it's tuesday, may 31st, right now on "first look" a prominent republican promises to reveal a new candidate to take on the gop front-runner. it's the story that has everyone talking as outrage grows following the gorilla's harambe's killing to save the toddler. mother nature's wrath continues with multiple twisters spotted. at least eight lives lost in the past few days. a nasty case of road rage in florida goes terribly wrong. then paying a speeding ticket with 22,000 pennies and the splash brothers take game 7. "first look" starts now.

good morning, thanks for joining us today. i'm betty nguyen. a cincinnati zoo official defends the decision to kill the silver back gorilla in order to save the 3-year-old boy. and the cincinnati police had no plans to file charges against the boy's parents. nbc's blake mccoy has the latest. >> reporter: outrage over an incident at the cincinnati zoo. when a 3-year-old boy fell into the gorilla enclosure saturday. for ten agonizing minutes onlooks watched including the boy's mother who cried out the him. at one point the 420 male silver back named harambe dragged the boy through the water. >> mommy loves you! >> reporter: zoo officials opened fire, killing the gorilla and rescuing the boy. zookeepers defended their decision. >> naturally, we did not take the shooting of harambe lightly. but that child's life was in

danger. >> reporter: a fire storm, people upset that the gorilla was killed. many blame the boy's mother, who runs a day-care center. many are urging she be charged with negligence. in a facebook post, the mother defended herself. as society, we are quick to judge how a parent could take their eyes off the child. i keep a tight watch on my kids. accidents happen. a subsequent statement thanked the zoos for the acten. >> just being a gorilla and it paid the ultimate price for something that was not its fault. >> reporter: zoo officials say a tranquilizer would have agitated the gorilla more. they're now reviewing how the child was able to get into the enclou closure. this shows a steel railing with wires below that railing is followed by four feet of vegetation into the moat. harambe heard splashing and jumped in also.

a small vigil outside the zoo where something is being lost in the blame game. >> in the middle of this fighting, the victim is being forgotten. >> reporter: flowers surround a gorilla statue as the exhibit remains closed. >> that was nbc's blake mccoy reporting. the zoo insists the enclosure is safe and say they haven't had a breach in the 37-year history. it is set to reopen next weekend. world famous physicist stephen hawking said while he may have a handle of the universe, understanding donald trump's rise is something entirely different. he is baffled by it all, saying i can't, he's a democragogue. he made no secret of his disdain for trump previously joking about his intelligence. meanwhile, hillary clinton spent memorial day with her husband marching in a parade in

chappaq chappaqua. and bernie sanders campaigned in california where there was a brief security scare after animal rights protesters jumped over the barricade at an oakland rally. the incident was quickly dealt with by the secret service. but just as sanders thought he'd have california all to himself the clinton camp announced a major change in her campaign schedule. she will return on thursday earlier than anticipated. meanwhile a new poll from the public policy institute of california shows the two democratic candidates in a statistical dead heat. 46 to 44. the institute's previous poll had clinton leading sanders. while clinton could pull off a win there it may be a small margin. not the sign she wants to send as she's trying to unite her party. also the specter of a third party candidate continues to dog trump on the trail. political junkies are racing through a massive list of hopefuls. hallie jackson has those

details. >> reporter: donald trump's marching toward the general election. now looking at a possible new challenger after conservative writer bill kristol hinted at an independent candidate with a strong team and a real chance. trump calling kristol quote a dummy, can't allow lightweights to set up a spoiler indy candidate he tweeted even after months of flirting with his own independent bid. >> i don't want to do the independent thing, but i do keep it and it's leverage. >> reporter: kristol said nothing is imminent. others familiar with the search for an alternative said something cob announced this week. whispers surround mitt romney but a source tells nbc "today" it remains unlikely he would run. the same goes for ben sasse. other names are condoleezza rice and susana martinez who skipped trump's rally, prompting a war

of words with the presumptive nominee. even some of his former rivals are the subject, but none seem interested in what would be the long shot candidacy. >> there are people who won't be voting for either of them. >> reporter: another potential spoiler, new libertarian pick gary johnson. he received just 1% in 2012. trying to be taken more seriously this cycle. >> according to a new associated press/orc poll it's fueled an overall sense of pessimism across the country. 12% of republicans believe the gop is responsive to ordinary voters and 25% of democrats believe the same. among all americans just 8% say they have confidence in the gop. compared to 15% who say they have confidence in the democratic party. and that number drops even more if you can believe it, only 4% of americans say they have confidence when it comes to

congress. now, to what some are calling one of the best nba play series in history. golden state taking on oklahoma city, game 7. the thunder were in charge early and down only six at the halftime, after this steph curry floater at the buzzer. in the second half, curry showed why he's the first unanimous mvp. he had 36, including seven three-pointers en route to the 96-88 win for the warriors. curry also said an -- set an nba record with 32 threes. game 1 is on thursday. now, in details about how mexican soccer star alan pulido managed to break free from the kidnappers. the kidnapping happened in the mexican town near the texas border which had been plagued by warri warring drug war tells.

he reportedly punched a guard, snatched a cell phone and called for help. reports say he beat the kidnapper while on the phone until he found out their location. so far, one of four kidnappers believed to have been involved is arrested. at least eight people have died and one is missing as severe weather and historic rains continue to hammer the great plains. a 16-year-old boy was killed monday while working with a church clean-up crew in the texas town of brenham. the tree damaged by storms fell on him. he's the first person -- well, actually one person is still reported missing in kansas. and in texas, rain swollen rivers continue to rise even after a break in the rain. the river in houston is expected to crest at a record high of more than 53 feet. it's also washed out bridges and destroyed homes and now more rain is in the forecast for the rest of the week. we don't want to hear that. and then there's this. three tornadoes they were reported in northeastern

colorado. this cell phone video captured one touching down near a wind farm in peetz. several power poles caused widespread outages. no injuries were reported there. >> that was a picturesque tornado. >> scary and beautiful at the same time. >> at the bottom it was over a dirt road, so it was picking up the dust like a vacuum would. you don't see that very often. what was left of bonnie kept us soaked saturday, sunday into monday, in the mid-atlantic. that is exerting for today. you don't need your umbrellas, but maybe in cape cod. rain in minneapolis and texas for the most part had a nice day

yesterday. west texas had a bit of rain. here's the problem. we're getting reloaded. that storm system that's moving across the plains is going to stall that front through texas. we'll have three days in a row of on and off scattered storms. but our estimates are here about anywhere from two to four inches is possible in the next week. so the river levels will remain high. we will see some isolated flash flooding. still warm on the east coast. this as warm as it will get this week and then the rest of the week will settle down to where we typically are. a quieter week ahead. >> we like that. thank you. just ahead, how a texas man paid a pretty penny for revenge over a speeding ticket. and following a nasty case of road rage. and look who happened to show up at the warriors/thunder at game 7. who is that? bernie sanders. hey there, hi.

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isis continues this morning. iraqi forces backed by u.s. military aircraft launched an operation to storm fallujah. it's one of the last major strong holds in iraq. isis claimed to show the counterattacks. about 50,000 civilians remained inside that city and are at risk of being turned into human shields. now to philadelphia, over 100 firefighters battled a massive blaze at an american legion post on memorial day. the four alarm fire took nearly three hours to contain. while everyone inside was safely evacuated, community members mourn the loss of memorabilia inside. some of which dated back to world war i. police in florida are investigating a shocking case of road rage. look at this. a verbal altercation leads to a car toppling a motorcycle with two people on it. so far no reports of injuries. police say one person has been arrested. and a man in texas found a unique way to pay off his $220 speeding ticket with 22,000

pennies. yes. that's right. brett sanders says it was his way of protesting the fine he got for driving nine miles over the speed limit. it took the office about three hours to count the coins and he actually overpaid. he is now owed $7.81. let's get down to business with cnbc's landon dowdy. good morning. >> hey, there, good morning to you. well, the markets look to start the week off on a positive note. after the dow had the best week since march. it is a big week for economic data with the reports on personal income and spending. home prices and consumer confidence and betty, it's all topped off on friday with the monthly jobs report. my favorite friday of the month. >> really? >> oh, yeah. meanwhile, striking verizon workers will return to their jobs on wednesday. the unions who represented the internet employees reached a tentative contract agreement with verizon on friday. the strike which began in april was one of the longest u.s. job

actions in recent years. also, sony is fridaying back the playstation experience back to the annual e 3 conference next week. if you know can't be there in person, you can watch it at the movie theaters around the country. tickets are free and are up for grabs for free. everyone will get free stuff. >> hey, that enticed me. who doesn't like free stuff? 16 minutes after the hour. is bernie sanders california dreaming? "scrambled politics" is next.

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19 minutes past the hour. here's your first look at the dish of "scrambled politics." former u.s. attorney general eric holder now says fugitive leaker edward snowden performed a public service for his actions, but notes that he still deserves to be punished. here's what he told former obama adviser david axelrod. >> we can certainly argue about the way in which snowden did what he did. but i think that he actually performed a public service by raising the debate that we engaged in and by the changes that we made. now i would say that doing what he did and the way he did it was illegal. >> holder called on snowden to come back to the u.s. and face the consequences of his actions. snowden has been living in moscow for the last three years and he claims he had volunteered

to go to prison but had not heard back from the u.s. government. the doj would not confirm or deny it. the veterans administrations are saying they will name themselves but the totals have been scrutinized and there's yet to be a full accounting of where the funds went. veterans groups have protested demanding to know more. meanwhile, amid reports of an independent candidate, trump supporter ben carson said that the u.s. is set on a course for carnage and death if republicans don't rally around the presumptive nominee. >> i think what bill kristol and many others like him need to recognize is america right now is like a cruise ship that is about to go off the niagara falls with tremendous carnage and death. what you have to do first is recognize the problem. stop the ship and turn it

around. and bernie sanders took in the incredible game 7 warriors/thunder game last night ahead of next week's primary. he attended it with danny glover and cheered on the warriors. he arrived just in time to watch steph curry pull out a win. in the hint to the 2016 campaign, he tweeted last week golden state was down three games to one and tonight they finish off a great comeback in california. i like comebacks. and that's your morning dish of "scrambled politics." i think there was a hint or two in that. all right, 21 minutes past the hour in washington now. i'm joined by daniel litman, co-author of politico playbook. good morning. >> good morning, how are you? >> i'm doing great. there's a lot of excitement around the announcement of the independent candidate to take on donald trump.

any hint as to who or when it would? >> i can't happen a week before the election but one candidate that people are talking about is mitt romney. he's run for president so many times. if you're mitt romney why would you do this, given that donald trump is, you know, doing really well in the polls. it would take a long time to actually build the campaign and raise so much money and so it's looking less likely for mitt or anyone else to run. this might be, you know, bill kristol teasing something that may not happen actually. >> so this all this excitement may be a big old dud? >> yeah. that could happen because you know why -- there's no reasonable path for an independent to win. this would ensure a hillary clinton election pretty easily. >> kind of what donald trump is arguing against. you know, what are you doing? if you do this, this is definitely going to hand it to her. >> i don't think mitt wants to lose for the third time. >> you have a point there. let's talk about the california primary. it's exactly one week from today. hillary clinton is headed back

there earlier than originally scheduled. does this signal that she might be worried bernie sanders could take california? >> she was doing much better in the polls even a few weeks ago and they tightened to only a couple points. she's definitely worried that, you know, bernie sanders could do really well. there's a famous line that bill clinton likes to use, the democrats fall in love and republicans fall in line. that's proving true again this time around too. and so democrats in california, you know, they love to dream d and, you know, they're dreaming of bernie sanders right now. >> bernie sanders has been campaigning very hard in california. he's making news with protesters yesterday and then showing up at the warriors game with danny glover. does he have a real shot at winning this? >> he definitely does, but even if he wins california before the polls even close in the golden state, once new jersey polls close next tuesday since they're on the eastern side of the country clinton could clinch the nomination then. >> thanks so much for joining us today.

we do appreciate it. >> thank you. just ahead, meet the three women who stopped an alleged date rape at just the right time. there are two billion people

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i used to like that song. now to a story millions are talking about across the world, three women out for a night of fun in california when they spotted a man they believed was up to no good. so rather than sit idly by, they took action and now they are being hailed for stopping an alleged sexual assault attempt. >> reporter: it's a hero's story grabbing headlines, germany, australia australia, india, talking about three friends in

santa monica, who stopped a woman from being drugged. >> i just saw her put something in his drink. >> reporter: they were sitting across from a couple who looked they were on a first date. >> i said, get the drink off the table. >> reporter: sonya said -- >> that guy you're with put something in your drink. she said, oh, my god. he's one of my best friends. >> reporter: back at the table, the other women told restaurant staff who began to stall to prevent 24-year-old michael shu from getting away. >> security watched the footage. security called the police. >> reporter: shu charged with attempt to commit rape. his bond $1 million. attempts to reach him or his lawyers is unsuccessful. police are waiting for the results of chemical testing on the drink. >> we knew we had to say something. >> reporter: after the arrest, many in the restaurant thanked the friends. the friends hoping their story will inspire others to have

courage and act if they see someone in danger. gadi schwartz, los angeles. all right, i'm betty nguyen. this is "first look" on msnbc. like us on facebook. "way too early" starts right now. it's the story everyone is talking about and the decision many people are questioning. was the cincinnati zoo right to shoot and kill an endangered gorilla after the toddler elle into the enclosure? >> beyond the right decision. you have the animal and the human decision. when they go after each other, when the young male will look at the big male it's beyond anything you ever want to watch. plus, this memorial day, severe weather, devastating tornadoes in the middle of the country and deadly flooding in

the south. is the worst behind us? and hillary clinton is going back to cali, hoping to make a full pivot to the general, but first she has to prevent another upset from bernie sanders. it's 5:30 on the east coast, it's 2:30 out west. this is "way too early." ♪ hey, there. good morning, it's tuesday, may 31st. i'm alex witt. the battle for california is intensifying. hillary clinton swept monday in chappaqua, but she's returning to california, for a sign of the rising stakes out west. and while it's possible she could secure enough delegates to shut the book on the nomination before polls even close there, bernie sanders is looking for a comeback. over the weekend he spoke at event after event with thousands of people