i'm chris matthews, out in milwaukee, wisconsin, where voters tonight give a nasty swipe at donald trump and also delivered a wicked wake-up call to hillary clinton. trump was walloped on the republican side by about 20 points with clinton also taking a double digit defeat, ripping open at least for the next to weeks the separate claims to the party's nomination. here's where things stand at this hour tonight. bernie sanders is the projected winner on the democratic side. he leads clinton by 12 point. the gap is even wider on the republican side as i said.

ted cruz who is backed by nearly every major establishment figure in this state earned nearly 50% of the vote tonight. cruz told his supporters early tonight that the race was fundamentally -- or has fundamentally shifted. here he is. >> tonight is a turning point. it is rallying cry. it is a call from the hard working men and women of wisconsin to the people of america. we have a choice. a real choice. as a result of the people of wisconsin defying the media, defying the pundits, i'm more and more convinced that our campaign is going to earn the 1,237 delegates needed to win the republican nomination. >> well, we'll see. anyway, donald trump's campaign had scathing statement. donald j. trump withstood the onslaught of the establishment

yet again. lyin' ted cruz had the governor of wisconsin and many conservative talk radio show hosts and the entire party apparatus behind him and not only did he spend thousands of false advertise on him, he was coordinating with his own super parcs which is illegal and whoetly control him. anyway, for his part, senator sanders said his campaign now has momentum. >> with our victory tonight in wisconsin, we have now won seven out of eight of the last caucuses and primaries. and we have won almost all of them with overwhelming land slide numbers.

>> well, hillary clinton congratulates sanders by twitter and the question tonight, where do these candidates go from here? on the republican side has wisconsin given a play pack to the stop trump movement that other states can follow the deny the billionaire to the 1,237 delegates he needs to clinch this thing, are we headed to an open convention in cleveland? let's bring in the round table of nbc and msnbc reporter, chris jannings, chris hansen, and john, you first, tonight. i do think -- i want to ask you something i told you i wasn't going to ask. life signs. are the american voters, the people that decide elections that 20% in the middle in every fight, are they alive and saying something we haven't heard before? what's the voice of wisconsin for the country tonight?

>> look, i think what wisconsin said and in the loudest of voices it wants both contests to go on. i think people will look for an endorsement of a particular individual. certainly sanders is very popular in the democratic side. he did very well. but i'd be careful on the republican side of thinking this was a big endorsement for ted cruz. the fact of the matter is, wisconsin has the most developed out conservative infrastructure in the united states. and that infrastructure lined up behind the candidate they decided to put in the empty suit. that happened to be ted cruz. but i don't think for a second that that same infrastructure exists in many other states. most other states have not had three gubernatorial elections in the last five years. >> joy reid, are we alive and -- >> i think wisconsin showed that trump can be defeated. and the evangelicals are the most dead set against trump, and

i think john is right. i think the infrastructure was unique. you had the entire gamut of right wing talk radio that was dead set against trump. you had the armada of what this is is of the conservative movement aligned against him. you won't have that in new york or pennsylvania. i don't know if you can repeat this anywhere else. >> what happened to the armada? >> it went national. they had a little bit of trouble. >> no, it did well for a while. >> looked like it coming out. i mean -- >> what's -- give me the wild notion you're hearing in the notion, the zeitgeist of the public tonight. wisconsin is damn important, it always has been. >> i think john is interesting, the appetite for the campaign to continue. if there's one thing -- i remember back in 2004 following that -- on the democratic side it was this all sort of desperate who are we going to get against bush, desperate, desperate.

we find a general, wesley clark, let's get him. no, no. and howard dean had the moment and then as soon as john kerry won iowa and then he won new hampshire, boom, done, let's do it. everyone fell in line. now in 2012, mitt romney if you look at his average performance, you see a line that goes up like this, this is our guy, let's do it. that is not happening on either side right now. it is remarkable in a historical sense. there's no consolidation. i was expecting to see more of it on the democratic side. i have not seen it. it's certainly -- you're not seeing anything like a never trump movement on the republican side, you're seeing this historical effort to block this single candidate that people identify as an existential threat to a party that's been around for 150 years. so the contest roils on because there's no consolidation and no one falls in line and we're in april. >> the best encapsulation was

the trip was the birth place of the united states, and they founded this party on the idea of the unity and civility and ending slavery. and to talk to people -- >> ended the expansion of slavery. >> thank you. to talk to people in the town about what the republican party looks like today and what they want it to look like, not a single person could agree. >> that tells you the republican party is trying to figure out what it is right now. >> to throw in on that, do you know who's really popular and ripping in 2008? barack obama. the fact of the matter is, i don't think rypien has change. >> we have to clean up, chris. this failure to gel, the pudding is not gelling, the jell-o is not happening. we're not picking a president yet. >> so this weekend, on friday night i went to the fish fry, the republicans on saturday night i went to the democratic dinner. i sat to so many people. i can't tell you the number of

groups of friends and neighborhoods and boyfriends and girlfriends who are on separate -- have separate ideas about who should -- and they -- i said, this must cause some really difficult times in your household. well, yeah, but we really like having this conversation. >> yeah. >> i have never seen in any of the campaigns that i have covered a deeper electorate. people are really getting into this. they don't want to let it go. they want to hear what people have to say. i kept looking for tanking on the numbers on the debates. i thought aren't people sick of them yet? they weren't, were they? people keep watching the town halls. they're engaged, they want to stay engaged. they care about making the right decisions. >> also, one of the great things -- i grew up in the bronx. the way that the electoral college system work, ten states get all the candidates' time and usually the primary calendar is front loaded enough it doesn't go deep enough. i'm watching 17,000 people to go to the bronx -- st. mary's park in south bronx, to watch a

person to run for president of the united states, staten island, howard beach, no one campaigns in new york. >> i'm getting a consensus here, no gelling here. it isn't moving towards closure. people are enjoying the ongoing reality of getting to decide. unfortunately they're only down to two or three candidates in each party now, robert. >> it was a tough night for john kasich. it was a rust belt state a state you thought he'd do better. the movement right, the activists, the tea party, the ideological conservatives they've got a horse now in cruz. but it's a long two weeks between now and new york and trump has 10,000 people, long island, tomorrow, a big rally. a big question, can he bounce back, can he pivot as you say to being presidential?

the thing he's always resisted doing. >> well, why doesn't he do it? >> he keeps talking about the fight. bob woodward and i sat down with him and he said i'm not going to reach out to the party, i'm not going to act presidential but he's under pressure now. this is looking like a contested convention. i spoke to people very close to trump tonight. i said what is he doing tonight? he's in trump tower with his family, he's watching the returns. he helped type out his statement tonight. hard hitting statement against cruz. it's about turning the corner to now tomorrow in new york to see if he can look ahead. but they're already talking about california too, chris. they're saying this thing is going to go to june for sure. and they'll be there later this week. he'll go to his golf course there and have a news conference to try to get back his swagger. >> you know, chris, one -- >> let me finish up with robert. i want to you about this 1,237. when i was talking to him last week, he eke talk about getting a gimme, a hundred votes. like he doesn't have to get to

1,237, a gimme. using golf language. does he expect to get a gimme, or does he know he has to get to 1,237 or he's cooked? >> he thinks he can get a gimme. and sticking with golf, chris, he thinks look, there's not a pure cutoff mark, a certain score he needs to meet. he thinks if he gets close enough, if he shoots 77 instead of 76 in golf terms, in terms of the delegates he can get there. he's going to make the point and you hear this from his statement tonight, if he's close enough, if he's near 1,237, 50 degrelegs away, 100 delegates away, this would have been stolen from him. he's already starting to make the case if he doesn't get to 1,237 that it's stolen from him. that's going to be a case he could make going into the convention floor. >> let me go back to joy. if trump makes that case, who does he make it to? we were screwed, a brooklyn kind of thing. it was stolen from us. if he doesn't get the

nomination, somebody else does, does he run third party or just stew? >> well, i think in both of the parties what you have is this amore fous thing called the establishment. if there was a petri dish in particular, this would be it. this is a predominantly white state, so you see the anxieties of that particular group of voters play out among the democrats and among the republicans. the most liberal of democrats and the most conservative of republicans. if trump is denied the nomination, i think you'll see an explosion. because this amore fous thing is seen as evil by the base of the parties. >> what happens if he gets the nomination? the hard right walks out, you have the same crap going on. disaster. >> i think they'll try to save the senate and the house. i don't see the appetite working with trump. >> what's more divisive, a republican party gets stuck with

trump or a party that's dumped him in favor of a cruz or a ryan? what's more crazy. >> i think they should dump him. >> what should be is more crazy? >> much more crazy -- look, this is a political party as was pointed out a couple of mints ago that was -- minutes ago that was founded more nan 150 years ago. in the history of the republican party, it has said we're in the wrong track. in 1940, this party was headed toward nominating a isolationist on the eve of world war ii. they took wilke, who didn't run in the primaries. i'm not saying we're in the same kind of a moment, but i'm saying that the party has to become adult and the leaders have to say we'll take the attacks, we'll take the criticism, but we are a pushing this stuff aside.

because it doesn't work. >> they weren't going to run as an anti-war party either. they did it again in '52 with ike. >> america first, by way, which is donald trump's talk. been used recently. >> no way, of course not. >> mussolini. i don't say this casually, at a certain point this party has to become an adult party. >> i think you're speaking normatively. you're saying should. i don't know what should means. it's going to happen? >> i think this. if your interest is in the continuity of the republican party, you can't nominate trump. if in terms of what's the mo most -- so i think that what is the most divisive? not nominating trump. right? so the thing is broken either way. >> no, you can't do it. you for it, is nominating trump the worst thing? >> yeah. >> depends on what comes afterwards. >> it becomes his party then.

>> you have to remember that not all of the voters that the republican party care primarili about the continue newtie -- continuity of the republican party. >> i think there's a democratic establishment, it's called the clintons. back to robert costas. does trump think he'll win this at the convention going in with 1,237? >> he does. it's really behind the scenes game right now with trump. i spoke today with ed brookover, the guy running his delegate operation. they're starting to reach out to the unbound delegates in states like pennsylvania where you don't really need to be bound on the first ballot. they're bringing in paul manaford, they're gaming out california. trump has a big new york stretch for the next two weeks but his eye of the campaign and the people behind him, it's on cleveland, it's on the delegates because he has to build the relationships as well as the delegate number right now. so if it goes to the second ballot, or a third ballot, he has the political capital to sustain his candidacy. >> let's wait to see roger stone, his partner come in too.

we'll see. you'll be reporting something like that. we're coming right back, thank you, robert costas, from "the washington post." we'll have some wild conversations coming up. our coverage continues after this.

i know a little bit about the office, i spent the first 18 years of my life in brooklyn, new york. please keep this a secret. do not tell secretary clinton she's getting a little nervous. but i believe we've got an excellent chance to win new york and a lot of delegates in that state. >> i just love senator -- i don't want her to get more nervous, of course he does. that was senator sanders off his huge victory in wisconsin today. back with chris jansing, jacob

soberoff, chris hayes, joy reid and in the editorial board, sanders was pressed over many of his positions including on guns. the daily news asked this, the victims of sandy hook are looking to have the right to sue the manufacturers of the weapons. do you think that is something that should be expanded? quote, do i think the victims of a crime with a gun should be able to sue the manufacturer? is that your question? sanders replied, no, i don't. he said. so look at the daily news cover, we don't like your answer. let me start with you, chris. do you get the sense that the daily news is with hillary on that? >> on the front of the new york tabloid, not what you want to see. and if there's something on point with -- >> don't you know what a political revolution is?

>> he didn't know what could be done or how it could be done. >> let's go to your end, start right back across the room here. i have the suspicion that a lot -- they say in washington the safest vote is the vote for something that doesn't pass. because then you're never blamed or the vote against something that does because you're never blamed. a lot of people i think vote strategically. they vote for bernie because they want to keep hillary on her toe, they want to keep the campaign going. the -- they don't want bernie as president necessarily. but what's the impulse in wisconsin? because he looks like he might win it or he can't win it, therefore, it's a safe vote. >> in wisconsin i talked to a lot of folks and went to a lot of the rallies. frankly, they were both on top of their game. hillary clinton gave one of the best speeches i ever heard her give on the supreme court a week ago. i think chris would back me up on this, a really powerful

speech at the founders day dinner. so she was really on her game. sanders as well was giving by far the best stump speeches. much more connected. bottom line, i think they had a real campaign here. i don't think people were voting casually for bernie sanders. i think they liked what they heard, they were voting for him. but i will emphasize to you, that the feeling when i talked to people in wisconsin is, very much this is early in the process. they weren't thinking, you know, we're making -- >> to november. >> they weren't thinking they're making the final choice on the democratic nomination. this is a real fight, we love being a part of it. >> by the way, the old line of the left i group in the '60s in d.c. november doesn't count. >> i don't think they're quite there. remember, wisconsin is a politically mature state. they had an election in 2010 where, you know, people were a little casual about it. they got scott walker. so these people do take politics seriously. but they have also become hardened and very edgy in their

politics and the fact is that sanders' message, particularly that pro labor message -- >> it's him. he's running for president. not his message. joy, the same question to you. it seems that bernie sanders will be 75 in september. okay. he's obviously a rugged guy. he can give a speech four hours day, he's unbelievable. what's new in american life that says 75 is a good time to start the presidency? look at how obama has aged. even george w. he didn't feel the whole thing. >> 70 is the new 40? >> i think it's the new 63 maybe. i don't know. >> the only people who raise that concern is the older people themselves. >> because they feel it. >> they're feeling their age. they're thinking it might not be possible for him to be a robust and vigorous president at that age. but i'll tell you, i think we are in an age where people's expectations the floor has been raised. we had the first african-american president. and for particularly democrats they feel the magnitude of change, the possibility of it is just greater.

i think you see in sanders' supporters the desire for greater. you feel that the bar actually has been higher. >> are they voting for the message, voting to send a message or do they think he should be the chief executive -- >> it's a closed primary. you have the independents voting. >> i think they like bernie's politics. >> do they like him to be commander in chief, chief executive of the united states? >> i don't think most are thinking in that sense. i mean, even just saying commander in chief. commander in chief is the shorthand we use. commander in chief is one thing they do. arguably, wage war. it's life or death and the most important. but i don't think most -- i don't think that's the way -- i don't think that's a terminology that most of the supporters, particularly the most hard core supporters would use to refer to the president of the united states. i watched bernie sanders, it wasn't -- $15 minimum wage. free college tuition. universal health care. i mean, basically this is a bunch of social democratic items

and get money out of politics and break up the corrupt system. >> when i was in his field office -- >> they like that. >> just yesterday, i'm talking to the folks who have left their jobs and are taking their money out of their savings and they're going from state to state to state. these are the true believers, right? these are the folks who are going door to door. they're making the phone calls, doing what ever is asked of them. and they're smart. so they'll say to me, look, i know there's not going to be free college tuition. i don't think that's going to happen. i would like for it to happen, i have big college debts. but i believe he's going to move us in the right direction and i believe his message is pure and i believe when he says something and they don't believe that about hillary clinton. i believe when he says something there's no political agenda behind it. it's what he really thinks. >> i got to interview him. i said, you need 60 votes in the senate to get anything passed. anything. he said the trouble -- i can't do the accenaccent -- the troub

with you you're inside the beltway. he drew a big circle around me like i'm hopeless. inside the beltway is where they pass the tax laws and you have to deal with that. >> are people voting strategically voting for bernie to keep hillary on her toes? if anybody is voting strategically around bernie it's actually even if they support bernie they may vote for hillary because they don't want to risk it basically. >> let's -- to inspire us all. you're senator sanders. the guy's got the mojo. here he is tonight. >> let me say a word up -- well, maybe two words, i don't know, about what momentum is all about. momentum is starting this campaign 11 months ago and the media determining that we were a fringe candidacy.

momentum is starting the campaign 60 to 70 points behind secretary clinton. momentum is that within the last couple of weeks there have been national polls which have had us one point up or one point down. momentum is that when you look at national polls or you look at statewide polls we are defeating donald trump by very significant numbers. [ cheers and applause ] and in almost every instance, in national polls and in state polls, our margin over trump is

wider than is secretary clinton. >> these gestures they're going to be codified some day. every instance momentum -- >> larry david. >> let me say something about -- is this sending a message or this sort of sense of the -- what's realistic, all right? three years ago when i was first starting my show, we covered the fast food workers strikes. it was a completely fringe idea. completely fringe. there would be a $15 minimum wage. >> what were they getting at burger king? >> they were getting $7.50. so the idea -- people said, obviously there's not ever going to be a $15 minimum wage, that's ridiculous, it's double what the minimum wage right now. two of the largest states in the union have passed it two years later. if they had listened to the advice of the people, this is a preposterous ask and it's not doing to than, they wouldn't have got there. they only got there because they insisted on something that people called impossible. there's no reason -- >> but what's the federal

minimum wage going to be a year or two from now? not 15 bucks. >> if there wasn't anybody pushing $15, it would be lower than what it is. if you talk about free tuition, opening asks, quite a bit. >> who else besides bernie? >> i think a lot of -- >> donald trump. nobody is going to believe there's a wall. they don't think the mexican government is going to pay for the wall. they think at least this guy gets serious about illegal immigration. that must be what it means. don't get crazy. >> think about what sanders' slogan is. a future you can believe in. now, trump is the exact opposite of that. make america great again. so trump is saying, you know, let's go back some place because we don't like where we're at. sanders says -- i think especially you have -- he's got 80% of the under 30 vote. sanders said we'll go some place, it might as well be some place good instead of bad.

>> but he was never able to lead as a united states senator. he had no record of getting anything done in the senate. i don't want to squash the dream, but it hasn't happened. we'll be back in milwaukee with joy reid. we have the results.

either before cleveland or at the convention in cleveland, together we will win a majority of the delegates and together we will beat hillary clinton in november. >> welcome back to our continuing coverage of the wisconsin primary right now. we're live from milwaukee. the lake front brewery in fact. we're back with chris jansing and you're leaving us here. to going back to new york. what was your favorite moment here? can -- >> a very good question. >> this is the best moment of anybody's life here. >> all of us for us to be here together. kumbaya with you. >> do you think? >> do you know what i loved? i was at two polling places, heavily republican districts. one had turnout of 61% and 56%. i think the enthusiasm of people

getting out to vote is an extraordinary thing, getting engaged in the process is an extraordinary thing and going into the field offices and seeing people working and going -- it was an icy day. people were coming in and going out and knocking on doors. i thought, democracy is a really impressive thing. >> this is what i wanted our network to do. i just kept think, i want to show the process. not just the results. you guys -- you guys especially know how to walk backwards. you don't know how to talk backwards. how did you learn the ginger rodgers technique to walk through the endless hallways. chris, i don't know how many corners you turned. >> i don't think the marquette folks were happy about the ink they were getting with that. >> jesuit school, you gave them a shot. >> i want to double down on what chris said, particularly with the voter i.d. stuff, the amount of hurdles people had to go through, i was at madison, you know --

>> explain that. how many steps -- you had to register to vote. >> it was basically -- i said earlier on the air, getting your license and registration pulled when you get pulled over by a police officer. you have to pull your proof at the university -- >> you have to access it through the special system. >> print it out on a bar code like you're going too the airport. and still over a thousand people, almost 2,000 people which is the biggest polling place that i saw of the night that happened in multiple places, showed up to vote. people really wanted to come out, despite all of the hurdles that were putting on their place. >> like getting on el al, they interrogate you to get on the airplane. >> where was your bar mitzvah. >> my favorite moment was up in green bay. they had very long lines in green bay and people waited up to two hours. there were some sanders young folks who were toward the front of the line. and some cruz backers showed up and said, you know, we just have a short amount of time, we're on a break from work or something like that. and the sanders backers let the

cruz backers get in front of them in line. >> yeah, they did. >> i thought to myself -- >> to screw trump. >> yeah, maybe. >> no, chris. i felt -- i felt that wisconsin was illustrating socialism. >> you know what, i hope not to be a downer, but i do hope that we'll go back and sort of unpack what the real world impact was. i think that the long lines and the stick-to-itiveness of people when they have to stand in them, perhaps voter i.d. and voter suppression isn't quite so bad, but the actual suppression -- perhaps the progressives was not so cheery, you did have a tightening of the conservative grip on the state supreme court. it's going to come out of tonight. >> isn't it awful -- >> ten years and one of the people who's the most -- who has

said the most extreme things i ever heard a public official say will be spending a decade -- >> we're learning about super delegates and about the other delegates that the democrats have -- >> unbound. >> we've gone to caucuses where everybody doesn't vote. so many -- i mean, of course, you have the electoral college. >> the process -- i mean, every time i'm in a room with a cam what, this is good television, for bad democracy. it's great that we have caucuses, we can show the room. we're showing the lining. but the fact of the matter is it shouldn't be nothing to show. it should be easy. you don't show people doing things easy. >> can i amplify something that's important? those long lines were a result of the fact that the state of wisconsin under governor scott walker tightened up early voting. they took away weekend voting, they took away night voting. >> i wonder why they did that? i have been watching the voter suppression game. if you're in a demographic bind and there aren't as many white people as there used to be, make it harder to vote. thank you, chris jansing and

jacob soboroff who invented the back walk. the rest of the panel is sticking with us. more from milwaukee.

welcome back to our special election coverage of the wisconsin primary. we're live from milwaukee still. with the stop trump effort showed big results today. ted cruz is the projected winner here tonight in the badger state with 93% of the vote in now. cruz is up by 14 over trump. 14 point spread here. look at that. bernie sanders is the projected winner on the hillary side, beating hill bare by 13. joining the round table is hallie jackson who covers the cruz campaign by the minute along with former cruz campaign director rick tyler. everybody else is going to zone in on you two guys. >> the hot seat.

>> i grew up -- it felt like the suburbs, and i'm a city guy. i don't get the cruz thing. i don't get him, but let's not talk about him personally. what he looks like. how he comes across, but let's talk about his movement. rick, you were in the belly of the beast. who was he with -- they're not just voting against trump, but voting for cruz. they want him to be president of the united states. explain this. >> well, there are millions of americans now who are feel like they're getting hammered and that the government is too overbearing and they pass things like obamacare and pass things -- they're not anti-government, but they want government to work within the means. within the constitutional bounds so there's a lot of people who feel like they're restricting our gun rights, they're forcing us to buy health care and have all the regulations. like common core. the government is in our lives. the people don't want government. they just want to be left alone. >> specifically when you talk about cruz though, i think that

would apply to a lot of folks in the conservative movement. when you talk to people supporting him, you hear number one, the constitution. ted cruz is a disciplined candidate and he's been pushing the message he's a -- >> fifth amendment. >> for months. for a year since he launched his campaign in march. the other thing you hear, again this is messaging from ted cruz he has been pushing for a long time. he will do what he says he's going to do. it's wild, almost word for word when you talk about why you're supporting him. you hear talk about the supreme court and other issues that people -- you know, are hearing ted cruz talk about. after justice scalia died, you would be amazed at how many people brought that up at the town halls because it's part of his message. >> look, the conservatives felt look we gave the republicans the majority in the house and in the senate and we felt we were better off with harry reid and nancy pelosi. >> i'm confounded by this, because i look at what's happened since the 1960's, you went to school in the -- we felt

like protestants, everybody is the same. you want that back? >> the what? >> prayer in school? do you want prayer in school back? >> i think it's fine if people pray in school. it doesn't hurt anybody. >> and organized prayer, you want organized prayer -- >> i don't think the state -- that's covered in the -- >> i wonder how much of the old time religion do you guys really want? no gay marriages? >> well, no, it's not anti-gay. it's -- it is that -- >> well, cruz doesn't believe in gay marriage. >> like the other way around. people don't respect christian values and people believe that marriage between one man and one woman, let them leave it. no, they can't believe it. >> the cruz campaign -- i want to be clear on the policy here. the cruz campaign does not believe in -- believes that the supreme court decision was wrongly decided and would -- >> should be in the states. not in the constitution. that marriage is not in the

constitution. >> the point being they think it's wrongly designed, they oppose it. >> yeah. >> when you talk about values, you talk about growing up in the city, philly. let's talk about new york values because that's something -- >> that hasn't been talked about. >> i'm sorry. >> what does that mean by the way? >> every new yorker outside new york city knows what it means. >> well, that's the line that ted cruz will use when he's in the bronx tomorrow talking about this. >> talks loud? is that new york values? i don't know. >> just go upstate. you'll find out. >> but i grew up in a town of about a thousand people. and i didn't know what new york values was. i don't have that anti-new york thing that -- >> probably something like they'd call san francisco values. probably something cultural. >> jean kirkpatrick said it meant gays. >> people who are less moral. what was interesting in both of what you talk about, in terms of what the cruz campaign says is return to constitutionality,

barack obama. a lot is this a convulsion and reaction to the obama presidency. a guy was taking all the calls from conservatives, a lot of them cruz supporters. a lot of what they would say is that obama has destroyed the constitution. he's taken the presidency outside the realm of constitutionality. they didn't name specific things, but in their minds he's destroyed the boundaries that the presidency was written to be in by the founders. >> i don't know if he's destroyed the second amendment. i think the nra and the republicans have kept him from destroying it and a lot of pro second amendment democrats have as well. i mean, i think -- my guess is that obama would have gone further and tried to after newtown and he wasn't able to. >> let me the you this question. kasich needs 111% of the delegates to win. now, i'm go -- i don't make a lot of prediction. i predict he won't get there. now, cruz has had this line. he's basically saying kasich should drop out because of it.

cruz is going to get to 100%, might be after new york. if he gets to a point where he can't get 100% will he stay in the race? >> i'm not sure he will. >> really? you think -- >> right now, i believe that cruz and trump will arrive at the convention. neither of which will have a majority. >> right. but i'm saying that mathematically there's a point before that, before the convention where cruz would -- in order to get 1,237 would have to win more than 100% of the available delegates the way that john kasich does now. if kasich drops out because he wouldn't do it, why doesn't that apply to cruz? >> a fair question to ask. >> i do all the math. do the delegate math. >> i think it's going to -- if trump gets to the convention -- we don't know what the gimme is. he's a hundred shy, 50 shy, 200 shy, we don't know. then he goes over and cries and begs and -- and begs to marco

rubio for his box of marbles. and goes to kasich, can i have your box of marbles because all i need is 50, can you give me that? by the way, the offer is good at that point. i'm going to be the nominee, i can give you anything you want. a post office job for your kid, something. ambassador. a lot to give away. >> abraham lincoln in the democratic -- chris, you have to think more of the republican side. it has to be bigger than the post office job. >> i'm thinking there's a lot of goodies to give away. that's why when it's close on the hill, the president wins. the president can give whoever is -- he'll give them something. we'll talk more about how you can buy the nomination. it was a big primary tonight. back after this.

we're back with some big thoughts following the big wins in wisconsin tonight. let me ask you a serious question, joy reid, my friend. why it is that we refer to the two refer candidates by their surnames, cruz and trump, and we relentlessly refer to the democrats by their first names, bernie and hillary. answer please. >> i think hillary branded herself many years ago when she dropped it from hillary rodham clinton to hillary clinton to then just hillary. and it started actually when she ran for the united states senate in 2000. she rebranded herself as a one word name like madonna or sting.

she's hillary. i think bernie did same thing. the democrats are smart about that branding. on the republican side, the mr. trump i find it odd and a weird way to refer to him. >> like everybody is his driver. >> he's comfortable with that. >> and ted cruz is not very easily brandable. >> tip of the hat. john? why do we call the democrats by the casual first names and the republicans by their surnames? >> oh, my, i think it has something to do with the -- you know -- >> class distinction? >> i do. i think it has something to do with the resonance, something that's still real within the democratic party that you're supposed to actually kind of be one of the people. whereas with all due respect in a race with donald trump in it, that is not a one of the people sort of thing. >> no. >> you've been in there -- nobody calls him ted. >> affectation. >> it's cruz.

>> cruz is a cool name. >> that's true. >> spoken like a communication -- that's true. >> jeb bush wasn't jeb bush and he was jeb. and marco rubio was always marco. >> that's true. >> belittle one of the opponent, he would call them by the first name. lyin' ted or he would be little marco. but jeb did brand himself as jeb. >> little marco that seems like nine years, doesn't it? >> ancient history. >> hasn't this lasted nine years. >> what is the chances of hillary clinton being president? one to five. >> five. >> five. >> four. >> two. >> i'm a reporter, not a pundit. >> what are the chances of ted cruz being president. you're first. >> two. >> go ahead. >> former communications director. go ahead. >> one in five, maybe less. >> one or less. >> i think that the next president of the united states might welcome ted cruz up to the white house for -- >> in other words, zero.

what about donald trump, what are his chances right now? one in ten -- >> to be president of the united states? >> yeah, win the whole thing, win the whole he is bang. >> under one. >> 2 1/2. >> you know up, it's funny. i would have said two to three three or four weeks ago. now one -- i think that he has shown an inability to do the kind of things he'd have to do -- >> is he choking? >> he's not choking. i just these he is who he is. >> what do you think? >> one to two. >> we didn't get to bernie. hallie jackson, chris hayes, what a group. our coverage will continue after this.

it's wednesday, april 6th. right now on "first look," big wins for bernie sanders and ted cruz adds pressure to the front-runners. >> we have now won seven out of eight of the last caucuses and primaries. >> we've got the full spectrum of the republican party coming together and uniting behind this campaign. >> but are the front-runners worried? with new york being the next big prize. two political battles from alabama's governor facing impeachment to the controversial religious freedom law and many more. uconn's date with destiny