happens. thank you-all for joining us. that is "all in" for this evening on this insane news day. the ra"the rachel maddow show" now. >> good evening, chris. what do you mean insane? >> i don't even know what happened today. i keep imagininmagining, i see scene of the president's body man like what was it? a bouncer thing like the scuff of the neck thing? how does that happen? >> not allowed to get the jacket. last night when this reportedly happened, it was not a warm night in washington. >> no, you're out, kid. >> yeah, i have a feeling that eventually we'll look back on this day and have more clarity what happened but right now it feels like a complete spaghetti dinner and all related courses thrown up against the wall to figure out. >> enjoy. >> appreciate it. thanks for joining us on what now passes for a totally normal typical tuesday in

american news. listen, i'm going to cut to the bottom line right now and tell you that i do not know why secretary of state rex tillerson was abruptly fired today and neither do you and anybody who says they do know, well, we're going to get as close as we can to that tonight. right now, it is still a mystery. nevertheless, he is out and so i'm going to do that awkward camera turn right now. so we can add the name of the secretary of state to the list of departures of senior officials from the trump white house and the senior ranks of the trump administration. just in the past couple weeks we have had to move my camera position so that we can show you this bigger wall so we could make room to add a third column here on this wall. we were two columns before. we had to add hope hicks as she

resigned and josh raphael as he resigned from deputies communications director, the one that worked for jared and ivanka and jared and ivanka's other friend, the guy trump put in charge as the office of innovation and the number two official at the homeland security department, eileen duke. then we had to add the top official in the whole u.s. government on north korea policy. his last day in the administration after 30 years working on this issue was the friday before trump announced surprise, he's going to meet with a dictator of north korea. who needs a specialist on north korea policy anymore? we have the ambassador to mexico, also announced shes leaving. another 30 plus years in the foreign service. she was not invited to the meetings that jared kushner took when he went to mexico last week. and then we had gary cohen. the white house chief economic advisor also leaving, as well. we've had to develop this whole

new system of trying to keep this list all in one place. now tonight, we've got to squeeze things even a little bit more because now we've got to add in drum roll please, the secretary of state rex tillerson who apparently came back early from a trip to africa either because he was tired and not feeling great or make sure he would be in u.s. air space by the time he saw the president's tweet firing him. one of those two depending who you ask. i don't know why rex tillerson was fired and neither do you, but we're going to get as close as we can to that tonight. first of all, there is stuff you should know that is related to the russia scandal that pertains to rex tillerson who was just fired as secretary of state and information related to the russia scandal that pertains to mike pompeo. we'll get to that stuff right here in just a second. that's a piece of the tillerson story that i think is worth considering.

but for the real skinny, for the whole holistic story of what happened today and why and why now, we're going to be talking tonight on this show to the reporter covered this beat better and longer than anybody else in the business, one of the legends of this industry, that reporter will be here live with us in a moment and i think she can get us closer to anybody else at explaining why rex tillerson was forced out today. before i get away from the wall, though, i do also have to add a couple more names. first of all, we got to squeeze in the number four guy at the state department, the under secretary of state for public diplomacy named steve goldstein. he was fired today, too. apparently in relation to the rex tillerson firing. he put out a statement explaining rex tillerson hadn't known he was being fired until he saw the president's tweet about it this morning. so the number for a job at the state department, he was fired

after rex tillerson. we'll have more on that in a moment. we had to make room on the big wall today for the head of nasa. the nasa administrator who was proved by the senate was a former astronaut named charles bolden resigned as nasa administrator the day trump was sworn in and deputy administrator. the trump nominee to become the new head of nasa looks like he probably will not be able to get confirmed in the senate. the acting administrator of nasa, the guy running nasa, he just quit. also, we just lost the head of the u.s. forest service in the face of multiple allegations of sexual misconduct and there is more. we also lost the personal assistant to the president today. he didn't so much as resign as he apparently got marched out of the white house. now this one is a strange story for a bunch of reasons. first, let me show you a picture

of this man. this is not rob porter. rob porter was the white house staff secretary, he was the guy pushed out a month ago because of serious domestic violence charges against him. this is not rob porter. this is johnny mcintee on the left and rob porter on the right. they look so much alike they have been mistaken for one another in national newspaper captions and on television more than once but rob porter was the staff secretary on the right and johnny mcintee is on the left, he was personal assistant to the president until last night for some reason he was hustled out of the white house. look how much they look like each other. the "wall street journal" was first to break the news mr. mcinte, was out. quote donald trump's personal assistant john mcentee was fired. mr. mcentee had been a constant

presence at mr. trump eastside f side for three years and over the weekend, ensurped that the clocks in the white house were adjusted for daylight savings time and then poof. he was removed from the white house grounds monday afternoon without being allowed to collect his belongings. he left without his jacket according to a white house offici official. on saturday night he's changing the residence clocks for daylight savings time and as for today he had been booked on board the president's flight to california but then something came up that fast and yesterday afternoon they ran him out of the white house without letting him get his jacket. now again, "wall street journal" was first on this story what they are reporting he was denied a security clearance.

people close said the problems related to online gambling and mishandling of his taxes, those problems prevented him from gaining clearance necessary for his job. according to one law enforcement official, the secret service is investigating mr. mcentee for these issues. so today we added secretary of state, the nasa administrator, head of the forest service and the president's person l assistant. anybody else going tonight? msnbc multiple source reporting that trump's of mike flynn is due out any day now, is due out by the end of the month. they got wind at the same time we did the embattled secretary

of veterans affairs may also be on the way out reportedly to potentially be replaced by rick perry who it's still amazing is the current secretary of energy. i have to tell you, honestly, there is so much intrigue and manufactured outrage and aggressive spin on david shulkin, it's hard to speculate his departure from the wishes for people trying to arrange his departure. a lot of people are talking about this but grain of salt there. if you were getting the sense this is a nuts day in the news, you're right, even for this administration. firing the secretary of state was very dramatic first act for the day. we had a big start today but it hasn't stopped. here is a few other nuts things that are going on today and into

tonight. i mentioned a moment ago that the president flew to california today. an unusual thing that personal assistant had been scheduled to be on that plane before he got frog marched out of the white house for unexplained reasons yesterday. well, the president went to california today. tonight, i believe as we speak the president right now is attending a fundraiser in beverly hills. now, ken vogel at "new york times" obtained this invitation for tonight's fundraiser, which as you can see brags in bold type that the president is going to be there and also brags about the hosts of tonight's fundraiser including elliott o broidy. this may not be the brightest idea this white house had. you have seen this recent reporting that the robert mueller special counsel investigation has started to look into whether or not foreign money, particularly money from the u anytinited emirates made

way. elliott broidy obtained reportedly several hundred million dollars in contracts from uae since the trump inauguration in part because of his association with an advisor to the government of that country who is a frequent visitor out white house, a man named george nader. he was picked up several weeks ago by fbi agents who detained him, hit him with a search warrant on the spot and george nader has since become a cooperating witness for mueller's prosecutors amid reports that mueller is looking into the flow of foreign money into trump's political operation. now, i know the president's legal team are not considered to be the most potent drugs but which white house lawyers decided it would be a good idea to put the president himself at a fundraiser tonight hosted by this guy who is right in the

middle of something robert mueller just arrested a guy for at the airport. trump campaign chairman paul manafort's daily life has just gotten considerably smaller. it was an order made public today by one of the two federal courts that's hearing multiple felony counts against trump campaign paul ma that fon manaf know has ordered that paul manafort shall be confined to quote home incarceration between now and his trial in july. home incarceration is a status that is far more constraightiic and the judge's language on this is stark and straightforward. just look at this from the order that was just posted tonight. quote, these conditions are necessary because the defendant is a earn many of great wealth

who has the financial means and international connections to flee and remain at large, as well as every incentive to do so. get this, specifically given the nature of the charges against the defendant and the apparent weight of the evidence against him, defendant faces the very real possibility of spending the rest of his life in prison. accordingly, it is here by ordered that defendant shall be subject to home incarceration, defendant is restricted to a 24-hour a day lockdown at his residence other than attending court proceedings, he will be permitted to leave his residence to attend meetings with defense counsel, to attend medical appointments and religious observing and 48 hours in advance. so again, this order from the court in virginia just unsealed, just made public tonight. a, this is house arrest for paul manafort. this is not what manafort had previously been dealing with.

this is above and beyond his two ankle bracelets. b, the judge is flat out saying here given the weight of the ed against him, he's facing the real possibility of spending the rest of his life in prison. that stark warning for the president's campaign chair coming tonight as the democrats on the intelligence committee in the house surprised everybody by releasing status report in the house investigation and house intel that republicans abruptly declared case closed yesterday and shut it down. when republicans shut down that investigation yesterday, democrats hadn't been told the investigation is over. republicans were releasing and we got reaction to that shut down by the republicans yesterday from the democrats on the committee but even with those democrats telling us what they thought about that yesterday, we didn't know that the democrats were going to go

ahead today and release something like this, release their own status report on where they think the investigation had got to. but boom, they just dropped this tonight. it's 21 pages long and it makes some eyebrow raising claims. for example, the committee learned that candidate trump's private business was actively negotiating a business deal in moscow with a sanctioned russian bank during the election period. really? we knew, of course, from public reporting the organization was trying to figure out if they could build a trump tower moscow during the campaign. that was difficult for the president to explain because of his public assertions he had no deals with russia despite the fact he signed this letter of intent and pursuing it during the campaign. this is a step further. democrats on the house intelligence committee say that the committee has evidence that

the trump organization was actively negotiating with a sanctioned russian bank during the election. we can assume that relates to the trump tower moscow project, i guess, but active negotiations with a sanctioned bank during the election, that is new. oh, also, do you remember when fired fbi director james comey said lord di hope there are taps of his conversations with the president when the president was pressuring him to drop the investigation. are ebb that mome remember that moment in the hearing? >> the only thing i can think to say because i remember every word he said, i was playing in my mind, what should my response be and that's why i very carefully chose the word. i seen the tweet about tapes. lordy, i hope there were tapes. >> lordy, i hope there were

tapes. tonight on this russia investigation that got shut down yesterday, the democrats say in their status report they released in a surprise tonight, they say that james comey may get his prayers answered, lordy. quote, the minority has a good faith reason to believe that the white house does in fact possess such documentation moralizing president trump's conversations with director comey. really? i told you today was nuts. and you know, this is all happening on a day when we thought absolutely hands down the biggest story in the country would be this very exciting special congressional election in pennsylvania. this is a district outside pittsburgh that went for trump by 20 points in november 2016. therefore should be an easy hold for the republican party at least by the numbers. polls close at 8:00 eastern time tonight. this is what we're looking at so far in terms of results. right now we got 42% of the vote in the democrat and left side of

your screen is conner lamb. the republican is rick saccone on the right side of your screen. again, this is a special election. there is a republican member of congress who represented this district. he resigned. he's a staunchly anti abortion member, there were reports he had an affair and pressured his mistress to have an abortion. 42% of the vote in this special election tonight, conner lamb, the democrat in this district is up by eight points at 54% of the vote with rick saccone at 46 points. that's remarkable in itself. again, trump won this district by 20 points. so we'll keep updating the numbers as they come in tonight there is a lot of suspension about the race here. democrats feeling like if they can make a trump plus 20 district a close race in a special election, that could bode well they think for their chances of contesting control of the house of representatives come november of this year.

republicans spend over $10 million to try to keep this seat in republican hands including campaigning by the president and campaigning by the vice president and even the -- look at this man. that's how bad they want it. even the president's eldest son breaking the do not wear a hair net while campaigning rule. he was so desperate to help, he helped in a hair net. that's how bad the republicans have been trying to hold on. let's put the board back up there live one more time. right now, it's gone up 50% in now and narrowed a bit. 50% in right now. conner lamb the democrat at 52%. rick saccone, a five-point swing between them. half of the vote in. again, these are the pennsylvania numbers thus far. we'll stay on this live throughout the night until we've got a result. so, that's one reason to stick with us tonight. also, next on the show, we'll go through as i mentioned earlier, one specific thing about the firing of the

secretary of state. a piece of the story that relates to the russia scandal. i don't know whether or not it's relevant why rex tillerson was fired today but if there is a day you should know this happened, you should know this happened. that's next and more live results from pennsylvania. lots to get to tonight. stay with us. you know what's awesome? gig-speed internet.

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last night reporters david corn and michael ik ircorn andk published the text of a memo written by the steele dossier. this is something written by steele after the election. after he was done working for fusion gps. we learned this memo existed last week by jane mayor. but david corn and michael got the text of this memo written by christopher steele.

these are christopher steele's words quote speaking on november 29th, 2016 a senior official working at the russian ministry of foreign affairs reported that a rumor is circulating there that u.s. president elect trump's delay and appointing a new secretary of state is the result of an intervention by president putin/the kremlin. quote, the latter meaning the kremlin reportedly asked that trump appoint a russia-friendly figure to this to position prepd to move quickly on lifting ukraine-related sanctions and cooperation in syria. the source assumes the kremlin's intervention was in response to the possibility that mitt romney viewed as hostile to russia might be appointed as secretary of state. this memo from christopher steele makes this somewhat mind-blowing allegation that russia believed it for some

reason deserved to have veto power over who is secretary of state as long as donald trump is president. not only do they believe they should, they felt it was their right to ask but they blocked romney. now, that source sited by christopher steele said to be speaking on november 29th, well then two weeks after that, december 12th, donald trump announced who his pick would be for secretary of state. he had been saying for weeks he would choose between giuliani and romney but he unveiled his choice and it was somebody with whom he had no known personal connection, somebody he never met before the election and said his new secretary of state would be the ceo of exxonmobil. they wrote quote it was an unusual pick. he had close relations with senior leaders in moscow. so that's the unusual set of facts and allegations

surrounding how rex tillerson got the secretary of state job in the first place but today, rex tillerson is out and there is wooliness today about the timing of when tillerson was notified he would be fired. that timing may end up being really important. i mean, one thing we do know is that the last thing secretary tillerson did before we found out he was going to be fired was that he gave very strong, very direct remarks criticizing russia. he was asked about the spy that's critically ill right now after being poisoned by what the u.k. government says was a russian-made nerve agent. the white house has been reluctant to cast any aspersions on russia after teresa may did so herself yesterday. but even though the white house was hedging, last night rex

tillerson was e kwthere. he said i got off a phone call with boris johnson. we'll put out a statement to support what their mindifindinge been. it appears it clearly came from russia. tillerson sayi ing last night, clearly appears russia did this but goes further. tillerson says quote, i've been extremely concerned about russia. we spent most of the last year investing a lot to solve problems and address differences. quite prafrankly after a year w didn't get far and we saw a pivot to get more aggressive. this is very, very concerning to me and others there is an unleashing of activity we don't fully understand and if this attack in the u.k. is the work of the russian government this is a pretty serious action. rex tillerson made those remarks last night on his way home to the u.s. after cutting short his trip in africa. made those remarks last night.

then this morning we all learned he was fired. and we still don't know why. that has led to questions today about the exact timing about whether tillerson knew he was already fired when he made those remarks or if he didn't might those remarks have been a precipitating event for his firing. those questions particularly pointed in light of the newly reported allegation russia allegedly believed they had veto power who would be secretary of state while donald trump is president. in terms of the man replacing tillerson as secretary of state if he is confirmed, the president says it will be mike pam p. it seems to be an opaque place but we know about him as a figure. he supported trump and proclaimed as he did in this tweet that stolen dnc e-mails published were proof that the

fix was in. need for the proof that the fix was in from president obama on down, busted. 19,000 e-mails from dnc leaked by wikileaks. mike pompeo was a member of the house committee and leaked them having obtained them from the russian government. once trump took office as cia director mike pompeo has taken it upon himself to deliver the president his daily intelligence brief. the white house was warned about serious concerns of the fbi and intelligence community that the trump national security advisor was a serious risk that could be vulnerable to blake male or co-horgs. they werwere raising concerns, the 18 days they kept mike flynn

on, cia director mike kept delivering the intelligence briefing with michael flynn sitting in the room with him with pompeo in on the reasons they were concerned about him as a security risk. the washington pose reported in march of last year while fbi director comedy's investigation was underway, president trump pulled the director dan coats aside with pompeo and asked to try to get the fbi director to back off the investigation and mike flynn. mike pompeo was reportedly in the room for that. dan coats discussed this with other officials afterwards and decided he wouldn't do what trump asked him to do. what did mike pompeo do? we have no idea. but we do know he was in the room and saw it.

so, mike pompeo's role in the investigation is a black box but we know he's been in the middle of it. he made a critical change to the structure of that agency, as well. within the cia, there is a counter intelligence mission center. this is the unit that helped trigger the investigation into possible collusion between the trump campaign and russia. that part of the cia that was a conduit for information between russian individuals and associates of the trump campaign. this is a sensitive center within the cia. this is the part of the cia specifically that turned up intel that helped start the investigation into possible collusion between the trump campaign and russia. while he was at cia, mike pompeo did a little reorganizing that made it so that unit reports directly to him. he reorganized the cia so that

unit is the only part of the cia that reports to him and not to the deputy director or some other official. and there is not much else that we know in terms of behind closed door stuff from mike pompeo's time. he's sometimes said things about russia that are completely untrue. when the community released the report on efforts to influence the 2016 election, that report was quite clear that the intelligence community wasn't making any assessment as to whether these activities or attack affected the outcome of the 2016 election. they did not look, we did not make an assessment of the impact that russian activities had in the outcome of the election. that was the intelligence committee's report january of last year. ten months later in october, mike pompeo said the intelligence community's assessment is that the russian medaling did not affect the outcome of the election.

that was not true. even if it does match what the president says all the time. the cia had to issue a correction, had to walk back. no, there hadn't been another report that we all missed in which the intelligence community had come to that conclusion. we do have some real loose ends and some questions about mike pompeo and we still really don't know why rex tillerson got fired from that job or when he learned for sure that he was getting canned. but the best reporter in the country on the state department and the top diplomats in this country will join us here tonight and if anybody can sort it out, she can. stay with us.

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like complimentary wi-fi and drinks. plus savings for everyone in your stateroom when you book now during the celebrity cruises sail beyond event. i'll now return to private life as a private citizen, as a proud american, proud of the opportunity i've had to serve my country. god bless all of you. god bless the american people. god bless america. >> mr. secretary, can you say what the future of iran will be? >> nbc chief foreign affair core spon dan -- correspondent andrea mitchell was still trying to answer questions. andrea mitchell, thank you for joining us tonight on what's a

really incredible news day. thanks for being here. >> my record of not getting answers is unblemished, rachel. >> shoot for the moon. >> yeah. >> andrea, let me ask you first about how this happened. do you have clarity on when tillerson found out he was fired? a top-ranking official at the state department was fired today after tillerson after he said tillerson only found out he was fired from a trump tweet this morning. it's been a lot of different reporting on this today. do you have clarity on it? >> not entirely. i do know that according to the white house, according to the briefings for white house reporters, john kelly called tillerson on friday night while travel income africa. we have been calling the s-hole apologiy tour so he was away fo more than a week in africa and he got a call warning him according to kelly's version of this that the president wanted him to step aside. kelly called him in the middle

of the night saturday warning him. there are two explanations for this. the warning was not explicit or in fact, tillerson just thought this was another frequent warning that the president wanted him out and he is constantly been saying for months now that if he wants me out, he has to fire he to my face. i'm not going to quit. this man wanted to stay on the job. in fact, those with him including my colleague abigail williams and gardener harris from "the new york times" and josh letterman from a.p. said he was on the tail end of this trip, flying home monday night he was in fact, briefing the press which he doesn't always do. he was in a very good mood and talked about what he intended to do in north korea and in the meetings the point person, he was anointing himself and with secretary mattias for diplomacy over rocket man and my button is

bigger than your button. despite criticism on twitter and elsewhere from the president, back when the president was still being fire and furry a against north korea, rex tillerson was calling for diplomacy and he was constantly under cut by the president but could not be humiliated into quitting. he wanted to keep his job. he's not on twitter but called by an aid this morning around 8:44 and told the president fired him on twitter and still did not announce he was stepping aside until the president called him from air force one after 12 noon. there are reports john kelly persuaded the president to call the man and tell him he's out and he scheduled the 2:00. steve goldstein was fired i'm told by the deputy director of white house personnel after that statement that was tillerson's version of how he was fired. there are two other names to add to your list, margaret, chief of

staff to rex tillerson and her deputy, as well. you need a bigger board. >> so tillerson's chief of staff and the deputy chief of staff to tillerson are out tonight with this announcement. >> exactly. >> let me ask you another question on this andrea, it may obviously be a coincidence, it was striking today else specially given that timeline they laid out that this firing poll lowed followed tillerson for the poisoning of the ex spy. is there any reason to think those events are related? >> i thought so initially. i was posting on that. when our colleagues called us from the refueling when they had w wi-fi and could give a statements that followed, a written statement from tillerson which exactly was what the brits were saying, what teresa may said as you pointed out and so different from what sarah sanders said from the briefing

room, i thought that was quite unusual. i was on the phone with a state the president official around 10:00 last night and was confident well, tillerson was in trouble again but he's been in trouble before. and a wiser person said to me, he'll be out by tomorrow and i said no, that's not going to happen. this guy isn't going to quit. i was wrong. >> wow. if that wiser person would ever like to take us bth ooth out fo drink, i'd like to go. >> yeah, let's do that sometime. >> andrea mitchell -- >> i was going to say, i know we have to hurry. iran is in play and smart people are pointing out kim jong-un is hardly going to sign a deal or make concessions to the united states if the president and mike pompeo now tear up the iran deal at the next deadline in may. >> andrea mitchell, nbc news, the host of "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc noontime.

huge day. thank you for being here. >> you bet. >> quick look. live check in on the congressional election results in pennsylvania. 75% in. it's tightening up two points between the democrat and republican with three-quarters of the vote in in this special election. only 3500 votes between them. this is a trump plus 20 district. we'll watch the last quarter come in over the course of tonight. stay with us.

>> last year when president trump served as deputy director, this is how that news looked in headlines. gina haspel had leading role in torture. in 2002 she over saw the torture of two terrorism suspects at a secret prison in thailand and took part in an order to destroy videotapes that documented the torture. after her appointment last year to the number two job at the

cia, two democrats on the intelligence committee sent president trump a letter protesting that appointment. protesting gina haspel's background makes her unsuitable and urged trump to declassified a description of her role in the cia's torture program. needless to say trump never did that and did appoint her to the number two job last year. now today he's nominated gina haspal to be the director as he tries to move mike pompeo out replacing the abruptly fired rex tillerson. it was said he will oppose the nomination to run cia. he says he'll oppose it for some reasons he can't talk about and for some reasons that he can. >> i, of course, have access to classified information and i'm very troubled about what i know and can't discuss.

what seemed to me to advance gina haspal right now would be infect to vote favorably for secrecy. >> joining us now is senator ron wyden, a senior member of the senate intelligence committee. thank you for making time to be with us today. >> thank you. >> you said it would be to vote favorably for secrecy, to vote for gina haspal for cia, what do you mean? >> in effect, the facts have been covered up here for quite sometime. we have been trying to get this information, as you know, gina haspal has never testified before the united states congress. there have been published reports, public reports about various links with respect to interrogati interrogation, torture and the like but the public has a right to know here and what senator and i are talking about is

information that could be made available to the american public, particularly with this nomination that would in no way compromise sources and methods and it seems to me in the name of transparency and and accountability this information needs to be declassified. >> do you have any option to make any of that information even in a round about way, do you have any opportunity to make any more information, any more information public about her than already has been made public? >> well, she will have to come to a public hearing for this particular nomination. and what we're going to do is lay out in particular what happened with respect to torture during those bush years. we know that the detainees were treated in a very cruel way. in effect, people were injured, were tortured. we know that the cia lied with respect to whether or not torture had actually stopped

terrorist plots. the agency lied to the congress, lied to the american people. and what we'll be asking at those hearing is what role ms. haspel had, if any in those matters. >> you also said you will oppose michael smerconish's nomination to be secretary of state replacing rex tillerson. you said that pompeo and the president both have a casual relationship with the truth. why will you oppose pompeo? >> we saw when he was the director of the cia that it was so hard to pin him down on fundamental issues with respect to accountability. you and have i talked about the open intelligence committee hearing in the past when i tried to pin him down on mike flynn. sally yates said that mike flynn was a security threat we could never get mike pompeo to

describe. and pompeo is going to have a huge affect on american policy, with sanctions represent to iran and russia, what he has always tried to do is curry favor with the president, to play down the role of the russians and potential collusion. so those are going to be important hearings. >> senator ron wyden, senior member of the senate intelligence committee, thank you. much appreciated. >> thank you. lots to get to tonight, as you've been watching these numbers come in the pennsylvania special congressional election right now. you can see it's tighter than a tick. we've got less than 20% of the vote. we've got 87% in. with two points between them. the democrat currently in the lead. we've be right back with live coverage. stay with us.

in tonight's special election in pennsylvania's 18th congressional district. this is what we've got right now. look at this. 95% in, and it's 50-50. right now 928 votes between the two of them. the republican has been trailing all this time as we've been watching these results come in. but right now with 95% in, rick saccone and conor lamb look like they're tied at 50-50. but saccone obviously has a narrow lead there. so we're going to be watching as these come in. to tell you about this district, this is a district that tim murphy has represented since 2002. tim murphy, a republican member

of congress known for among other things for being very staunchly anti-abortion. he got this seat for the first time in 2002, sworn in for the first time in 2003. won handily in that race. he had such a grip on that district that in 2014 and then 2016, democrats didn't even bother to run somebody against him. democrats just let him run uncontested in terms of having a democratic opponent. this district in pennsylvania, everybody has been talking tonight about the fact that it was a trump district, that trump beat clinton there in 2016 by 20 points. but it's been a republican district for a very long time. right now in 2012, romney beat obama there by 17 points. in 2008, mccain beat obama there by 11 points. so the margin by which republicans have been carrying this district in presidential races has been going up and up and up over the last three cycles. but this conor lamb versus rick saccone race was brought about

through unusual circumstances. tim murphy, the staunchly anti-abortion republican congressman is found to be having an affair and to have reportedly advised the woman he was having an affair with that she should have an abortion. that ends up being not just family values hypocrisy on his part, that ends up being hypocrisy on the issue that he is most known for in terms of his social conservative anti-abortion activist views. so tim murphy has to resign there. we get conor lamb as this democrat who jumps in that race. tailor-made for that race if any democrat was. he is an ex-marine. he is a former prosecutor. he is pennsylvania born and bred, running against rick saccone, who is a trump-tile republican and a trump style republican is the kind of republican who would handily hold on to this case. especially in a district where a democrat hasn't even bothered to run a district -- a democrat in this district for the last couple of cycles. but let's put that board back up

again. again, right now we're watching the last few votes come in here. do we have the -- do we have the board? thank you very much. 95% in right now. obviously the difference number -- there we go. so saccone at 100,979. conor ahead at 101,907 votes. forgive me. i got that backwards before. 90% of the vote in. 50-50. less than a thousand votes between these two. steve kornacki has been tracking the results for us over the course of the day and into tonight. but as this -- keep in mind as we get the last 5%, as we get what we hope will be a final result at some point this night, this is a race that democrats thought if they could even keep this close, it would be a huge victory for them. it would be some sort of great sign for them in terms of what they're looking at heading into the november elections when they would really dearly love to take

back the house. but for republicans, this is a race trump plus 20 district where you think they would be able to win here without spinning too much of their wheels. but they spent more than $10 million here. they dispatched the president, the vice president, even the president's son to try to hold on to this thing. watching this thing come down to the wire is going to be fascinating just as its own election in its own district. but also for its national implications. so i will see you again tomorrow. we're going stay with this pennsylvania coverage for the rest of the night tonight. it's now time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening. >> i just had to put on my election night glasses. i realized when i saw you reading the numbers at the bottom of the screen, i'm going to be doing a lot of that and trying to figure out what the margin is between these two. this looks like a count every vote situation. >> we'll see as it comes in. when we were planning for our production lanning tonight, we'll probably have 10, 12, 15