tv Hardball With Chris Matthews MSNBC April 4, 2016 11:00pm-12:01am PDT
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on the night that he won the california primary, bobby kennedy was assassinated. the primary that makes milwaukee famous. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in milwaukee, wisconsin, on the eve of tomorrow's big republican and democratic tests. can donald trump prevail over questions about his fitness for the country's highest office? can hillary clinton inspire democrats with the prospect of a second clinton presidency. can bernie increase his victories to six of the last seven contests, thereby shaking hillary loose from her image as the inevitable nominee? let's start with donald trump. the republican establishment
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here from the governor on down has lined up against trump. here in wisconsin. but here's the big but. the most recent poll out today from emerson college shows ted cruz ahead of trump by just five points. that's half the lead that cruz had in last week's polls. so trump may be regaining strength here in wisconsin. at a rally today, trump predicted a win here tomorrow. >> i really believe tomorrow we're going to have a very, very big victory. if we do well here, folks, it's over. if we don't win here, it's not over. but wouldn't you like to take the credit in wisconsin for ending it? give wisconsin the credit for ending it. and then we can focus on hillary instead of these two guys. >> well, trump mocked his rival ted cruz. here he is. >> we've gone through many, many states. i have won, i think, 22 states. cruz gets up, he says i'm the only one.
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you know, i wish he could just talk normally every once in a while. you ever hear this? i'm the only one. that has proven that i can beat donald trump. remember in the debate. i beat him five times. and i looked over and i said, yeah, but i have beaten you 22 times. you remember that? remember? and he stuck like this. he didn't say anything. >> robert costa is a national political reporter for the "washington post," susan page is bureau chief for u.s. today. let me start with robert. how did the trump people looking at tomorrow's bet after what happened last week with all the bad news. >> they think the base is energized and motivated because of the negative week trump's had. the tumultuous week he's had.
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they think people will show up. it's a test for the trump campaign. they don't have the same organization cruz has in the state. cruz has the conservatives in the milwaukee suburbs. they want to close this just like trump said in the trump campaign, but it's a test. >> do you show the polls getting closer or not? we said, i said a moment ago they were twice the lead that cruz had twice the lead about double digit about ten points last week. now he's down to half a double digit, about five points. is that your sense of the race right now going into tomorrow's fight? >> it's all over with polling. because some polls show it close. there's a new poll out tonight that shows trump up. it's cruz who has been leading for weeks. the big question is cruz is likely to win milwaukee suburbs, the walker base. the walker people likely going to cruz. the question is northwest wisconsin, southeast wisconsin, some of the more working-class, rural areas, harder to predict. >> donald trump said he could be
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presidential if he wants to be, but he's not ready to be that yet. let's watch him. >> i could be presidential. but if i was presidential, we'd only have about 20% of you would be here because it would be boring as hell. now, let me be unpresidential just for a little while longer. and maybe i'll be a little unpresidential as i beat hillary because, oh. we'll beat hillary so badly. don't forget, i haven't started on hillary yet. >> now, robert, i'll get to the other later, but you have been watching this. is this his way of saying don't held me to some test of president fitness. it's too early for that. don't ask me if i can say things correctly or not. let me make my mistakes. let me test the air, let me have fun with all the schtick of mine. is that what he's trying to say to smooth over what happened last week? >> he's not just talking to the press. he's talking to his family, to
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his friends, his closest advisers. based on my reporter, bod woodward and i sat down with him. we're hearing everyone is telling trump, tone it down, act presidential, pivot toward the general election. and in private and in public he's saying no thanks. i'm staying to be the swaggering guy i have been the whole campaign because he things he has to win. he thinks if he pulls back, if he pulls a punch, cruz is going to get room. >> talk about that internal memo you got your hands on this week that showed sort of the attitude he has on the inside. >> an attitude, chris. this is not a soul searching campaign. this is not a group of people who over the weekend are saying, woe be us. we have struggled in the polls. we're behind in wisconsin. instead, they're attacking their critics. they're saying the critics are wrong. we're fine, everything is good. this is a campaign in a fight mode. a lot of people in the party establishment say this can't work out long-term. they got to do some expansion of
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the message. for now, this is a tight-knit group around trump, and they're fighting. >> susan page, and perry, is this still the primary, early primary season where you can get away with just being the best show in town? >> well, i think we're going to find out tomorrow night because this is the biggest test that donald trump has faced since iowa. it's a test of whether the kind of resilience he's shown to our surprise over and over again, still conveys. and i think he continues to have a short-term strategy of being, letting trump be trump and being the kind of outrageous,
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heconcerned about that at this point. his negatives now in key voter groups like women, hispanics, african-americans, suburbanites are so high, it's hard to have a scenario where he wins the general election. he sees focused on the strategy that took him this far, made him the 41 runter for the nomination. >> about women, is there any way to read how women reacted to all that went on last week, starting with the faces of his glamorous wife up against heidi cruz? and then what happened with lewandowski and the battery charge, and then what happened with us on msnbc? all of that seemed to raise questions about fitness to women, wouldn't it? do you think there's no reading yet on that total is what you're saying? >> the arg poll showed one of the biggest jepder gaps in the history of american polling. trump doing really well among men in wisconsin and really badly among women. a huge disparity, and i think that reflects some of the things that have happened in the past week, including on your show. >> let me go to perry on that. same question to you, because you know, it was a bad week of press. he's saying that internal memo that robert got ahold of it, it was all the press's fault or the elite's fault.
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that's the normal thing to do. is there an objective to reality. >> there's twof different campaigns going on. in terms of the republican nomination process, in terms of the voters in the primaries and caucuses, he's probably doing fine. he's got a certain base. it's likely not big enough in wisconsin, but he's likely to win in new york and maryland. but there's another campaign about the unbound delegates, the potential second ballot, and the republican establishment, the people choo w.h.o. can vote in the convention, they're looking for a guy who can win the election, who is electable, who is presidential. and paul ryan today saying if cruz wins wisconsin, we're having a contested convention. i think that tells you they don't want to see trump win. trump has to think about appealing to the base and the elites in case he has to win the nomination at the convention. >> yeah, we'll talk about paul ryan. incipient campaign or potential campaign in the next block. i think there's something going
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on there. robert, as you said, you and bob woodward interviewed trump this week. one of the topics was the economy. trump had a gloomy warning out there that we're on the verge of a very massive recession. trump also was asked about investing in the stock market. he told you, quote, it's a terrible time right now. look, in wisconsin today, trump stood by his dire predictions on the economy and he offered one glimmer of hope, elected donald trump. here he is. >> what i said is we're going to go into a massive recession. but i also say if i'm president, that's not going to happen. because i'm going to straighten things out before it happens. >> well, there's a logic question there, of course, robert. if he gets elected president, puts together an economic plan, it takes six months to a year to have any fiscal effect, or monetary policy effect. what's he talking about, there's a recession coming next july he can forestall? that's the only argument. >> starting with next
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presidential candidate. it's so unprecedented for a major party figure to step out and talk about a massive recession on the horizon, calling it a terrible time to invest. woodward and i walked out and we said, we wonder if the markets were open what it would do. trump as he's talking down the economy. his answer for everything on the economy, he has a tax cut, butthal answer, trade. he thinks renegotiating trade deals is going to cause growth. experts say it's going to be hard, and they don't expect a massive recession. we have reported on that as well. they don't have the same view as trump, the broad view and the consensus in the economic community. >> perry, i have never heard of a politician predicting doomsday, saying all hell goes loose if i don't get elected. by the way, i'll get there just in time next summer to change course, to somehow change the economy and the economic outlook.
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what is he doing this for? >> it fits his strategy, which is to say everything in america is terrible, we need to have a man like me fix it. so it fits what he's doing. it's a very dangerous thing, though, to talk about recessions and the economy collapsing. if he says that kind of thing in october, the markets really could go down if he's likely to win. it's a very dangerous comment, and it suggests, and also it's as we know, economic growth is growing. the job growth is growing in america. there's no evidence of a massive recession coming. again, it's another place where trump is at war with the facts. >> susan, last word. it looks a little selfish to say elect me or the economy is going to go down. if you're not sure, objective data that something is coming. i'm not sure he has any. >> it raises the question if he were presidential and made comments like this, it would have global implications, negative ones, for the economy. for some people who are maybe undecided between the candidates, they might look and say is this theperson i want to
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elect? it goes to the idea of trump's strength is his willingness to say what he's thinking, to not have it be filtered. but when you're trying to think about being elected president, that's also his weakness. >> attention getting, no doubt about it. catching our attention. robert, susan, perry. not sure it's good for the country to talk down the economic future. thank you all for joining us. >> coming up, as trump and cruz gear up for a contested convention this summer, could it be that house speaker paul ryan will emerge as the republican nominee? ryan is going out of his way, of course, to say he's not interested, but would the party rather lose with trump or cruz or run a fresh face like ryan to topple hillary? i'm thinking a lot about that. plus, the democratic fight between hillary clinton and bernie sanders. sanders has momentum right now and should win here tomorrow night. so why is this campaign talking about mistakes it's made in the past? i don't think it's making many
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mistakes now. and the "hardball" roundtable is here in milwaukee. will tomorrow night's wisconsin primary be a turning point in the republican race? will it point the democratic race in bernie sanders' direction? finally, let me finish with this political situation in our country as of tonight. this is "hardball," live from milwaukee, on the eve of the wisconsin primary. we needed 30 new hires for our call center. i'm spending too much time hiring and not enough time in my kitchen. (announcer) need to hire fast?
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go to ziprecruiter.com and post your job to over 100 of the web's leading job boards with a single click. then simply select the best candidates from one easy to review list. you put up one post and the next day you have all these candidates. makes my job a lot easier. (announcer) over 400,000 businesses have already used ziprecruiter. and now you can use ziprecruiter for free. go to ziprecruiter.com/offer99 united states supreme court has unanimously rejected a challenge from texas voters that would allow the state to draw election maps reducing the strength of latino voters. the highest court said states may continue to count all residents when drawing election districts. regardless of whether or not a resident is eligible to vote or if they entered the country with proper documents. the move denies an effort by conservatives to increase the number of mostly white districts at the expense of largely minority voting districts. the decision maintains the
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essential principle of the political system based on one person, one vote. and we'll be right back..3 c1 p? or stop to find p? a bathroom? cialis for daily use is approved to treat both erectile dysfunction and the urinary symptoms of bph, like nding to go frequently, day or night. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions and medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, or adempas for pulmonary hypertension, as it may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. do not drink alcohol in excess. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long-term injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision, or any symptoms of an allergic reaction, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. ask your doctor about cialis and a $200 savings card.
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welcome back to "hardball." as republicans brace for the possibility of their first open convention in decades, many are now eyeing an outside candidates if delegates are deadlocked between trump and cruz. mike allen, of politico, reports today, quote, top republicans are becoming increasingly vocal about their long-held belief that speaker paul ryan will wind up as the party nominee for president. perhaps when the fourth ballot at a chaotic cleveland convention. one of the nation's best wired republicans with an enviable prediction record for sees a 60% of a deadlock, and a 90% chance that the delegates turn to ryan. speaker ryan, who has repeatedly
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said he has no intention of accepting the republican nomination, denied again today he would be willing to take the job. here he is. >> the people put my name in this thing, i say get my name out of that. if you want to be president, you should run for president. and that's just the way i see it. >> you're not the fresh face that karl rove was talking about. >> i'm not the fresh face, i'm not that person. i would like to think my face is somewhat fresh. not for this conversation. i think you need to run for president if you're going to be president. period, end of story. >> well, not end of story. in another interview published by the times of israel, ryan also said wisconsin is a fairly important signal as to whether we're going to have an open convention or not. if trump wins, then he's putting himself in a pretty good path to clinching the nomination. if he loses wisconsin, it makes him more likely that it's an open convention. i'm joined by former wisconsin governor and john kasich supporter, tommy thompson, as well as msnbc political analyst,
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howard fineman of the "huffington post." thank you for joining us. i know you're for kasich, but i'm looking at a lot of coverage today that suggests that ryan will be in the mix once it goes to more than one ballot. >> well, chris, first off, thanks for letting me be on your program, and it's good to see you again. but let's face the facts. john kasich has got the record. he's got the ability. he's got the intellect to be a great president. and if you look back at 1860, when we had the first open convention, the first convention for republicans, abraham lincoln came in number three to the convention in chicago and came out of it. john kasich is well qualified, is a great candidate, and i think he's going to come out with the nomination, either on the second, third, or fourth ballot. paul ryan is a great person. i support paul ryan. i asked paul if he was going to be a candidate for president. he said absolutely not. i think some day he will be
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president. but this year is not his time. so i think that if everybody wants a new face and an ability to get this country turned around, john kasich is that person. let's get behind the person that has shown he can do it, balance the budget, run the state, he's got the record. he's the person we should nominate. >> howard, your view about ryan, because i'm thinking that roger stone, you don't have to like the guy to know he's smart. and roger stone suggested -- >> that's right. >> it's either going to be trump on the first ballot or ryan on the fourth, and the last several days since he said that, i'm beginning to see the truth of that because i don't think this gossip involving all this chaos of trump and cruz and kasich is adding up to any clarity. your thinking? >> in talking to people across the spectrum, including our mutual buddy roger stone, my sense of it is that how we use the term zombie candidate the other day, you like that
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terminology about trump. well, paul ryan is running a zen campaign. what i mean by that is absolute stillness leads to, in this case, not enlightenment but the nomination. i think he is running by not running. people make fun of me for saying that because how do you prove it? i think that interview with the newspaper in israel shows that a prediction is also a wish. he didn't have to go so far as to say a loss for trump in wisconsin would mean an open convention. a lot of people think that even if trump loses in wisconsin, he's still on track for the nomination. so for ryan to go that far in his assessment of the situation shows me yet another sign that if asked, at the appropriate time, he'll take it in a cleveland minute.
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>> let me try a couple thoughts by you. here's why i think ryan's in the mix if trump doesn't get the 1,237 requisite majority number going into the convention in cleveland. number one, ryan has been vetted. he ran for vice president. he didn't do a great job. didn't do a bad job either running for vp. he's been made speaker of the house by acclimation. the entire conservative party, the republican party accepted him. i think he's a conservative without the crazy. he seems to be the golden mean in that party, and he's also, even though he's been around a bit, he seems fresh. he's part of the establishment, but at the edge of the establishment. there's nothing wrong with the guy if you're a republican conservative, and he would unite the party, which is what they desperately need. their number one goal, it seems to me right now, is to save the republican party. keep it as a political party in this country. they got to do that first before they win. and by the way, they also would like to beat hillary clinton. and ryan could beat hillary clinton because he doesn't have any scar tissue. >> well -- well, i agree with
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you. also, without getting bogged down in details about the rules at the convention, there's no particular advantage to john kasich. yes, he started running at the beginning. but other than that, procedurally at the convention, after the first ballot, it will be just as easy for a paul ryan to be nominated from the floor as it will be for john kasich to be nominated or continue his quest from the floor. so there won't be any real bar after the first ballot because about 70% of all the delegates after the first ballot go-round will be unbound. it will be easy for somebody like ryan to step down from the chair -- he's the permanent chair of the convention. he can easily hand the gavel over to somebody else and wham, he suddenly becomes a major contender. >> i think it's all possible now. i think everything is possible now. we'll see a lot more if trump loses here tomorrow, everything becomes more possible. thank you very much, howard.
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our thanks to governor tommy thompson, and thank you, of course, my friend howard fineman. >> up next, democratic duel. hillary clinton is campaigning in new york state. could she pull off an upset here in wisconsin tomorrow? this is going to be close on the democratic side. could she end the bernie sanders threat once and for all by pulling a comeback here in wisconsin tomorrow night? this is "hardball," the place for politics, live tonight from milwaukee.
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but i think we win here, we win in new york state, we're on our way to the white house. >> welcome back to "hardball." that was, of course, senator bernie sanders at a rally in janesville, wisconsin, taunting hillary clinton and sounding, i thought, very confident ahead of tomorrow's big democratic primary out here in wisconsin. the real clear polling average in wisconsin shows sanders leading former secretary hillary clinton by just under points. still a close one. spinning hard, clinton's chief strategist said, however, that wisconsin is tailor made for a sanders victory. talk about spin. here it comes. >> it is much less diverse than most of the states we compete in, in democratic primaries. it's got a lower population of african-americans, a very small population of latinos. we've gun done very well in building a diverse coalition, which is why we have won far more primary elections than senator sanders has, and combiled a bigger delegate lead by a lot.
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the key is to compete hard, try to win the state. either way the state comes out, it's close enough there isn't going to be a big shift in the 230 or plus pledged delegate advantage that hillary clinton has right now. >> well, a win here in wisconsin would extend sanders victories to 6 out of the last 7 contests and propel him to new york's primary on april 19th in the top of this game. msnbc correspondent kasie hunt is covering bernie sanders right now, and there is a rally in milwaukee right now. patrick healy is a "new york times" correspondent covering the campaign as well, and here with me in milwaukee is u.s. congresswoman gwen moore. she's from this area of milwaukee and she's supporting hillary clinton. >> kasie, it all seems within the margin of error out here in wisconsin on both sides. >> hey, chris. yeah, forgive me. i can't hear you terribly well because what's going on here is
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a rave or a concert, i can't really tell exactly what. we're waiting for bernie sanders. he obviously is pretty confident going into this. you talked a little bit about, showed what he had to say earlier. i think there is a little bit of danger here in the expectations game for bernie sanders. at this point, we're looking at the margin of his win, and if hillary clinton can plausibly argue after tomorrow's results that she held her own, that this wasn't a significant win, remember, for bernie sanders to catch hillary clinton in this delegate lead, he has to win states, and he has to win them big, by margins of 60% to 40%. and their argument is going to be if he can't do that in wisconsin, where else is he going to do it? that said, if he does do well here, it's going to set up two weeks heading into new york that are potentially very difficult for hillary clinton. i think looking ahead, the sanders campaign is planning a series of major events in new york city, all expected to draw
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potentially thousands of people. we saw tens of thousands, basically, in the bronx, 18,000 people showing up. that's going to be a potentially embarrassing and difficult stretch for her to deal with in her adopted home state. although one note i will say, back to wisconsin, the crowds today have not been where they often are for senator sanders. they have been smaller. even this rally is smaller. a crowd of hundreds, not thousands. that's pretty unusual. whether it's a telling sign, we'll have to find out. >> thank you very much, kasie hunt, who is with the sanders campaign. patrick healy, you wrote in the "new york times" today, despite the urging of some advisers, mr. sanders refused last fall and early winter to criticize mrs. clinton over her $675,000 in speaking fees from goldman sachs, an issue he now targets almost daily. he also gave her a pass on her use of private e-mail as secretary of state, even though some allies of his wanted him to exploit it, and he insists on giving time to his time as
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senator. tad devine, by the way, responded to your report today in an interview with andrea mitchell. here he is. >> my first talked to them about this a couple weeks ago. i think they were determined to write a story if bernie sanders had run a tough, negative campaign, he could have defeated hillary clinton. he was never going to run that camppign. that's not who he is. >> what inspired you to write a story about what might have been last year or earlier in the campaign? bernie is doing pretty well right now. why go back to what coulda wooda shoulda happened. >> that's comaktly it. he's doing really well right now. the reality is that he's still far behind hillary clinton in terms of the pledged delegate count. certainly in terms of superdelegates.
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the pledged delegate number is key. he's more than twice behind her compared to the lead that obama had over hillary clinton in 2008. that hillary clinton was never able to get, to catch up to. what we were looking at was looking at the question of is hillary clinton beatable? you know, was she beatable? and did sanders do kind of whatever it took to beat her? what we found in reporting and talking to tad devine and others, is that there were sort of a series of judgment calls or missed opportunities in 2015 that could have positioned bernie sanders to be in a much sort of stronger posture against hillary clinton in the pledged delegate count right now. their entire strategy was based on sweeping iowa, new hampshire, and nevada. that didn't happen. they only won new hampshire. they had to change strategy after nevada. then they had to change strategy
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again after super tuesday. then they find themselves now doing well, he's got a good chance of winning in wisconsin tomorrow. he's going to contest new york pretty firmly. but he's still so far behind in the pledged delegates, and you know, we can sort of jockey and strategize and spin all we want, but the delegate math is hillary clinton and barack obama knew very well in 2008 and as you know, is the essential sort of standard here. and the reality is, the questions are being asked even in the sanders campaign, could there have been a way to have a much closer fight now than they do. >> patrick, great to have you back covering politics. my buddy, thank you. >> would hillary clinton have given bernie sanders a bye on the e-mails if it was his problem? i watched the debate when he said enough about the e-mails. would hillary clinton ever have let a guy off the hook? because he had her, and he let her go. that's when i said this is a protest campaign. this guy isn't going to win. is hillary going to win tomorrow
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night? >> i think hillary is. i think anytime, chris, your campaign relies on not having african-americans in the state, relies on not having latinos, and you have bragging rights about your potential to win because you don't have a diverse state, i think that speaks volumes about what -- >> what do you constituents think about bernie when you talk to them? what do they think of senator sanders? changer? is he a stranger? >> it's always good to have new friends. so there are many people who have never heard of bernie sanders. i point out to them that she's he's been elected to something or other since 1981. whatever criticisms they have of hillary clinton, yeah, but guess what, she's been there. she's been there through the good times, through the bad times. stuff that's broken. she's made efforts and has legislated to fix. and bernie is a new friend with aspirational, profusorial --
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>> why does hillary clinton get dull when she gets in the lead? the minute she gets ahead and looks like she's going to win, no more excitement, no more charisma. i'm ahead and i'm sitting here. it's like the tortoise and the hare. how come the campaign is getting tight right now? bernie is gaining on hillary right now. why? >> bernie has spent a lot of time here. >> nationwide. nationwide. it's down to about five points. >> right. well, you know, bernie is exciting. i mean, he's promising no health care premiums. he's promising free college. he's going to decriminalize marijuana. he's going to do all this, and
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he doesn't have any numbers behind any of his initiatives. >> what is hillary going to do? what is hillary going to do? >> what hillary is going to do -- hillary is going to do what hillary does. >> what is that? >> she's willing to sit down, even with people who don't agree with her, and come to some kind of consensus. >> what's one thing she's going to do for the democratic voter that they can get excited about when they vote tomorrow? >> one of the things she's going to do for people here in wisconsin is not just complain about manufacturing jobs leaving the state. but actually is going to put the political will together to really put some resources into the solar energy economy. >> this is the problem you got with hillary. that's the problem. ahillary clinton does not have an exciting glistening object she can put in front of the voters and say if you elect me, i'll do this. >> creating jobs ought to be exciting to people. >> they all promise that. >> she's never caught on in that way, in terms of being the exciting, high enthusiasm candidate. the clinton campaign can point to different polls that show her supporters are enthusiastic, but the reality is she got several hundred supporters out in harlem the other day. bernie sanders had 18,000 out in the bronx. you know, there's just a
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difference there. but the reality is, as you know well, the tightness that's going on right now, sort of the nervousness in her camp, a lot of it is about new york. she cannot allow herself to be beaten in her adopted home state. that's a real concern. she beat obama by 18 points in 2008. if somehow bernie sanders is able to flip this and he's able to beat her there, while the delegate math may not change appreciably, it could change somewhat, but more so, it will create such a counternarrative to the hillary clinton campaign that the primaries after that in pennsylvania, california, and also the superdelegate conversations could become really problematic for hillary. >> one word from you, how will bernie's accent go over in new york? >> i think it will go over pretty well, chris. i think they'll be wondering, this guy is from vermont,
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really? >> sounds like local. anyway, thank you. what subway stop is that, senator. thank you, gwen moore from here, from welcoming us, and patrick healy of the "new york times." >> still ahead, on wisconsin, could tomorrow's primary change the dynamic of these campaigns. i have a milwaukee roundtable, all three of them right here with me. you're watching "hardball" live from milwaukee, now the place for politics.
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i have long thought trump was a side show. i'm amazed he's lasted this long. almost frightened me. >> bu bernie really has a grassroots movement going. a lot of the millennials, the working class laborers behind him. >> the best and the worst is honestly, i would probably say hillary clinton. >> i'm kind of liking trump, just because he's not pulling any punches. he's just saying what he thinks instead of all the political double speak you hear. >> that's the voice of wisconsin voters you saw right there. welcome back to "hardball" here. rolling into tomorrow's wisconsin primary, front-runners
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donald trump and hillary clinton are looking at strong challenges from their chief opponents. ted cruz and bernie sanders. cruz and sanders are on opposite ends of the idealogical spectrum, but they have a common challenge, they need to crush their opponents to win the nomination at this point. it's april 4th today. would a win in wisconsin give either of these challenges candidates the momentum to overcome the front-runner. joining me, two reporters from the milwaukee journal sentinel, as well as wisconsin state representative, mandela barnes, who represented northeast milwaukee. i have to ask you a question, as a democrat, what is this bill out here that means you can't vote unless you have a photo whatever, you have to show a government-issued i.d. or you can't vote. >> first of all, a very exciting day to be in the state of wisconsin. but the need to have photo i.d. to vote is a part of the republican agenda across the entire country to limit the electorate.
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and higher turnout elections, republicans cannot win across the country. >> their way of dealing with demographic change -- >> the only way they can cope with a high voter turnout is to limit the people who can cast a ballot. >> what about the college students inthey can't vote with their student i.d.s. >> there are a number of schools who have i.d.s that are allowable, but not every college. it creates so much confusion among the young people. >> tell me about the state tomorrow, what we're looking at on the democratic side. bernie has the bern, the college campuses, madison, you have college campuses all over the state, right? >> right, yeah, and madison, i mean, madison is bernie territory. those early rallies that he had in madison were like 10,000 people. and that was -- >> how come madison is still like it was in the '60s. how come it has not changed since the vietnam war at all? >> it's more so. madison has grown.
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people vote like crazy. the democrats draw margins out of madison they couldn't have dreamed of 20 or 30 years ago. >> how come berkeley hasn't changed, ann arbor hasn't changed, madison hasn't changed. these centers of progressivism are the same as they were in my day in college. >> it has a big impact on state politics. yowl veer bernie tomorrow will draw huge numbers at madison. like the best performing county in america for democrats. >> let me ask you about the outcome. which way is it going? is hillary tightsening it up, is trump tightening it up? >> hillary is tighten itting up in some areas. we're not a winner-take-all, so i assume bernie will do well. hillary will lead in milwaukee, although the college students will turn out for bernie here. trump, he does have support in janesville. he does in places up north. certainly not southeastern wisconsin, which is kind of conservative talk radio land. scott walker land. >> why do you think the people on the right are totally in bed with cruz. they don't like trump at all. >> it starts with being
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anti-cruz. they weren't in bed with cruz a month or two months ago. they had walker and then they were moving toward rubio. and their guys kept dropping out. >> cruz is just a vehicle, right? it's a strategic tactical move that came together in wisconsin, the anti-trump stuff was always there. >> what percentage of the democratic primary will be african-american? >> it will be around maybe 6%. the state of wisconsin is 6% african-american. maybe a little smaller. maybe 4%. >> bernie country. >> i wouldn't say that much. >> we're going to come back. you have to give me a scoop. the roundtable is sticking with us. up next, these people are going to tell me something i don't know. a scoop out of milwaukee. anyway, "hardball" live from milwaukee on the eve of the wisconsin primary. we needed 30 new hires for our call center.
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from one easy to review list. you put up one post and the next day you have all these candidates. makes my job a lot easier. (announcer) over 400,000 businesses have already used ziprecruiter. and now you can use ziprecruiter for free. go to ziprecruiter.com/offer99 we've got a big day of programming set for you for tomorrow night. wisconsin voters head to the polls. 7:00 p.m., i'll have a special with "hardball" at 7:00 p.m. eastern live from here in milwaukee. at 8:00 p.m. eastern, i'll join brian williams and rachel maddo for complete primetime coverage with full results and analysis of the republican and democratic races here. it's all here on msnbc, the place for politics. we'll be right back.
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we're back with a hardball round table. tell me something i don't know. >> i was pretty sized last week. i had a conversation with donald trump and other conversations. he noticed i had gotten interrupt bid some of the other reporters and allowed me to stay back and ask questions i hadn't gotten a chance to ask. >> that surprised you? >> i was surprised. seemed quite gentlemanly. >> donald trump said kasich should get out of race because he's taking my votes. the kasich people really don't like donald trump. most won't vote for trump in fall. they're little less comfortable from ted cruz. >> wisconsin had some very unique issue.
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we had a highest black, white achievement gap in the nation. they can address the issues on the democratic side. it will be the ones that carry tomorrow. achievement gap in the nation. they can address the issues on the democratic side. it will be the ones that carry tomorrow. >> what is there to do? >> we have to treat our drug offenders. we've done it wrong and the people with mental illness locked away in prisons but specifically in wisconsin. our african-american incarceration rate, male, is at 13%. >> it's a sad story all around. who will win tomorrow night? >> i think cruz is going to lead. i would not be surprised if trump and kasich delegates too. >> you hear that. the dirty little secret about wisconsin is it almost always votes for the front-runner.
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xfinity lets you download your shows from anywhere. i used to like that song. let me finish tonight with the political situation in this country. i think donald trump has a powerful hold on the republican vote. it's driven by the deep feeling of anger that this country has been betrayed by its governmental elite and bad trade deals. the futility and stupidity of the iraq war. all these factors add to trump's strength in the voting booth. in all, the people who vote for trump believe they've been betrayed as long as trump stucks to these issues, the better chance he has of wrapping up this nomination. hillary clinton, the democratic front-runner faces a very
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different situation. it's just not clear what her issues her. yes, she would be the first woman president, but that's the icing on the cake. what's the cake? here's the problem. bernie sanders offers lots of benefits to the voter, free tuition at state colleges and university. did you hear that? free. free health care for life. all that sounds pretty, pretty good to someone in their 20s facing a big college loan debt. it sounds just as good to a retirees looking at a too skinny social security check to someone facing high medical or prescription drug co-pays. what's hillary clinton offering? what's she got to show to the democratic voter here in wisconsin should she get elected? voters want to know. show me the money as cuba gooding used to say in movies. they're looking for an economic break. what's in your wallet they ask as they think of all that bernie has promised them.
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that's "hardball" for now. "all in" with chris hayes starts right now. tonight on "all in." >> if i was presidential, would only have about 20% of you would be here because it would be boring. >> will the plot to stop donald trump finally work in wisconsin. >> our campaign still has a clear path to earning 1237 delegates before the convention. >> donald trump, bernie sanders, ted cruz all speak live in wisconsin in this hour. tonight, why trump is winning votes but losing the delegate fight. exclusive reporting from inside the trump campaign from new york magazine. then, clinton supporter on hillary versus bernie. >> why would the democrats nominate someone who is not democrat? >> i don't want to get hillary clinton more nervous than she already is. >> "all in" live from wisconsin starts right now.
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