it was dangerous and difficult work in the streets of this city, half a century ago this summer. that is our broadcast for this friday night and for this week. have a good weekend. thank you for being here with us. good night from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. ♪ i just flew in from miami and boy are my arms tired. you knew it was coming. the reason my arms are tired is because i landed in time to watch the end of the u.s. women's soccer team match where they beat france. that amazing game. there was a lot of hands in the air cheering and fist pumping and very exciting. usa, usa, usa. it has been just super exciting few days. i can barely tell whether i am coming or going. i'm so excited still and so fried. this might be one of those shows

where things go wrong. letting you know right now. i will say also, just this week, one of the disorienting things about all the excitement is i feel like i just had a little space walk out of the news for a few days because of this two-night democratic debate eclipsing everything else. it's like the country barely noticed, but the president's campaign chairman really did just get perp walked through a courthouse to face his next set of felony charges. that's a remarkable thing to have happen on the day that democratic candidates are starting their primary to pick someone to run against president trump. there is president trump's campaign chairman in handcuffs. while his deputy campaign chairman awaits sentencing and his national security adviser awaits sentencing and his personal lawyer is in federal prison for crimes prosecutors said the president directed him to commit.

it's not being made into a big issue in the campaign. for better or worse, it's not. what that means is that for us citizens, here and now in our time on earth as americans we really do just have images like this on the president's campaign chairman in handcuffs. that's sort of waltzing along the margins of the news with nobody taking much notice and the president planning to run for re-election. we also got the conservative dominated supreme court catching the trump administration in the act of trying to jerry rig the census so it undercounts latinos and there by undercuts latino voting power. they tried it and lied to the courts about why they were doing it and how and the court stopped them incredibly interesting and dramatic ruling from the supreme court yesterday. at the same time almost literally at exactly the same time, we got the court giving

thumbs up to the states totally rigging congressional districts to benefit whichever party is in control in that state. i know the whole gerrymandering thing sounds like another fine print process thing, but that gerrymandering ruling from the supreme court, it utterly scrambles the playing field for electoral politics for the next decade and urgently changes what both parties are going to need to prioritize right now for the next year and the next election. whatever happens in the presidential election in 2020 and the house and the senate elections in 2020, all of a sudden thanks to that ruling, we now know that the thing you are some day going to care the most about in terms of what happened politically in 2020 is not necessarily the presidential race or the senate or house race. it's the elections for your state legislature, of all things. whichever party controls state legislatures next year, that

party will -- they have been given unfettered power to draw districts in that state in ways that more or less permanently disenfranchise the other party. in most cases for a decade at a time until there is another census in 2030. as an example, democratic and republican states have drawn partisan gerrymandered maps. one of the maps that ended up before the supreme court was a map from north carolina. north carolina republicans ended up in court in the supreme court case because they devised a plan where if north carolina voted straight down the middle where half the votes in the state were cast for democratic legislators and half were cast for republican legislators, it was an even split that would result in 10 north carolina seats going to republicans and only three going to democrats. even vote, 10-3 outcome.

that's how much they rigged the game in north carolina. equal vote from equal voters and republicans get 10 seats, democrats get 3. that was the case the supreme court was looking at from north carolina when they said this week, yesterday, that's fine. we have no role in telling you not to do that. so i know that democrats and republicans were doing that and looking at a map in maryland. the two parties have come to different positions on this as an ideological issue. republicans are happy with gerrymandering and democrats are getting to be uncomfortable with it. thanks to the supreme court ruling, democrats are free to do that or worse whenever they hold the state legislatures. the only way democrats can s compete against that is if they do the same thing in the states they control. if you look at democrats' policy

proposals and there is a lot of activism on it right now. what you sea is democrats proposing big, good government disarmament. democrats are saying let's he our districts chosen by nonpartisan commissions. let's take the parties and the partisanship out of it. that's how democrats have been approaching this. with the supreme court ruling that, is over or at least unilateral disarmament on the part of democrats that ensure permanent control of congress by the republican party for at least a decade and beyond that for the foreseeable future. so democrats had been trying -- including a lot of democrats on the debate stage and say this shouldn't be a partisan thing. they said this will be a partisan thing. democrats, it's your choice whether or not you play, but republicans have free reign. and they are happy to go with it. whether you are a republican or

democrat watching right now, if you know someone who ought to run for something or if you ought to run for something, the thing you or your friend ought to run for is the state legislature or state senate. you better do it right now. whoever is elected in this next election specifically, whoever is elected in state legislature in 2020, whichever party gains control in 2020 is going to get to set district maps for a decade that decides control of the u.s. house for a decade and control your state for a decade. if you were ever going to run for something or support a campaign running for state legislature or senate, now is the time. that supreme court ruling is absolutely huge. that happened yesterday in the midst of all this stuff. and president trump is meeting with vladimir putin alone again

at the start of this meeting. only russian state-controlled media were allowed in because our president is comfortable with that. while meeting president putin, president trump started talking about terrible fake news and ranting against the free press. he chose to do that today on the one-year anniversary of the mass shooting in annapolis, maryland, where a guy stormed into the newsroom in annapolis and shot dead five reporters and editors. the president has never stopped denouncing the press as the enemy of the people and the fake news. and on today's one-year anniversary of "the capital gazette" shooting, he talked about the fake news and the media and how it should be gotten rid of and laughed about russian interfering in the american elections. as they try to win the right to

compete against trump in the general election, one of the things we see happen already is the impact of the debate this week, last night and the night before, being felt in dollars and cents. in politico, they rounded up some of the very early instant fund-raising consequences of the debate for some of the democratic contenders. the debate sparked fund-raising gusher. julian castro, president obama's housing secretary and mayor had a huge fund-raising response to his performance and his campaign said castro raised triple the amount he raised on any previous day of his campaign, including his launch day in the 24 hours after his debate appearance two nights ago. cory booker was also a night one contender and said he had a big fund-raising bump from his night one performance. his campaign said yesterday was the third-biggest fund-raising day of his campaign so far.

kamala harris of california had not even made it a full day, but by 4:00 this afternoon, her campaign was touting that not even one full day, they raised more money today than on any other day since her launch day in oakland, california, back in january of this year. i know money is not everything. there is two ways the candidates qualified to get up there these last two nights. one is polling, but one is fund-raising. honestly, they all need fund-raise their hearts out in any event. sunday is the end of the fiscal quarter. they will have to publicly release their fund-raising totals. that's a practical consideration when other donors and voters even are looking at the viability of the various candidates, judging strength and whether that candidate can raise sufficient money to compete is a serious part of what people look at.

the candidates need to fund-raise their hearts out because they need to make it into the next debate which has the same qualifications threshold as the debate did this week. that next debate will look much the same. it's a month from now and it's going to be 20 candidates again, two nights again, 10 candidates each night again and again you will be able to get into that debate only by meeting the same threshold that you had to meet in order to get into this first one. a certain number of donors from a minimum of 20 states and 1% in the national polling or polling in the four early states. that was the threshold to make it on to the stage for this week and the same threshold for next month. but, it doesn't mean we will see the same 20 people next month. we know there are two very well-known totally credible candidates who didn't hit the threshold this week. montana governor steve bullock and massachusetts congressman

decorated iraq war veteran molton. they were excluded from the debate this week, but not giving up their campaigns. they are absolutely in contention to make the thresholds to make it into the next debate. the cnn debate a month from now. if they are going to do it though, they will have to knock other candidates out. there is still only 20 podiums am they will have to surpass two of the people we saw over the last two nights. that i think is a new dynamic. you may not believe this at first. i'm not sure i would have believed it in the abstract before it happened. having been there the last two nights in person, i do think this is true. i wouldn't have expected it, but i think it's true. however you think any of the candidate diagnosis in the debate, night one or night two, whether there was a candidate who blew the roof off or a candidate who got his or her

butt kicked or the contrast between two in particular really shown one up and however you think any of the individual candidates did on the stage, every single one who was on the stage for this debate these last two nights, every one, i believe, did well for themselves. i mean every one of them even if there was one or two who you thought got shellacked, every one had at least one moment on stage from which they can build and raise money and attract money and have chances of making the next debate. this is to the detriment of bullock and moulton. they are strong candidates even though they didn't make the first debate. they have good records and good skills. i would put them up on the stage with any of those other guys and i can imagine them going toe to toe. them not having made the first debate sets them at a disadvantage. 20 people gave every person on either of the last two nights something pretty significant to build on. they all had at least one

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every single candidate who made the debate stage for the democrats these last two nights did themselves some degree of good. i know that is not the common wisdom. i know that some candidates came out on the short end of a confrontation with another candidate and some have dull spots or wish they had done better. i get it. but, every single one of the candidates also had at least one good moment. which i think is good for them and b, i think it's interesting about the debate that that was possible when there was 20 of them over the course of two nights. that's the last thing i would have thought was possible heading into that.

i think it's also potentially important going forward now because this was just debate one. there is like a dozen, right? it's a long primary. they all now need to scramble the next threshold to make it into the next debate. that's another debate where not every candidate is going to make it. they will have to appeal to people and also appealing to enough people who will tell pollsters that's who they prefer in the race and they need to attract donors from lots of places around the country to get a podium at the next debate. having a good moment in that first debate may be the most priceless thing you can do at this point. i will prove to you that every single one had a moment. i am going to -- this is going to be a catastrophe, but i am going to draw candidates out of a hat in random order because i'm going to prove that every single one has at least something from the debate that played in the room and i could tell because i was there and i also think will play with their existing fans and that will

likely make new people interested in them. every one of them. at random. number four. mayor pete buttigieg. i numbered them in alphabet cal order. the mayor is the youngest candidate. there had been questions asked this week about whether or not he would even still attend the debate given the uproar of police shootings and the rage in his city and some was directed at him. the first question i asked him at the top of the second hour was a question about that controversy in his hometown. he answered that with contrition that was striking and was an important moment. i picked out this moment to show you because i think this was sort of a lightning bolt from him and this caused heads to snap around and pay attention to him maybe even from red states. watch. >> the republican party likes to cloak itself in the language of religion. now, our party doesn't talk about that as much. largely for a very good reason

which is we are committed to the separation of church and state and we stand for people of any religion and no religion, but we should call out hypocrisy when we see it. for a party that associates itself with christianity and say it's okay to suggest that god would smile on the division of families at the hands of federal agents, that god would condone putting children in cages has lost all claim to ever use religious language again. >> mayor pete buttigieg of sound bend, indiana. not the only candidate to reference his or her faith, but the who did so to the most effect and with the most rhetorical power. super striking moment from him. next candidate at random out of a hat. it's a system. marianne williamson. all right. you have to admit she is the candidate you were least likely to know anything about before she appeared on the stage.

if you never heard her speak, what is this interesting mid-atlantic accent. it's a total surprise to most people seeing her for the first time. her closing statement got the most attention. but for me, the thing that i thought more marianne williamson totally brought it, there were a few candidate who is had the best moment on this issue, but when she talked about the trump administration taking kids away from her parents. she was not the only one who was super eloquent on that issue, but what she said, i didn't know her from adam heading into this debate and it was powerful and a huge response in the room and worked for her. >> if you forcibly take a child from their parents' arms, you are kidnapping them. if you take a lot of children and you put them in a detainment center, thus inflicting chronic trauma on them, this is collective child abuse. when this is crime, both of

those things are a crime. if your government does it, that doesn't make it less of a crime. these are state-sponsored crimes. what president trump has done is not only attacked these children, not only demonized the immigrants, but attacking a basic principal of america's moral core. we open our hearts to the stranger. >> marianne williamson, obviously not a typical insider candidate. we have a few outsiders running on the ticket. powerful moment from her on the issue of kids being taken away from their parents. it was very well received in the room. another candidate. vice president joe biden. the guy with the most at stake. the far out front-runner from before he even announced. vice president biden knew he would take heavy fire all night and he did. he gave the other candidates like kamala harris and eric swalwell big moments of their own when they took aim at him. all the press you have seen all

day and night is how hard of a night he had. watch actual joe biden, too. don't just watch the other candidates throwing bashes at him. watch biden speaking on his own terms. in doing so last night, he was exactly who he wants the country to know is running. we got all of this press and certainly all of this negative attention in terms of the way he was on the receiving end of it from the other candidates, but watch how he presented himself in terms of policy and also on emotion. watch this. >> when my wife and daughter were killed in an automobile accident and my two boys were badly injured, i could not imagine what it was like to not have health care. when my son was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given months to live, i can't fathom what would happen if they said by the

way, the last six months of your life, you are on your own and we are cutting you off. the quickest fastest way to do it is build on obamacare and build on what we did. >> build on what we did. less obama mentions in the debate overall, but moments like that with vice president biden saying we did that. president obama and i did that. let's build on it. nobody else is in a position to say that. congressman eric swalwell, the second youngest candidate, a-year-older than mayor pete buttigieg. he was on the far edge of the stage. one of those lecterns in the wings last night, but he brought this absolute fire to the stage and as i mentioned, trained it on vice president biden. watch. >> i was 6 years old when a presidential candidate came to the california democratic convention and said it's time to

pass the torch to a new generation of americans. that candidate was then senator joe biden. joe biden was right when he said it was time to pass the torch to a new generation of americans 32 years ago. he is still right today. if we are going to solve the issues, pass the torch. if we are going to solve climate chaos, pass the torch. if we're going to solve student loan debt and gun violence for families who are fearful to send their kids to school, pass the torch. >> congressman eric swalwell of california. having his moment. he already made a t-shirt saying pass the torch. vice president biden kept going on, but for having popped with a big grin while he was throwing that at him, kudos to both of them. governor john hickenlooper. he is one of two guys without a national profile from colorado on the same stage. both he and michael bennet are

up against that. you are from where and have what to do with each other? governor hickenlooper gave a great closing statement where he was like as governor of colorado, i have done all the stuff that you guys are proposing and bragging that you came up with. it was a great closing statement, but like marianne williamson who also had a good closing statement, he had his moment of the night when talking about kids being taken away from their parents by the trump administration. he's not a hyperbolic guy, but to put this emphasis, you will hear how it resonates. >> the images we have seen this week just compound the emotional impact that the world is judging us by. if you had ever told me in my life that this country would sanction federal agents to take children from the arms of their parents, put them in cages, actually put them up for adoption, in colorado we call

that kidnapping, i would have told you it was unbelievable. >> governor john hickenlooper of colorado. not a high profile candidate on the stage. he didn't get the most talking time, but when he landed as he did with that line, he landed and other candidates quoted back that line of we call it kidnapping. next one. secretary julian castro. very interesting. secretary castro. julian castro was obama's housing secretary and widely perceived and i don't think this is controversial to say to have way overperformed expectations in this debate both because of fund-raising and polling. i don't think people expected him to be a stand out candidate on either night, but he definitely was. part of that was eloquence and seriousness. what i want to play here is not one of his eloquent sound bytes.

i want to play a clip of him basically starting a fight and taking out his home state rival. another young texas congressman beto o'rourke. secretary castro is an even keel, very serious, sober guy. i'm not sure anyone expected him to bring the fire like he did. this is part of how he elevated his profile on the stage and him being shot out of a cannon at the rest of the field and this is why he was such a wow factor in the debate. >> as a member of congress, we don't criminalize people that are seeking asylum. >> i'm talking about everybody else. >> you're looking at one small part of this. i'm talking about a comprehensive rewrite of our immigration laws. >> that's not true. i'm talking about millions of folks, a lot of folks that are

coming are not seeking asylum. a lot of them are undocumented immigra immigrants. and you said, the reason you didn't want to repeal section 1325, you were concerned about hm trafficking and drug trafficking. title 18 of the u.s. today, title 22 covered that. >> if you did your hokework on this issue. >> one more before we take a break. senator gillibrand of new york. very interesting take on the stage. right from the very beginning she was jumping in. everybody had to decide whether they were going to interrupt. senator gillibrand from the beginning not only interrupted to get herself time, but to try to get time for other women on the stage who she felt were being stepped on by the other male candidates on the stage. that was an interesting dynamic in itself. her fighting for her own air

time and at least in one instance fighting for other women's air time was a statement, but when she did get the microphone to comment on the stuff she wanted to comment on, she let loose, including with what was the most eloquent moment of the night on abortion rights. >> 30 states are trying to overturn roe vs. wade right now and it is mind boggling that we are debating this among democrats whether women should have access to reproductive rights. we have to stop playing defense and start playing offense. let me tell you one thing about politics because it goes to the corruption and the deal making. when the door is closed, there are conversations about women's rights and compromises have been made on our backs. what we need to know is imagine this one question. when we beat president trump, and mitch mcconnell walks into the oval office, god forbid to

do negotiations, who do you want behind that desk? i have been the fiercest advocates for women's reproductive freedom for over a decade. >> senator gillibrand not only making that as forcibly as she did, but opening herself up to explain who she was talking about in democratic politics, who behind closed doors has tried to trade away women's reproductive health. if you know the recent history of reproductive health, you can pick out high profile names she might be aiming at. she is setting us up to name them soon. kirstin gillibrand had a far-sighted interjection and a moment that landed with power on its own. i have the rest of the hat and we'll be right back. stay with us.

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next one. congressman beto o'rourke. at last night's debate or at two nights ago debate. what's today, friday? congressman o'rourke has taken a lot of heat in particular because of confrontation launched by julian castro against him and his response to that. his center place on the stage, people are wondering is he going to bring the fire? congressman o'rourke has taken

the brunt of the post debate coverage almost to the extent that vice president biden has. but as with vice president biden, i think it's worth looking at the way congressman o'rourke performed on his own terms. he definitely mixed it up with other candidates and you can definitely contrast him with whoever you want and he was there, but when standing on his own two feet talking about things on his own terms on issues he does not opine on very often like this clip i pulled right now, there is a reason why he came close to winning a senate seat. this was beto o'rourke on the issue of impeachment. very little talk over the two nights about the issue of impeachment and related matters. beto o'rourke was eloquent and sort of classic beto. watch. >> one of the most powerful pieces of art in the u.s. capitol is the trumbell painting of general george washington resigning his commission to the

continental congress submitting to the rule of law in the will of the people. that withstood the test of time for the last 243 years f. we set another precedent now that a candidate who invited participation of a foreign power and sought to disrupt the investigation. if we allow him to get away with this, we will have set a new standard. some people because of the position of power and public trust they hold are above the law. we cannot allow that to stand. we must begin impeachment now so we have the facts and the truth and we follow them as far as they go and high up as they reach and save this democracy and if we have not been able to do that in this year and the year that follows, under my administration, the department of justice will pursue this to make sure there are consequences, accountability and justice. it's the only way we save this

country. >> beto o'rourke on the issue of impeachment, potential prosecution of the president if he is not impeached. senator michael bennet of colorado. he suffers from as i mentioned being one of two colorado democrats in the race who doesn't have a preexisting national profile and one of seven democratic senators in contention for the nomination. he blends in, but then on stage, he opens his mouth and tells this story of his own family and what donald trump has turned the u.s. border into in the eyes of the world. senator bennet just nails it. watch this. >> when i see these kids at the border, i see my mom because i know she sees herself. she was separated from her parents for years during the holocaust in poland. for donald trump to be doing what he's doing to children and their families at the border, i say this as someone who wrote

the immigration bill that created a pathway to citizenship for 11 million people in this country that had the most progressive dream act that has ever been conceived and 68 votes in the senate that had $46 billion of border security that was sophisticated 21st century border security, not a medieval wall and the president turned the border of the united states into a symbol of nativist hostility that the world is looking at when what we should be represented by is the statue of liberty that brought my parents to this country to begin with. we need to make a change. >> to have hit the emotional core at the end while he is being wrapped and to still hit it and to hear the audience, senator michael bennet of colorado. mayor bill deblasio of new york. total wild card and not a national politician. certainly a national figure as the leader of the nation's

largest city. people thought what's bill deblasio going to want to talk about and mix it up on? is he going to be brush interrupting new yorker or bring out on every topic? this was the moment when he interjected himself on the debate on national security and made it personal at the same time. this was a brilliant moment for him. >> we have learned a painful lesson as americans that we have gone to war without congressional authorization. this is very personal for me. i know the cost of war. my dad served in the pacific in world war ii in the u.s. army, battle of okinawa and had half his leg blown off and came home with scars, both physical and emotional and did not recover. he spiralled downward and ultimately took his own life. that battle didn't kill him, but that war did. even in the humanitarian crisis and i think we should be ready, congressman, to intervene. god forbid there is genocide. they have not challenged presidents and let them get away

with running the military without congressional approval. we learned a lesson we seemed to have forgotten. decisions need to be made by congress in the name of the people. >> mayor deblasio in new york interjecting him on a national security matter saying i have something to add and bringing it to his family's personal story. governor jay inslee of washington. everybody knows he declared himself to be the climate change candidate. we asked about income inequality and everybody knows he is going to go to climate. everybody is expecting he is going to go to green jobs. he doesn't start there at all. he's the first person to go to this topic from the debate stage in a way that wakes the audience up like they had been in a nap before. watch this. >> how would you address income inequality? >> i think plans are great, but

i'm a governor. the people who brought us the weekend unions need to bring us a long overdue raise in america. i'm proud of standing up for unions. i have a plan to reinvigorate collective bargaining and increase wages finally. i marched with the folks. it is not right that the ceo of mcdonald's makes 2,100 times more than the people slinging hash at mcdonald's. >> he interjects that and the audience picks it up. great moment for him. back to the hat. senator cory booker of new jersey. senator booker you might have seen got the most words of any candidate on the first night of the debate. that's interesting. that's just math. it's moments people remember and stories. i picked out a sound from senator booker as one of a

handful of times he took an issue and like we saw with mayor deblasio brought it to his own experience and stopped everybody in their tracks. >> i hear gunshots in my neighborhood. i think i'm the only one, i hope i'm the only on this panel who had seven people shot in their neighborhood just last week. sha had smith was killed at the top of my block last year. for millions of americans this is not a policy issue, this is an urgency. for those not directly affected, they are tired to have their kid guess to school to learn and how to deal with an active shootner their school. this is something i'm tired of. i'm tired of people all they have to offer is thoughts and prayers. in my faith, people say faith without works is dead. we will find a way, but the reason we have a problem right now is we let the corporate gun lobby frame this debate. it is time we have bold actions

in a bold agenda. i will get that done as president of the united states because this is not about policy. this is personal. >> senator cory booker of new jersey known as a rhetorical magician, but brought it with exactly the right calibration and you see the emotion and making it personal and the audience reacts. i know the audience in the room is not the 20 million people around the country, but super powerful moment on an issue where a lot of people had powerful things to say. one more. tulsi gabbard. this was a fascinating moment. she was not directly asked this question. she jumped in. we asked tim ryan a question about afghanistan. he said the reason the u.s. was not able it get out of afghanistan. the u.s. had not stayed engaged and while we have been there for a long time, we have been ignoring it. congresswoman gabbard took acute exception to that and invited herself into that discussion and

levelled congressman ryan with this. >> is that what you will tell the parents of those two soldiers who were just killed in afghanistan? we just have to be engaged? as a soldier, i will tell you that answer is unacceptable. we have to bring our troops home from afghanistan. we are in a place in afghanistan where we have lost so many lives. we spent so much money. money that's coming out of every one of our pockets and should be going into communities here at home, meeting the needs of the people here at home. we are no better off in afghanistan today than when this war began. this is why it's so important to have a president and commander in chief who knows the cost of war and ready to do the job on day one. i am ready to do that job when i walk into the oval office. >> tulsi gabbard. each night we had an iraq or afghanistan vet on stage. when she jumped in and responded to congressman ryan's answer as

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some did better and some did worse, but every person had at least one moment they can take to the bank. to prove it i have all of them in this hat and i will tell you each one had at least one great moment. andrew yang. wild card, right? outsider. no one knows what to expect from him. is he going to mix it up and stick to his own issues, which are different than everybody else's and try to put things on his own terms. he had a closing statement that was perfectly crafted and told you why he is different and why that's good and goes to the question of electability. andrew yang. >> i am proof our democracy still works. democrats and americans around the country have one question for the nominee. who can beat donald trump in 2020. that's the right question. the right candidate will be solving the problems that got donald trump elect and have a vision of a trickle up economy that is drawing thousands of disaffected trump voter, conservatives, independents and libertarians. i can build a broader coalition

to beat donald trump. it's not left or right, it's forward. that's where i will take the country in 2020. >> andrew yang had less speaking time than the other candidates on stage. that was his closing statement though. memorable to the point on his own issues and to the concern of electability. very good. this one requires no introduction. you heard about this. the moment of the debate, probably the moment of the two nights. this is senator kamala harris inviting herself into the discussion here and addressing her comments to vice president biden. i will stand back from this one. >> there is not a black man i know, be he a relative, friend, or a coworker who was not the subject of profiling or discrimination. growing up my sister and i had

to deal with the neighbor who told us her parents couldn't play with us because we were black. i will say also that in this campaign we have also heard and i'm going to direct this at vice president biden. i do not believe you are a racist. and i agree with you when you commit yourself to the importance of finding common ground, but i also believe and it is personal and it was hurtful to hear you talk about the reputations of two united states senator who is built their reputations and career on the segregation of race in this country. it was not only that, but you also worked with them to oppose bussing. there was a little girl in california who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools and she was bussed to school every day. that little girl was me. so i will tell you that on this

subject it cannot be an intellectual debate among democrats. we have to take it seriously and act swiftly. as attorney general of california, i was proud to put in place a requirement that all my special agents would wear body cam ares and keep those cameras on. >> that swivel of vice president biden's head when she said that little girl was me, him and everybody else in that room looked to see the new front-runner in the race in terms of who was on that stage that night. i can't say more about it than had been said already, but it was like the weather changed. a stunning moment. former congressman john delaney. john delaney is the most moderate centrist practical guy. he knows he is going to be come in from the wings and didn't have a ton of room to turn and cheers moments like that from senator harris, but he does it with perfect pitch.

>> we need to get things done. that's why i believe we need to operate in a bipartisan manner. i will sign into law bills passed on a party line basis, but all the transformative things we have done in history happened when huge majorities of the american people get behind them. that's why we need real solutions, not impossible promises. >> congressman john delaine fre maryland. in terms of him introducing himself to a candidate and to a field that didn't necessarily know what to expect from him as well. okay, senator bernie sanders knows he is going to get the inevitable socialism question handles it where he doesn't have to come up with a practice response.

he is perfectly comfortable in his own skin. great moment from senator sanders. >> what is your response to say nominating a socialist would reelect donald trump? >> the responses at the polls had us 10 points ahead of donald trump because the american people understand that trump is a phony, that trump is a pathological liar and a racist and that he lied to the american people during his campaign. he said he was going to stand up for working families. well, president trump, you are not standing up for working families when you try to throw 32 million people off their health care that they have and 83% of your tax benefits go to the top 1%. that's how we beat trump. we expose him for the fraud that

he is. >> senator sanders had to know the socialism question was coming. make it a beat donald trump question. that's his -- the way he knew he was going to handle it and it landed like a nuclear bomb in the room. >> we have a perception problem with the democratic party. we're not connecting to the working-class people in the stage i represent, in ohio and the industrial midwest. we have last all decks. we have to change the center of the democratic party from being coastal, elitist, and ivy league, who was some perception. to get the workers back on our

side that we can say we'll beat solar panels and vehicles. if will be a working class party. >> this needs to be a working class party. two more. which one has the show? senator amy klobuchar of minnesota. she knows who she is. she has never tried to be anybody else. and it's all about being practical and getting things done. in this case, going after donald trump. >> the president went on tv on fox and said people's heads would spin, when he'd see how much heeds bring down pharmaceutical kriss. 2,400 drugs came in double digits. he gave $100 million in

giveaways to the farma companies. all foam and no beer. we got nothing out of it. to do something about far ma, to bring in less expensive drugs from other countries, pharma from washington, they don't i don't know me. >> it is the last one. elizabeth warren. warren, is in full teacher mode here. this is one of the moments where she is talking about something where the right comes in and said this will be a liability. they don't account for the fact that she is willing to sell it and teach the american public why this is her position. here's her in sort of unleashing the teacher. >> i spent a big chunk of my life studying why families go broke. one of the number one reasons is the cost of health care. medical bills. that's not just for people who don't have insurance.

it's for people who have insurance. look at the business model of an insurance company. it's to bring in as many dollars as they can in premiums and pay out as few dollars as possible for your health care. that leaves families with rising premiums, rising copays, and fighting with insurance companies to try to get the health care that their doctors say they and their children need. medicare for all solves that problem. i understand, there are a lot of politician who is say oh, it's just not possible, we can't do it and have a lot of political reasons for this. what they are really telling you is they just won't fight for it. health care is a basic human right and i will fight for basic human rights. >> senator elizabeth warren saying you know, you can say me saying i'm for medicare for all and that's a liability for me, let me explain to you why i'm

for it and let me bring the house down. anyway, i know this is an unpopular take and everybody wants theirs to be winners and losers and people suffered for. they all need to build on something. it's time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. >> my favorite post debate moment last night. when we got you on the air in our coverage and brian asked you how did you think it went? what i thought i was watching is somebody asking a boxerar r after 15 rounds how you think it went. the person in that stadium who knows the least about how it went is the boxer. they are just in too close. >> exactly. i was like oh, sure. i can talk about that. just give me a second and three beers.