it's over the investigation of a tea party targeting controversy. though koskinin wasn't even on the job during that time. he was brought in after heads rolled. paul ryan will probably try to push house republicans towards tabling it or take it to committee to die or go to a censure vote. but consider this the first skirmish of the fall and perhaps of the next year in the battle between ryan and the freedom caucus. can he tame them? can he try not to have overly enthused promises, like impeaching the irs commissioner, that can't get done. can he stop the house republicans from doing something like that? we shall see. that's it for tonight. "with all due respect" starts right now. >> i'm nicole wallace. >> and i'm john heilemann. and with all due respect to those peddling the latest scandal about hillary clinton not drinking water, if you want people to notice, now need a clever name. something like waterga, eh, we'll come back to it later.

we have got plenty to have wadr, or water, as we like to call it, on the show tonight, sports fans, as hillary clinton takes a second day off the campaign trail to recoup from her bout of pneumonia. she was able to call in pretty decent subs to fill her shoes. at an afternoon rally in philadelphia, president obama was on fire as he showed off his stump speech, showmanship, and issued a dire warning to middle class voters about the dangers that he said would come with a donald trump presidency. >> this is the guy you want to be championing working people? this guy who spent 70 years on this earth, showing no concern for working people. this guy suddenly is going to be your champion? i mean, he spent most of his life trying to stay as far away from working people, as he could. and now this guy is going to be

the champion of working people? huh? i mean, he wasn't going to let you on his golf course. >> out here, where i am, in southern california, bill clinton is taking his wife's place at a pair of fund-raisers, fresh off his own strong and feisty performance, in an interview with charlie rose, which aired earlier today on "cbs this morning," we'll hear some of that sound in a moment. in the meantime, nicole wallace, my friend, filling mark's chair, there aren't that many days remaining between now and november 8th. and it looks like hillary clinton won't be back on the trail until friday. so that's not great, but at the same time, with surrogates like these, barack obama, bill clinton, how bad is it really? >> well, i would answer that by asking you, how bad was her convention, where every night was filled by a different super surrogate, the very same super surrogates who are out on the trail for her name. and she came out of that week in the strongest position of her campaign so far. so it's not bad at all. and if you see her come down with another cold, you might

come to accept that she didn't think so, either. these are great messengers for her. the president is an incredibly impassioned surrogate. and i actually like this performance today, better than the one where she set him up and spoke as well. >> right, look. hillary clinton has admitted she's not a natural campaigner in her way that her husband and barack obama are. so this is no denigration of her to say, that these two, when they are on their game, that is president clinton and president obama, they are just better than she is. and today, barack obama, i thought, was fantastic as an advocate for her. she has a the challenge right now, as we see these polls tightening, one of the things we know that the problem for her is not just the republicans are, to some extent, coming home for donald trump, but that she has an enthusiasm problem with african-american voters, young voters, and hispanic voters. she's getting a big percentage of them, but there's still the enthusiasm gap there. barack obama, probably more than anybody, can do something about that. if anybody can, it's him. so it's good for him to have her

out there in full throat. >> and there was always some ext strategicry to this. there's strategy in holding back and not pushing bernie off the stage, was to be able to do just this. they were well aware of sort of her structural deficiencies with those big swaths of the obama coalition. and their plan was always to come in, in these final months and bolster her support and bolster her number with those pieces of the coalition that they knew she would need in these close states. >> and i'll say, as i said, we're going to listen to some of this bill clinton sound in a couple of minutes, but bill clinton is not as consistent at this stage in his career, at his age, he's not as consistent a performer as barack obama, but this morning on charlie rose when he took on trump and tried to explain what was going on in the electorate, it was like the old bill clinton, or at least the bill clinton from 2012, when he was a fantastic surrogate for president obama. that president clinton was on display, arguing for his wife, until, like i say, if she's got those two firing on full -- on all cylinders, she's in a pretty

good place. she couldn't have any better people out there being in her instead while she's resting up. >> yeah. and we'll come back to her health in a minute, and the way that the campaign handled her illness this week. but -- because it's one of the two big stories, i know you guys talked about it yesterday, and we'll do it again today, dominating presidential politics today. but the other one is the way she lumped half of donald trump supporters in a single shrink-wrapped basket of deplorables last week. on both fronts, the clinton campaign is tired of being on defense and now they're doing their best to spin these flaps and get themselves on offense. the gist of the counterattack is, sure, we've made our share of mistakes, but trump is even worse than we are, not exactly hope and change. but today, 24 hours after the trump campaign released an ad trying to capitalize on this baskets business, team clinton released their own ad, featuring some not-so-flattering things that trump has said in public. watch this. >> you can't leave this nation if you have such a low opinion for its citizens.

how stupid are the people of the country? we're building a wall. he's a mexican. you've got to see this guy. ah, i don't know what i said. ah, i don't remember. you're living in poverty, your schools are no good, you have no jobs. what the hell do you have to lose? >> the clinton campaign is also jumping all over the latest controversy surrounding republican presidential candidate, mike pence, who refused to call david duke deplorable on a cnn improve yesterday. on cnn this morning, trump wouldn't go there, wouldn't utter the "d" word, but reiterated neither he nor trump wants to support. still, trump is trying to keep the focus on clinton's comments as seen this afternoon at a rally in clive, iowa. >> she offers no ideas, no solutions, and only hatred and derision. it's true, you saw the that. i'm running to be a president for all americans, democrat, republican, independent,

everyone. whether you vote for me, right? whether you vote for me or whether you vote for someone else, i will be still your greatest champion. while my opponent slanders you, as deplorable and irredeemable, i call you hard-working american patriots, who love your country, and want a better future for all of our people. >> john, there are some people who say that hillary clinton would rather be talking about this than her e-mails or her health. can she manage to turn the deplorables gaffe, which she herself walked back the day after, into her advantage? >> yeah, look, i think, you know, she can, and she is, to some extent. we've now had a couple of days of debate where we've had people arguing about, is 50% the right number or not? let's look at the data. let's look at the polling. let's see the percentage of trump supporters who are there,

who are birthers, who believe president obama wasn't born in america. let's see how many would like to ban homosexuals from the united states. let's look at the numbers. that's not a great debate for donald trump. and the other thing, as byron york, a conservative writer pointed out this morning, this has set up a kind of diabolical trap for republicans, which pence was faced with last night. which is, every time some outrageous trump supporter does or says something outrageous, in this case, david duke was the example, people in trump's campaign will be asked, well, is that person deplorable or not? is david duke deplorable? and when they say no, because they don't want to use the clinton language, they'll get hit with headlines, as pence has been, as, mike pence refuses to call david duke deplorable. that also is a good thing for the clinton campaign. >> off-topic here, but don't you think the deplorable, i always think it's a good name for a band. let me say this on mike pence. there's no other answer. there's literally one answer.

in multiple choice, there's one answer, is david duke deplorable, yes. yes. [ bleep ] [ bleep ] yes. so this is mind boggling to me. but i think taking on trump supporters is a mistake, because all of the people who agree with her are already voting for her. and the people she needs to convert are ones who share some pretty grave concerns about her as well. so she needs to bring around moderate voters who are not on the clinton bandwagon. the people in the bandwagon, yeah, they think trump's base contains plenty of deplorables. but the people she needs to convert to win states like ohio, they're not warming up to her when they hear her malign half of his base of support. not smart. >> well, i would say there is one other thing which she needs to do, and that is fire up her own base. and that, this is succeeding in doinging. hillary clinton may be taking time off the campaign trail and letting her super surrogates pick up the slack, but she did find time to call into cnn last night. in a brief interview with anderson cooper, clinton tried to shift attention away from her

and her team's obfuscations about her health this week, and two questions about her opponent's own multi-faceted lack of transparency. >> compare everything you know about me with my opponent. i think it's time he met the same level of disclosure that i have for years. you know, you've got a medical report on me that meets the same standard as mitt romney and brorm bro barack obama. donald trump's doctor said he would be the healthiest president in history. that's just not even serious. and i've released nearly 40 years of tax returns. he hasn't released one. >> sounds pretty familiar, doesn't it, bill? >> if a martian came down from outer space and watched america unfold over the last six to eight weeks, it would be hard to see all these earnest pleas for disclosure, which are entirely one-sided. >> people are demanding that donald trump release his income

tax returns all the time. >> but it's nowhere near the same kind of story. it would be refreshing if there was one thing in life where he disclosed more than she has, but there isn't, not even one. >> so donald trump is planning to reveal more about his health on "the dr. oz show" this week, but he continues to be pressed about when he's going to, if he's ever going to, release his federal income tax returns. and over at t"the washington pos post", a reporter continues raise questions about trump's charitable foundation and whether he's given much, if at all, of his personal wealth. so clinton is also planning to release more information about her health in the days ahead. but my question is, how successful do you think her efforts to jiu-jitsu this broader issue of transparency might be? >> you know, it's always a strategic and a structural misjudgment when, you know, there's fairness and then there's parody. and on the question of transparency, i know the clinton

team finds it unfair, but their sort of pursuit of parody just isn't going to come to fruition. she is expected to, and i think, will benefit from moving towards more transparency, because that is her single greatest political liability. his greatest liability is something different entirely. it's this notion that his depth of knowledge, you know, is a millimeter deep and he's volatile. so they're both trying to solve different problems. and that's why -- and put the media aside. pause the media should certainly expect the same thing from both of them. but the truth is, voters are holding them to different standards, and that's evident in the fact that i think he still maintains an advantage on this question of honesty and trustworthiness. even though, as bill clinton accurately points out, over the years, there's been a lot more information about her release to the public. >> right, but look, the bottom line here is that she has held to a different standard. you can say whether it's fair or unfair. i think it's unfair over the

long arc of her career. but it's the case that it's a smart move for the clinton campaign to focus on his lack of transparency, which is epic, and the fact that reporters have not done a great job of drilling down on him. david farrenhold is an exception. this is a guy who is putting himself in contention for a pulitzer by looking at the trump foundation, by finding out that the trump foundation is unusual in a variety of ways. that donald trump's money is not much of the trump foundation. that it takes other people's money and spends it. calling hundreds of charities that have not received donations from the trump foundation, chasing down phantom contributions that the trump foundation claims it's given, that the charities say it's given to have no record of. the tax law violations. this is a rich area for inquiry, and i think it's smart for hillary clinton to try to push all of our colleagues and us to do more on this. >> i agree. the only thing i would add is that trump is kind of running as a scoundrel. he's running as a guy who has worked over a rigged system.

so part of the reason these stories don't stick to him in the mind of the viewers is he's openly running as a guy that gamed the system. when you're running against a rigged system, you get away with more than she does. >> let's make sure all voters know exactly -- if he's going to run as a scoundrel, let's make sure they know exactly how big a scoundrel he is. when you go to the voting booth, remember. when we come back, we'll look at the coverage of hillary clinton's health situation and if there's any gender bias involv involved. hmm. right after this. the long brown path before me leading wherever i choose. the east and the west are mine. the north and the south are mine. all seems beautiful to me.

i have to say, martha, i think there's an element of sexism in how this is being overcover overcovered at this point and worry they appear guilty of the same thing, but, you know, i think the idea of a woman as weak is, you know, a sexist stereotype. >> that was former "new york

times" executive editor, jill abramson on bbc radio, critiquing the way the media has been covering hillary clinton's health scare on sunday. nicole, jill abrahamson is not alone. others have also claimed that sexism, gender bias, misogyny when it comes to how this whole thing has been handled by reporters and their news organizations. my question for you, as the woman in this conversation, is, are they right? >> yes and no. let me just speak, i don't think hillary clinton is in trouble because she got pneumonia. i think voters are very forgiving, the campaign is grueling, the reporters that cover her know how grueling it is. it is difficult to keep up with anyone running for president. hillary clinton is in this predicament because she didn't tell people she had pneumonia. so i want to separate out those two things. but, sarah palin, and, you know, a lot about her, you wrote a book about that campaign. but the degree, the specificity with which she was forced to address very personal details about her pregnancies and her

recovery and when exactly she was in labor and what she did were like nothing i ever did working for george w. bush and dick cheney, a vice president with a health condition, and jm, a candidate who was a skin cancer survivor. >> i think there are two things you can say that are unequivocally true, at least as far as i'm concerned. one, if there's any presidential nominee, male or female, were caught on video collapsing at a public event, it would get a lot of attention. i think that's true. the second thing is, that there's no doubt that part of why this whole story has been amplified is the fact that people like rudy giuliani and others around donald trump have for months spreading conspiracy theories about hillary clinton and trump has talked about her in a totally misogynistic way talking about how frail she is and whether she's durable enough to be president. that has amplified it. so there's a little bit of an element of gender bias that's crept in. up next. >> but if i can just say quickly, women are the deciders and republicans don't win the white house unless they narrow the gender gap and this is a losing strategy to do that. >> you're getting the last word

on this, for sure. not just because you're a woman, because you're nicole wallace. up next, we will check in with our trump and clinton beat reporters about the state of the race after these words from our sponsors.

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politics, and here on set, we have jennifer epstein who covers hillary clinton for bloomberg politics. kevin, i'll start with you. how is -- i know when you go through something like this, communications crisis, at best, a health crisis, at worst, how has the campaign calibrated and tried to reset from an internal dynamic? >> they seem to be going back to what they often do, which is to not reveal a lot of information, to kind of bring it -- >> so basically, no change. >> they've said that they regret how they handled the situation and they should have been more forthcoming, at least on sunday, if not, you know, on friday or saturday, about her pneumonia. if she really did think that she could just keep working through it and nobody would notice. >> any promises to keep a protective pool closer by? >> no. we've been pushing on that. >> carry on! >> i am one of the people as a traveler, as a member of the pool, have been pushing them on this for weeks now.

we were pushing them this a lot last week when we were on the plane with her. but what happened on sunday shows that there's something different between having a close pool and having a fully protective pool that would be in the motorcade. or if they couldn't get in the motorcade motorcade in time, that that press van would have caught up along the way or would have known they were going to chelsea's apartment and would have gotten there 15 minutes after her, as opposed to like two hours after she got there. and kevin, to be fair, donald trump doesn't do that either. >> there was no pool reporters for the trump campaign at all for sunday's service, which i think is awesome, to be honest. >> well, good. >> but you were there. >> let me ask you to explain the eighth wonder of the world, which is how donald trump has managed to stay so restrained after letting his surrogates really cross a lot of lines in terms of insinuations about hillary clinton's health. w, since she nearly collapsed into a van, have they managed to keep the lid on any hyperbole

about her health? >> as this was developing on sunday, and as we reported on bloomberg, trump was notified of this during the actual service, as it was reverberating across social media. he made a key decision not to campaign on this issue at all, out of respect for 9/11. but behind the scenes, his aides were meeting and plotting away, at how to really capitalize on this, arguably, a rough point for the clinton campaign in the 48 hours over the weekend, and they made a decision to really focus on baskets of deplorables. monday morning, of course, they came out with that new attack ad, hitting clinton on that particular comment. after that evening, they brought up member after member of trump supporters, letting them speak for themselves. so they really feel the basket of deplorables is a way to attack clinton without having to attack her on the health and overplay their hand. >> kevin, i'm going to stick with you. let me ask you about this question about donald trump and

his health. he's going to tape "dr. oz" tomorrow. that's going to air on thursday. we still, as far as i know, do not know who the doctor is who performed the physical on him that he says that he's had. do you know anymore about the details of what we should expect from that health care information that they're going to put out? >> john, the bottom line is, no. they have not put out details about surrounding the doctor or the physical that you alluded to that took place last week. and you know, we've asked them about this. and i think that there are, at the end of the day, kind of similarities between the clinton campaign and the trump campaign on the issue, not only of their health records, but also with their relationship with the media, in terms of a protective pool. and so both candidates, i think, this perhaps is another reason why trump campaign aides are not attacking hillary clinton specifically through trump on this issue. i think they recognize that he, himself, has also not been as forthcoming as previous candidates in regards to his health return records. >> right. jennifer, let me ask you, i

think we now believe that lick will not be out on the campaign trail until friday. how worried are -- is the clinton campaign about her absence given the short number of days there are between now and election day, to have missed four days out there, that's a lot. >> i don't know it's definitive that she won't be up before friday, but even if she just misses yesterday and today, it was not exactly what this campaign had been hoping for. they were planning on doing an economic speech today in california, that ended up having to be postponed. and that was part of an effort to do these positive, affirmative policy speeches, that go into a little bit of sort of what motivates her as a candidate, and as a public servant, to serve. and they saw it as a way to kind of course correct a little bit, from the very heavy anti-trump theme of the last several weeks for her campaign. and to, instead, make more of an affirmative argument. and now that it's on hold and we're getting even closer to the first debate, which is, you know, less than two weeks away,

and everything -- the whole calendar has become a little bit more compressed for them. and to some extent, they have a very detailed schedule for the whole way through. and when you have to think about rescheduling some california fund-raisers and other things like that, it gets kind of difficult. >> kevin, really, really quickly. are you hearing anything, that there could be any sort of surprise in donald trump's medical history? anything unflattering or embarrassing? >> they're keeping all of the medical records close to the vest, so, no, we are not. but, of course, everyone eagerly awaiting -- donald trump is never one to not have a surprise. so we'll have to wait to see for what dr. oz is able to find out. >> never been so excited to see dr. oz. all right. coming up -- i love dr. oz. i will not tell you how many of his diet tips i've followed. when we come back, we're bringing in the strategist to talk deplorables, health, and the coveted obama coalition, after this.

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welcome back. it is time to talk strategy. we're going to be joined in a minute by democratic strategist and deputy press scare during the obama administration, bill burton. he's going to be here with us momentarily from santa barbara. but the person who is with us right now from washington, d.c. is ed rogers. let's start with you. ed, you are, just to clarify, right, you are never-trump, or you are not trump right now, but maybe trump by election day, which one? >> i call myself a non-supporter. i'm not never-trump. i've been waiting on trump. the clock is ticking, but i'm a firm non-supporter. >> at the moment. >> is that good enough? >> okay. so as a non-trump supporter, but you're also doggedly not a supporter of hillary clinton, so let me just ask you, you're sort of neutral. how much duke that the basket of deplorables plays to donald trump's advantage? >> well, it's been a real gift for him.

are the degree to which he needs something to talk about, and the degree to which he needs a gift from hillary from time to time, this was a good one. it rallies his people, it serves a as a focal point for people that don't like hillary anyway. it's been really good. it's hard to quantify, in terms of what it means for him. you know, that said, the race is sort of bogged down in deplorables and pneumonia and disclosures of this and that. it's not about the economy. it's not about what's going to drive votes. and that's probably better for hillary clinton than it is for trump. >> ed, riddle me this. why is it hard to answer this question? is david duke deplorable? >> good question. >> right?! >> why not -- the press wants you to give them the word, give them the word in that case. that said -- >> isn't he in a category of his own, though? why is this hard? >> first, he's in the category of creature created by the national media. the guy's never had a foothold

in the republican party. the guy's been totally unaccomplished, yet the media fixates on him and i'm sure that governor pence just didn't want to go there, didn't want to give them what they want. but in this case, give them what they want and move on. ignore david duke all you can. and this was sort of the opposite of ignoring him. just go ahead and say it. yes, deplorable. that's deplorable. my people aren't deplorable. this guy is. let's let them have that. let me ask you a question about something i'm sure something you find deplorable, which is, knowing you in the way that i do, which is donald trump's embrace of vladimir putin, and the man crush that he's had on -- >> what's that about? >> what is that about, ed? and how -- and do you think it's electorally consequential? will voters care about the fact that trump has cozied up to putin for this entire campaign? >> it's clumsy, and some day i'm sure it will be revealed, what on earth it's all about.

but the notion of having some kind of diplomatic reproachmonte with russia could be the subject of a serious policy speech. it could be the subject of some component of a stump speech. but this sort of personal administration and this borderline fawning is just weird. is there a business connection? is there some potential he sees down the road for some sort of selfish benefit? i don't know. but it's weird and it's unprecedented. i can't think of anything close to this. i can't think of what good is coming from it. so it's bizarre. among other things that are bizarre with the trump movement. >> yeah, no doubt about that. let's bring in bill burton. we finally located him and corralled him up in santa barbara. bill, great to have you with us. your old boss out of the campaign trail today, we've been looking at the polling for the last week or so. i'm thinking about why this race is tightening, and one of the reasons that the number crunchers have come up with the notion that a lot of the obama

coalition is not totally jazzed up for hillary clinton. do you think your boss, even without his name on the ballot, can help her with that group, or with those groups? >> oh, yeah, absolutely. as an incumbent president who has such high numbers, his usefulness crosses geographies and crosses demographics. i think he will be very help informal a bunch of places. but just like you mentioned, it's the obama administration that really needs to get brought on board in a really serious, enthusiastic way. and not a lot of people can do that like the president. so she's lucky to have a surrogate like that. donald trump doesn't have anything that even approaches that. >> i'll press you a little bit, bill. because it's the case, as you point out, barack obama's approval rating, super high. he's still beloved by his voters. and yet, not very many people in the obama coalition donate know that barack obama is for hillary clinton. and yet, it's still the case, with a lot of african-american voters, a lot of hispanic voters, she's not seeing the enthusiasm. so what more can he do to close the sale with those voters and

get them riled up? >> i've worked for four different presidential candidates and one president and i've seen a lot of different presidential campaigns. i'm not as old as you, but i have seen a lot. >> thanks, man. >> what i've learned the most was john kerry's campaign, when i was just a regional press secretary. and we would put surrogates into different media markets. and what we saw was, depending on the strength of your surrogate, if you put somebody into milwaukee or des moines or minneapolis, you could see a bump in the numbers after they came. hillary clinton has this stable of awesome surrogates, led by president obama, who can go into a market and specifically target that geography and get people jazzed up. people may know that president obama supports hillary clinton, but that's different from him coming to town, doing an event, getting people fired up, being on the front page of the newspaper, leading the newscast and getting that appreciable bounce in the polls sort of target-by-target. >> bill burton, you're speaking my language. you and i were both on that

campaign of '04. that's how we used to do things in the republican party, as ed remembers. we used to target by county, where you had to tick up your support to make the state turn in your favor and every -- your bus and mine, we used to cross each other on the highways of wisconsin and ohio. trump is not playing that gape. and are you completely confident that hillary clinton has adapted to his asymmetrical warfare? it doesn't seem like the polls reflect this obvious advantage in strategy and infrastructure. >> one of my favorite memories of the crisscross on the campaign trail is when both president bush and john kerry were in davenport, iowa, and there were like six bank robberies that day in the metro, because all the cops were all tide up. >> and we all got bumped off the news, because of it. i do remember that. >> exactly. yeah. exactly right. no, she's not adapting to his asymmetrical warfare. and sometimes, because the media is covering this in a different way than voters consume it, and voters participate, i don't know that she has to, even though it

might look clunky up against the kind of warfare that donald trump is employing. i think the fact that she's using data, she's out there, working, county by county, she's got her surrogates out there doing it, that's the path to winning. it's not donald trump, lead the press around the by the nose with his twitter feed, with like something more and more outlandish every single day. it's, how do you get in there, talk to voters, be in t plahe ps that matter and move swing states back into your column. >>, i have to get back to you. i think i'm in your basket of republican angst. what do you feel more stressed about? waking up and having hillary clinton have one or waking up and having donald trump have one? >> well, i wake up having republicans having lost the senate. that's my number one stress level. i'm more anxious about that than anything else. i don't see a downdraft building hillary, certainly not building a wave campaign that's going to sweep out a bunch of republicans. it doesn't look like the floor is falling out from underneath

donald trump. so i'm stofort of dodging your question on that. >> in the basket, that's fibro. ed rogers, question-dodging ed rogers, and young bill burton. younger than me, apparently. according to bill. >> it's true. i mean -- >> unfortunately, it's true. >> check wikipedia. >> yeah. thank you, both. bill, you're never come back on the show again. coming up, the math campaigns actually use to figure out how to win the battleground states, coming up after this. ...but they couldn't miss the show. so dad went to the new safelite-dot-com. and in just a few clicks, he scheduled a replacement... ...before the girls even took the stage. safelite-dot-com is the fast, easy way to schedule service anywhere in america! so you don't have to miss a thing. y'all did wonderful! that's another safelite advantage. (girls sing) safelite repair, safelite replace. (girls sing) safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪my friends know me so well.s they can tell what i'm thinking,

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if donald trump has any path to the white house, it probably runs through the rust belt. states like ohio and pennsylvania, where manufacturing decline could make voters ripe for trump's america first message. but when it comes to winning these states or any state, the clinton and trump campaigns are using the same basic voter formula. >> campaign strategists divide up voters into three main groups. there's the base. party loyalists, who will turn out on november 8th, no matter what. then there's what campaigns like to call gotv targets. get tout the vote. people who will probably back you, but who are unreliable voters and need some extra encouragement to get to the polls. in pennsylvania, for instance, democrats have such an advantage that if hillary clinton runs a perfect turnout operation, she could technically win the state without a single vote from independents. but in ohio, where both trump and clinton start with similarly-sized bases, it's all about persuadables. those are the undecided voters,

who both campaigns are trying to woo through tv ads, campaign events. from there, the math is simple. if your base, gotvs and share of persuadables add up to the estimated win number, well, you win. >> joining us now are two guys who will be crunchi ining those numbers over the next two weeks. they started in the rust belt with ohio, pennsylvania, and michigan and what it would take for trump to cross the finish line in each state. th sasha eisenberg and also with us is one of our producers. let's start with you. all i was thinking is, you are the person who gets me through these hours. >> i'm used to be here. >> i'm totally lost without you. now it's clear why. you're the star of the show. that was amazing. and in 2000 and '04, it was florida, florida, florida, clearly now, it's ohio, ohio, ohio. >> and a lot of people know ohio

will be close, but i don't think they know why. the reason is, like we showed you, hillary clinton and donald trump start with very similar bases. they have very similar gotv, get out the vote sort of targets that they're trying to get to the polls. and the group of persuadables is pretty large. it's about 500,000 persuadable voters. and whoever gets the share of those, the larger share of those, wins. obama lost the independent votes in the state by a huge, ten point points. he got creamed by romney, yet he still won, because he was able to turn out more of his gotv. hillary clinton doesn't have that advantage this year. if she lost by the same margin that obama did in 2012, she would have to run the ground game of a lifetime. >> and the reality is that life for people in ohio is this barrage of messages, to do just this, right? most of the ads are targeted to that third category. >> and that's why the clinton is spending $13.5 million in the state on tv ads, behind florida, which is still important this year, it's the second state that

they're spending the most ads in. >> and if it's ohio, ohio, ohio, my question for republicans is always, what are you doing in pennsylvania? it's always a giant head fake for republicans. so what are we doing in pennsylvania, as republicans? is there something different happening there? >> well, you know, what we tried to do was look at the part of the democratic coalition that in those states where trump would have to eat into the democratic base, where would he look for defections? so we mapped in all three of those states white men without college educations, who are historically democrat, are likely to be voting this fall, and live in communities directly affected by factory or plant closings in the last two years. and of the three states, we found that pennsylvania has, by far, the most. about 300,000 of them. a little over 200,000 in ohio. a little under 200,000 in michigan. so hillary clinton -- sorry, donald trump has to eat into hillary clinton's base, but that's where he would go to do it. those non-college white men

we've been talking a lot about. and they're clustered around the pittsburgh media market, to a smaller degree, around erie and scranton. >> i cut you out. you were about to say on pennsylvania? >> it's a totally different situation than ohio. hillary clinton's base, gotv, if you add those up, she could win without winning any persuadable voters. and the persuadable universe in pennsylvania is so much smaller than it is in neighboring ohio. it's about three times larger in ohio. trump could do everything he can to try out his base, to turn out his gotvs, he could win even persuadables and it wouldn't be enough for him. and that's why people say that pennsylvania is such an uphill climb for him. but it's still such an important for him to win. he has to peel off these democrats, and these are the democrats we think are the most vulnerable for him to convert. >> sasha, talk to me about michigan. if pennsylvania is a rea for donald trump, michigan must be well out of his reach. >> yeah. you know, we see sort of a similar economic dynamics across

these states. but that the mix to have the electorate is really difficult for him there. you know, there are about 189,000, we found, of these working class white democrat men who live in communities hit by localized plant closures. 70% of them are in the detroit media market. that may be one reason why trump is spending money in michigan. i think it's the seventh highest state by his ad spending. even though clinton and her outside super pacs aren't there at all. so, you know, i think there's a sense that when you look at the other states on the electoral college map, places like pennsylvania and virginia, where he has a difficult challenge, that he thinks that's a place where maybe he could pick them off. >> sasha, real fast. you're like a data guru and we'll be doing this series you and steve through november. why is the voter profile better? >> we went to a firm called clarity campaign labs. this is what campaigns do. they count up individual voters instead of trying to divide the

electorate by percentages. and one big reason is, is that a large part of the campaign is not about changing people's opinions, which is something we pick up in polls, but is about getting your own coalition autovote. and it's a much better way to actually look at who the voters are and where they are, going straight to the voter file, than just relying on polls. >> so you guys, thank you both. up next, we'll be talking about a political revolution. and no, we are not talking about bernie sanders. find out who we're talking about after this. ♪ using 60,000 points from my chase ink card i bought all the framework... wire... and plants needed to give my shop... a face... no one will forget. see what the power of points can do for your business. learn more at chase.com/ink

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with us now is larry kudlow, economic adviser to donald trump's campaign and the co-author of the new book, "jfk and the reagan revolution: a secret history of american prosperity." welcome, larry. i wish ias there with you, because you are always a delight. >> thank you. >> my question is, you basically

argue that jf kennedy, who was basically a tax cutter, you're arguing he was a supply-sider. explain. >> during the eisenhower years, the economy didn't grow. look at the numbers, three recessions. so kennedy ran on 3% growth but didn't tell you how he ran on the campaign beat nixon. he believed as president, if he didn't get 5% growth, he wouldn't be re-elected. initially they tried some old-fashioned government spending. did not work, economy got worse. and a republican -- this is the key. a republican in his cabinet named douglas dylan was treasury secretary, and dylan basically talked him into lowering marginal tax rates across the board. high-end, middle end, low end, corporations, you name it. and what they got, they went from 91%, which was outrageous, to 70%. and guess what, it worked. it worked very well. and i'll say to connect the dots, john, 20 years later, as a young deputy in omb, ronald

reagan followed the same policies as john f. kennedy. >> here's my question, larry, about that. he certainly cut taxes across the board. but was reagan actually -- did he look to kennedy for separation, or is it just that they implemented the same kind of tax-cutting policies? >> he looked to kennedy for inspiration. it was -- jack kemp was kind of the go-between, the lake jack kemp, my mentor, and they said, we need something to get us out of the '70s mess, inflation and unemployment. so jack said, let's just use the kennedy tax cuts. 30% across the board, which became the kemp-ross bill. and kemp sold it to president reagan. and by the way, from day one, reagan gave jfk credit, constantly had him in speeches, major addresses. when he sold it to the nation in early 1981, got to remember my dates, he mentioned kennedy and quoted kennedy, a rising tide lifts all boats. so, yeah, kennedy was kind of the pioneer and president reagan

was a follower, what they used to call -- kemp called a duplicate. he was a duplicate. >> right. all right, so, larry, take off your author's hat now and put on your adviser to donald trump hat. yesterday, the republican nominee was on cnbc, and he advanced to sort of like a conspiracy theory, i would say. where he said that janet yellin is keeping interest rates low in order to help barack obama and help hillary clinton get re-ele re-elected. he previously had said nice things about janet yellin. i know you like low interest rates. he said he likes low interest rates. so what's this about and what merit, if any, do you think this argument has about yellin acting with political motivations? >> well, as an old fed guy, that's how i started my career a long time ago, presidents don't dictate to fed chairman. they may discuss, they may talk, but fed people are very independent and they have disagreements among themselves. you're seeing one right now inside the federal reserve, whether it's to raise rates or not. it's a big disagreement. and the economic models have

fall fallen. but, no, i don't see a conspiracy. i think yellin is doing what she thinks is best. lale brandon, whatever her name is, now at the treasury, from the fed, came out and said, no, let's not raise rates. they're having a debate inside. i don't think president obama has a thing to do with it, frankly. >> so why is donald trump indulging in this conspiracy theory, and is there anything, if you disagree with it, that you can do to make him stop? >> look, i think that the fed should be criticized. i think the fed needs a lot of reform and a lot of restructuring. really from top on down. and a whole bunch of areas that we don't have time to focus on. so i don't have any problem with criticizing the fed, per se. and i don't think this qe business had worked very well, if at all. in fact, in recent years, i think it's done more harm than good, that's my own personal view. however, again, the fed is an independent central bank. and you talk to the president. i was in meetings like that years ago. but the president does not

dictate monetary policy. that's that good thing, not a bad thing. >> so donald trump is your pupil, you're advising hill on economic policy, which is one of the only things that makes me feel great about him. but let me ask you about something he said about unemployment. he said it was 40%, the real rate is 4.2%. when he says something like that, do you speed dial him. tell me how this goes down, when he says something like that and he's your student on -- >> please don't give me that kind of -- >> well, you're his adviser. >> that's all i am. >> he's being advised on you. he says real employment is 42%. >> among with many others, it's the truth. a lot of people. however, there will be discussions, there have been ongoing discussions about this. i honestly don't know where that number comes from. so i'm not really sure -- >> do you call him and say, what are you talking about? >> i did not. i did not call him. as i said, there are ongoing discussions about -- he's speaking to the new york economics club on thursday. it's a very important speech.

and what i can assure you, these things, notwithstanding, it's going to be a powerful economic growth speech. trump has a terrific tax cut plan, which frankly is very much like jfk's and reagan's, and he has a good plan to roll back regulations, including obamacare, and the country needs growth. that's the key point. the country needs economic growth. >> larry, we got to go. >> and you'll get that from mr. trump. >> we've got to go. and i know there's no way you think the real employment rate is 42%. larry kudlow's new book is out and it's called "jfk and the reagan revolution." we'll be right back. if you try to write, on a plain old mac the difference can be seen (it doesn't work) get the surface pro (the keyboard detaches from the screen) get the surface pro (i like the blue!)

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or visit transitions.com for details. for me and the fabulous nicole wallace, thanks for watching, and until tomorrow, sayonara. "hardball" with chris matthews is next. he's back! let's play "hardball"! good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. did you catch president obama today? if you didn't, you missed the start of what could be the wildest barnstorming presidential campaign ever, certainly won by an incumbent and certainly a campaign for someone else. barack obama made it clear today that it is personal. he's in the race to secede him, because he passionately wants hillary clinton to win. and fanatically wants donald trump to lose. lose