see a tree? a treatment for cancer? alternative fuel for our cars? do you think of hope for the environment, or food, clothing, shelter? we do. weyerhaeuser, growing ideas. >> they are coming across our borders. >> i think it is a racist law. >> this week on "inside washington," the immigration debate. >> together we are going to win on november 6. >> for mitt romney, it is all over but the coronation. >> mitt romney, next president of the united states. >> could this be at the beginning of a beautiful friendship? mytell them, it don't raise rates.

>> in 2033, incoming revenues and trust fund resources will be insufficient to maintain the payment of full benefits. >> new numbers on social security and medicare, not good. newt gingrich decides to pack it in. >> i believe, obviously, i would be the better candidate, but the objective fact is the voters did not. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- start with the supreme court and the arizona immigration law. the largest wave of immigration from a single country, mexico, is over. 12 million ameri -- mexicans entered, half of them illegally. the flow has stopped or may have

reversed. economy, greater enforcement of the borders. tell that to arizona. >> the federal government is not protecting the state. >> drug cartels have taken control. >> arizona governor jan brewer. two years ago, arizona passed a tough new law. this week it went to the supreme court. at the state of arizona argues that if the federal government will not deal with the problem, the state has the right, duty, to deal with it. gov. brewer says she thought the hearing went well. nina do you agree? >> it did well for the show me

your papers part. i think the court will uphold that a strike and other parts -- strike down other parts. >> evan, isn't this the responsibility of the federal government? >> it is. congress, being dysfunctional these days, could not handle it. you would think that this would be a good time to do the fed for reform that is clearly called for -- federal reform that is clearly called for. don't hold your breath. >> as i understand it, if a police officer pulls you over for speeding, he can check your immigration status. we heard a police officer in phoenix says this is racial profiling and makes his job too tough. do you agree? >> whether i do not is irrelevant. the case does not hinge on atha.

it hinges on federalism. what the obama administration is arguing is that arizona overstepped by trying to enforce a law that the fed's refused to enforce themselves. that is why the court had to uphold that part of the law. >> mark, your thoughts? >> first of all, this may be the answer to the republicans' dilemma over the latino vote, that latinos are going to mexico. a bad economy has helped republicans added that latinos are counted on by democrats as crucial. half the growth in the country's population from 2000-2010 are latinos. by a three-one margin, they lien democrat or republican.

republicans have -- they lean democratic over republican. purple plants have made this -- republicans have made this the core, anti-immigrants, of the nomination of mitt romney. he attacked it perry, attacked newt gingrich for saying that people will have been here for 25 years and worked and paid taxes could be qualified to stay. he has endorsed the arizona law. >> how big is the problem? pew center says that as of march 2010, there are 11.2 million un as base authorized immigrants in the united states. -- un, priced immigrants in the united states. is this a demographic problem, political problem? >> they have stepped up

enforcement. what you have to understand about immigration is that it is the complex problem. you squeeze the borders in texas and california, people come to arizona. also, farmers depend on immigrants to harvest their fields. a lot of states have passed a law is and it state officers say we did not know what we were voting for tr. >> farmers say they lost 1/2 to $40 million while food rotted on the ground. >> right. >> the solicitor general took another beating this week. even sotomayor towercam to -- even sotomayor took him to task. >> sb 1070 looks, at least at

this point, to be a difficult task, and the justices knew that. it looks to me like it is and the trouble in the supreme court, because the federal government has a regime that deals with employment and it does not make it a crime to do work. >> evan? >> even if hispanics are going home, which appears to be the case, many are still here and they have a high birth rate. the demographics will still be more hispanic and abel favre -- the democrats. th -- that will favor

democrats. the clear that it is equalized is to predict a future you cannot predict. the worst recession since the 1980's, so the country is not a job magnet. when the american economy recovers, as it will, who knows what will happen? romney was ridiculed during the campaign for saying that in the end, what we will do his self- deportation. that was considered some kind of weirdness. now everybody is applauding the fact we have an equal flow in and out and the flow out is self deportation. that is what people were laughing at before, and now it is welcome. >> the reality is that in 2000,

george w. bush carried white voters over al gore by 12%. in 2008, john mccain carried white voters over barack obama by 12 points. one race was 50-50, 2000. obama won in a landslide. that is because of the influx of latino voters. that is what republicans, rather than at george w. bush, do not understand. >> mitt romney, politics, and a word from senator marco rubio. >> 3, 4, 5, 6, seven years from now, if i do a good job as vice president -- sorry. [laughter] >> you all got that? >> bit of a gaffe there.

but if you look at the latest nbc-"wall street journal" poll, romney is trailing obama among latinos. romney-rubio, a match made in heaven. >> match made in purgatory. [laughter] no, he is a ticket, smart, makes a great case, -- he is articulate, smart, makes a great case, has a record in florida -- >> but? >> everybody is an amateur running for office, and republicans learned that painfully in 2008 with gov. palin. >> this guy is no sarah palin. >> no, but he has a prickly relationship with the florida press. there are questions. does the cuban connection -- the

dominant threat through the latino community is for mexico and central america. >> ideally, he is on the ticket and could solve this huge problem for republicans. i talk to people around romney who say that there are things about arabiya that make -- about rubio that make them nervous. little gaps in his story that could be resolved, but he will get a thorough scrub -- >> he could help them in florida, which ain't chump change. in the last analysis, people vote for president, not vice president. >> i am reminded of tony blair. even when you don't agree with

tony blair, you love to hear him speak. >> he is. he has a great life story. there is a distinction between cuban-americans and weather non- cuban hispanics consider to pinspotter -- consider cubans part of the family. he has come up with a revision of the dream act which does not citizenship but says you do not have to worry about living here the rest of your life. he what citizenship, you have got to get in line like everybody else. >> this is for children. >> this is for the children of illegal immigrants. the idea that citizenship is a gift, could be a lure, therefore we will give you a permanent residence and you don't have to worry about the petition, that is a compromise that could be increased by both

sides of the aisle. he has not endorsed it and it will be hard for him to endorse it, but it is a path that helped him begin to walk back what happened in the primaries. >> "walk back what happened in the primaries" is the crucial line in charles' statement. john boehner, speaker of the house, candidly said this could not pass the house. in the last nine elections the republicans won, there was on the national to get a candidate named either nixon or bush. if you are talking about florida in 2012, there is one person. >> jeb bush. the name bush, except for to bush, never comes up in the campaign. -- except for jeb never b -- jeb

bush, never comes up in the campaign. >> i applaud his ability to lay low. >> i am not talking about him. i'm talking about romney. >> jeb bush, before george ran successfully, was always the one considered the political star. >> if he had a last name, he would be the vice-presidential candidates. >> he says he is not interested. >> he left the door open. >> he should change his name. what about jeb ochocinco? [laughter] >> what is the spanish word for "bush"? >> not going there. >> now is not the time to make schools more expensive to for

our young people. [applause] . >> aw, yeah. you should listen to the president. or as i like to call him, preezy of the united steezy. >> president obama on "late night with jimmy fallon." "wall street journal" says the president is running a brilliant campaign to win over incoming college freshmen. before we get to student loans, was this an appropriate of venue for the president? >> i am so clueless that i did not get it, but that says more about me than him and his audience. >> i'm reminded of clinton -- >> the consensus among the

chattering classes is that it was undignified, and i think that is just the chattering classes. we are all old. i think it was kind of funny. it was borderline, but i think it was kind of funny. >> old? my goodness. that cries of condescension to young people. i know the ad does not appeal to our demographic, and i was scratching my head and the way evan was -- >> not an ad. >> it is one thing to play the saxophone. i don't remember clinton arguing anything between riffs. i would agree, it is and little like nixon going on "laugh in." >> "sock it to me" was the line from that show. it was a campaign riff -- >> he did not argue --

>> this was a takeoff on the argument for his position. everybody does it for a purpose. is this as appropriate as though clinton going on after his and this nominating speech of -- endless nominating speech for michael dukakis, admitting to johnny carson that it was not the best hour of his life. >> but it is about the youth vote. in 2008, obama got something like a 67% of the youth vote. only 69% of 18-to-29 voters are registered, only 46% say they plan to vote. >> they are young. >> they at enthusiasm in 2000 it. > -- 2008.

>> the things that inspired them in 2008 are completely gone. it will be a miracle if they turned out like then. >> every young person i knew was canvassing. i don't know anybody who is doing that now. >> youth is the ultimate dissolution of " over experience -- distillation of hope over experience. i think the lighting is back in the bottle. >> if you listen to to the treasury secretary this week, the benefits are not going to be there for them. >> i now it is jobs. for college person graduating, it is pretty tough. >> the kids who are fought over are the ones with certain skills

that are needed. they are not majoring in english literature. i was talking to an electrician the other day in newton, massachusetts. they closed out a program to train kids to be electricians because they had not woone kid apply. >> and everybody is looking for electricians these days. >> good point. americans now owe more in student loans, $1 trillion -- it has doubled in the last five years -- than we owe on credit cards. no question that president obama has won tactically this round. mitt romney has changed his position and endorsed it, move away from the ryan budget. john boehner has endorsed it as well. the reality is that if you spend $6 billion, what it costs to make this difference, maybe we

ought to think in terms of spending it for people who are getting out of high school and helping them along in community colleges. those are the ones who need help most of all. >> there is a serious question about what you get out of college. there is a lot of research and data that show that kids don't learn anything in college, they are about the same when they leave as they went in. there is a big question about whether you are getting your money's worth. >> who is the liberal who is going to lead the fight on college costs? >> i heard all might talk about it at georgetown university -- i heard paul ryan talk about it at georgetown university this week. >> it will take a liberal to lead a that fight. >> the president added interesting itinerary this week. >> college tours.

[laughter] boulder, colorado -- swing state. chapel hill, north carolina -- swing state. >> amazing coincidence. >> amazing coincidence. presidents never do this. >> peggy noonan in "the wall street journal" this week -- "there is a growing air of incompetence to the administration did you get a growing sense that nobody is in charge, that the administration is paying attention to politics but not date date governance." is that fair? >> no, i don't think that is there. of real thing is eigh scandal, but the civil service scandal that was not in washington.

the supreme court argument is a real argument, just in losing argument with this court. >> there is a reason it is a losing argument. it is so obvious that the show me your papers provision was done purely for political reasons, to show hispanics that we are pro-hispanic. eight is going to be struck down by a large majority. that is pure intrusion of politics into judicial affairs. >> if you are going to argue this thing, why not from the ankle of racial profiling? >> when you bring the challenge, you have to show that the law would have to be unconstitutional in all applications. there is a racial profiling case waiting in the wings. >> they to not want to wait because they want to challenge

it now to affect the election. >> there is a really good argument enunciated by the chief justice about parts of this. some do it for political reasons, and i agree with you about artists. -- part of this. but you are defending a federal law and you want federal dominance because that is the way the federal government works. you have to defend the product lives -- prerogatives. >> one democrat i know says he was concerned with obama's reelection, that would you -- when you put together solyndra, a gsa, leon panetta is spending thousands of dollars flying back and forth to california, it gives romney and opening in the general election to run a non- ideological campaign against the

president, that i am the guy who can make things work, i am the turnaround artist, what ever else you want. does not even get to a question of left-right. >> does not help that on friday that the gdp numbers came in for the first quarter, and it was low. 2.2% is tragic when you are coming out of a deep recession. think about ronald reagan, a comparable time in his reelection, and it is historically the lowest since the second world war. that is the reason that the jobs problem is going to remain stagnant between now and election day. >> look at the election of 1952. harry truman is seen as a great president, and if you look back at that time, all these trivial scandals. >> and a lot of people hated

them. newt gingrich prepares to leave the ring. >> we will be in camp as the nominee in august -- tampa as the nominee in august. >> didn't work out that way. if you don't believe in yourself, nina, who else is going to? >> some people believe in newt. he has been down and out before, and he comes back with a great pontificating life and makes a fortune while he does it, i suspect he will do it one more time. >> newt is always on the fine line between a visionary and fool. but you know, he has been a visionary before, so he could come back. >> not at the presidential level. he is not cut out for that job. but he is smart, talented, and often has good ideas.

i would like to see him as u.n. ambassador. [laughter] he would tell them the truth and nobody else would and he would be a triumph. >> he was the candidate of big ideas and i did not hear one other than colonizing the moon. >> see you next week.