ari fleischer -- the character of the person matters. >> i think that relationship from afar looks broken. >> i think you are right. again. rights, all hour long. when can you come back. we will make you a regular. jon meacham, mimi roberts, and jennifer ruben, my thanks. "mtp daily" starts right now with steve kornacki in for chuck todd. doing double duty, my friend. >> on a day like this, it's -- [ no audio ] ♪ good evening. i'm steve kornacki in new york, in for chuck todd. welcome to "mtp daily." we begin tonight with that breaking news that could reverberate through american life, culture, politics, for a generation or more. this afternoon, supreme court justice anthony kennedy, he is widely considered the swing vote

on that court, he announced his retirement effective next month. that means that the makeup of the court could move to the right. you can bet that president trump's nominee to replace kennedy is going to be someone at least as conservative, probably significantly more conservative than him. that could mean we are gearing up for one heck of a political fight. kennedy has been the deciding vote on landmark cases involving affirmative action, abortion, the death penalty, same-sex marriage just to name a few of the hot of the buttons he has touched. president trump says the process to pick kennedy's replace men will begin immediately. that pick will need to be affirmed in the senate where republicans have a 51 had been 49 edge right now. and with senator mccain battling brain cancer the count is closer to 50-49.

democrats are likely on the other hand have to pull out all the stops if they want to hold this up. i do mean pull out all the stops. remember, democrats lost the power to filibuster supreme court nominations last year after republicans invoked that so-called nuclear option so they could overcome a democratic filibuster of neil gorsuch's nomination. that 2017 drama came a couple of years after democrats invoked nuclear options under president obama. what does this mean? it means that republicans can confirm trump's supreme court without democratic votes but they have in order to do that they have to keep all of them together and avoid defectors. democrats meanwhile have to hold their caucus together and then pick off at least one republican, maybe more, if they want to have a chance of

stopping this. right now, democrats are trying to pressure mitch mcconnell to extend a precedent he claimed during the 2016 election when he refused to consider president obama's court pick because it was a presidential election year. democrats are arguing, well, 2018 is a midterm election but it's an election year as well. >> our republicans colleagues in the senate should follow the rule they set in 2016 not to consider a supreme court justice in an election year. millions of people are just months away from determining the senators who should vote to confirm or reject the president's nominee. and their voices deserve to be heard now as leader mcconnell thought they should deserve to be heard then. anything but that would be the absolute height of hypocrisy. >> joining me now, tom goldstein, cophoneder of the scotus blog and a msnbc supreme court contributor and chris matthews, host of "hardball"

right here on msnbc. tom, let me get to you on what this shift -- what another trump appointment in replacement of kennedy -- would mean for the balance of power. when we talk about supreme court picks and supreme court cases invariably we go to abortion, the roe versus wade, to the longevity of that decision. a trump pick to replace anthony kennedy, does it have the potential to change roe versus wade as we know it? >> it's likely to. the question is whether roe would be overruled or instead reduced in its scope so states could pass abortion restrictions. it would be shocking if a nominee to replace justice kennedy wasn't more inclined to limit the scope of roe versus wade. so, too, with other decisions of those permitting affirmative action, and like you suggested limiting the death penalty. there are a bunch of these questions. while justice kennedy was conservative he was the limiting agent, the barrier to taking a

big leap to the right in american constitutional law. >> elaborate on that if you could. we hear about him as the swing vote. this we can i think we saw a couple of example where is he swung to the right. maybe if you have a republican pick from trump here, the ruling would end up the same. where are the ones where the balance of power could shift here, where this swing vote being replaced by potentially doctrine airre conservative where the decision move toward the right. >> conservative is probably the wrong label. i wasn't that justice kennedy couldn't go back and forth on different issues. gay marriage, gay rights in the employment space, when it came to employment discrimination. he reserved the core of roe versus wade. gun rights. the court said there is a right to bear arms.

but not a particular right for example, to have concealed carry. in the death penalty he was the pivotal vote who said we will not execute someone who committed a crime while they were a minor or unable to under the consequences of what they did. those issues, and parts of campaign finance law, the law can move distinctly to the right and as you suggested for long time. a president can come in and replace the policies of donald trump after the next presidential election. but a supreme court is there these days a minimum of a quarter century. >> the president made reference to a list of 25 names that's been out there, potential nominees from the 2016 campaign. when you look at the names that are in circulation, what we saw with the gorsuch pick, how that came together. are we looking at basically a cookie cutter model here where they are all likely to be the same itio logically or are there

any wild cards? >> i think it is cutie cooter and conservatives think it tastes really good. you are talking about the farm team that the bush administration put in place ten years ago and republican governors for example, in tech did the same thing. they have a group of nominees who they around really concerned will come onto the supreme court and drift to the left like a lot of our justices, like retired justice david suter did. i don't think there is a huge difference. in any individual case there can be but on the core issues like abortion, gay rights, campaign finance rights, they are going to be similar and going to be a step to the right of justice kennedy. >> let me bring in chris matthews on the politics of this and that conversation that looms in congress. you have been all over the air wave calling on democrats to fight this. from your standpoint if you are democrats with 49 votes in the senate and you need to where i over at least one, probably a couple of republicans to have a

chance of knocking this off, what is the best art or the best tactic that democrats would have to pick off those republicans. how about survival of the democratic leadership? in 2016 look what happened. hillary clinton, the establishment candidate won. how did she win? the party rules helped her. they had debate during nfl games. any way to protect her from the onslaught from bernie sanders. then they lose a vote on merit gareland for the supreme court. now we are talking about a vote before a midterm election on whoever trump cooks up. i don't think the leadership could survive this. how can you explain that you couldn't stop it when you had 49 senators and they just have 50? just a few years ago -- look at the way the republicans played the rules. first of all they said it took 60 senators to approve a supreme court justice back two years ago. also, that's 60 years. then they got rid of that with the nuclear option. then they said we are not going

to elect anybody in the year before a presidential election. they denied confirmation hearings or meetings with garland, the democratic nominee of president obama. they are playing all of these games of it's 60 votes. now it's 50. by the way, we are not going to have a vote on it. here they come in and say let's do it nice now, let's make sure we have a vote even though we only have 50 to their 49. let's make good order here. it's not going to happen. the left of the democratic party, the progressive base of the party, minorities, young people, millennials, also hispanics, latinos, african-americans, they are tired of losing. they are tired of losing. >> chris, i think what i'm trying to get to the bottom of with you is this. if every democratic adopts the posture you are talking about, fights this and stand together they have got 49 votes. they lose. >> you don't understand.

>> -- [ overlapping speakers ] >> let's go this way. the day after trump's nominee for the sport this time around say in october gets confirmed by the united states senate by one vote you don't think the democratic base is going to go wild about that? i'm telling you they are going to say how did you not use your procedural votes, your delay tory tactics, parliamentary procedure with all the tricks they pull in the senate and you couldn't pull this off with one less vote than the republicans. they would not believe it. it would not seem believable that they couldn't stop the senate from approval a nominee with just 50 votes. it used to be 60. now it's just 50. it doesn't look right in the history books. >> what is the tool? i understand what you are saying about the base being fired up. >> it's chuck schumer's job. >> if the party wants to pull

out all stops and you are saying they are not going to accept that. if you don't have 50 votes, you can't beat night let's talk about this in a couple of weeks and we'll see who is right, all right? >> chris, i'm asking you what the tool is. that's all. what is the tool. >> i am not a parliament aryan. uhl they will find a way to do it. there are ways to slow down votes, to prevent a modest majority from 50 to 49 from getting its way. if they fail they will lose their leadership. the party will not accept failure on this front. they will not allow somebody to come into the supreme court for 30 years, 30 years, because they lost by one vote. that's not going to be acceptable. to answer another question, i don't think susan collins is going to vote for somebody to the right of anthony kennedy. i'm not sure murkowski will. >> there you go. that's what i was asking you. i was asking, whether is the republican opposition going to come from. >> that's not the only way. >> that's -- that's what i was trying to get to, there.

>> that's not only way. you are wrong. there are other ways to do this if you are in the minority. the minority can stop thing. there are so many ways to stop -- how about some really -- we'll see how they do it. they better do night tom goldstein are you aware of a mechanism or a procedure that the democrats could use to kill the 50 votes? >> no, it's not a real issue for the democrats. the democrats have to vote because there is no procedural way to stop it before the midterm election. there are too many people who are running in elections, senators in states that donald trump won. there is going to be enormous pressure on them since they can't beat the nominee to vote for the nominee. i'll take chris's bet at 10-1. i think whoever it is is going to get confirmed by about 56-44. and democratic leadership chris is right is going to try to lay down on the tracks. the problem is the train is going to run over them. there isn't anything they can do. >> we'll see. it's unacceptable -- what you

said is not acceptable politically to the democratic base. it is not acceptable to accept this as a fait accompli. if you take that complacency and acceptance of them forcing this history -- in other words for the next three decades or more we are going to be run by a 5-4 right wing court and just accept that. >> chris, channelling i think the passions of the democratic base here. we will measure it up to the reality of the masses. >> if you lay down like the experts are saying and lay down and accept this as history that can't be stopped, you are going the see a political party in serious implosion. you watch. >> chris matthews, tom goldstein thank you for joining us. ahead, much more on this breaking news of justice tony kennedy's retirement. get ready for a political battle for the ages. getting a preview of it. the next justice could shape the high court for decades to come. first word you think of

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so frank can focus on the beat. you hear that? this is frank's record shop. and this is where life meets legal. welcome back. a monumental day in politics. let's get right to it with tonight's panel. caitlyn huey burns. noah rothman. mari gay. let me put the question out there for everybody. you are all in the position right now of a democrat who does not want to confirm donald trump's next supreme court nom neechl you want to derail this thing somehow. how do you do it? tactically, how do you do it? >> i think the first thing is you try and whip as many moderate republican shows as you can, which is no easy tachlkt but you start with susan collins of maine. the other thing you do is -- and not just for political purposes,

but you dig really deep into your kind of parliamentaryian bag of tricks that you can come up with and you fine whatever you can and you make it clear to voters what you are willing to do anything you are able to to stop it. now, ultimately, democrats may not be able to stop it. but if they do not make a serious good faith evident to show their voters that they are drawing a line, they are going to be out. >> are there republicans who could be picked off here, do you think, collins. >> it depends on who is nominee is. if there is a real originalist position on roe i think you might lose collins. but democrats do not want to not confirm this nominee. they don't know who they are going to get, in the event that they don't get the right nominee first. the first nominee is likely to be the most acceptable nominee because republicans will go to the well and find somebody who is more conservative and there will be more pressure to confirm

the second nominee. the phil buster was not to destroy. they had to break a filibuster from democrats which was a strategy that was doomed to fail. >> how gorsuch got onto the court. >> it was a sock to the base. the base wanted to see a display a grand justice, they got it and they lost the judicial phil buster. now they are saying let's block legislation, gum the works. then they lose the legislative filibuster for example. and there is no guarantee there is going to lose the senate in 2018. it seems to be a flawed strategy. they are better off getting this off their plate and confirming this nominee. >> another dynamic with democrats is they have a handful of democrats running for re-election in deep red states where voting for a supreme court justice that the president appoints could be some currency with voters -- >> manchin, heitkamp -- >> exactly. a couple of them did vote for gore sum of inthat's a dynamic that's going to be difficult for democrats. the only difference between now

and what gorsuch is is that kennedy was the swing vote. you could argue scalia was replacing another conservative. this is potentially going to change the balance of power. >> mara mentions susan collins. roe versus wade. goldstein said that's a major thin here. collins and murkowski are republicans for choice. >> exactly. you have to consider who the nominee is. you have to consider the 150 federal court vacancies. the way it animated the republican base. look at the exit polling. all of our reporting confirms this is a top priority for trump voters. you have republicans responding to that energy in their base. we will see if democrats start to respond in kind in midterms. >> what about the point that noah is making, the democratic wanted to fight last year against neil gorsuch. they did the filibuster.

the republican said we will nuke the filibuster. it's gone. democrats don't have that tool. they are sitting on 49 votes. is there any second-guess on that. >> it's interesting. democratic voters are getting quite an education right now about the power of not just the presidency but also what these judicial appointments can mean. i think it is an issue that has animated republican voters, especially pro-life voters for years. they have built -- this is the result of years of republican and right wing infrastructure that has been put in place. everything from think taverns to elections. and democrats are way behind and they need to really start paying attention, even as voters to the fact that every single judicial appointment matters, top to bottom. >> what about, noah, in 2016 the backdrop for all of this. we talk about the filibuster in 2017 and the gorsuch as it is came open because scalia died

early in 2016 and mcconnell and the republicans said you have a nominee, no hearings, no vote. because it is an election year. now we have an opening in an election year. is there an argument to leave it open until after november. >> the argument was barack obama is a lame duck president. voters should get to say who gets to nominate the next candidate. that was the argument. like it or not, it won. now it is an election year where a third of the senate is up, that's not the same argument. it is muddier. if they want run with that, i think they will, i don't know what it's supposed to achieve. it's saying we are going to do this. they will fail. the base will say you failed, you promised us this and then you stabbed us in the back. that's a recipe for a civil war. >> i think there is merit in the argument that you schumer is saying let's wait to see what

voters decide. the senate math is very favorable to republicans right now. i mentioned the seats where they are fighting on democratic territory. the democratic makeup to be more favorable to republicans next year. waiting until after the election might not be the thing that democrats want. >> i think that it does raise the question in the immediate moment. feelings are raw obviously for all sorts of reasons in politics and certainly around judicial politics right now. in the immediate moment the impulse to fight this out for democrats i certainly get. but it raises the question what is the end game. if trump going to be president through 2020, maybe longer but we will say 2020. we have election this is fall. republicans could gain and build on the senate numbers they have right now. what do democrats ultimately try to get out of this? they can't block it for two and a half more years, can they? >> it's interesting, they might gain exactly what republicans gained by saying no to every single thin that barack obama proposed. controlling the narrative,

bringing out their base and their voters. >> is it --? i don't know. there is a lot of room for strategy. i'm not saying that's the only way forward about that that's the most responsible bay. but i do think this is an issue where the liberal base of the democratic party is extremely energized. they are angry, and they expect these democrats to draw a line somewhere. and even if they cannot produce results, this is not go along get a long time for the liberal wing of the democratic party. >> it feels like the example was set by 2016 by holding no hearings, no vote, anything like that. democrats now say, well, it worked. why don't we try to do something similar. >> if you talk to a tea party republican, dyed in the wool republican they will say the opposite. they will say republicans capitulated at every turn to whatever democrats and barack obama wanted. it is what they believed.

it wasn't long ago that democrats had the tea party pegged. i think they are falling into a similar trap here. >> stay with us. how the mid terms could impact the supreme court nomination and how the nomination could impact the mid terms. we will go to the big board and crunch all the numbers. stay with us. but for cyber criminals it's plenty of time to launch thousands of attacks. luckily security analysts and watson are on his side. spotting threats faster and protecting his data with the most securely encrypted main frame in the world. it's a smart way to eat lunch in peace. sweet, oblivious peace. you're smart,eaty to you already knew that. but it's also great for finding the perfect used car. you'll see what a fair price is and you can connect with a truecar certified dealer. now you're even smarter. this is truecar.

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welcome back. tonight in meet the mid terms, something different. how could midterm politics bey

play into the confirmation of the next supreme court justice? we have been talking about this. look, here's the balance of power in the senate. the republicans, trump has got to get the nominee through the senate. the good news for republicans is they have 51 votes. there is no more filibuster. 51 votes would do it. john mccain, we don't know his status. that could functionally mean that republicans are at 50 votes. that puts them right there with basically no margin for error. on the flip side the question for democrats has been hey if you want to try to beat this nomination can you hold everybody together and pick off some republicans? let's look at it from the democratic standpoint. they have got their 49. they want to hold those together. then what. where could they look. they have got to pick off republicans somewhere. where could they look. dean heller, running for re-election in nevada. nevada a state that hillary clinton carried. a clinton state republican running for re-election. could democrats raise the

political temperature enough in that state to make heller think it is in his interest to vote with them and oppose this nominee? how about corker and flake? two senators who have had their differences with donald trump, not running for re-election, do not have to face the voters, don't have to face republican primary voters. maybe there is a burst of independence there on their part and they feel it's time to make some kind of a statement. how about susan collins, lisa murkowski. they are not up for re-election. they are pro choice. roe versus wade factors in critically to this nomination potentially. would one of them say on the basis of that issue -- they have had their differences with their party and the consebtive base before. mccain, last year a thumb's down, maybe he could emerge. however, all of them were yes votes on neil gorsuch last year.

and democrats have to worry about their own. joe manchin, running for re-election in state donald trump won by 42 points. heitkamp, 36, joe in a state where trump won by 20. do they want to side with the democrats and blockade a nominee of this administration? that's a tough sell. that's the mathematical reality if they want to try to beat the nominee. we will see who president trump nominates and then come back and visit it then. up next, what democrats plan to do to try to keep the president from move the court to the right. pain talk to your doctor and say yesss! to linzess. ♪ yesss! linzess treats adults with ibs with constipation or chronic constipation. linzess can help relieve your belly pain, and lets you have more frequent and complete bowel movements.

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we have been talking about the desire we are hearing on democratic activist's part to fight this thing. your colleague in the senate, blumenthal from connecticut said the senate should do nothing to artificially delay the vote on the next scotus nominee. do you agree with that approach? >> here's what i know. the next supreme court nominee is going to decide and be a major decision maker on things i care deeply about. whether it's access to health care a woman's right to choose, our clean air, right to privacy. the list goes on. and this is a monumental decision change for our country that we all have to get into this ballots on. we have to make sure that this nominee gets all the scrutiny they can. we have to look at every option that we have. and at the end of the day, mitch mcconnell needs to remember that he made the decision not to have

this kind of consequential decision made until after an election. i believe in the golden rule. i think everyone should be calling mitch mcconnell and telling him to do unto others as he has done to himself and that we need to make this decision after this election. >> what you are describing gets to the question i'm trying to figure out here from a democrat's perspective. if you have an instinct to fight this, to scrutinize it, maybe to stop this, the tools that you have at your disposal to do that, are those tools political? court of public opinion, or are they legislative? is there something, is there a series of steps you could take as a legislator to stop it from that standpoint? >> it will be difficult. we will look at everything we have. but what i do know can make a difference is all of your listeners calling their senator and saying this decision is important. i care about a woman's right to choose. i care about the quality of air

that i breathe. i care about the right to privacy. i care about how people are treated in this country. no matter who they look like or where they are from. i care about our country immensely, i want you to hold off on this decision until after the people have spoken in november. and if that doesn't working we have to make sure that if whoever this nominee is has the intense scrutiny and every single senator is held accountable for their vote. >> what's the end game here though? donald trump no matter what happens in november stays as president it's possible -- we just showed the map up there, it's possible the republicans emerge in november with 53 or 54 votes. ultimately, are you going to have to have to settle for donald trump putting somebody on this court? >> there is no doubt that this president is going to put forward a nominee that is going to make decisions that change the course of our country. so every one of us, every one of your listeners need to weigh in about what's important to them.

as we evaluate who he sends over, we have a yes or no vote here. at the end of the day, after everything else is done. and we need every senator to know that people are watching, what matters to them, what the issues are, and how they will be evaluated on that vote. >> one tool that you and your party do not have at your business posal now is the filibuster, forcing republicans to come up with 60 votes for this nomination. that was killed off last year because democrats san jose to filibuster the gorsuch nomination and republicans chose to invoke the nuclear option. five years earlier, democrats in 2013 did a nuclear option on other judicial nominations. and mcconnell said then, you will regret this some day. do you look at this and say you do regret tinkering with the filibuster five years ago? >> what i can say is that we

told mitch mcconnell that the decision to not have a a filibuster should never impact a supreme court because they are at the end of the day lifetime appointments decisions where you have nowhere else to go. so these people are absolutely critical on vital issues, and they should take 60 votes. now the republicans are moving forward on a nominee that is going to show this country why that's so important. so that's why this is so important, that we all have an opportunity to weigh in with our senators who wherever you are, or whoever your senator is, to say i'm watching, i'm counting on you to protect my right to make my own health care choice if i am a woman. i'm counting on you to put a nominee in that will protect my ability to buy insurance if i have a preexisting condition. i'm counting on you to make sure that my children, if they have asthma, have clean air to breathe. i mean the list is long. and everyone needs to not just talk about the process.

that is critical. but what is important are the issues that will change if a president's nominee is going to go through that changes the course of our history today. >> all right, senator pat oou murray, democrat from washington, thanks for the time. >> thank you. >> just ahead we will talk live with alexandria owe caseio cortez just off of her stunning and i mean stunning primary victory. coming up. over 260 years later, with a little resourcefulness, ingenuity, and grit, we're not only capturing energy from the sun and wind, we're storing it. as the nation's leader in energy storage, we're ensuring americans have the energy they need, whenever they need it. this is our era. this is america's energy era. nextera energy. the first survivor of ais out there.sease and the alzheimer's association is going to make it happen. but we won't get there without you.

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is enormous, obviously, not just because of his experience, but also because of his balance, because he was thoughtful, and he was prepared to stand up and take a 5-4 the other way rather than just have the court in this perennial 5-4 situation. that is going to change. i mean that's -- as far as i'm concerned. unless some republican is prepared to go the other way. and i, given the current trend will be doubtful about that. >> former secretary of state john kerry and andrea mitchell talking there. let's bring in tonight's panel again. we talked with patty murray one of the top debtsment in senate. what i took away, yeah, from a democratic standpoint they are saying the strategy is not

legislative tools it's political pressure. to the extent there is a strategy, it's first the lay for time, to ratchet up pressure and say republicans you have got to kick this off until at least after the election. >> that seems to be the strategy for now. but it is a gam about it because we don't know what the makeup of the senate is going to be like after the november elections. it could very well favor republicans just given what the map looks like. but as we were talking earlier, this also seems to be somewhat of a motivating mobilizing tool among democrats to purgt mobilimobile i -- to further mobilize them to turn out to vote. if not a practical legislative moon ufer is available this certainly is starting to have a rallying effect around the base more so than it has already. >> you talk about the pressure from the base. how does that match up with the pressure you just heard from senator murray.

>> the base has reached a point of no return, where it's not willing to go any farther, and i think the retirement of justice kennedy today has terrified a lot of liberals across the country who already are fired up and ready to go to the polls. and i think that you are absolutely right, this is a rallying cry. we are going to be hearing about this all summer. republicans actually may not want that to be something that the democrats have to play with. which -- i don't know, but maybe that even influences their choice. >> heller, flake, you know, corker, the names, murkowski, collins we just showed there. if you are a democratic you are saying if we are going to get help it's going to be from one of these. anything you hadert from patty murray about their messaging, out of fairness, wait until after the election. anything going to resonate with any one of those republicans and make them wobbly.

>> i don't think. i think that's going to frustrate the liberal base of the democratic party who wants to see a grand gesture, even if it's a suicidal gesture, something that reflects their anger. in the it -- it doesn't necessarily get you a bunch of liberal signal senate democrats. >> theoretically, let's say the democrats stall it through the election and they get the senate, they get 51 votes in the senate coming out of this. trump's president, democrats have the senate, does that change -- >> let's be clear. this is a case where -- supreme court is a place where individual people matter. the difference between a conservative who is a traditional conservative like john roberts and someone who is far to the right can be very substantial. and that could be the difference -- i mean, that margin could be the difference. >> what republicans have understood that democrats are

now kind of coming to terms with is that it's not just the supreme court. it is the federal courts, the makeup of the federal courts. mitch mcconnell has identified that as a priority. conservative voters have identified that as a priority. there are almost 150 vacancies and they want to confirm these judges not just on the supreme court but at the federal level across the country as well. and so as much as this could certainly be a rallying cry for democrats, i think republicans have already demonstrated that it is a rallying cry for them, too, not just on the supreme court but on lower courts as well. >> i was looking at the history of this, republican senators voting no on republican nominees to the corps. there is two in the last generation where you had multiple republican deflections. one was bjork. the bjork case was its whole thing on its own. bob dole had thoughts about his physical appearance and that might have scared voters.

and clarence thomas and the sexual harassment issue. besides that, every nominee has that unanimous republican support. >> the divisions within the republican party as it relates to donald trump are more centered on his behavior and his approach, and some policy issues, trade one of them. but if it is a conservative justice that conservatives -- jeff flake at the ends of the day is a conservative member of congress, john mccain is a conservative member of congress in the traditional sense. it is hard to see them defecting if it is a judge they agree with. >> they were all there, republicans for gorsuch. stakes could be different this time. thank you, great discussion today. ahead, our interview with the woman who surprised everyone very much, including me, when she won that democratic primary over one of the top democrats in the country last night. alexandria ocasio cortez is here next. shoes,

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before justice anthony kennedy's retirement announcement shook the political world this afternoon, the political earthquake everyone talking about was the 28-year-old democratic socialist who came out of nowhere to win a primary last night in new york knocking off one of the most powerful democrats in congress. many thought he could be a speaker and soon. there's some folk who is see this as a result as a wake up call for democratic leadership. those folks aren't in democratic leadership. establishment democrats have managed to fend off most challengers. there's evidence that crowley's defeat was maybe more of a perfect storm situation. it was a low turn out election. it might have been a lackluster campaign by the incumbent.

welcome back. you've been in the building earlier today. i imagine you've been elsewhere. welcome to politics, by the way. let's get back to your win. i read when you were declared the winner, joe crowley didn't have your phone number. have you manage ed to talk? >> we're trying to make contact. my phone has been bricked all day. we tweeted back and forth. we'll be making direct contact later today. i'm looking forward to having a conversation with him. >> he was blind side by this. >> i think a lot of world was. >> including the democratic leadership in washington.

this was a big topic down there today. nancy pelosi was asked about it. does this mean something bigger, nationally. she down played that and said this is about what's going on in that district, nothing bigger than that. do you agree with that? >> i think there's a lot of districts in america like mine. there's a lot of districts that have changed a lot in the last 10 to 20 years. perhaps they may have had incumbents aren't at home as much as perhaps they should be in such volatile times. i think there's a lot of races. i'm part of a slate of 60 candidates nationwide that's running the same race i am. all of these primaries are coming up. i'm hopeful. i'm hopeful this is part of a potential caucus that might be

coming up. >> it's interesting to hear you talk this way. in politics, i'm sure you know this, when folks win and get into the office. the code is you're in. you support incumbents. you came up against that in this came pa campaign. once you take the oath in january, you still going to be backing challengers to your colleagues? >> i think at the end of the day this is about issues. this is about health care, education, housing. even my opponent, the congressman himself at a recent debate, he said there are bad democrats. he said that. not even me. i think that if the fourth most powerful democrat in the house of representatives are saying there's bad democrats, maybe there are. i think that primaries are healthy for our democracy. i think there's plenty of incumbents doing an amazing job. just because you're in a seat, doesn't mean you're entitled to

keep it. this is a democracy. we do have elections every two years. there's healthy and amazing directions that i think we can go. >> joe crowley was thought to be next democratic leader this year and maybe the next speaker of the house. he's out of picture. nancy pelosi says she wants to run again. do you want to support her? >> let me win the election in november before i make commitments. i think that she's one of -- i think she's a candidate to consider. i think that when it comes to the leadership of the party, that's a conversation i have once i'm an lelected member of congress. >> have you heard from her today in. >> i have. she was incredibly kind. >> what did she say? >> she said that she loved working with joe but that she's

always wanted younger women in congress. men tend to run at younger ages and women run at older ages. she's happy to see some new blood. i look forward to meeting her in that chamber. >> you're a member of the democratic socialist of america and it was not long ago where the idea of being associated with socialism, we couldn't consider you could win a serious election. be movement you're part of, how big do you think it is and could it still cause political problems for the democrats in part of the country? >> i think we create these fear base labels. duo talk about authoritarian capitalism because we have an authoritarian hyper capitalist in the presidency. i think we start fixing these labels instead of thinking about what does this mean? what are we fighting for? we're fighting for the right of

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the new nominee. we turn to one of the most significant moments of trump presidency thanks to justice anthony kennedy stunning announcement. he use ed the end of this week' court term to say he's retiring next month. we don't know why he chose today. there's much hyperbole and drama these days. let's begin this newscast with something i've never said before. the filling of this vacancy is the most developing this is the most far reaching decision donald trump will make. that presents a remarkable test for how congress and the democrats respond. before we go any further, we'd like to begin with substance around here. let's look at why kennedy is more pivotal than some other justices. he ofte