extreme way -- >> build the dang fence. we ignored it. we were like that's cute. he did it. >> thanks for being with me tonight. rachel maddow show starts now. good evening. >> what did the buffalo bills do? >> it's a long story. google that and you'll get some great photos of him in very '80s, pants. it's a great photo. google it. >> i'd be happy you're blaming that than the media. i'm going to say that's my choice. thanks to you as home for joining us this hour. on monday nights, i'm used to saying thank you for joining us on this blah blah, blah eve. monday has become the eve of things whether it's the eve of super tuesday or sec tuesday or

super western primary tuesday night. i've gotten into a groove where every monday night it's the eve of some important election that's going to take place in the presidential race on tuesday. this is tonight, in fact, the first tuesday eve, sorry, tuesday eve/monday night since mid-february when there isn't a big primary or two or three or four or ten scheduled for the next day. there's nothing tomorrow. that means you do not have to stay up until 2:00 in the morning with me and brian williams and everybody else tomorrow night. congratulations. that said, you probably need to catch up on sleep any way because this weekend was riveting. this weekend was a big deal on the democratic side of the presidential race. just as one measure of how big a deal this weekend was, the bernie sanders campaign says they have raised over $4 million since the polls closed on saturday in alaska and hawaii

and washington state. the bernie sanders victories in those three states were expected heading into those contests but the margins by which he won many those states, those were very impressive. senator sanders won by 64 points in alaska. i don't mean he got 64% of the vote, i mean he got a 64-point margin of victory. senator sanders had margin of victory in hawaii of 40 points. in washington state the margin of victory was 46 points. those were absolutely massive wins for him this weekend. no sides, no states on the democratic side are winner take off, but when you win by margins that big, it ends up being winner take most in terms of the delegates. the overall delegate haul for this past weekend, it looks like he pulled in roughly 55 pledge delegates. secretary clinton pulled in only 20 pledge delegates. that's just the pledge

delegates. leave aside the issue of the super delegates. that's a whole different discussion. looks like senator sanders cut into the pledge lead by about 35, give or take. here's how that delegate race looks overall in perspective. as you can see, a change of 35 delegates one direction or another, it's not a substantive enough change in the democrat standings to feel like it's changing the race but for the sanders campaign it's better than nothing. b, it does give bernie sanders bragging rights for winning the states. not just winning them but winning convincely. c, it gives him an argument of momentum. i'm sure they wish there were some contests tomorrow after the these huge wins this weekend. there's been six states that have voted since march 15th.

march 15th was a bad night for bernie sanders. he's won all five. there's been six contests, he's won five of six. if you're a bernie sanders supporter, five of six, five of the last six, that's got to be exciting news. if you're a clinton supporter or the clinton campaign that run of five out of six victories isn't good news for the clinton side, but there's an easy reason to understand why that string of victories isn't causing major freak out. of the last five states, every single one of them, all five of them were caucuses. for whatever reason, bernie sanders and his campaign have done great in caucuses. there's 12 states that have caucuses so far in this entire primary campaign. senator sanders did get off to a slow start in the caucuses.

he lost the first two by barely in aiowa and nevada. he's won ten straight and won by big, big margins. look at the margin of victory. that's an amazing record. here's the weakness in that track record for the sanders campaign. i don't want to take anything away from how impressive that is. it's also true he cannot be expected to keep that up. that's because there's almost no more caucus states. we're not yet halfway through the primary. there's only two caucuses left. wyoming in april and north dakota in june. if past is prologue, bernie will win in north dakota a wyoming

and he will crush in those caucuses. there aren't enough of those contests left to push him up ahead of hillary clinton overall. unless things change radically these caucus wins aren't enough. the candidate himself is started to make a public case that he may not win the nomination on pledge delegates but maybe he'll win by persuading the super delegates to switch their support to him. he wants to win on super delegates thinking he can win in primaries and caucuses. that's a way to win but it's not the case that senator sanders was making at the out set of this campaign. it's not the case to win the nomination that supporters would expect of him or necessarily support, if that's going to be the way he tries to win. in addition, to the super delegate, today the sanders campaign advanced a new theory of the case for where they sand against secretary clinton in the race for the nomination.

bernie sanders senior strategist told reporters that the only reason he's so far behind in the overall race is because of secretary clinton getting victories, quote, where bernie sanders did not compete. tad devine gave a list of eight states where he said the only secretary clinton won is because bernie sanders didn't try in those states. these are states where he said the bernie sanders campaign did not, quote, compete with her. he listed texas, alabama, virginia, louisiana, tennessee, mississippi, georgia and arkansas, all super tuesday states. it's one thing to make the case that, yeah, you've had some wins and losses but here is the way you'll win. it's one thing to make that case. you try to sell reporters on that. all campaigns do. it's another reason to make the case you lost thus far is because you weren't really trying to win, but you'll try to

win from here on out and that's why you'll win the nomination. i think the sanders campaign will have to walk back this line of argument if they haven't already. i'll tell you why. all of these states that the sanders campaign identified today as places that they lost because they didn't even try to compete there, those were all super tuesday states in the south. the super tuesday contest were held on march 1st. you might remember on this show we did a bunch of reporting on the lead up to super tuesday of what was going on with the sanders and clinton campaign. not just tracking tv spending and candidate appearances, we looked at opening campaign offices and hiring staffers. one of the things we reported exclusively here is something we found surprising. we reported it in advance of

super tuesday. we reported it in february of this year. what we reported was that the sanders campaign was not only competing in a whole bunch of those southern states, we reported they were first on the ground ahead of the clinton campaign. they had larger operations. we reported that in texas, alabama, tennessee, virginia. those are just four of the southern states where we were able to track well this advance of the march 1st super tuesday race. they had been there first and opened more officers than the clinton campaign. if they're now going to say they only lost the states because they wanted to, because they meant to lose them, they didn't even try to win them. honestly, that is bullpucky. that's not what happened. i think that's not going to fly. so, i think they will have to walk that back. i think there's case to be made for why senator bernie sanders still could pull out the democratic nomination. this idea it's because he's

going to start trying and he wasn't trying before, that is not a reasonable case to make. you know what, it's not like there thing is over, and we need to be doing the postmortems already, explaining away the more uncomfortable losses. it's not like this thing is over. it's not like it's half over. i meant it when i said we're not halfway through the primary calendar. it's been nine weeks since the primary season started. there's 11 more weeks to go before the end of the primaries. we're not even at halftime yet. on the republican side, at least, there's a lot more to go even beyond what we're thinking of as the calendar. on the republican side of the race, we're going to have to start looking beyond these very exciting late tuesday nights we keep spending together as various states hold their primaries and caucuses. on the republican side we'll have to start watching and covering state republican party

conventions. the prospect that donald trump might not get enough delegates to win the republican nomination out right before the convention starts in july, that prospect on the republican side means the contest to win the republican nomination is basically moving away from these election nights now and into, instead, the much lower profile processes which republican parties in every state use to choose their delegates for the national convention. this isn't what's been on everybody's political calendar. these local state by state processes for picking delegates, these are the state by state processes that the ron paul campaign gamed to pretty dramatic effect in 2012 when they stole a bunch of mitt romney's delegates that made for unexpected drama and violent and arrest on the way to the national republican convention that year. it was ron paul in 2012 who went after the delegate process in

way the national media didn't much cover. this year it's the ted cruz campaign who appears to be infiltrating the state party processes meetings and conventions to turn states that look like they have gone to donald trump into states that are secretly for ted cruz. it's the ted cruz campaign that's most effective at organizing slights of delegates in state after state after state that appear to be actually planning on working for ted cruz at the national convention regardless of how that state voted this year in their primary or caucus. now, the rules are weird, and the rules differ from state to state in a way that means that different delegates will have different amounts of freedom to campaign for the candidate they really like instead of who they're state voted for. this process of locking up double agents, sending your own loyalists to the convention in states all across this country, this process is under way. all the campaigns are doing it

on the republican side. most reporting seems to indicate that the ted cruz campaign appears to be furthest along in their organizing. in response, the donald trump campaign is now threatening to sue. they're threatening a lawsuit in response to ted cruz out organizing donald trump in louisiana to get delegates out of louisiana even though donald trump technically won the primary in that state. mr. trump has tweeted this threat that he's going to sue louisiana over the delegates out of that state. after that tweet from mr. trump a representative from mr. trump's campaign told msnbc today that yes, maybe it would be a lawsuit or maybe it would be some sort of otherwise formal complaint. >> why should trump be able to sue anyone when it's literally your job to try to win these delegates under the rules at the conventions? >> the problem we're having here is there was a secret meeting in louisiana of the convention delegation.

apparently, all the invitations for our delegates must have gotten lost in the mail. there's a process to deal with this. it's in the certification process. i've been with our legal team most of the morning now, and we're moving forward with a complaint to decertify these. >> are you telling us you're going to file a legal complaint? >> it's not something you file with the court. it's something you file inside the party. it's a desertification so these delegates and rules committee members and folks don't get seated. >> are you saying that will function instead of the lawsuit that trump threatened or in addition? >> that is the lawsuit that he talked about. >> understood. that's with the rnc as a private party appeal. interesting news you're breaking there. >> the donald trump campaign is going to sue or at least file some sort of legal complaint with louisiana to try to change the make up of the delegate

slate that louisiana is going to send to the national convention. of course, they're going to file a legal come plants. of course they're going to sue. he's threaten to sue john kasich over anti-trump ads that mr. trump heard that a pro-kasich super pac might start running against lihim. mr. trump threatened to sue over any such ad had run. he threatened to sue ted cruz for being born in canada. he threatened to sue the ted cruz campaign for running ads he didn't like. it's the window into the mind of a rich businessman. if you ever felt like the legal system and court system are just two more weapons that rich people use to get what they want in life, donald trump is giving us a window into that mind set. it's win thing one thing to get

with the zoning board or settle a dispute with the miss universe pageant. it's another thing to try to get yourself the presidential nomination of a major political party. that's where this is going. buckle up. we'll be right back. when it comes to small business, she's in the know. so strap yourselves in for action flo! small business edition. oh, no! i'm up to my neck in operating costs! i'll save the day! for plumbers and bakers and scapers of lawn, she's got customized coverage you can count on. you chipped my birdbath! now you're gonna pay! not so fast! i cover more than just cars and trucks.

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i did not see that coming. don't deal with disruptions. get better internet installed on your schedule. comcast business. built for business. south carolina was the third state to vote on the republican side. you may remember it was a winner take all state and donald trump won all 50 of state's delegates. politico reports that many of those actual in the flesh delegate humanoids will be anti-donald trump agents who will defect to john crted cruz n kasich at the first opportunity. thanks for being here with us. we're starting to see this story play out in bunch of states.

south carolina, georgia and maybe colorado and michigan ahead. what do you make of this. is it your sense this is materially where the republican party will pick its nominee in. >> i think it's equally as important as the primaries and caucuses we have been obsessing over. in a sense that domds trump is the nominee ahead of cleefds then maybe th cleveland maybe this is a moot point. the delegate selection process will matter as the primaries and caucuses themselves and gotten far less attention and it's playing out in rapid fire as we speak. >> i think this is the only place where it's gotten lots of attention because i'm obsessed with this. we followed this in 2012 when the ron paul campaign proved good at yanking delegates out from the mitt romney campaign.

i wonder, this part because i'm obsessed with this, and in part because you've been watching this up close. do you have a sense that one of the campaigns is better at this type of work than the other? >> there's no question that everything we heard suggest that ted cruz is dominating this part of the race. he connects with the republican activist class in way that donald trump does not. donald trump performed well among independents and people not republican voters. they're not the people who participate in the delegate selection process. cruz has been running the table in the early process so far. >> we saw donald trump hired a very old school republican operative named paul manifort to lead his delegate efforts. what's your sense of the trump campaign? it may be playing camp u ining seats like they are trying to organize a top tier organization.

>> they have a team in place. it's a skilled veteran campaign team. they aren't necessarily building on top of anything. ted cruz has built these ground up organizations across the south, across a lot of the states he thought he would perform better in the primaries. he does have these teams in place where donald trump was built on this sort of indescribable energy that carried him to big victorievict. >> we have gotten threat pr ts the trump campaign they will start suing. is that -- can you see that coming? is that a major part of this fight? >> there will be some formal complaints lodged. i wouldn't be surprised if we see contest of certain state delegations. the rules have been out there for a long time. just because ted cruz has been

better a maneuvering through them, i don't think the trump campaign will get a lot of traction. >> kyle, i want to thank you. it's been a lifelong dream to interview any member of the cheney family. you're as close as i've gotten. >> glad to help fulfill that for you. >> to all other members of the family, see how well kyle did. it was very informative. everybody got a lot out of it. we could do this. come on. we'll be right back. i asked my dentist if an electric toothbrush was going to clean better than a manual. he said sure...but don't get just any one. get one inspired by dentists, with a round brush head. go pro with oral-b.

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more unlikely shocking political scandals to erupt out of nowhere concerned alabama republican governor. this guy facing explicit allegations of a sex scandal. facing those allegations from a fired member of his cabinet. if that was not shocking enough, those allegations were followed up several hours later by a tape of the governor having phone sex being publicly released. part two of that tape has just been released. oh, god. that's next.

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hope you had a good easter weekend. the governor of alabama spent the saturday of easter weekend catching what appears to be an enormous large mouth bass. he spent a portion of the same day also taunting one of his staffers for catching a much smaller bass on the same trip. he tweeted enjoy fishing this afternoon. i think he was using the wrong bait. i believe@zlee0251 is a man named zach lee who is the director of federal and local government affairs for the state of alabama working for governor robert bent lley. he started in 2010.

he's been a top staffer ever since they won that race. governor robert bentley, staffer zach lee is famous in alabama politics not just for his job title or closeness to the governor. he's famous because he makes a special appearance on the governor's phone sex tapes. when the governor explains he sent texts that were sent for her to zach instead by accident. >> you know, it's just, a while ago, a while ago i text you and i said i'm sorry i have not been able to call. i said something along the lines of how much time or something like i'm sorry i've not had -- it went to zach. well, he said he text me back high pressure he said did you get the videos.

he said. he said you sent it to the wrong person did you get the videos. i text back and said i did. i said, thanks opinion i said i didn't mean to send to you. i had some people i need to call. so, i mean, it was fine. he couldn't -- cause he couldn't. well, i know. he couldn't tell who i was sending it to. it didn't say baby i love you so much. i'd like to spend the rest of my life with you. >> governor robert assuring his alleged misstress while he did text one of his top staffers when he meant to be texting her, he did not say, hey, baby i love you so much i'd like to spend the rest of my life with you. no worries. zach lee was spared those kinds of details by the luck of the draw. we know in alabama republican

politics getting texts intended for the governor's misstress by mistake and getting named check on the governor's phone sex tape with his alleged misstress, that's not enough to cancel a sweet bass fishing trip the weekend of easter with the governor after he tries to humiliate you in public about the size of your fish. you think your job is still sucking. wow. governor robert bentley of alabama did make his first official public appearance since last week's press conference in which he admitted to having some sort of inappropriate relationship, at least inappropriate contact with his senior political advisor. he said he was not considering resigning as governor. since then, things have changed in terms of what alabama knows about their family values social conservative marriage campaigning governor bentley. the position he staked out last week was that although he did admit to making inappropriate comments, which he would not discuss or elaborate on.

he said that is all he had to apologize for. he insisted he never had an affair. he said he never had a physical relationship with this staffer. never had a physical affair with the senior advisor. he said last week he was not resigning. he said he never had a physical affair of any kind. since then it's become harder to maintain that position in public because of the tape appearing to have phone sex and in part because of the new extended audio of him having phone sex with his mistress that was released late last night by yellow hammer news in alabama. >> you'd kiss me. i love that. you know i do love that. that, when you know what, when i stand behind you and i put my arms around you, and i put my hands on your breast.

and i put my head on your [ muted ] and just pull you in real close. i love that too. putting my hands under you. that did you in? oh, babe. i know. i'm thinking about that right now, so i better quit. yeah. you were thinking about it?

i could tell you were thinking about it last night. hey, i love you. i love touching you. i do. hey, i do. i do love putting my hands on your [ inaudible ] i do. i do. baby, let me tell you what we're going have to do. we're going to have to start locking the door. if we're going -- if we're going to what we did the other day, we're going to have to start locking the door. you know it is. you know what, it is kind of

scary. somebody open that door. yeah, i know. he came this morning before i had my clothes on. he just got to see my boxer shorts. no. hey, hey, you've seen those. >> you've seen those. maybe she does his laundry. that audio was just released late last night. after promising the people of alabama that he never had a physical affair with his senior political advisoadvisor, govern bentley was asked if he could resign. he said he would not consider resigning. we have had two rounds of audio tapes of him having conversations with the staffer about what he liked to do with her and enjoyed doing in the

past. since the tape release he's not addressed the issue of whether he might resign, but members of his own party are calling on him to do just that. in montgomery county, alabama the republican party passed a resolution this weekend calling on him to leave office. montgomery is one of the largest counties in the state. alabamalive.com, the home of birmingham news, the press register times, they did a poll of their readers. it's had more than 20,000 response, 89% of people responding say they think the governor should resign. only 8% thinks he should stay in office. i know. i know you. now is about the time when you're thinking about hitting pause on your remote and going to google the name of the lieutenant governor of the state of alabama. i'll save you the trip. if and when he resigns, this will be alabama's new governor. her name is kay ivy.

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programming note. whatever your plans are for wednesday night, you need to change them or take a rain check or do whatever you want to do to get out of them. wednesday night at 7:00 eastern, chuck todd will host a town hall with john kasich. at 8:00 chris matthews will host with donald trump. at 9:00, we'll have an extra special super sized edition of this show. i'll have back to back interviews with hillary clinton and bernie sanders, which means we'll probably be on the air longer than our usual one hour. that's a lot to get in. it will happen at wednesday night at 7:00 eastern and 8:00 and 9:00. you have to tuesday night

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there are now three candidates for the republican nomination for president. not that long ago there were 17. before there were 17, there were 22. that's what we started with. we've had to poof an awful lot of people off this list. it started with 22 republicans who were talking about running for president or who were not ruling it out when the idea was suggested to them. of those initial 22 republican candidates this year, one of them was indiana's republican governor mike pence. one year ago a lot of conservatives were excited about the run for the white house, but then this happened. that's indiana governor mike pence surrounded by invited againsts of a specific stripe signing bill that protected the right of people in indiana to discriminate on the basis of

sexual orientation. there was so much backlash that sales force and angies list pulled their business from the state. the nba and ncaa said they were reconsidering their events in indiana. within a week the governor had to backtrack and amend the bill that he had just signed. he had to amend the discrimination bill to make it seem like less of a discrimination bill. it was a disaster. despite the supposed after the fact fix to the bill, that law appears to have cost indiana $60 million in lost revenue from companies and organizations moving their business elsewhere. no, he's not a candidate for president, obviously. the disaster of his discrimination bill and the way he handled it became an object lesson for other american governors.

while he was writhing his way through that mess in indiana, the legislature in arkansas passed their own version of that bill. after getting pressure from a little company called walmart and from mayor of arkansas's largest city and even from the governor's own son, arkansas governor ended up rejecting that bill that mike pence had just signed. today, that same thing happened in georgia. georgia governor announced he will veto the discrimination bill the georgia legislature sent him. that mean he may have saved his state from some serious economic repercussio repercussions. disney and marvel said they would stop filming in georgia if this bill became law. georgia has a multibillion dollar film and tv deal. the nfl said atlanta might not be able to hold a super bowl.

over a dozen conventions said to move out of the state. if you're looking for immediate context why they would veto republican legislation, you can probably thank the business concerns but also thank mike pence for making such an example of himself and his state, in a bad way. that disaster in indiana did apparently scare off arkansas. arguably it scared off south dakota as well whose governor vetoed an anti-transgender bill earlier this month and dissuaded nathan deal in georgia. that didn't get to the governor of north carolina. north carolina's legislature last week called an emergency session. they spent more than $40,000 in state money to rush the entire legislature back from vacation so on an emergency basis they could pass a law that combine the greatest hits of indiana and south dakota's bill and overturn overturned every local

anti-discrimination ordinance. they passed the bill. the governor signed it in the space of 12 hours. not only are apple and facebook and paypal and a bunch of other companies freaking out that they are doing business in state with a law like that, not only is the nba considering pulling the all-star game out of charlotte and espn is rethinking holding the x games there, not only does he have hundreds of protesters outside his house, now the state is about to get their pants sued off them by the aclu. joining me is one of the lawyers that file this. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> sues the pants off is not a technical term. >> that's the official term. >> why do you say it's unconstitutional? >> this morning they filed a lawsuit against the governor and other officials in north carolina. to us it's very clear that this

law is unconstitutional and it violates the equality and liberty protections under the constitution. it also violates federal law. federal law that protects against sex discrimination receiving federal funding. our lawsuit has constitutional claims as well as title nine claims. >> you've named -- you have plaintiffs in this case. some of the defendants include the governor himself, the university of north carolina system. tell us about your plaintiffs and why this would have a day-to-day effect on their lives. >> as you mention, one of the things about this law that's so disturbing is it does combine all the horrible things we have seen in the almost 200 bills that have been introduced targeting lgbt people. so many target transpeople in particular. this law mandates that transgender people use the bathroom and locker room in public in government buildings and in schools across the state. that's according to what's

listed on their birth certifica certificate. our clients are two men who live their lives as men and had up until this emergency legislative session gone to school and used the bathroom with other men and used the bathroom with other men at work. now they said you can no longer do that and our clients are impacted by this as are the people in north carolina. what we know about this conversation and it's really important to note this is there's been a lie that's been peddled. several lies that have been peddled across the country in pushing this anti-transgender bills as well as pushing back affirmative nondiscrimination. they say it allows predators into restrooms and the even more insidious lie is transgender people are a threat to the existence of other people. our clients are standing up and saying that's not true. trans people deserve to have

access to public space. it's not a threat to anyone's public safety. there has never been ever in the history of an example of someone exploiting a non-discrimination ordinance for the purpose of assaulting someone in a bathroom. >> because as you mentioned there's been a whole rash of these laws proposed and enacted in some cases across the country. but a ton of them proposed. is this new legal ground that you're on if you win, if you prevail in this case in north carolina, are you going to be setting a new benchmark in terms of non-discrimination law, or do you feel like you're following precedent here? >> i think we're following pretty basic precedent here. i mean, two things. on the sexual orientation side with the lgbt protection that's have been stripped there's a long history of the court saying it is not a legitimate government interest to pass a law just because you don't like a politically unpopular group. you can trace that back to romer versus evans in 1996 where we saw really the beginning of the jurisprudence that led to the decision by the supreme court

this last june in the marriage equality decision. and then when it comes to discriminating against transgender people, the law is also very clear that it is impermissible sex discrimination to target and discriminate against transgender people. so in a lot of respects we're following the precedent that's been set for us in the courts over the last 20 years. but the lawsuit is really just part of a larger conversation that needs to happen and that is happening where people are mobilizing outside the governor's mansion, trans people are coming out, telling our stories and saying, you know what, this conversation needs to shift, these lies have to stop being told and we're going to demand that people take us and our needs seriously through litigation and through advocacy. >> chase strangio, staff attorney with the aclu. we've been watching the economic part of this and the business argument about this and the political argument about this. now we get to watch the legal part. thanks for helping us understand it. >> absolutely. thanks so much. >> lots more ahead tonight. stay with us. ... and sometimes, i just don't eat the way i should. so i drink boost to get the nutrition that i'm missing. boost complete nutritional drink

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the republican party in the great state of florida would like your attention, please. florida republicans want you to know that seven counties in their state have flipped to red. bradford county, columbia county, washington county. you get the idea. in those seven counties registered republicans now outnumber registered democrats. now, i should tell you, six of those seven counties already voted republican. most of them went for mitt romney last time. but now their voter registration matches their voting pattern and there are more registered republicans in those counties than there are registered

democrats. the "miami new times" speculates that that's due to donald trump, that some conservatives in those counties may have finally gotten around to updating their registration because they wanted to vote for donald trump in the florida primary. or maybe they wanted to vote against him. who knows? we've checked those seven newly red florida counties today and in six of them the number of registers democrats did drop over the past month. and donald trump did clean up this month in florida. he won every county except the one that gave us marco rubio. if voters who switched to being republican meant to join the stop trump campaign, it didn't work in that state. if they went to the trouble of switching from blue to red because they like donald trump that much, well, that's a whole other thing for democrats to worry about. more on that ahead. stay with us. there has to be a way. carry the centimeter, divide by 3.14 something something something... [ beeping, whirring ] great caesar salad! ♪

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love them as you do. house majority leader eric

cantor did not spend the morning 692013 primary out shaking the hands of his constituents or nervously tallying up the internal polling numbers for his campaign. eric cantor spent the morning of his primary 2014 at starbucks. congressman cantor was very confident he would sail to victory against his anti-establishment republican challenger that day that he didn't even spend the morning campaigning. he instead held a fund-raising meeting at a capitol hill starbucks. by that night, however, eric cantor was out of a job. he was not just defeated in his primary, he got laminated. he lost by double digits. and to be honest, i don't think his challenger really saw the upset coming either. congressman-elect dave brat ended up holding his victory rally that night in what the warra "washington post" described at the time as "the atrium of a nondescript building at an office park." i have never run for office but i promise you the atrium of a nondescript building at an office park, that is not the venue you book when you think you're about to pull off one of the biggest and highest-profile congressional upsets in american

history. it's been nearly two years since dave brat ousted congressman eric cantor. but now once again we are seeing what maybe looks like an anti-establishment insurgency in the republican party. from the time donald trump started rolling up actual primary victories, establishment republicans have worried that mr. trump not only -- might not only make the party look bad at the top of the ticket this fall, he might generate a new groundswell of anti-establishment throw the bums out enthusiasm among republican voters. so maybe we'll see lots more republicans losing their seats in primary fights just like eric cantor did in 2014. that's been the worry. now we know, though, that's not happening. every single republican incumbent in congress who has been primaried so far this year has won. all of them. house ways and means chair kevin brady faced the toughest primary battle so far. he still beat his closest challenger by 16 points. alabama senator richard shelby and richard burr from north

carolina, they were both thought to be kind of vulnerable. then they each won their primaries by more than 35 points. the future not having happened to us yet, it is hard to know the effect a trump nomination will have on down-ticket republicans in the general election, but for now at least we are not seeing a big rush to throw the bums out. people don't seem hellbent on an anti-incumbent insurgency in the republican party. that appears to be one of the myths perpetrated this year that really isn't borne out by the facts. republicans are not saying no to the republican party or to republican incumbents in any measurable way at all. they're just saying yes to donald trump. everybody freak out. that does it for us tonight. we will see you again tomorrow. now it's time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. thank you very much. >> thank you. well, my first guest tonight is ashamed, ashamed of how the media has covered donald trump. and he's in the media. and my other first guest tonight, because they'll both be here at the