrong. >> the african americans think they're being targeted because they're african americans not because they're democrats. >> well, you know, i tend to agree with them. >> some say tillis might trigger a voter backlash trying to en80

these voter restrictions. it could cause african americans to show up in greater numbers at a protest. >> from what i can tell, the state's voter i.d. laws are motivating the base like nothing i've ever seen. i think the republican party overreached to such an extent that they'll have a hard time for the next couple of cycles. they're going to have to own what they've done. >> the consequences of these new laws are far reaching and could determine which party wins control of the u.s. senate. every vote in a battleground state like north carolina counts. every vote that gets suppressed does too. joining me now is political analyst gene robinson of "the washington post." you grew up with this stuff and they're back at it. >> well, yeah. i thought we had established the right to vote back in 1964 and '65. >> i thought this was interesting. i brought back a little bit of advice for voters. this is a placard i got from the

naacp, a non-partisan placard. a lot of people are spreading the word you need an i.d. card, even though these pushed off for two years. so that intimidation factor worked in pennsylvania for the presidential election. people say, don't bother, because you don't have an i.d. what do you think of this, that groups like the naacp, they may be democrats, but it's a non-partisan issue. >> and it's a group that doesn't get involved in politics in a partisan way. and i think that's highly significant. i think what we heard about motivating the democratic base, frankly, in north carolina, could well be true. >> the counterattack, the backlash? >> yeah, there are some indications that in 2012, in some states, you know, attempts to suppress the african american vote resulted in a higher than normal african american vote, especially in ohio.

>> let me ask you a question, i don't think there's an answer, but i'm going to throw it at you. i asked kay hagan the question, african americans down here think it's at them. not just democrats, it's at them as a group? >> well, how could you not feel that way, if you see something that clearly has a disproportionate impact on african american voters. that in particular, that is something they went way out of their way to get rid of, and that's something -- >> they targeted the black vote. >> if african americans were loyal republican voters, would the republican party be doing this? i'm not sure they would. >> it's like nixon, was it anti-semitic or jewish or democrats. anyway, a new poll on the senate race in iowa. 47 for republican joni ernst, the hog castrator, and 46, one

point behind her, bruce braley, who isn't the greatest campaigner, but he's holding his fight there. that's a five-point move. plenty of heat when they debated last night. let's watch. >> senator ernst is fond of saying things that sound good, but when you look at what they mean to iowans, they don't make iowans better off. >> i think it's important to have farmers in the united states senate. when you talk about your word behind closed doors at a fund-raiser in texas. you poked fun at senator grassley for being just a farmer without a law degree. >> there's been a direct attack, there's been applause, i think i should have an opportunity to respond. senator ernst, you know that i apologized to senator grassley right away.

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i am on the ballot in north carolina to be re--elected to my u.s. senate seat. the president's welcome to come to north carolina at any time. >> that's senator kay hagan over the weekend, responding to reporter's questions about being associated with president obama. last week, another particularic candidate for senate, kentucky's alison lundergan grimes was asked if she voted for president obama. here was her response. >> did you vote for president obama in 2008 and 2012? >> you know, this election isn't about the president. it's about making sure we put kentuckians back to work. >> did you vote for him? >> i was in 2008, a delegate for hillary clinton. i think that kentuckians know i'm a clinton democrat through and through. i respect the sanctity of the ballot box and i know that the members of this editorial board do as well. >> so you're not going to answer? >> again, i don't think the president is on the ballot. as much as mitch mcconnell might want him to be, it's my name, and it's going to be made holding him accountable for the votes he's made against the people of kentucky.

>> during my visit to north carolina, i asked senator hagan the same question. admittedly, she was probably prepared for it. >> who did you vote for for president in 2008 and 2012? >> president barack obama. >> that's not a hard question? >> that's not a hard question. >> i have a number of theories about it. alison lundergan grimes didn't want to answer that question. what's your theory? >> i don't have a theory. it looked like that was kind of prepared. and if that was prepared, it was really weird. answer the question. >> do you think she voted for president obama? >> you think she didn't? >> i'm beginning to be suspicious that she wanted to be honest and she had an answer she wanted to provide, but how can it be bad to say you voted for the guy that you obviously voted for? i think she's a regular

democrat. >> no, no, regular democrats voted for barack obama obviously because he won twice. so they did. to not say that, it seems like you're going way out of your way to try to not offend kentuckians who don't like the president, yada yada yada. answer the question. >> mitch mcconnell, the old pro, is going to nail her on this and force her to answer it and say, it took you x many days to answer the question. even if she does answer it tonight, he'll say, how long did that take you to do it? he can be a nasty sort of character to say the least. and he'll use this. anyway, eugene, thanks for having fun here. and i think kay hagan looks like a winner. she's running a campaign against a guy who isn't that likeable and she's focused on north carolina issues effectively. that's what we saw down there.

up next, the round table and who's in charge of stopping ebola here in the united states? plus, race and politics, could the voter suppression effort trigger voters going in the other way? people who weren't supposed to vote are going out in droves. you're watching "hardball," the place for politics.

>> here's what's happening this nor.

welcome back to "hardball." time now for the round table. and tonight's topics, diving into who's in charge on ebola and why is there no unified national response to the virus, no tsar. and could voter suppression efforts in north carolina motivate voters to turn out in bigger numbers? plus, fire wall, north carolina, why the state could withstand a big sweep. joining me now, howard fineman, and michelle bernard, and darryl weiss. his new book is right on the numbers here, billionaires, reflections on the upper crust. want to talk about ebola. reminds me of one of those

movies, invasion of the body snatchers. who's next? even though it's in small numbers, it's against the promise we were given in the beginning, that it would be unlikely for it to get here. >> what's frighten, we can't point to one person who is in charge. and now there's a breach in protocol in the hospital in texas where a nurse now has ebola. what if the protocol is just wrong? i have a friend who is a physician in new york, here hospital treats a lot of african patients. she was sharing with me some details. and it's frightening. the protocol begins with put up a map of africa in your emergency room. train your staff on the names of the countries in africa and train your staff on the names of the cities in the countries where you find the ebola virus. >> or the donald trump protocol, no more airline traffic from that part of the world. >> it's ironic, we spend a lot

of times hearing from conservatives about the need for less centralized government, the more local the better. in this case, the exact opposite is true. we need the best, global, national information, carefully administered and supervised by a central figure. for political purposes and maybe administrative ones as well. i don't know that dr. frieden at the cdc, as competent as he is, is a big enough figure to match what's going on in the public sphere today. and after all, every infectious disease is also a matter of publicity and public affairs. so you need that strong person. if president obama doesn't have the time to do it, and he's busy with things like isis and so forth -- they need somebody of unimpeachable global stature to reassure the american people and every hospital in the united states.

>> a chain of command, like eisenhower had. right down the line, like general of the army. or else people will be confused. >> the problem now is, no one is in control. the message now, the world is in chaos, no one is in charge, there's disorder out there. the problem for the administration, if this election gets framed around the themes of chaos and disorder, that will be damaging. >> the president has a policy. when he was asked about the rollout of obamacare, it was, who is really in charge? well, it's the chief operating officer of the medicare, medicaid group in hhs. that's part of hhs. you say, who are you talking to? it was the president didn't seem to be talking to anybody. there was no chain of command. >> on certain issues, he is brilliant in his measured responses. this is not one of those areas. we don't want to cause or create large amounts of panic, but somebody needs to be in charge and admit to the american public

that we don't have all the answers, and that we need to be stealth on this. why are we not looking at this the same way we would look at an act of bioterrorism? we need to be very serious about this. >> president obama's leadership style has always been one of, let's be calm now, let's be cool. and i think that's a very useful and a very effective leadership style for him in many ways. in this case, you still need some -- you need calm, but you need the calm of utter scientific and administrative authority, which is not him. he's president of the united states. who is that person? does dr. frieden? until a week ago, nobody knew who that guy was. >> and we don't have a surgeon general. >> and he's not fully in charge. >> right now, we have panic with two cases in the united states, what happens when we get up to ten? >> the surgeon general plays a critical role when it comes to

public health scares. the most famous was coop taking on the tobacco industry in the 1980s. this was him testifying about the dangers of tobacco. >> -- maintains and encourages the social acceptability of tobacco use. it just doesn't make sense to me to have unbridled advertising and promotion in view of the overwhelming scientific evidence that we have of disease and those 350,000 deaths a year. >> authority is an interesting thing. it's not power. it's true authority based upon election or expertise. >> yes. >> he came off with that. he was appointed by the president, and he's the guy you check with about cigarettes. you may want to risk cancer if you want to, but it's there. >> and there's something about his leadership style at that point in time that instilled confidence. we need that, whether the person in charge is a man or a woman, we deeply need that right now.

we don't have all the answers. >> either the world health organization or the united nations or both, just said within the last few hours, that ebola is going to be the biggest health threat to human beings in history. they made that statement just a few hours ago. >> talking about the deployment of u.s. troops being a mistake occasionally and sometimes they're necessary. 3,000 american gis, guys going over there, are they going to be trained in what not to touch, what not to be near? >> there's the question of the extent to which they have been properly trained. i think they've been trained to the limits of both what the army and the government knows. but again, as darryl said, one gets the sense that the cdc is here, the nih is here, the surgeon general doesn't even have a surgeon general now permanently because the republicans blocked that person. and while the president and

there's hhs. the president has called people in for photo ops on sunday and monday, saying i'm on top of the situation, but who is really running it? >> this is a great question. there's no clear chain of command, no tsar, so is it he like a president like kennedy in the missile crisis and get into the bowels of the government? is he that kind of president? i don't think so. >> he's not. in this political era, no one trusts authorities. we already have a situation where the hospital said one thing and it was wrong. we had obama say it's not going to be a problem and we already have cases. it's not like this is the only crisis. we're facing challenges on the foreign policy front, on domestic policy issues, when you add ebola on top of the other things, that has the potential -- [ all speak at once ] >> the fact is -- >> exactly. >> at this point he needs two situation rooms. he needs a situation room for the middle east and the terrorism issue and he needs a situation room for this.

>> and the question of the fat cats, the pigs from the '60s are going to spend millions of dollars to weed out liberals they don't like. anyway, round table is coming up. this is "hardball." zero heartburn! prilosec otc. the number 1 doctor-recommended frequent heartburn medicine for 9 straight years. one pill each morning. 24 hours. zero heartburn.

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we got a couple new polls on key governors' races. first to florida, a poll has democrat charlie crist leading republican governor rick scott by five. 47-42. this may be a roll for charlie. in georgia, republican nathan deal and jason carter, tied up at 45. what a close one. he's the grandson of former president carter. in massachusetts, coakley leads baker by just five in a new poll. 39-34. that race is really close. we'll be right back.

back to the round table. howard, michelle, and darryl will talk about big money. the u.s. military and our allies have dropped more than 400 bombs in isis in iraq and syria. and as nbc's richard engel reports the extremist group doesn't seem to be degraded at all. in syria, they control more than a third of kobani on the border with turkey. in iraq, near baghdad, a campaign of suicide bombings. only eight miles from the city's airport where some of our only military are stationed. meanwhile, the iraqi army is withdrawing from more territory. today the military made a retreat from a base in anbar province. two different takes on it this

weekend. susan rice said the campaign would take time but it was off to a good start. >> our air campaign is off to a strong start. we've seen important successes in mosul dam, sinjar mountain, where we rescued tens of thousands of civilians at risk. this is going to take time and the american people need to understand that our aim here is long-term degradation and building the capacity of our partners. >> on the other hand, senator john mccain had this dire assessment. >> they're winning and we're not, and the iraqis are not winning. the peshmerga, the kurds are not winning. and there's a lot of aspects of this, but there has to be a fundamental reevaluation of what we're doing, because we are not degrading and ultimately destroying isis. >> of course you have to agree with mccain. the trouble is, he has no alternative either. >> no. >> and bombs mccain is not

necessarily the answer either. >> even if he's talking about putting boots on the ground. to me, the key is turkey. turkish friends that i know told me yesterday when the white house was saying, oh, the turks have agreed to a new situation where they're going to help us more to do this. well the turks came out today and said, essentially, no, we're not. >> they're there. >> they're right there. but they don't want to do anything that they think will help the kurds, which shows you one of the many wheels within wheels complexities of that region that even 50,000 american troops on the ground, i'm afraid, is not going to solve. so in that sense, the president is right. but the bama campaign isn't working, either. >> so, michelle, who's going to defeat isis? >> ultimately, i believe it's going to have to be the united states. i love that people have to say this is the iraqis war, maybe iran.

>> who's going to do it? do you think obama is going to put troops in. >> president obama is not going to have any choice but to put troops in. this whole philosophy of degrading isis isn't going to work. isis has to be taken out. >> i don't think so. >> and he was wrong. he was wrong to take troops out of iraq. >> in this case, he was right. in the beginning, or a month or so ago, he said that countries have to do this. he wasn't acting that way a couple years ago when carefully nurturing and helping to build those kind of alliances and military capableties of the people on the ground would have been helpful. but to say that now -- >> i don't think in hillary clinton's way back machine. >> how do you get the turks? >> the turks, the iranians and the asad.

>> our nato allies are the turks. where are they? >> and the bottom line, it's in our national security interest not to sit around and have other people take care of this. >> let's talk about your book and the billionaires. talk about the role that you're seeing in the reporting today. that they're waiting until the last couple of weeks, these right wing, wealthy billionaires -- that's redundant -- are going to drop a ton of money. >> 2014 is going to become the battle of the billionaires. these are smart business guys. they're going to look at, you know, seven or eight key senate races that ultimately are going to decide -- control the senate. they're going to focus on the three or four where putting a million in, five million or even ten million is going to move the needle one or two percentage points. >> under the law, is there any limit? >> there's no limit what they can spend, if they're working through non-profit organizations.

they don't even have to rorpt the expenditure. so from the voter standpoint, it's probablymatic. the messenger is as important as the message. >> most of the tv time in most of these states that's allotted to political advertising has already been taken. so more and more of it is going to go on to the internet. >> so what do you do if you you will you have a lot of money and you can't spend it? >> aside from walking around, i don't know. you have to put it into the ground game, which the democrats have already been doing. give credit to harry reid here. he focused on the ground game and not advertising a long time ago. >> the amusing thing is that millionaires are going to have to pay a premium for last-minute purchases, but they can afford it. >> this is the place --

>> what an irony. >> this is the place to decide the golden election. >> if they're spending another 10 or 20 million, they're finding out how to capitalize. >> even with all the advertising dollars for people who live in under-served communities, if you can't vote, it doesn't matter. the advertising or not, they are so successful in all of these states. >> okay. which is it? >> it's both. >> okay, thank you. that's what i think, anyway. michelle, bernard, thank you, dear. and thank you, dear. i had a couple myself. we'll be right back after this. my life has been positively cray-cray. what's snapshot, you ask? only a revolutionary tool that can save you big-time. just plug it in, and the better you drive, the more cash you'll stash. switching to progressive can already save ye $500.

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let me finish tonight with the right to vote. the right to vote. it's not just about the power of himself or herself, it's about whether the power of those who hold office is jell lit mat or not. true authority as opposed to the simple, brute force of any government comes from being elected by the people. true authority in a democracy is to be chosen by the people. the essential basis of its powers being elected in the first place. when you deny the deny the people the right to vote, it lacks the legitimacy of office. who can say that they hold true authority to make the powerful, moral decisions of government.

i think i know why the republicans in so many states are making it harder for blacks and young people to vote. i think it's their chances of winning elections. they can balloon the electoral power of older, white people. that's a math mat cat fact. and we've heard a few republicans, a couple leaders from my home state of pennsylvania dare recite that fact out loud. it's about legitimacy. if we were to do to sports what we were doing to the electorate, we could reduce the number of black athletes. think what that would do? would the nba and nfl retain their status of having the best players available? or would they be in the arenas that can no longer make that claim. the legitimacy of being the best arenas for the best players. so tell that to people out there. tell them that regardless of what happens in any particular election, that you are ready to compete fairly and squarely on

the political playing field. that you would rather lose an election than cheat. and that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. "all in" with chris hayes starts right now. >> tonights e, on "all in," wendy davis doubles down on a con tro verse yal campaign add. >> a tree fell on greg abbot. he sued and got millen yous. >> the first and only debate in the marquee race. we've got news from kentucky. a texas nurse tests positive for ebola and the cdc tries to explain what went wrong. protesters square off across a generational divide. >> missouri is the new mississippi. scott brown may be down at the polls.