they plan to talk. what a day for you to be solo at the pentagon today. good work. thank you for everything you have done today. we will be back thursday because if it is thursday. i'm steve kornacki. right now new details on a meeting between pope francis and kim davis. she is the kentucky clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples s breaking news russia begins air strikes in syria. russia says it is targeting isis. the u.s. not so sure. secretary of state john kerry just spoke at the united nations. we will play you some of his remarks. round two in the granite state. donald trump and jeb bush have dueling town halls in new

hampshire. we start with what was likely the best kept secret of pope francis's u.s. trip. a secret meeting with the kentucky clerk jailed for refusing to issue same-sex marriage licenses. attorneys for davis released this photo of two rosaries they say the pope gave to davis when the two of them met last thursday. with every move crowds of people and hundreds of cameras followed the pope on his trip in the united states but no one until now know this meeting with kim davis had happened. davis just opened up about what her conversation with the pope meant to her. >> i put my hand out and he grabbed it and i hugged him and he hugged me. and he said thank you for your courage. he told me before he left stay strong. that was a great encouragement.

knowing the pope is on track with what we are doing and agreeing kind of validates everything. >> last week reporters asked the pope about davis. he didn't mention her by name but did say i can say that objection is a right that is a part of every human right. it is a right. and if a person does not allow others to be a conscientious objector he denies a right. here is the president's response. >> it is important for americans across the country to say clearly that our religious freedom doesn't give us the freedom to deny fellow americans their constitutional rights. our position about ms. davis is quite clear that the president believes strongly in the rule of law. >> i want to talk about this secret meeting with dean ofurse line college's school of graduate and professional studies.

gina, let me start with you. i'm curious about -- we know about this story apparently through lawyers for kim davis. they put this out. do we know anything more about the circumstances of how this meeting came about? how she landed on pope francis's radar? how this was scheduled, what kind of briefing he had and information he had. do we have knowledge about that? >> steve, thank you so much for having me. that's a great question. i don't think there is a great deal of knowledge about how this came about but certainly this has been a major issue going on in the united states and the u.s. bishops did arrange the visit for pope francis and created his schedule. given that marriage equality is such an incredible issue happening right now in the u.s. and that the catholic church continues to take a particular stance it does make sense that they created this meeting for pope francis. but i think it is also very,

very telling that at this point the pope hasn't confirmed or denied the meeting itself. i think it goes to show that he realizes that this was a very controversial thing and that this is something that is going to have a great impact on the american people's understanding of the pope. >> you know the vatican well. i'm curious of what your take is. this is pope francis. about a year ago he gave an interview that caught a lot of people offguard where he said on the subject of homosexuality who am i to judge. it seemed to set a different tone. when people think of that comment and meeting with kim davis they have difficulty reconciling that. >> what i'm told is that the place to look for where this meeting was set up is to the vatican. that he is a very strong

cultural conservative. the meeting did take place at sort of the vatican representative ambassador with some authority over the american church although limited authority. i am also told by a very reliable source that the american bishops were not in on this meeting, that they were satisfied that the pope had sent a strong enough signal on the issue of religious freedom with the meeting made public right away with the little sisters of the poor. i think there is more here that we need to know about because the pope was careful not to sound culture war themed. he was as best as i can tell he never used the words same-sex marriage and he was clear on religious liberty. i'm not saying anything otherwise but this meeting i think was a surprise to an awful lot of people at the top of the american church. now i think you are going to see

as you often see with this pope very strongly conflicting accounts of what happened depending on the point of view. i think very conservative catholics will say he was with us so long. more progressive catholics say did he know about who kim davis was and how was this meeting set up i think it would be interesting if they said more. i think more will come out on exactly how this happened. >> it's interesting that part of papacy has been this political tug of war between the left and right each trying to claim ownership of pope prancefrancis the attorney for kim davis spoke. >> the pope has expressed a universal human right for religious freedom and his time

to meet with kim davis who went to jail for her religious beliefs and her deeply held convictions is something that i think ought to cause all of us to say we need to respect this human right of religious freedom of all of us no matter our walk of life. >> that is a little bit. people on that side of the debate play it up as the pope weighed in on behalf of kim davis. do you expect that we will hear more from the vatican, that we will hear more from the pope as this stirs up such a controversy over here? >> that is a very interesting question. it remained to be seen if he decides to comment further. i think people have been enthralled with this pope because we see him as presenting some very liberal social policies and really creating an option for dialogue from people on both sides of the fence. one of the things we miss about pope francis or not paying

attention to is he really is a traditionalest when it comes to family. he is very focused on the theology of compliment arity. talking about roles for women, single parenting. so this is a major issue. this will communicate very much a contradiction for pope francis. he came into the u.s. talking about dialogue and the need for us to work together and for him to meet with kim davis and use language such as stay strong really contradicts what he has been talking about. >> also news mike huckabee, the presidential candidate organized a rally on behalf of kim davis on twitter saying it may just be the pope's visit that pushes the out of touch political class in d.c. to reequity j judicial

tyranny and could put this up for you. the latest poll numbers asking people whether kim davis should have been required to grant marriage licenses by a two to one margin. 63% to 33% people saying yes. on the domestic politics of this and not just roman catholics but to all of america we know the way the greeting this pope received in the united states last week to you think this will effect public opinion on that subject? >> one thing that was striking about the pope's visit and i saw this from an e-mail from 23r ends, i heard from a lot of nonbelieveers who were very taken by his open spirit and his openness to nonbelievers. i think for some of them this will come as a shock. i think that is why more reporting and more clarity on this will be useful. how much did he know about kim

davis when he met her? what do we mean by conscientious objection? it is one thing to say as we have during times of war that people can object to serving in the military. it is another thing for a general to decide in the middle of the battle i am a pacifist. i use that metaphor which is a strong metaphor to say that people who are public officials have certain responsibilities and now we do have an arran arrangement where kim davis doesn't have to issue the licenses but they have an issue. >> that was the ultimate compromise. thank you. appreciate you both being with us. still ahead breaking news. russia says it is targeting isis with today's air strikes in syria.

that is creating new concerns for the united states. >> that approach is tantamount to pouring gasoline on the fire. plus hillary clinton's campaign says they're vindicated after a surprise admission. >> everybody thought hillary clinton was unbeatable. we put together a benghazi special committee. a select committee. what are her numbers today? her numbers are dropping. >> and this hour donald trump and jeb bush holding dueling town halls in new hampshire. why both candidates need to do some serious work at winning folks over tonight. first we are tracking hurricane joaqu joaquin. the holidays bring many challenges to the feet.

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where governor granted stay of execution for an inmate set to die this afternoon. he was convicted of orchestrating the murder of his boss. the pope sent the governor a letter asking her to commute the sentence. the governor said she made the decision because of questions about the chemicals used for lethal injections. also we are monitoring developing news. hurricane joaquin threatening to pound the east coast from north carolina up to new jersey this weekend. already a category 1 storm packing 85 miles per hour winds as it moves towards the bahamas. let's bring in keith carson. how much rain could joaquin bring to the east coast? >> a lot. five, six inches of rain. ten inches possible in the carolinas. winds 85 miles per hour. first order of business will be in the bahamas. they have a hurricane warning there because it is basically on

top of them. after that the track diverges. steve started the conversation with rain. that is a concern but there is a concern that this storm will hit the eastern seaboard as a hurricane. could be cat one or cat two. latest computer models trying to hook it towards the carolinas but also possibility of further north movement. one computer model brings this out to sea and that would spare a lot of rainfall and a lot of the heavier impacts. it stands alone. it is the european computer model. there is joaquin and it pushes it out to sea. we have a situation where it looks like heavy rainfall likely but could be more a big deal for wind in the carolinas as we head into the weekend. >> keith carson, thanks for the update. still ahead, breaking news we have been telling you about russia begins air strikes in syria in what the country says is a preemptive strike against isis.

>> perfectly clear what russia's intentions are to prop up bashar al assad, the father of isis, to make sure that they have a secure base in the region. good. very good. you see something moving off the shelves and your first thought is to investigate the company. you are type e*. yes, investment opportunities can be anywhere... or not. but you know the difference. e*trade's bar code scanner. shorten the distance between intuition and action. e*trade opportunity is everywhere.

just moments ago we heard from secretary of state john kerry and russian foreign minister after that met at the united nations. the two of them discussing air strikes that russia began conducting today in syria. kerry and lavrov agreed that u.s. and russian militaries need to stay in touch. >> it is imperative to find a solution to the conflict and avoid escalating it in any way

or seeing it intensified by forces beyond anybody's control. we need to see syria kept whole, unifi unified, secular, democratic. those are big agreements in that regard. >> russian officials say the air strikes today were targeting isis militants. the action came hours after the russian parliament gave president putin approval to use military force in syria in support of president bashar al assad. earlier today secretary of state kerry telling the u.n. security council that he is concerned russia may be attacking groups fighting the syrian government. >> we would have grave concerns should russia strike areas where isil and al qaeda are not operating. strikes of that kind would question russia's real intentions fighting isil or protecting the assad regime. >> secretary kerry said the u.s.

wants to negotiate for assad to step down. assad is spuspected of using chlorine gas to attack against civilians. in 2003 the u.s. dealt with another dictator accused of gassing his own people and the u.s. took out saddam hussein in iraq and created a host of other problems in the region. that leaves america with a choice. do we want to get involved here? should we get involved? we bring in mark ginsberg who served as mid east policy adv e adviser. >> the united states, you want to fight isis so do we, this is how we are going to do it. the u.s. is saying we think you are propping up the assad regime and we want the assad regime to fwoe. where does the truth lie? >> both of those are true statements. for russia they are not making the distinction among various

people. look at it from the other perspective which is we are supporting the assad regime regardless of who is fighting the assad regime. that is the position russia has taken. so for them they are playing with the words, maybe isis or al qaeda or other rebels but at the end of the day they all pose a threat for the assad regime and they are going to go after them. the united states wants russia to make that demarcation between the good opposition, good revels that we are supporting and then the isis al qaeda affiliates that we are going after and russia doesn't see it that way. that's why at the end of the day the final analysis is that russia is helping the regime of president bashar al assad who is coming under increased president according to a lot of sources in that theater of operation who could tell he was having a hard time recruiting soldiers for his military. >> his government might be on the verge of collapse here? >> no doubt his government was under pressure.

to say collapse is maybe a bit of stretch. certainly they are under more strain because rockets were landing and didn't have ability and manpower to keep the ground war going. that is why he is relying more and more on barrel bombs which everybody has been describing as the main catalyst for refugee crisis that we have seen a sudden spike of people leaving and going to europe. the people that are leaving to go to europe are leaving from areas being bombarded by the regime. they are not leaving from areas held by isis. the regime is fighting more and more against people in nonisis held territory and russia is now supporting that regime. >> the case that russia would make for the united states to be supportive of what it is doing and propping up assad is saying take a look at iraq. saddam hussein was terrible. you took him out and it got even worse. so you have a strong man over there and a bad strong man,

maybe that is the best way to fight isis and create order. >> it's the devil you know. guess what. even israel subscribes to that theory because the bottom line is that russia has always been the patron saint of the assad regime for decades. it has a major naval military base there. syria is the largest purchaser of arms. most importantly for putin maintaining a shiite dominated assad regime is essential one because of the importance that syria is and an extremest sunni takeover in syria could pour more extremists into the southern part of russia chechnya. my friend has it absolutely right.

"huffington post" piece i posted today lays out why from a geo strategic view there is nobody to replace assad at the time. even the europeans are on board with the russians inso far as not pushing assad stage left to the exit. >> hillary clinton was asked about the situation. let's play what she had to say. >> you know, i had a different strategy back when i was secretary of state. i can't sit here today and tell you that if my strategy it been followed we would be in a different place because this has so much of a dynamic of its own. what i believed then is that assad was the principle threat because his bombarding and his ruthless behavior towards his own people was going to create more terrorists. it was going to create refugees. it was going to destabilize

neighboring countries. all of that has come to pass. where we are today which is the president's view that we need to build up the iraqi army. we cannot take back positions from isis because we are not going to put troops on the ground. whenever republicans say we need 10,000 american strootroops on the ground that demonstrates how little they understand and the lessons learned over the last years. >> i am curious what happened going forward. the u.s. is not going to publically back up that assad has to go. practically speaking are we going to see the u.s. ease off a little bit? >> you are hearing the word transition more and more because transition is a very kind of ambiguous timeline implementation of what that looks like. one of the lessons learned from iraq is that you don't want to destroy the state institutions. right now although the assad

regime is in control of 25% to 35% of the country there are still state institutions and a cohesive force that the united states don't want to dismantle because if you destroy the state apparatus you create a much more situation where there is a lot more cast. they want to see assad step out of power and pave the way for process to bring in new leadership. that is the sticking point. who can replace assad? right now there is nobody on the horizon that anybody can agree on. >> former ambassador, appreciate you both joining us. up next, top republican lawmaker seems to admit that investigating hillary clinton over benghazi is politically motivat motivated. was this an honest admission or big mistake? (wind noise)

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just over a week house republicans are going to choose the successor to speaker john boehner. the man widely expected to win the race majority leader kevin mccarthy made a slip seeming to admit that the house benghazi committee is focusing on undermining hillary clinton. >> everybody thought hillary clinton was unbeatable, right? but we put together a benghazi special committee, a select committee. what are her numbers today? her numbers are dropping. why? because she is untrustable. no one would have known any of that had happened had we not thought -- >> the real clear politics polling shows clinton's stand dropped 25 points. house republicans insisted it is above politics and now democrats not surprisingly are slamming the committee. california senator barbara boxer saying it is a politically

motivated sham and calling on speaker boehner to disband it. >> what's your response to mccarthy's comments? >> i have to tell you, i find them deeply distressing. i knew the ambassador that we lost in benghazi. along with him we lost three other brave americans who were representing us in a very dangerous part of the world. there have already been eight investigations in the congress. one independent investigation. we have learned all we can learn about what we need to do to protect our diplomats and our evt other civilians and we need to be enforcing and implementing those changes which is what i started and what secretary kerry has continued. so when i hear a statement like that which demonstrates unequivically that this was always meant to be a partisan

political exercise i feel like it does a grave disservice and dishonors not just the memory of the four that we lost, but of everybody who has served our country. >> and al sharpton's full interview with hillary clinton will air on politics nation this sunday here on msnbc. clinton is slated to appear before the benghazi committee next month. the question now is will mccarthy's slip take the teeth out of that benghazi investigation. kelly o'donnell is with us now. from mccarthy's standpoint i thought this interview was so interesting to watch last night. the full context is hannity was goating him saying you republicans in congress failed on this and that and the other thing and finally as if to get him off his back you had the irritated tone this is what

mccarthy comes up with. what is his office saying today? >> i think it is important to have the context because it did appear that kevin mccarthy was backed into a corner trying to defend himself where outside say republican leadership in congress has not done enough. so he comes up with this. was it motive or result? with the formation of the benghazi committee that is how it came to light that hillary clinton used a personal e-mail and private server, not state department e-mail for her work during her years as secretary of state. that is one of the results of the committee and that harmed her in the public eye. they are saying that this was not politically formed and that the committee is doing proper work. the committee itself put out a release with nine points establishing how it is not political. they interviewed 50 witnesses. only four of them directly tied to hillary clinton, that the chairman has never uttered her

name at any hearing, never fund raised off of benghazi. it is two different ways of looking at this. i think mccarthy had a stumble as he is getting into this new leadership position. we expect that to go forward. this is really a gift and reassurance for democrats and democratic voters that they can hang toon this idea that it was politically motivated all along with some credibility because it came out of kevin mccarthy's mouth. >> you can feel the glee from the clinton campaign over having this talking point to have when this issue comes up. really appreciate you joining us. now to breaking news. donald trump is at a town hall up in the keene, new hampshire. >> i don't want to interrupt other people. so the poll just came out on the debate.

680,000 votes. it's donald trump 51%. carly at 23% who did a good job, by the way. marco at 7% and ted cruz at 6%. the ti"time" magazine poll. i have no influence over time magazine even though i was on the cover last week, right? "time" magazine has trump winning 55% for trump, 20% for carly, 7% for marco rubio. i am watching these shows and they say trump was okay, not great. maybe had an off night. i don't understand. i thought i did fine. they were just trying to beat me up. i thought we did good and i think we are doing well. and the most important poll --

those people -- new hampshire, it's a great, great state. it's a great state. a friend of mine from new york said what are people from new hampshire like? can you believe these questions i get? i say they are just amazing people. they love the country. they love to work. like me i love the country. i love to work. [ applause ] we are all in the same boat. and we are going to straighten it out and make america great again. that i can tell you. we are going to make it great again. a thing came out i was going to save it for a little bit later. we made that horrible iran deal. i just wrote this down. i was watching one of the networks and they said we should have had the prisoners released.

we should have made a deal of knocking the hell out of isis and syria. we are giving them $150 billion. we got nothing except defeat because we don't win anymore as a country. we are going to win so much. it is really embarrassing. i tweeted this before. do you believe this? iran wants to trade our three prisoners -- we have four prisoners, they are only talking about three. the fourth they are not even talking about. they want to trade our three prisoners for 19 prisoners held by the united states and many other things. i mean, how stupid are we? how stupid are we? it's just going to change. it's going to change. it's just going to change. so embarrassing. bergdahl. we get bergdahl, they get five

killers that they wanted so badly. you remember bergdahl? he left. he desserted and we had five and probably six people killed going after him. and the other day i read for the first time he wasn't feeling well. he may not be -- who the hell cares? [ applause ] and they think he might get off with nothing. six people died. and he was a desserter. in the old days when we were strong, what did we do with desserters? there was no deserting. so a lot of the press has been nice to us in the last few days because we gave a very detailed

tax policy where we substantially reduced taxes. very substantial. and i'm going to go over it but we are going to create a lot of jobs. we are taking jobs back from china and these other countries that have been ripping us. mexico, china, japan. we are going to be taking them back. but you know they were so happy in a certain way they said, well, we want policy. so i gave policy on immigration. and they were sort of happy with that. they didn't necessarily agree with everything. a lot of people say you can't build a wall. how can you build a wall? our trade deficit with mexico is 4r5 bi $45 billion a year. i love the mexican people. i have thousands and thousands of mexican people that have worked with me over the years. i have a great relationship, but their leaders are too smart for our leaders. too cunning, too sharp. they are ripping us.

so we have a deficit. nabisco is moving. what is more united states than nabisco. they are moving to mexico from chicago. they are going to make oreos in mexico. and then we have ford motor company. $2.5 billion plant. you heard that story. i'm not going to tell it. if i do they will kill me. every other candidate can go and make a speech. every other candidate and they make the same speech for months but they have 100 people. jeb bush is down the road. they are expecting 125 people tonight. it's true. i'm going to tell you because we have been getting amazing crowds. we had 20,000 people on friday in oklahoma. 20,000 people. in oklahoma a great place. that was an amazing event.

we had 20,000 people. we filled up a stadium where the mavericks play, mark cuban. good guy. it's called american airlines center. that's in dallas. 20,000 people showed up. some were so far up i said can you even see me? and we had three days to do it because when we got it -- when they said you can have that arena if you want it. i said when? monday night. this was like thursday. i said how can we fill it up? the first day they did 12,000 people. then we went to mobile, alabama, as you know just before that. we had 35,000 people. it's been amazing. so tonight -- and i want accurate counts because these people they don't count heads. they will say the place was okay. the press, they are so -- by the way, pan out on these people, please. cnn and live cameras, pan out.

because you know what they do? they have the camera, live television on my face the entire amount. my wife goes -- i go home. were there any people there tonight? they don't see. they never show the crowds. they don't want to. they don't want to. at this room we have another room just as big. cnn and all the people. it's so important. the fire marshall, the only reason because we have a lot of people can't get in. 3,564. that's what we have exactly. and we love the fire marshals. but the fire marshall actually right over here, the fire marshall said you can't have them in the aisles. if there is a problem we get out of here. i will be the first one out the door, believe me.

we have 3,564 people. we have closed circuit it is amazing. it is always like this. it's always like this. we did have one event so beautiful in south carolina i was called by a friend of mine who is african-american, a great guy. the south carolina african-american chamber of commerce. he wrote the most beautiful letter. i said i was going to read it to you. he put it in one of the papers today. and it was the last minute thing that said would you speak? i am speaking to the african-american chamber of commerce. they didn't come from the back. they just formed in the front. it was beautiful. and they said it was the biggest crowd, the best crowd they have had. it was such a beautiful day. it was a lunch. it was wonderful. and the cameras because they were all up front the cameras showed chairs in the back that were empty like trump's lost it. is trump losing it?

i just walked in and did them a favor. these people were so angry. african-american people that do such a great job and you have to see the letter. anybody who wants it we have it. it was such a ubeautiful letter and so unfair the way they were treated. that is why i like to have the press see what is going on. there is a movement going on. this is more than like people show up. when bush have 125 people and when rubeio comes in and has 12 people and when all of the other ones -- some of them i really like. but nobody has crowds like us. nobody. including bernie who does pretty well. nobody. and the fact is something is happening, something incredible is happening. so what's gone on is we put in

policy on immigration and that's build a wall. people have to come into the country legally, have to do it. have to do it. have to do it or we don't have a country. the anchor babies we are going to have to do something there. by the way when i first brought that up people come in. they're in the other side. they're on the other side of the border. they have a baby. nobody stops anybody. it's like we are open territory. the woman has a baby on our land in the united states. now we have to take care of that baby for 85 years. that baby becomes a citizen. i said it can't be. everybody said that baby is a citizen born in the united states. turned out i'm right. because they are not coming in legally. if you read the language other than some television scholars

that said the baby is ours people are coming from china. they are coming from all over asia. they are coming from latin america, south america, coming from mexico. they walk across the border. it's ours. doesn't read that way. i didn't think. they said you have to go through a whole big thing, every state has to go to referendums. the 14th amendment and so many different things. but it's not working that way. it's wrong. and i turned out to be right. because the real scholars said he is right. maybe it's going to -- how can it be wrong? so this is something that has come up. we have to get rid of these sanctuary cities. it's disgraceful. it's disgraceful. because i have had so many friends that i have made. first of all, kate, magnificent

kate shot in the back and killed in san francisco sanctuary city. i have property in san francisco. i own a big chunk of the bank of america building. can you believe it? when i hear san francisco i always felt so good. now you learn about sanctuary cities. the state of florida had sanctuary cities while jeb bush was governor. nobody said anything. i have gotten very friendly with a lot of the people because it has become a very important issue for me the whole thing with illegal immigration and crime. it is far worse than anybody in this room understands. far worse. tremendous people come in but you have some terrible, terrible problems. the other week as you saw a lot of press, a woman 66-year-old veteran raped, sodmized and killed by an illegal immigrant.

came in and killed her. 66-year-old veteran, killed her. and that is happening all over. we are going to stop it. we are going to have a wall. and i'm really good at walls. what i do great. i build. what i do better than -- that's why with the infrastructure of the country falling apart. we are spending money all over the wall. i was going to have a list of dumb things the country does. one is a washer. a screw, a washer and extra grip. it was a two cent washer by the time it went to south carolina to texas it cost $988,000 to have it delivered over a long period of time. there are so many things like that. there are so many things. there are item after item.

hammer that you buy for $7 selling for thousands that we buy as a country for thousands of dollars. some people are getting really rich. who are these people that are making these deals? you are probably saying maybe i do, too. i want a part of these companies. things that sell at a store for pennies they are selling for thousands of dollars. there is so much fat. so much fat. and i get a lot of credit for coming out with immigration. some people don't agree. they think it is trash. some people think it is good. dwight eisenhower was a wonderful general and a respected president and he moved a million people out of the country. nobody said anything about it. when trump does it it's like -- when eisenhower he was allowed to do it. that was also in the '50s.

different time. that's when we had a country. that's when we had a country. [ applause ] that's when we had borders. without borders you don't have a country. we don't have a country. without borders you don't have it. dwight eisenhower big reports. they used to take him out and put him on the other side of the border. you have to stay here. they come right back and they do it again and do it again and then they said this doesn't work. and they took them out and moved them all the way south, all the way and never came back again because it was too far. amazing. and i'm not saying this in a joking way. this is what 4happened. they literally moved them all the way. a lot of the politicians never came back because it is too far. they would put them on boats and

all the way down south. that was it. but then a lot of things happened and a lot of changes took place and now we have become so politically correct as a country that we can't even walk. we can't think properly. we can't do anything. every time you say something that was not politically correct. it wasn't politically correct. nobody respects women more than i do. that's true. and i will do more -- thank you. it's true. my mother was the greatest person there was. nobody respects women more than i do. and two weeks ago i was making a speech and i said i cherish women. i cherish women. hillary said we don't want to be cherished. we want to be respected. i said that. i think you want to be cherished. it's better than respect. you want to be respected and loved and cherished, everything. i think, am i right or wrong?

[ applause ] and nobody cares more than i do. i will tell you women's health issues where jeb bush recently said that he's not going to fund them. he said he misspoke. the word is misspoke. can't misspeak. that's going to be so vital and so important. we are going to take care of women and our vets. we are going to take care of everyone. we will really take care of people. we are going to bring jobs back to the country and we are going to become a rich country again. we are a poor country. we are a poor country. we are now 19 trillion. we owe china $1.5 trillion. they take our jobs, they take our base. they take our money and we owe them $1.5 trillion.

that's like a magic act. we owe japan the exact same amount. $1.5 trillion. we owe them. they send millions of cars here. we pay for the cars, no tax, no nothing. try doing business in japan. i always say how many chevrolets do you think you are going to find in the middle of tokyo? maybe none. might be none. we sell them beef and they don't want it. beef. and they don't want it. the farmers don't want it. so we owe japan $1.5 trillion. think of it. they sell us all of these cars. we owe them money on top of everything else. it's going to stop. so easy. it's so easy. we have to balance out. i went to my people this week and i said i want to know something. i want to know how much do we in

terms of plabalance of trade, h much are we behind the eight ball with china, japan and mexico. china it is almost $400 billion a year. 40 0 billion! japan is almost $70 billion a year. and mexico $45 billion. they say you capacin't get mexio pay for the wall. i build bigger, better stronger for half the price, much less than half the price. much less than half the price. because i know how to build. it will be so beautiful. it will work so well. it's going to work so well. you see the picture in the big magazine this weekend. i knew the magazine because i was on the cover. they have a wall like probably eight or nine feet and they have a ramp going up and another ramp going down. they have cars and trucks going

over taking drugs. so here is the deal. we get the drugs. they get the money. these trucks go right over the ramp over the wall. you can't do that when the wall is higher than the ceiling or a long way down if they miss that ramp. it's a long way. and i don't blame you. if people can get away with it let them get away with it. we will make our country so strong and so beautiful we are going to do. then i put in something on policy with regard to the second amendment. i'm a big second amendment person. you have all seen it. [ applause ] and in two weeks this is something that i have really gotten to know a lot about. we are going to take care of our vets. i'm going to put in a policy paper on the veterans and the veterans administration. and i know what to do. it's not even the money. we spend so much money but we

have all thieves, tremendous corruption, a few weeks ago on wednesday we had the longest wait in the history of the veterans administration. they waited days to see a doctor. they are dying. you saw the reports. hard to believe so many people are dying while they are waiting. >> that's donald trump speaking at a town hall in keene, new hampshire. for reaction -- mercedes, let me start with you. donald trump a lot of talking there about his poll numbers, about crowd sizes. this is sort of the theme of most of his speeches. it also comes the context new poll did come out today, new national poll from usa today puts him at first place with 23%.

i'm curious what you make of trump's current standing in the polls. obviously he is still leading but another argument could be made that things are leveling off a little bit. he is not expanding support. >> that i think is donald trump's biggest challenge. how can he expand his support. the only way i believe if you start seeing other republican candidates say let me let go of my ego and the numbers start shifting i don't think the voters will necessarily go in a trump category. i think they spread. again, i think trump does have that problem which is the fact that he is not able to expand as far. the headline will be that nabisco is making oreos in mexico. >> while donald trump was speaking in southwest new

hampshire one of his favorite targets, former florida governor jeb bush was holding his own event in bedford about an hour from keene. jeb bush who has been struggling in the polls as donald trump likes to point out apparently made light in his standing in the polls. let's play that for you. >> here in new hampshire because you all are the discerning voters, the ones that get to kick as many tires as you want. some guy yesterday told me he narrowed it down to five. i'm in the top five. woo hoo! things are looking up. a couple of months ago a state senator told me i was in his top 18 and there are only 18 people running. so you take your time in doing this. i think as we get closer to the election i think people are going to know what you have done to give me some indication that you can do what you said you are going to do? rather than just talking about

stuff. >> we got to credit donald trump with putting the term low energy into the political lexicon. not the first time we have seen the two of them speaking at the same time. that contrast between the bluster you are hearing from donald trump in a very different more subdued style from jeb bush. has he picked up his game at all do you think? >> i think jeb bush has learned over the summer that you cannot allow donald trump to dictate the direction of your campaign or the issues you are going to be talking about. he wasn't comfortable attacking donald trump. that was apparent to everyone and at times led him to make statements that could come back to hurt him certainly when it came to discussing immigration policy. he has been ruling out policy proposals on energy. he had a substance abuse town hall in new hampshire which is an issue that constituents care

deeply about. that is where he is strongest articulating policy because he has a deep understanding of the issues. that is where he is better suited to play the long game and reposition as potential nominee. >> we can put this up for you. this is the polling average in new hampshire. the average of polls taken. you see donald trump not surprisingly in first place. you have to go to fourth place to find jeb bush. fifth place to find jeb bush at 7%. the significance of this is a lot of people look at iowa and say iowa with very conservative, religious state. jeb bush not expected to do well there. he has to win new hampshire to be viable for this thing. >> he has to win new hampshire since the family compound is in maine which is right next door. what i was looking for straining to see the graphic from my chair is the margin of error. and the margin of error could possibly push all of these

people into a tie. i think the energy that we saw in the clip of jeb bush is actually showing that he is learning the lesson that he has to be energetic and has to give people a reason to vote for him. >> thank you for watching. i'm steve kornacki and "hardball" starts right now. trump fights um b s obama. let's play "hardball." good evening on a wild and strange night in american politics. donald trump riding a triumphant lead says u.s. should let vladimir putin bomb isis. the problem for donald trump is that putin's bombers were bombing the