so that's where we were up until a couple years ago in this country. constitutionally speaking, kids cannot legally be killed by our government. the state can't actively take a kid's life. but kids could still be sentenced to die. they could be sentenced to die in prison. that's called life without the possibility of parole. it's a sentence to never get out of prison. it's a sentence to die behind bars. in 2010, a legal office called the equal justice initiative which is in alabama, run by a really remarkable guy named brian stevenson, argued a case about the unconstitutionality about sentencing american kids to die in prison. the outcome of the case was a ruling that said a kid could not be sentenced to die in prison unless he had committed murder. this year, 2012, equal justice initiative and brian stevenson went back to court again. we talked to him in march after

he did the oral arguments in this case. what he was arguing is even if your crime is murder, if you commit that crime while you're a kid, the government should not be able to sentence you to die in prison. today, the supreme court ruled in that case. they said there cannot be mandatory death in prison for a crime committed by a child. in america now, if you're a kid when the crime is committed, you must at least get a hearing on what your sentence ought to be. you must at least be allowed to argue that you should not be senanced to die in prison. no more mandatory death in prison sen nlss for people who commit crimes when they're kids. there are about 2,500 people in the united states who were sentenced to die in prison for something they did as a child. by virtue of today's ruling, those people will now get hearings on whether or not they ought to die in prison or get some lesser sentence that's offers them a chance to get out.

the united states is one of few countries that has or uses the death penalty for any of our citizens. more than two thirds of the countries in the world have gotten rid of the death penalty by law or practice. we herin the united states are still one of the world's top five enthusiasts of using the death penalty. that puts us on a top five list with china, iran, saudi arabia, and iraq. for the record, on the juvenile side of this, we're also the only country in the world besides somalia, which isn't really a country anymore, that h has not ratified the u.n. convention on the rights of a child. although my lieflt has bn a generation of the united states being an international anomaly, almost a rogue state on issues like this, sometimes even in this lifetime, the brian stevensons of the world win. sometimes people swimming against that incredible tide win. sometimes they make progress. and now even though it has taken

until the year 2012, we have concluded that the explicit constitutional requirement that we not be inhumane, that's in the bill of rights, no cruel or inhuman punishment, that's in the bill of rights. we have decided in 2012 that constitutional explicit requirement that our government not act in an inhumane manner, that means someone at least ought to consider thinking about it before sentencing an american child to die in an american prison. that said, all of the conservatives on the court were against this ruling. chief justice john roberts all but shouting from the pages of his angry diisn't that it couldn't be cruel and unusual to sentence kids to die in america because we do it to so many of them. if you sentence 2,000 kids to die in america, that's no longer unusual, right? it's freak wnlt. samuel alito was so angry he

read it from the bench out loud with volume. these days, anthony kennedy sides with the conservatives on just about every, but on the issue of sentencing american children to die, anthony kennedy has sided in the past and today again sided with the liberals. the liberals are not lucky however to have that same swing justice with them on issues of democracy and corruption. justice kennedy was the author of the decision in the most justly famous radical supreme court decision since bush v. gore, citizens united. that struck down decades of anticorruption election law and said corporations need to be able to spend in an unlimited fashion to dominate the political discourse in our country as much as they want to. at a time when corporate profits are at an all-time historic high and american wages are at an all-time historic low, no

literally, both of those happening at once, one might think corporations are doing okay getting what thaw want. doing just fine dominating american politics and policy on their own without this big assist from the supremes. but giving the opportunity to partially reverse or limit the impact of the citizens united ruling by letting states guard at least their own state elections from being outright bought, today, justice kennedy sided with the conservatives again. and proclaimed that montana's century old anti-corrupt practices act be overthrown. citizens united stands, not only at the federal level but at the state level. there's no bull work against that decision. both of these decisions today, the montana decision and the sentencing kids to die in prison ruling, were frankly overshadowed by the ruling that mostly struck down arizona's anti's immigrant papers please law. but even these overlooked

decisions today, the montana decision and the killing kids in prison decision today, even those ones, even those were overlooked today, they even got a heck of a lot more attention than another decision that came down last week, last thursday, which you should definitely know about, particularly given what just happened with this montana ruling today. the supposed free speech argument in favor of citizens united in this montana ruling and all these other rulings overthrowing the anticorruption laws, the free speech argument is that corporations are just like people and money is just like speech. and so just as you can't limit people's speech rights, you can't limit corporations' money rits. you can't limit spending. the idea is if you don't like the idea of the koch brothers spending $400 million to help mitt romney beat barack obama this year, the remedy to that is easy. all you have to do is spend $400 million of your own money on the

other side from them. see, if money and speech are locked in a murderous analogy here, then the way you balance somebody else's speech, right, is with more speech of your own. that's always been the free speech argument. but if the money is analogous to the speech here, the skourlt pfsz argument is the way you balance somebody else's money in politics is with more money of your own. what if you don't have the money? who has more money than corporation s and the superrich to spend on politics to get more policies that benefit them more than policy already do. by definition, nobody has more mauney than the super rich, and the only aggregate source of money that can come from corporations conceivably, i guess that's unions, right, so even though all corporations' money in politics goes to one side, hugely to the republican side, we're not supposed to see citizens united as a partisan thing because at least

theoretically, the same decision frees up unions to spend a lot of money too. so maybe that equalized everything, right? as this conservative court has been twisting itself into really admirable gymnastic legal radicalism to flood corporate money into politics which always goes to republicans, they have also been limiting how unions can spend in politics. last week, and nobody really noticed it at all, the supreme court erected elabwiterate barriers on public sector unions making them available. this is john nichols writing about this. this is coming right after john's year and a half of dedicated day to day passionate reporting about the partisan effort to dismantle unions in wisconsin because unions in wisconsin help democrats. that was the whole scott walker controversy, right? so how level is this playing

field that's been set up by the supreme court? corporate money has been absolutely unleashed. union money, getting clamped down on. so here's a hypothetical for understanding how that works. if walmart, say, wanted to support candidates who promise to eliminate all taxes for walmart, that corporation, walmart, could spend unlimited amounts of money to do that. unlimited. in any level election that it wanted to. it would not need to gain stock holder approval. it could just go for it. let's say, a public sector union wants to counter the argument from walmart saying eliminating taxes might saver in the short run but it will undermine schools and public seices, if the union wants to do that kind of spending, the union, unlike walmart, has to go through this laborious new process of gaining permission from tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of members, and even after it goes through the process, it faces additional reporting and structural barriers imposed by the court.

it's very, very, very free speech for corporations, but it's not free speech for unions. and the whole first amendment argument here is supposedly this frees up unions as much as corporati corporations. no, and now the states can offer you no shelter from this totally legalized unlimited corruption in elections that has been green lit by citizens united which means we'll have elections choose choices and outcomes are predetermined by billionaires and corporations for the duration, from here on out, at every level of american democracy. until we amend the u.s. constitution as a way of overturning this ruling or conceivably, i guess, until we get a new supreme court. s substan substantially reconstituted. it will be harder for state governments to kill american children now, so there's that. as we await the supreme court's health care ruling on thursday,

this week, on a day like this, we need advice and guidance from somebody who knows these things so we turn to dahlia. she's senior editor and legal correspondent. she watched today's proceedings at the supreme court. great to have you here. thank you. >> thank you for having me. >> tell me what i got wrong. you watch these closely. you're a trained lawyer. i'm sure i misexplained something. >> no, i don't think you misexplained anything. just do connect up what you just talked about, it's probably worth noting that it was justice sam alito who did that far reaching decision last week with regard to union speech and to kind of close the circle or to open the circle, it's important to remember you started with bush v. gore. let's st remember that bush v. gore is the reason we have changed over from sandra day o'connor to samuel alito at the u.s. supreme court, and that's the vote that flips in citizens united on campaign finance. it's not just that sam alito is

this hugely, hugely consequenceal fifth vote in abortion decisions in campaign finance, soon to be in affirmative action, but it's realae really what happened to change the entire landscape was bush v. gore. >> you wrote today about the pl politicization of how we talk of the supreme court right now. how the supreme court ideally shouldn't want to be in the headlines right now, but right now not only are they headlines, they're continually putting out these very, very, very consequential decisions that have big partisan implications. do you see that elevated the supreme court into playing a more prominent role in election year politics and does the supreme court care? >> it's a very, very strange set of events that leads the court to say continuously and i think across all idealogical lines, rachel, that they're not partisan, this is not junior varsity politics.

they are umpires, they try to apply the law, and then they turn around and do things like, you know, we saw the argument in march in the health care cases and we heard those broccoli sound bites again today we heard as you said very, very angry, quite personal dissent by samuel alito. a dissent read from the bench also in the arizona case by justice antonin scalia that was again not just furious but went after the president himself on immigration changes. so it's an amazing thing to see a court that is, a, says it wants to be out of the spotlight, and b, suffering from the lowest poll ratings this court has seen in a long, long time. doing things that seem to deliberately promote the idea that the partisan rift at the court is worse than it's ever been. >> on the issue of the campaign finance stuff, i realize citizens united has been famous since it was decided. it's getting more and more famous with each passing day in american politics as we see it's

impact. it's interesting to see the montana attorney general put out a statement in response to this ruling. their state law is get overthrown by virtue of this decision. he seemed to signal he does not think this fight issoever yet. despite this disappointing decision, the last word has not been spoken on the issue of huh we preserve a viable democracy in which everyday people have a meaningful voice. the attorney general of montana. is that happy talk or is there a next step? is there anything that happened in terms of people wanting the citizens united ruling reversed? >> one of the most insightful things i read today was rick hasson at ucla saying be grateful that the court did not take this case because if they had taken it, they might have made citizens united a lot worse. the chance of justice kennedy flipping and saying you know, i was wrong in 2010, was about zero. the chance of them changing the law in some way that is even more egregious was not

inconsequential. i think there is some reason to think that between the reprieve that we have from the possibility of it getting worse and also the idea that the public hates citizens united and things like the disclose act are in place, attempts to get the regulators to do their jobs are in place, there's a sense more good could be done legislatively and through for regulatory branches than through the supreme court. it might be the truth. >> dahlia, you have been doing great work explaining this stuff, but also putting it in a broader political context in a way i think more clearly than anybody else. thanks for being with us. >> thank you. >> and there was thought one other case at the supreme court today. something ability papers and arizona and please. we have details on that one coming up including we'll be talking with a sheriff in zone zen whose is an important part of what happens next in arizona on thas case. >> and michigan, the state of michigan has gone crazy in a whole new really personal way

and it's all about you. that's ahead. a car insurance claim. [ voice of dennis ] switch to allstate. their claim service is so good, now it's guaranteed. [ normal voice ] so i can trust 'em. unlike randy. are you in good hands? thought they were dead. huh? [ male announcer ] should've used roundup. it kills weeds to the root, so they don't come back. roundup. no root. no weed. no problem. roundup. if you made a list of countries from around the world... ...with the best math scores. ...the united states would be on that list. in 25th place. let's raise academic standards across the nation. let's get back to the head of the class. let's solve this.

there it is ! there it is ! where ? where ? it's getting away ! where is it ? it's gone. we'll find it. any day can be an adventure. that's why we got a subaru. love wherever the road takes you. wow, there it is.

busy week. really busy week. today, you got the supreme court invalidated most of zine zone's papers please law, solidifying and in casing in steel their t citizens united ruling, and on thursday, this upcoming thursday, we now know we'll get the supreme court's ruling on health reform. also, and also on thursday, nbc

news confirming that republican controlled house of representatives will vote on contempt charges against attorney general eric holder in the fast and furious investigation. there was a video of eric holder playing over me when i said investigation, but yes, if you could hear it, you were right, i did put air quotes around the word investigation. the head of the fast and furious darryl issa appeared on three sunday morning shows. the right is furiously trying to main stream this story, and they got their guy on three network morning shows on the same sunday morning. the mainstream is taking the bait. the problem for republicans is when you ask them to explain what they think the scandal is, they go right to their crazy conspiracy theory. >> do you really think there's a possibility they were sending guns across the border, not because they were trying to get people into mexican drug cartels

but because they were trying to push gun control? >> two things, first of all, this was so flawed you can't believe they expected to get criminal prosecutions as a result of it. the level of flaw if that's a word, here is huge, but here's the real answer as to gun control. we have e-mails from people involved in this that are talking about using what they're finding here to support basically assault weapons ban or greater reporting. so chicken or egg in. >> the republicans really are going to vote on holding the attorney general of the united states in contempt this week, and if passed, it's going to be a party line vote. and the basis of the vote is a conspiracy theory that the obama administration was secretly fomenting gun violence in mexico so americans would have bad feelings about gun violence so they would have bad feelings about guns so the obama

administration could get on with their plan to eliminate guns and takes the guns away. >> could it be what they really were thinking of was i fact to use this, this walking of guns in order to promote an assault weapons ban. many think so and they haven't come up with an explanation that would cause any of us to disagree. >> they try to put the violence in mexico on the blame of the united states, so they concocted this scheme and sending our federal agents sending guns down there and trying to cook some little deal to say we have to get more guns under control. >> the whole point, don't forget, the whole point of fast and furious was to create mayhem in mexico among drug cartels with american made weapons easily procured so you and i would stand up in outrage and demand tighter gun laws. >> remember when republicans in congress during the clinton

administration tried to prove that a white house staffer had been murdered? and they tried to prove it by congressman dan burton from indiana shooting a pumpkin in his backyard as if the pumpen were a human head? dan burton who shot the pumpkin to try to call president clinton a murderer had the same job in that republican controlled congress that darrell isa has now. he said it's a secret plot to kill mexicans in order to take your guns away. except 15 years ago, all the repuicans in congress didn't vote with dan burton, the pumpkin shooting guy. this thursday, we'll see if any republicans in the house decide not to vote with darrell issa on this conspiracy theory. thursday, a busy week.

♪ hello...rings ♪ what the... what the... what the... ♪ are you seein' this? ♪ ♪ uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh... ♪ ♪ it kinda makes me miss the days when we ♪ ♪ used to rock the microphone ♪ back when our credit score couldn't get us a micro-loan ♪ ♪ so light it up! ♪ even better than we did before ♪ ♪ yeah prep yourself america we're back for more ♪ ♪ our look is slacker chic and our sound is hardcore ♪ ♪ and we're here to drop a rhyme about free-credit-score ♪ ♪ i'm singing free-credit-score-dot-com ♪ ♪ dot-com narrator: offer applies with enrollment in freecreditscore.com. olaf's pizza palace gets the most rewards of any small business credit card! pizza!!!!! [ garth ] olaf's small business earns 2% cash back on every purchase, every day! put it on my spark card! [ high-pitched ] nice doin' business with you! [ garth ] why settle for less?

great businesses deserve the most rewards! awesome!!! [ male announcer ] the spark business card from capital one. choose unlimited rewards with 2% cash back or double miles on every purchase, every day! what's in your wallet? [ male announcer ] ok, so you're no marathon man. but thanks to the htc one x from at&t, with its built in beats audio, every note sounds amazingly clear. ...making it easy to get lost in the music... and, well... rio vista?!! [ male announcer ] ...lost. introducing the musically enhanced htc one x from at&t. rethink possible.

great! tyler here will show you everything. check out our new mobile app. now you can use your phone to scan your car's vin or take a picture of your license. it's an easy way to start a quote. watch this -- flo, can i see your license? no. well, all right. thanks. okay, here we go. no one said "cheese." progressive mobile -- insurance has never been easier. get a free quote today. yep. the longer you stay with us, the more you save. and when you switch from another company to us, we even reward you for the time you spent there. genius. yeah, genius. you guys must have your own loyalty program, right? well, we have something.

show her, tom. huh? you should see november! oh, yeah? giving you more. now that's progressive. call or click today. arizona's anti-immigrant law today, sb 1070, the papers please law. they considered four parts of the law. three of them they struck down. and the fourth part they said, well, we'll wait and see. it's weird how poorly this ruling was reported on today because it's really not that complicated. the one specific part of the papers please law the court did not strike down, it's not like the court upheld it as definitely constitutional. they said on that part we have to wait and see. specifically in the ruling, they said it would be improper to enjoin it before the courts had an opportunity to construe it. once it's implementing we might

rule on it then. maybe the reason this got misreported is because if you liked arizona's anti-immigrant law and didn't want to see it struck down, you might not have made it that far in the ruling. you would have to get through the love song to immigrants the justices wrote in the paragraph right above that. sometimes the supreme court is petulant and winding and impenetrable and boring and sometimes they write a little poate. this is from the very end of the ruling today. quote, on may 24th 2012 at one of this nation's most distinguishes museums of history, a dozen immigrants stood bf the tattered flag that inspired francis scott key to write the national anthp. there they took the oath to becomes citizens. they bring together men and women of different origins who now share a common destiny. they swear a common oath to renounce fidelity to foreign

princes, to defend their country by law. the history of the united states is in part made by the stories, talents, and lasting contributions of those who crossed oceans and deserts to come here. they have power to regular immigration, and with power comes responsibilities and the sound exercise of national power over immigration depends on the nation's meeting its responsibility to base its laws on civic discourse. arizona may have understandable frustrations with the problems caused by illegal immigration while that progress continues but the state may not pursue policies that undermine federal law. that's from the ruling written by anthony kennedy. sometimes you can tell when the justices like their jobs. you've got news on the supreme court and news not on the supreme court, much more ahead. our cloud is not soft and fluffy.

our cloud is made of bedrock. concrete. and steel. our cloud is the smartest brains combating the latest security threats. it spans oceans, stretches continents. and is scalable as far as the mind can see. our cloud is the cloud other clouds look up to. welcome to the uppernet. verizon. begins with back pain and a choice. take advil, and maybe have to take up to four in a day. or take aleve, which can relieve pain all day with just two pills. good eye. thin coffee shops. people who i thave been out of work. you can

tell it wears on them. narrator: he's fought to pull us out of economic crisis for three years. and he still is. president obama's plan keeps taxes down for the middle class, invests in education and asks the wealthy to pay their fair share. mitt romney and his billionaire allies can spend milions to distort the president's words. but they're not interested in rebuilding the middle class. he is. i'm barack obama and i if we took the nissan altima and reimagined nearly everything in it? gave it greater horsepower and best in class 38 mpg highway... ...advanced headlights... ...and zero gravity seats? yeah, that would be cool. ♪ introducing the completely reimagined nissan altima. it's our most innovative altima ever. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪ nissan. innovation that excites. high schools in six states enrolled in the national math and science initiative... ...which helped students and teachers

get better results in ap courses. together, they raised ap test scores 138%. just imagine our potential... ...if the other states joined them. let's raise our scores. let's invest in our teachers and inspire our students. let's solve this. at this point, if your original proposal came to a vote on the senate floor, would you vote for it? >> it won't. it won't. that's why we went through the debate. >> it did. >> no, i would not. >> i would not vote for my own

proposal. of course not. as president of the united states, there are a few very specific tools you have at your disposal in terms of influencing the national opinion. you have tools that other politicians don't have. you can convene a joint session of congress, which president obama did toward the end of the health reform fight in order to get that legislation over the hump. you can call an inpromptu press conference at the white house that guarantees you road block coverage. you can drop into a normal daily press briefing which in addition to scaring the press core, allows you to set the agenda for it day's news. there's one thing you can do, it's bigger than the joint address to congress, the big kahuna of the bully pulpit. it's the prime time address to the nation from the oval office. that's the setting that president george w. bush chose to address the nation on the

evening of may 15th, 2006. >> good evening. i have asked for a few minutes of your time to discuss a matter of national importance. the reform of america's immigration system. >> george w. bush, halfway through his second term saying he would make it his top priority to pass comprehensive immigration reform. soon after he did that, something completely expected something completely unexpected happened. the expected thing is congress said no. they couldn't find a way to get their act together on that. that was expected. the unexpected thing that happened was this. president bush's own party, the republicans in congress who said no. they banded together as a group along with a couple democrats and they filibustered the president of their own party's immigration reform. the bill itself was bipartisan, the mccain-kennedy immigration bill, standing alongside john mccain and ted kennedy in the press conference were other

republicans like jon kyl and johnny isakson, but they voted to filibuster their own bill. there has been a really weird battle for the soul of the republican party on this issue for the last 20 years. and the once upon a time george w. bush, john mccain, lindsey graham wedge of the party, those guys lost the fights within their own party. they either got out of politics or reversed their position on the issue or they now just refuse to take a position on the issue or work on it. now when it comes up, they hope nobody remembers what their record on the subject used to be. orrin hatch of utah was one of the original sponsors of the dream act, a bill to grant legal status to immigrants who complete a couple years of college or join the military. he introduced it in 2001, reintroduced it in 2003. he was a de facto national spokesman for it as recently as 2010. >> with regard to the dream act, a lot of these kids are brought in as infants.

they don't know they're not citizens until they graduate from high school. if they led good lives and done good things, why would be penalize them and not l them at least go to school? >> orrin hatch, eloquent spokesman for the dream act. then after it became clear he was going to get primaries in his own party from the right, he changed his mind. he turned against his own dream act. senator hatch does face that primary in his own party tomorrow. he's favored to win, but had he stayed with his old position on the issue of immigration, he would likely be in much more trouble in this primary than he is because right now, it's republican party orthodoxy that being willing to do anything constructive on the subject at all is essentially a mortal political sin. >> mitt romney is often stylistically credited with seeming like a moderate republican, but he has plated his trough and it's not with the george w. bush side of the story. it's not with the guys john mccain and orrin hatch used to

be. he has both feet firmly planted on the super anti-immigrant side on this republican party. he picks his immigration adviser, the guy who wrote the papers please law in zone zen. he then called the law a model for the nation. the supreme court ruling on that case today on arizona's sb 1070 is described in the beltway process like a mixed bag or a compromise ruling. both sides getting something. despite spin to that effect from the right, that is not at all what this ruling was. there are four provigs of this law that the supreme court decisions. on three, it struck them down entirely. on the fourth one, on the part where arizona police officers are dreblthed by this new state law to demand to see your immigration papers if they stop you for something else, the court did not green light that and say that's firmly cotitutional. the court just said they can't strike that part of it down now because it hasn't been implemented yet and overtly held the door open to reconsidering the constitutionality of that

law, too if and when arizona does try to put it into effect. this is not a mixed bag of a ruling. this is a ruling striking down the arizona papers please law. the republican party used to have two wings on the subject of arizona. subject of immigration, excuse me. it's only within the last five years or so that the anti-immigrant side really won the fight within the republican party. the result of them winning that fight was policies like this, policies like sb 10 sfenlt, and that has been gutted by a supreme court majority that included john roberts. john robert was on the antiarizona side of the ruling. arizona has been a guinea pig on this issue for national republican politics for a long time now. now the people in charge of enforcing the law in arizona have to figure out what they're going to do next. joining us now for the interview is pima county arizona sheriff clarence dupenick, thank you for being here. i know this is a busy time for

you. >> my pleasure. >> as sheriff of a county that has a large border with mexico, can i get your personal reaction, your reaction as sheriff to the supreme court's decision today? >> well, i was surprised by it because what weave been hearing from the media and others was that they were going to support senate big 1070, so we were plez nltly surprised. from our point of view, it really doesn't change how we do business at all. >> do you think the kind of policing that that law tried to mandate in arizona, do you think it would have made the people of arizona safer or would it have made your job easier as sheriff? >> well, it would have been a nightmare for law enforcement to try to implement. one of the things that people don't understand that right now, when we encounter aliens in conjunction with other stops that we make, we call the border patrol and turn them over immediately and that's the end of it. this law would have required us

to charge them with a state misdemeanor, put them in our local jail, overcrowd the jail overnight, and then subject them to the local criminal justice system and overwhelm that system overnight, and then put them back in the pima county jail for a sentence and then call the border patrol and turn them over for the border patrol. and then we'd have to send a huge tax bill to the local taxpayers. people really didn't understand what this law was all about. they thought we needed this law to arrest illegal immigrants. the fact of the matter is we have been detaining for the feds for 54 years that i have been a cop, illegal immigrants and turning them over to the border patrol. >> i know you have been, as you said, you have been a cop for more than 50 years. sheriff for more than 30 years, how would you characterize the magnitude of the illegal immigration problem on your part of the border right now compared with previous years? is it better, is it worse.

is there a noticeable trend over time? >> in 19 -- well, i should say two years ago, there was a study done by the government which showedhat 12 years ago, we were arresting 80% more aliens than we are today. and that's in spite of the fact that we have increased the border patrol's presence three fold. so you would anticipate that they would be arresting more people. the fact of the matter is with the exception of narcotics, drug smuggling, the border is more secure now than it ever has been in the past. does that mean something to the right? not really, because they have taken the position that they're going to try for the rest of their life that until the border is secure, we're not going to talk about reforming the system. and if you look at berlin, they built this huge wall, put people with guns up there and shot

people that tried to get over, and they couldn't secure the border. >> sheriff, there is one portion of this law that has been sort of left hanging by the supreme court ruling. i think it was misconstrued in the press as having been upheld as firme constitutional. my reading is that the court wants to see how it's implementing and they may revisit it. in terms of that portion of the law going forward, do you anticipate that there's going to be lawsuits over that, do you anticipate there's going to be complications over implementing any portion that remains? >> i can't imagine there won't be. when they first passed this bill, there was an outcry from people like me that they were going to coerce law enforcement to in fact profile people. law enforcement officers are taught newt to profile people but to profile behavior. and they put in the law something i have never seen before in any law anywhere that says anybody who believes their

law enforcement agency isn't enforcing this new state law can sue them. they put a cop in a position of you're going to get sued no matter what you do now. because we get sued by people who think we're profiling them and now we're going to get sued by people who think we should be profiling them. >> pima county arizona sheriff clarence dupnik thank you for helping us understand how it would have worked on the ground. i appreciate your time. thank you. >> thank you. >> all right. on the one hand, the health of seventh graders for the rest of their lives. on the other, maintaining political idealogical purity, even in the face of looking lie you don't know what you're talking about. how do you think it turns out? your only hint is this is from south carolina. that's next. the greatest empires. then, some said, we lost our edge. well today, there's a new new york state. one that's working to attract businesses and create jobs.

a place where innovation meets determination... and businesses lead the world. the new new york works for business. find out how it can work for yours at thenewny.com. you're entered for a chance to win a trip to the olympic games for life. to cheer the summer athletes to new heights, starting in 2016... as you experience every moment, every emotion, every four years... for the rest of your life. visa. supporting athletes and the olympic games for 25 years. people everywhere go with visa.

a republican state official has resigned in michigan and decided his parting words are directed at you, at you personally. high did it for you.

he resigned for you watching the show right now and he wants you to know it. he's very specific about it. i'm serious. that's coming up. ♪ spread a little love my way ♪ ♪ spread a little something to remember ♪ [ female announcer ] fresh milk and real cream makes philadelphia and the moment a little richer. fight both fast with new tums freshers! concentrated relief that goes to work in seconds and freshens breath. new tums freshers. ♪ tum...tum...tum...tum... tums! ♪ [ male announcer ] fast relief, fresh breath, all in a pocket sized pack.

for about six months through the fall and winter of last year, right, the republican presidential primary debates were the best show on television. it was like a really compelling realit heyday, there was a new episode every week and then there would be madcap antics or outrage. >> i'm not going to eat barack

obama's dog food. i will tell you it's three agencies of government when i get there that are gone. commerce, education, and the -- what's the third one there? let's see. >> i can't. the third one, i can't. sorry. oops. >> take a loaf of bread. it does have five taxes in it right now. >> oh, yeah, i need the government to take care of me. i don't want to use heroin so i need these laws. >> you have a problem with allowing someone to finish speaking. and i suggest if you want to become president of the united states, you have to let both people speak. >> one of the weirdest moments of the run of the republican reality tv show came in a debate in september when rick perry took a brave stand against cancer. >> i hate cancer. >> i hate cancer.cancer." bold. also, i like puppies and good weather and afternoon naps. i think your mom's nice. i'm willing to say that in full view of the american people and take the consequences.

he didn't seem to be taking a controversial stand, but it turns out that is a controversial position for him to have taken. it hurt him. during that particular episode of the republican debate reality show, rick perry was being denounced by his fellow candidates for trying to require texas girls to get vaccinated at the age recommended by the cdc against the virus that causes most cervical cancer. >> forcing 12-year-old girls to take an inoculation to prevent this sexually transmitted disease, this is not good medicine. i do not believe. and not -- it's not good social policy. and therefore, i think this is very bad to do this. >> to impose something like an inoculation on an innocent 12-year-old girl, i would certainly oppose that. >> i hate cancer. we passed a $3 billion cancer initiative that same legislative session, of which we're trying to find over the next ten years cures to cancers. cervical cancer is caused by

hpv. we wanted to bring that to the attention of these thousands of -- tens of thousands of young people in our state. >> rick perry ultimately backtracked on that policy of vaccinating for hpv. but frankly, he was the odd man out in the republican presidential field, simply for ever having tried to do something about preventing cervical cancer, which is preventable. and this week, the aversion to preventing cervical cancer, the idea that trying to prevent it is a scandal, that idea seems to be spreading. south carolina's republican governor nikki haley had a chance last week to sign a bill that would greatly expand access to the cervical cancer vaccine for girls in her state. back in 2007, when she was a state legislator, nikki haley had co-sponsored a bill that would have required this vaccination for south carolina girls. he sponsored that bill, but it never became law. now, as of last week, the legislature in her state passed a watered down version of her same bill from a few years ago. and as governor, she vetoed it.

the earlier version that nikki haley had sponsored, like the one rick perry did in texas, would have required the vaccination. the new bill didn't require it, it just allowed the health department to offer the vaccination. so would not require anything. it would just make the cervical cancer vaccine much more accessible in a state that is ranked in the top ten for cervical cancer deaths in the united states. it's just a weaker version of what nikki haley herself wanted a few years ago. but it is 2012 now, and so governor haley vetoed that bill. because being against cancer in the republican party is a scandal now. at least being against cervical cancer is a scandal now. what, because there's a lady cancer, maybe? there is a vaccine to prevent this kind of cancer. what is the problem? [ male announcer ] you sprayed them. thought they were dead. huh? [ male announcer ] should've used roundup.

it kills weeds to the root, so they don't come back. roundup. no root. no weed. no problem. with two times the points on dining in restaurants, you may find yourself asking why not, a lot. chase sapphire preferred.

like a ramen noodle- every-night budget. she thought allstate car insurance was out of her reach. until she heard about the value plan. see how much you could save with allstate. are you in good hands? [ male announcer ] aggressive styling. a more fuel-effient turbocharged engine. and a completely redesigned interior. ♪ the 2012 c-class with over 2,000 refinements. it's amazing...inside and out. see your authorized mercedes-benz dealer for exceptional offers through mercedes-benz financial services. through mercedes-benz if you made a list of countries from around the world... ...with the best math scores.

...the united states would be on that list. in 25th place. let's raise academic standards across the nation. let's get back to the head of the class. let's solve this. [ music plays, record skips ] hi, i'm new ensure clear. clear, huh? my nutritional standards are high. i'm not juice or fancy water, i'm different. i've got nine grams of protein. twist my lid. that's three times more than me! twenty-one vitamins and minerals and zero fat! hmmm. you'll bring a lot to the party. [ all ] yay! [ female announcer ] new ensure clear. nine grams protein. zero fat. twenty-one vitamins and minerals. in blueberry/pomegranate and peach. refreshing nutrition in charge!

on february 29th, in michigan, a group of voters drove to the capital with more than enough signatures for a referendum on republican governor rick snyder's souped up emergency manager law. it's that michigan law that lets the state install a single overseer to replace all local elected officials. so your vote for mayor, your vote for city council, your vote for school board, null and void. the governor will put someone in charge to overrule whoever you voted. no more local democracy. in february, they delivered the votes to place a repeal of that emergency manager law on the november ballot. now, the deadline for challenging those petitions to put the thing on the ballot was april 9th at 5:00 p.m. and, hey, on deadline day, april 9th at 4:08 p.m., in comes a challenge. the challenge says stop there, we don't care how many voters signed these petitions. the font size on one line of the petition is too small, and because this is michigan, where democracy has gone a little cockeyed, the group challenging the font size on the petitions

turns out to live inside the office of a member of the board of state canvassers. the board that is deciding on the challenge. the board that decides whether the referendum lives or dies. that member, one of two republicans on that board of canvassers, was on both sides of the play, right? he's both the pitcher throwing the pitch or the umpire calling it a ball or a strike. and again, because this is michigan, and democracy there is apparently a wobbling drunk, one of the democrats on the board of canvassers also has a problem. the powerful people in michigan, a lot of the michigan press says they're okay with this. they're good with this kind of government by mutually assured conflict of interest. maybe so. i'm not so sure whether the citizens of michigan are all that good with it. on ail 26th, the board of canvassers deadlocked on party lines, throwing the petitions out, saying there will be no referendum on the ballot for that controversial michigan law. since then, this thing has been in and out of the courts and in

and out of the courts with the last ruling being that the board of canvassers actually has to put it on the ballot, but not until there's a chance for one more appeal. in the midst of all of this, with the clock ticking, with multiple cities and school districts under emergency manager authoritarian rule, which could be stopped if this thing's going to be on the ballot, in the midst of all of this, there is confusion in michigan over what that board of canvassers is doing now, when they're going to meet, what they're planning, how they're going t deal with these court rulings. and in the midst of all this confusion, very quietly, last week, the republican board member who had that giant, obvious, conflict of interest, resigned. very quietly. it was first reported on a blog out of michigan. we wanted to check it out. so one of our producers wrote to the guy who was reported to have resigned, republican board member jeff timer. we asked mr. timer if it was true he had resigned and when he had resigned. his answer to us, quoting the whole thing, "true, june 18th." when we followed up by asking

why he quit, mr. timher wrote this, "i just want to be liked by the tens of people watching your show." michigan, this is your state government at work. this is it, one sentence, 14 words. mr. timmer. we have tens and tens and tens of viewers, maybe even dozens, and still, we would like to know why you quit. really. incidentally, the remaining republican says he's happy on the board, but if he, too, quit, the board would have no quorum and could not do anything until the government appointed a replacement, which could run another month off the clock. the repeal campaign is running out of time. they do not have weeks to burn here. and they know it. and so do the people who want to stop them. we are expecting the people who want to keep this law and who want to keep michigan from voting on it to appeal their case to the state supreme court by the end of the week. we will keep you posted and we will look forward to the insults we will endure from the good people of michigan who are involved in this matter while we cover it. now it is time for "the last

word with lawrence o'donnell." have a great night. the crazy governor of arizona was crazy enough to get in a fight with president obama and eric holder's justice department and today, the obama/holder team crushed her in the united states supreme court. >> the excruciating waiti game may almost be over. >> today's decision by the supreme court -- >> the supreme court -- >> the supreme court -- >> the supreme court -- >> -- on arizona's immigration law -- >> declaring part of it unconstitutional. >> three quarters of it was struck down. >> it is a huge victory for the obama administration. >> the heart and soul of the arizona statute has been struck down. >> the heart of senate bill 1070 has been proven to be constitutional. >> did i miss something? >> i want whatever she's having. >> vindicated by the highest court in the land. >> this is not a victory for arizona. >> they just repeat over and over and over again. doesn't matter if it'strue.