i'm tamron hall. thanks for watching. uncertain trumpet. let's play hardball. good evening. while donald trump is trying to take back his words. he woke up this morning telling us all of his repeated claims is that president obama was the founder of isis wasn't meant to be for real. trump made the about face saying ratings challenged cnn reports so seriously that i call president obama and clinton the founder of isis and mvp.

they don't get sarcasm. let's watch. >> i make one mistake and they say oh, he mentioned something wrong. it's like headlines all over. i said the founder of isis. obviously i'm being sarcastic, but not that sarcastic to be honest with you. they all said he should not say that. they should call him an enabler. he is an enabler. i said that doesn't sound the same. she an enabler. these people are the worst. they knew i was being sarcastic but now they are analyzing, did i really mean that? how could i say that? these people are the lowest form of life. i'm telling you. >> well, this comes after donald trump in the last 48 hours made

the akization multiple times repeatedly doubling down on his charge. here is trump doubling and trimmi tripling down. >> he is the founder of isis. he is the founder of isis. he is the founder! as far as i'm concerned he is a founder of isis. they must love him. barack obama is the founder. >> you mentioned president obama being the founder of isis. what did you mean by that? >> he is a founder of isis. she a founder. he is a founding father. >> do you think it is appropriate to call the sitting president the founder of a terrorist organization that wants to kill americans? >> he was the founder of isis.

>> i know what you meant, that he -- >> no. i meant he is the founder of isis. >> i call president obama and hillary clinton the founders of isis. they are the founders. >> joined by hall ie jackson, wy did we all believe what he said? for weeks he was talking about the cliff there. he said no. no. he is the founder of isis. at 6:30 he gets up and says that was sarcasm. how do you figure? >> reporter: this is a pattern that fits into trump's play book in the past. i think you nailed it with repeated times he was able to get out of what we this said. he was asked point-blank, didn't you mean x, y or z and trump repeatedly says no. i see him as the founder of

isis. he looks at how supporters and others are reactions and decides how he will walk it back or not. he talked about it being sar z sarcastic. he said at the time, of course he was being sarcastic. it allows you to do a couple of things that plays well. it allows him for spinning these talking point and allows him which is something his supporters love to be. it has proven to be an effective

strategy. >> the only way we could lose in pennsylvania is if cheating goes on. we have to call up law enforcement and we have to have the sheriffs and police which i haves and everybody watching. if we get cheated out of a win in pennsylvania i know she can't beat what's happening here. if in certain sections of the state they cheat. >> you know what he is talking about, hallie. certain sections of this state. i know what he is talking about when he is out in altoona and

johns town. they cheat in philly. they wouldn't cheat in joh johnstown. no, they cheat back in philly. i know what he is saying. >> reporter: right. you know as a pennsylvania man yourself, they booed the mention of that, the mention of philadelphia but that trump is talking about a rigged system to trump it is a way of continuing to promote this argument that the big guys are stacking it up against him, that he is fighting like the ones in altoona. this is one of the more dangerous long-term arguments he is making. if he waking up he can point and say it's not right. it's not fair. it's rigged. it is an argument that he started making a couple of weeks ago and he brought up time and

time again. >> that's what they do with less developed democracies. you'll always say you have it stolen because you never lose. thanks for the reporting there. i'm joined now. why do we even record his words because two days later they say they don't matter. >> this is the same argument we heard him make in the primaries when it looked lielk ted cruz was going to be challenging. these numbers may be baked in and he started to lay the ground work for what will be the excuse is that the whole thing was rigged. it is essentially kind of a preemptive strategy. >> we have sort of this physical appearan

appearance. there are no actions in politics. that i are words. if his words are indescribable, unreliable, incredible, what is his campaign about? this is going on now for the time. the other classic example is when he said i want them to hack into hl ri's e-mail. >> or when he said the video showing the money drop rather than a hostage being released. he has this sort of cavalier approach to words and facts and the truth. yeah. it worked well for him in the primary but his message plays well. he is still talking to the same room. it's like trying to describe a snow globe that never settles. he is sitting there saying it was sarcastic. he is contradicting himself. it makes it really challenging. >> his supporters see what he wants to see. >> i think it was different

thou though. it does get blown up. in this case it was pretty deliberate. he played it over and over again. let's be clear here, no one is running this campaign for trump and it is a good strategy. >> he has 30% going to vote for him no matter what he says. the others like it. he is really from africa. he is not really one of us. of course he is the founder of africa. of course that 30% are buying the literal charge. he says wait a minute. i need a 20% thing. i better pull back. he gets up at 6:30 saying i can't win with 30%. they want to change and like the bush thing going all of the time. i got to get them back.

he says it is sarcasm. he says i better say i wasn't really being sarcastic. he is trying to pick up the 20. he is getting a little bat crazy about this. >> right. he knows what he thinks and believes. he is losing his leverage with the rnc. >> right. >> and trying to hammer into him, hey, get on message finally. he needs the rnc because they are the campaign. when they come and call and yell at him at some point he is running out of leverage. >> he is going down about 35%. chris murphy took to twit tore criticize trump with a showcasing true sarcasm saying what i'm looking for is a president who has a good sense of humor and russian cyber war fair. trump's allies have also been

critical ability -- even newt gingri gingrich is showing exacerbation. >> one of the things that's fraus rating is the imper sies language. i know what trump has in his mind but that's not what people hear. i think he has got to learn to use language who has been thought through and cleared to everybody and stick to that language because otherwise the mainstream media will take every excuse to pile on here. >> this isn't about piling on. let's take a look here. just this morning at 6:30 he tweets the fact that, you know, it was sar scassarcasm, saying t

obama is the founder of isis. it isn't the first time trump cl clarified a statement like this. trump later explained he was just being sarcastic. let's watch. >> russia, if you're listening, i hope you're able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing. >> when i'm being sar kcastic. >> do you remember on saturday night live? just kidding. just kidding. i'm just being sarcastic. >> it is so unconventional, able to be entertaining. the election is to the point we are looking at who will actually

be president. there is a seriousness to it now. you watch snl. you don't necessarily want to see that in someone who is going to have geo political impacts. >> a president of the united states says it could cause a collapse of the market. >> add it to the list. we have to move on day by day when he says these things. i feel like we are reaching that ceiling point in the polls where he came out of what was not the most successful republican convention. it has only been stumble since the gold star family fight, the second amendment comment the other day and i feel like the those who might have given him a chance, those are starting to harden. >> i'll talk about it at the end of the show. as you were so smart to say it was a dull convention. it was a barn burner at the very end.

the week wasn't that good. then he comes on. this week was worse. >> yeah. you wouldn't know it. >> paul manafort said this election is over. they didn't see it this week. >> what do you think he is thinking? >> thank you, sir. coming up, new battleground polling shows hillary clinton out to a big lead in the key states. it is raising the possibility that this race might be a run away. trump has a lot of ground to make up but can clinton afford to play it safe? you're watching "hardball," the place for politics.

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welcome back to "hardball."

we have new numbers out tonight from two states donald trump need to win. we start with the state of florida. the trump need to pick up. clinton holds 44 to 39. in north carolina the trump needs to hold in november, republicans need to hold onto that. clinton has a 9-point lead th e there. how big could a victory be there? i have been trying to figure out how trump wins for weeks now. he says he has to win florida and hold north carolina and win pennsylvania and ohio and some other states. those are essential. how does it look now? >> if there is a simple trump road map this is what his

campaign has been pointing to far while, what he would have to do to improve, win pennsylvania, ohio and win florida. that would get him to 273. like you say. he is down in florida right now. we had him earlier this week. poms down five points in ohio. big problem in pennsylvania. a couple of polls have him down double digits. he is not leading any of them and getting blown out in pennsylvania. add onto that north carolina. right now hillary clinton is the one. she is in hoe sigs to flip a red state to blue. look what happens. if she flips north carolina look at that, he is short of 270. yeah, he has got to hold the romney states and start flipping blue states.

we talk about what trump needs to doch. hillary clinton is in better states. >> you're the best. thank you so much. stul aheaill ahead, my next tackles that voting block with a of that left behind. that's coming up next. this is "hardball," a place for politics. isaac hou has mastered gravity defying moves to amaze his audience. great show. here you go. now he's added a new routine. making depositing a check seem so effortless. easy to use chase technology, for whatever you're trying to master. isaac, are you ready? yeah. chase. so you can. dog chow for 36 years now.d i've been making

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you only have so much. that's why we want to make sure you won't have to wait on hold. and you won't have to guess when we'll turn up. because after all we should fit into your life. not the other way around. welcome back to "hardball." from the outside of this campaign donald trump made this gamble he can turn out an oversized share of white working class voters. trump's bet is that his appeal in the tril midwest and others hollowed out will make up for any shortcomings he is likely to have with well educated voters. now a new book managed to

capture the very people trump is hoping to carry him to victory. it is titled hill billy elegy. it is about his own family but he describes it as a tough love analysis of the poor that back trump calling it a particularly the assent of donald trump. mr. advance has inadvertently provided a civilized reference guide for an uncivilized election and he's done so in a vocabulary intelligible to both democrats and republicans. imagine that. let's talk about your family. >> sure. >> what is it that you're trying to achieve in talking about people you call hillbillies,

rednecks and everything else. >>. >> it is really complicated. i think on the left we tend to have a conversation about what government isn't doing and on the right we tend to have a conversation about what individuals weren't doing. we seemed to have a conversation about what both could do better. i thought by opening up my own life and my own family that i could be part of a better conversation. >> what do you think makes people who have it rough, they live out in mountains. they don't have jobs. they don't have things that are good to have in life. they don't have beautiful homes or jobs or families. they can move ahead. what makes them break bad? >> well, think -- >> what's the cause and effect here? you're talking about people that live in the mountains. what's the chicken and the egg

answer here? >> i think it's the broad appalachians that have located themselves in pennsylvania, michig michigan, ohio and indiana. it's not just the people living in the hills. i think the answer, again, is pretty complicatcomplicated. i realize that family break down is primarily a problem of individual character. it is that families pass on their chaos and domestic strife. in the same way a lot of other pop up and have existed for many generations, it's complicated. it comes from economic disposition but also learned helplessness and problem that is people have acquired through their neighborhoods. >> i like the way you write, sir. by the way, it is the ohio state university. >> yeah. >> you'll pay for that. >> thanks for calling me out.

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