fought for things like ending racial profiling, changing the crack/cocaine and powder cocaine disparities. >> all right. karen finney, great to have you. >> great to be with you. >> that is "all in". we'll see you next week from houston, texas. tune in tomorrow. the rachel maddow show starts now. good evening. safe travels. thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. just when you think you know what's going to happen next. just when you feel like you got la handle on the story and where it's going. just when you think you've got it under control, things go a little nuts. there are still some known knowns in the world. we still know a few things about what will happen next. i can tell you that tonight is south carolina eve. tomorrow polls will open and

polls will close in the south carolina democratic primary. that will happen. in terms of what is going to happen in that primary, nobody can tell you that for sure in advance. the voters will decide. we decided to take a little snapshot of the last three days of polling heading into this weekend and beyond. looking first at the democratic side heading into this very important south carolina race tomorrow night. the polling situation in that democratic contest is pretty stark. over the last three days there's been two polls on the south carolina democratic race, and they both show hillary clinton leading bernie sanders in that state by a big margin. one of them shows -- sorry. we've got two polls there. both of which show her leading by a big margin. in one case it was 23 points. the other case it's 50 points. that clemson poll that shows hillary clinton leading by 50 points, i should point out that's much larger margin than we're seeing from other polls.

that's a bit of an outlier. that is -- excuse me. i lost my teleprompter. that's been the outlier. that clemson poll is a much larger than any poll. that's what they published. if you're planning on watching the south carolina results coming in and watching the reaction of hill clinton and bernie sanders to see how tomorrow's results will affect the overall trajectory of the race, i'll give you all the details in a moment in terms of what our coverage will be and how and when you can watch the south carolina race. after tomorrow night, after south carolina, just three days later, it's going to be mother of all primary days in both parties, super tuesday. on the democratic side, looking at just polling that's come out in the last three days, this is the polling snapshot we have for super tuesday. first of all, you can pull out colorado and minnesota. there's no polling in colorado

and minnesota even right before the vote, and that's because colorado and minnesota are,0 primaries. they are caucuses. caucuses are much harder to poll. we also have reported information from the state that tells us that colorado and minnesota are being hotly contested by sanders and clinton. the bernie sanders campaign say they think they have a very good chance to win in both the states. even though we don't have polling, don't read anything into the lack of polling. that's to be expected because they are caucuses. that said, we don't have any current numbers from the last three days for alabama, arkansas, oklahoma, tennessee or vermont. you can, i think, reasonably cut to the chase this two of those states. vermont is the home state of bernie sanders. he's expected to win there almost by acclimation. his numbers are completely off the charts. similarly, hillary clinton is thought to have large home state advantage in the state of

arkansas. she's expected to be a shoo in in the state of arkansas. the other states that we don't have data, those will be interesting to watch. it will also be particularly worth watching over the weekend to see if polling does come out saturday, sunday into monday ahead of the states holding contests on super tuesday. particularly, keep an eye on oklahoma where the existing polling showed the race is very close. both candidates have been working really, really hard and holding big events. the states where we do have current, new data for super tuesday on the democratic side, those states are virginia. a poll was out that showed hillary clinton leading by 27 points. in georgia there's two polls in the last three days. one of them has hillary clinton up by 28. the other has her up by 39 points. in texas there's been a bunch of polling. six polls. she has anywhere from 10 points

to 40 points dependi ining on ws doing the poll. there's also the massachusetts poll. we got a look last night. it doesn't show a giant double digit lead for secretary clinton like we're seeing in the states. this is a notable result for the democratic contest because it's massachusetts. massachusetts borders vermont. it's expect to be almost a home state race for bernie sanders. the sanders campaign, the candidate himself have said they expect to win in massachusetts. this wbur poll that came out last night showing bernie sanders trailing hillary clinton in massachusetts, even if it is by a small margin, that could be big news on super tuesday. fp you're the bernie sanders campaign or a bernie sanders supporter, tomorrow in south carolina and tuesday in all these other states, you look at

the polling, it's not a good outlook. the sanders campaign and sanders supporters are at a moment where however hard they have been working, they'll have to crank it up and start working three times as hard in order to overcome these stiff heads they have against the clinton campaign over these next crucial contests. that renewed front-runner status that secretary hillary clinton is enjoying on the democratic side, that is almost nothing compared to what front-runner donald trump is enjoying on the republican side. the republicans for their party, they don't have a contest this weekend. the next primary and caucuses is on super tuesday. if you look at the last three days of polling for the republicans, that will give you two polls out of virginia. donald trump leading by 14 points in one of them and by 23 points in the other. in oklahoma a new poll has donald trump leading there by eight points. that wbur poll in massachusetts has mr. trump leading by 21

points in massachusetts. there's two recent polls out of georgia right now on the republican side. both of them show mr. trump leading. one by 12%. one by 26%. the only place on the forthcoming calendar where donald trump is not leading where one of his competitors appear to be enjoying a home state advantage. the only state where that's true is the great state of texas. it does look like ted cruz could win there. there's been five polls released on the texas race over the last three days. one of them shows a tie between senator cruz and mr. trump. the other four show senator cruz leading in his home state by a range of anywhere from one point to 15 points. what do you do if you are donald trump presidential front-runner and leading in every single state many the country except for one, which is the home state of one of your competitors. if you're leading everywhere and you're donald trump, you go to that one state where you're not

leading. you hold a red face, scream your lungs out rally in front of 8,000 pumped up texans in ft. worth. if you're donald trump before you hold that mosh pit of a giant rally in ted cruz's backyard, the other thing you do is unveil a big surprise. we all got word at the news networks today that donald trump would hold a press availability before his big rally in ft. worth today. that's kind of par for the course. we all tend to get notice when these things happen. that's how the press shows up. if there will be a big announcement, some big endorsement at one of these press availabilities, we'll get a heads up. they will tell us there's going to be big endorsement or news made. there was no notice like that at all. no notice it would be anything special. we were told the time and reporters and camera crews turned up at the allotted time.

it's going to be a donald trump press conference. see what he's going to say. i'm going to show you the part before it started. i'm going to show you the raw footage from the network camera so you can see how that they made this happen. how they did it for shock value. the reporters were there because they expected a press conference. they had not been told to expect anything special. then it starts. thereon how the press reacts. listen to the reporter nearest to the camera when in walks donald trump with somebody else who nobody else expected to be there. >> wow. >> something's going on. >> wow. wow indeed. he said wow as if he's professing shock that the

cameras are there. the people are saying wow because we didn't know that was going to happen. that's chris christie. if he's here in texas with donald trump, he must be here to endorse donald trump. before today, none of the 64,000 republicans who have dropped out of the presidential race thus far had decided to endorse donald trump after they got out. the closest to that was mike huckabee's campaign manager. his daughter siegned on with th trump campaign this week. also rudy giuliani admits sometimes he talks to mr. trump. that's it. nobody, certainly from the whole giant failed field this year had endorsed the front-runner before today. nobody would have expected the first one would be chris christie especially after the way chris christie talked about donald trump during his own presidential campaign, which again only ended two weeks ago.

>> i just don't think he's suited to be president of the united states. you don't want this job. this is not play to your skill set. if the speaker of the house doesn't post one of your bills, you can't fire him. it's not the way it works man. i want this. no. you're fired. he goes back to his office on capitol hill and says, oh, yeah. the other guy whose only experience is sitting in fake board room in new york city looking into a camera and saying your fired. show time is over everybody. we're not electing an entertainer in chief. showmanship is fun but it's not the kind of leadership that will change america. whatever you want to say and have said about me over the years in terms that have come out of my mouth, they're fraction. i never said i could shoot somebody in the middle of fifth avenue and i wouldn't lose a voter. i never called mexicans rapists

and murderers. i never said ban all muslims from the united states. mr. trump has said he's walking, living special interest group and lobbyist. he's gotten special deals. he's admitted this on the stage. he said he gave money to hillary clinton because he wanted to make deals to her. he gave money to nancy pelosi because he wants to make deals with her. it's one of great ironies. he said i'm not going to be affected by special interests. he is special interests. he's walking special interest. you don't like to debate moderator, stand up and fight. you don't like the network, show up and fight. what's that tell you about what we can expect if things go sideways when you go into the oval office? what are you going to do? vladimmir putin can't being nic i'm not going to return his phone call. the press isn't being nice, i'm

not going to hold anymore press conferences. this is like a 13-year-old argument. we're not casting a tv show. this is real. he has no ability in this area. he has no experience and no ability. it doesn't make him a bad guy. i think he's generally a good person. you know what, he had no business being president of the united states. >> up until two weeks ago, the reason chris christie said he was running for president is because donald trump had no ability to be the president and has no business trying to be president. chris christie was running dw n

against him instead of helping him. as of today he's helping him. in a presidential race where we thought we had seen it all, chris christie endorsing him. it made camera crews go wow. they called it a shock endorsement today. when everything else around you is dying just adapt. you can live through almost anything. chris christie doesn't have a next political job lined up in his life. he's term limited out as new jersey governor. getting 2% of the vote in iowa and sixth place in new hampshire has dimmed any illusions there's some national republican appetite for what he has to offer. what kind of job, republican party chairman, national spokesman for something republican. i don't know. this might have been the only move left for chris christie that would give him any

political role in the republican party going forward. for mr. trump, it meet a couple of his needs. marco rubio was seen as having a pretty good debate performance last night in texas. this shocker, this unexpected chris christie endorsement early today quashed that debate story line pretty fast and let domds trump ta donald trump take over the news cycle. he's enjoying a diminished republican field in which only marco rubio has the establishment support and endorsements to stay in the race for the long haul even though he's expected to lose state after state after state to mr. trump. marco rubio is not expected to win in a single super tuesday state. that take down that chris christie administered in new hampshire, that may not have helped governor christie's own chances but it did establish him as the one proven marco rubio

slayer in the whole republican field. jeb bush won against marco rubio, he was ineffective. ted cruz has been ineffective, but chris christie has opinion great against marco rubio. marco rubio probably has his fifth place finish in new hampshire, he probably has chris christie the thank for that. even though chris christie is out of race himself. now donald trump has the patented rubio elixir on tap in the form of his highest profile endorser. this endorsement was a shock to the race. it does meet immediate political needs for christie and donald trump. we shouldn't have been so surprised despite what appeared to be mr. christie's previous opposition to mr. trump and that he was unqualified and now suitable for the job he's endorsed him for. here is the critical question.

not just for them as men and political figures. now that somebody like chris christie has stopped opposing donald trump, he used to really oppose donald trump. he said he was patently unsuited for the job of the united states. he didn't have the skill set. he had no business running for the job. he's given that up. now that somebody like chris christie has stopped opposing donald trump, he's given up and given in and decided to get on board the donald trump train. now that he's given up his opposition and gotten on board, should we see that as things to come. this is turns out to be an empirical question. there is part of country that finds him horrifying and opposed

to him winning the party's nomination. it is real. you can see it being in the ads run. you can see it in things like the national review, the conservative magazine trying to have some unified conservative movement against mr. trump. we'll have more on that ahead tonight including the moment that will be preserved as the first instance in american major politics when one candidate accused another of wetting his pants. the person who made that accusation was not donald trump. as the republican contest further descends and as mr. trump standings in the polls get higher and higher and more consistent in states all over

the country, there is now a critical question to ask about the republican party and it's important for all whole country. since it looks like donald trump will win, unless things change radically, are things going to change radically? are republicans going to do what chris christie did today and give up and get on board or will the anti-trump contingent within the republican party get stronger? does the anti-trump contingent within the republican party have any chance of ever getting strong enough to keep him from getting the nomination in it's an empirical question, and it's getting to be kind of critical not just to this race but to the future of who we are as a country. we do have one small specific way to try to get an answer to that question tonight ahead on this show. stay with us. but with my back pain i couldn't sleep... so i couldn't get up in time. then i found aleve pm. aleve pm is the only one to combine a sleep aid plus

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a word, choker as in a person who chokes.

that word is spelled choker. that's the relevant context here. >> you want to have a little fun. what is donald trump do when things go wrong? he takes to twitter. i have them right here. let's read some. you'll have fun. number one. here's the first one. lightweight marco rubio was working hard last night. this is true. the problem is he is a chalker. once a chalker always a choker. i guess that's what he meant to say. he spelled it choker. he called many mr. meltdown. last night in the debate during one of the breaks, two of the breaks he went backstage. he was having a meltdown. first he had this little make up thing like applying make up around his mustache because he had a sweat mustache.

then he asked for a full length mirror. i don't know why because the podium goes up to here. maybe to make sure his pants weren't wet. i don't know. >> this is the marco rubio campaign for president now. he says the front-runner, he peed his pants maybe. also the word choker is actually spelled c-h-o-k-e-r. while we're at it senator quayle, the word potato has no e on it. this is the campaign of the republican party. h once it get to where he says his opponent wears make up and peed his pants then there has to be a response. this is their campaign now. >> i'll tell you about backstage if you like. i walk back there and he's with a pile of makeup putting it on his face. i said easy with the make up. you don't need that much. i watched him with this man

where marco right over here and i looked at him and said are you okay. he looked like he came out of a swimming pool. he was a mess. we'll see what happens. i heard he had some nasty, personal comments. i saw him backstage. he was putting it on with a trowel. he's desperate. i watched part of his little act. he's desperate guy. i've been watching him over the last number -- he's not presidential material that i can tell you. he doesn't have the demeaner. he's a nervous nelly. i watch him backstage. he's a mess. the guy's a total mess. i joked recently can you imagine putin waiting for a meeting and rubio walks in and he's totally drenched. i don't know what it is. i've never seen a human being sweat like this man sweats. i don't think he's of presidential caliber. i don't think he has the demeanor. i don't think he will do well, and he's a mess.

>> bernie sanders and hillary clinton are also running against each other right now and running very hard. between them though peeing your pants and sweating too much hasn't come up at all. the parties are different every year. the parties are really, really different this year. esurance was born online. which means fewer costs, which saves money. their customer experience is virtually paperless, which saves paper, which saves money. they have smart online tools, so you only pay for what's right for you, which saves money. they settle claims quickly, which saves time, which saves money. they drive an all-hybrid claims fleet, which saves gas, which saves money. they were born online, and built to save money, which means when they save, you save. that's auto and home insurance for the modern world.

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country everything that we want it to be for our children and grand children. he's a good friend. he's a strong and resolute leader. he will lead the republican party to victory in november over hillary clinton which is the single most important thing we can do. >> becoming the first failed presidential candidate from this year to throw his endorsement president the front-runner, donald trump. at this point what's going to happen seems pretty clear. either donald trump will become the republican party's nominee or the anti-donald trump forces within the republican party will prove to be strong enough to stop that from happening. from outside the conservative movement and from outside the republican party, frankly, it's very hard to gauge the strength of the anti-donald trump effort. it is real effort. you can see politicians and strategists and passionately loyal republican individuals and individual conservative

organizations and sometimes other candidates in the presidential race. you can see them all trying to criticize donald trump or express their opposition to him getting the nomination as his front-runner status gets stronger and stronger. is the anti-trump effort basically tilting at wind mills or is it really a powerful enough counter force to what he's put together that it can derail it? i can't tell from the outside. in order to effectively report out this story we must consult with somebody on the inside. joining us is the former communications expert for the rnc. he wrote here is why i won't support trump if he's the nominee. great to see you. >> thank you. >> how strong -- explain to somebody outside your world. how strong is the organized effort against mr. trump inside the republican party inside the

conservative movement. >> if you have trouble defining it from the outside, i have trouble defining it from the inside. i've talked to countless people, not just in washington, d.c. but the early primary states and late primary states, for that matter, who think that donald trump would be the worst thing that can happen to the republican party even if he's not our nominee has been destructive to the efforts of party. it would be a total disaster if the house, the senate, controlled state houses. everything about this is bad. i would love to tell you it's great organized effort, it's not. i think you have seen a lot of individual who is have stood up and said i'm concerned about the direction of our party which means they are worried about the direction of our country. we're all standing up one at a time. i welcome all aboard to say that donald trump is somebody that we can't support but i think everybody i have talked to is happy the finally, thank god, marco rubio and ted cruz finally

giving real scrutiny to donald trump. we've had three phases. first was you can't attack him because he's not serious. that was the summer. in the fall, you can't attack him because it won't work. that was the fall. right now in the winter, you can't attack donald trump, it's too late. there's one common thing there, not going after donald trump. not treating the front-runner of the republican party as the front-runner. i've been arguing since july we need to treat him like the front-runner, hold his feet to the fire on issues and go after him. no one has done that until last night. >> with that evolution of all the reasons not to do it, now that he's getting closer to the nomination, obviously we're still early but super tuesday looks daunting. as it starts to look like he's closing in on that nomination, does the effort the try to stop him get weaker or stronger.

i expected it would get stronger but seeing chris christie jump in with donald trump today made me sort of feel like maybe what we should expect is the effort will get weaker. >> that's what we saw with chris christie. the chris christie of february 25 is not the chris christie from february 5th when he was speaking out against donald trump. i'll give the trump campaign credit. they held this as a secret. i know what a great fan you are of professional wrestling. this is like when andre the giant shocked the world. maybe in retrospect it makes sense. will it work? is it too late? i don't know the answers to these questions. i'm glad somebody is speaking

about him on candidate level. we're starting to see people go after him. we've never seen this before. obviously we never seen anybody like trump before but we have never seen a front-runner be immune. >> the scrutiny he has received has slid right off of him because it's not seemed material for whatever reason to the people who are trying to take him down. it's going to be fascinating after super tuesday to watch to see what happens to your side of the party. people who want to take him on. >> let me say quickly. whether or not our effort is successful or not, if he's the nominee, republicans know one thing, democrats will not make the mistake that republicans have whether it's folks like brad woodhouse, the hillary campaign will attack him hard and it will be bloody. republicans should have been doing this for eight months. >> doug high. a nice guy and a good sport. great to see you.

>> thank you. it's such a busy news night that i got to say it doesn't feel like a friday. feels like the middle of the workweek, doesn't it? that's because it is. we'll have more on that plus a governor who has become an unkpu unexpected household name in politics may be on his way out of his job. that dramatic story is ahead. stay with us. king one claritin every day of your allergy season... ...for continuous relief. with powerful, 24 hour... ...non-drowsy claritin, live claritin clear. every day.

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two roads diverged in yellow

wood. one led to who you expect winning the republican primary, the other led to no one winning the republican primary and the party being thrown into a level of chaos that's close to historic. the numbers, the official numbers that create this map, those numbers have been crunched by some of our very, very smartest colleagues. that reporting is next. it's a stark truth about what's about to happen that a lot of people have not come to terms with yet. if you want to sound smart about the presidential race this year, i have just the thing for you. dear, if we had directv, we could put tvs anywhere without looking at cable wires and boxes in every room. mother, we are settlers. we settle for cable. and the simpler things in life. like our drab clothing. that's right, daughter. and homemade haircuts.

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i tabut with my back paines, i couldn't sleep and get up in time. then i found aleve pm. aleve pm is the only one to combine a safe sleep aid plus the 12 hour pain relieving strength of aleve. i'm back. aleve pm for a better am. so far in the three states that donald trump has won, marco rubio has lost to many trump by 24 points, 10 points and 22 points. he's never gotten close enough to have lost to him by single digits. after the last one he was 22 points behind, senator rubio went on the fox news channel and said that mr. trump is the one who underperformed in that race. >> last time mitt romney got

over 50% so donald trump underperformed. >> it's true. mitt romney did get over 50% of the vote in nevada when he won the nevada caucuses twice. donald trump did get 46% this time. the one person who can't accuse that of being an underperformance in is guy who lost to the underperformer by 22 points. marco rubio has been anointed by the press as the one guy who can beat donald trump. when he's had the chance, he's never come close. that said, the smart kids at first street which is the msnbc politics blog they have taken this blunt reality into the future and them putting it as bluntly as they did today will set everybody's hair on fire the way it should. only two possible delegate out comes. number one, trump as nominee.

or two number, a contested convention. according to what chuck todd and mark murray have about this election about where the delegates are now and where that he are likely to be, if this is the delegate situation after super tuesday which is what we are expecting it to be, then forget it. forget it. if you're excited by marco rubio describing donald trump as an underperform as he crushed him in double digits. if this is the delegate count after tuesday, the only question is whether donald trump locks up the nomination two weeks later when ohio and florida vote and whether he doesn't lock it up and nobody gets the delegates to win and the republican party has to go to the nominating convention in cleveland and july with no clear nominee. those are the two options available. donald trump locks it up or

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to put you back in control. [doorbell] woman: coming! alka-seltzer plus sinus. before this week donald trump did not have a single endorsement from a sitting governor. today he had two. the first one is the one everybody heard about, chris christie who flew down to texas to make the shock announcement on camera. a few hours later, maine's governor paul lepage. he had previously endorsed chris christie but when mr. christie dropped out, paul lepage's endorsement was back up for grabs. he made his announcement today on the talk raid show show of howie carr. >> i'll be honest.

i said i'd like to see a governor. but the american people are not going for a governor this year so i'm going to endorse donald trump. the reasons why are very similar. i was donald trump before being donald trump was popular. >> now he's got two governors. he's got chris christie and his doppleganger. he was last seen complaining about white girls in maine being impregnated by black drug dealing men. any other governors want the hop on the line starts behind chris christie and paul lepage. t no cutting the line. we'll be right back. sears optical has glasses made for doing. right now, buy one pair and get another free. quality eyewear for doers. sears optical. when your symptoms start... distracting you?

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choose the lowest and hit purchase. now...if you'll excuse me, i'm late for an important function. compare.com. saving humanity from high insurance rates. we've got one big story ahead. we have big news about a republican governor who looks like may be out of a job soon. that story is next. first, here is a programming note. because i love you so much, i have decided that you and i should spend another saturday night together. tomorrow night, live wall to wall coverage of the south carolina democratic primary starting at 6:00 p.m. eastern. i'll be here joined by brian williams and chris matthews and the whole gang. we'll be here starting at 6:00 eastern. don't be late. it's okay to wear jeans. dad, you can just drop me off right here.

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auto and home insurance for the modern world. esurance. an allstate company. super tuesday this tuesday march 1st and then a few caucuses on the 5th and 6th of march, but the next big group of delegates is march 8th. there are four prime areas on march th and the big one is michigan. and there's something going on in michigan right now. let's say you were the governor of a state and nine people died in your state, possibly because of you, not because of negligence and horror ificily bad news. how would you do it? i don't know you. i can only occasionally see you

through the television but i doubt you would do this. >> the issue i'm going to discuss is what was present to me was information that over the course of 2014 and 2015 we saw a spike in disease. i was told about this a couple of days ago and basically i thought it should be shared as part of this process. >> that was how michigan governor shared the outbreak of disease in his state. nine people died just in one michigan county and that outbreak was connected to the same malpractice of government by which the administration lead poisoned of the city of flint. the disease part of this saga is

just horrendous. people died. when governor snyder announced it in january he made it a point of saying of this deadly outbreak that he wanted you to be sure -- to be sure to know that he didn't know about it until just a couple of days ago. he just found out about it just then. we now know his office did know a long time before that. one of governor snyder's top staffers knew about the outbreak last march, which is ten months before the governor announced that he hadn't known anything about it. ten months before governor snyder said that the governor's office got this e-mail that says more than 40 cases reported since last april. that's a significant uptick. more than the last five years or more experiencombined. the uptick in cases is contributed to the river as a drinking water source.

today the governor released more e-mails related to the flint water crisis and now we know his office knew about this deadly outbreak earlier. 42 cases since last may. i'll explain more on the phone. the date on that e-mail is january of last year. so with michigan residents literally dying from this, governor snyder says he had no idea until this year, but his governor's office e-mail traffic shows he knew about it a year before he said anything to the public. a year before he admits he heard anything about it. as march 8th the first big delegate prize after super tuesday. michigan's republican governor is in a frenzy of firing and reassigning and accepting the resignations and accepting high profile members of his staff and cabinet. the spokesman for the state environmental agency, two people

so far from the drinking water division of the government, yesterday it was the governor's communications director and the press secretary, everyone must go. now we have this new establish of thousands of pages of material that was with just released. reporters, including our own producers have spent the day and will spend the next several days going through this stuff, but what we've gone through so far it looks devastating for governor rick snyder. let's take one example. even before news organizations were reporting high levels of lead in the water, people knew there was something wrong with the water. it was so bad six months later that the local gm plant took itself off of flint water. they quit using the water at the plant because it was corroding the automobile parts that they made. when that happened, here's what rick snyder's top environment adviser wrote in an e-mail.

she said quote, i think we should ask the emergency manager to consider coming ba can to the detroit water system as a solution to both the quality and now the financial problems that the current solution is causing. i see this as an urgent matter to fix. the governor's top lawyer replies to that e-mail, good gravy to anyone who grew up in flint as i did the notion i would be getting my drinking water from the river is scarey. my mom is a city resident. nice to know she's drinking water with elevated chlorine levels and fecal matter. i agree, they should try to get back on the detroit system before this gets out of control. that was the conversation in the governor's office october 2014, six months into the flint water disaster. these are governor office

e-mails, but rick snyder did nothing even with this discussion with his top level advisers, despite these warnings from his top environmental adviser and lawyer, they did nothing. they left flint to keep drinking that water day after day, week after week, month after month for another year after that discussion happened in the governor's office. that's just one example. here is another one. march 2015 flint had been drinking this water for almost a year and the governor's chief of staff wrote this, quote, how about buying some water for the people for a time. $250,000 would buy a lot of drinking water and we could zrubt while we continue to make the water safer. if we procas nate much longer we'll have real trouble. you think this might be real trouble? this is real trouble like testifying before congress

trouble, like testifying before state lawmakers trouble, like fbi criminal investigation trouble, like calls for the governor's resignation trouble and some real way now the cracking of the wall that has so far protected governor rick snyder and kept him in his job. governor snyder, since this blew up he has continually kept as much distance as he could between himself and the idea that he knew what was going on in flint but in an interview today a man named dennis muchmoore said today that he and others in the snyder administration discussed their concerns about flint with the governor directly, personally. quote, we shared them. look, there's only so much distance that governor rick snyder can get from his own responsibility here. there's only so much plausible

deny abiliiability and there's many e-mails that can come out and so many staffers that he can fire, so much protected space that he can get around himself until it comes out he did it. there's only so much of his own governorship that can still stand before holding that office becomes untenable for him. are we there yet? that does it for us tonight. we will see you again tomorrow night for the coverage of the south carolina primary. now it's time for hardball with chris matthews. sure. why not. good evening. i'm chris matthews with four days to go to super t