i have done it once in the past successfully when then-governor tom vilsack thought he could legislateive order, and the case of king v. vilsack is in the books. that individual, by the way s now the secretary of agriculture. i wonder if he's not counseling the president. bill: chief counsel for the center of american law and justice. can he win if he sues? >> you know, it's a new question of law. you have people like senator graham, senator mccain, senator mcconnell also questioning. the president has executive power to prioritize and, certainly, he's already done that, actually, with immigrations and customs enforcement that said focus on the criminals, focus on the worst people, don't spend all of our time on young people that have no criminal record. but there's a difference between prioritizing and making something mandatory. even going so far, bill, as to overturn judges' decisions in the immigration courts who have already ordered a deportation. so this is not giving deference to immigrations and customs enforcement or those judges, this is making it mandatory. it says if they'd

tom vilsack gets high marks, partnership on capitol hill for how he's running ag, as you said with michael predecessor, regularly praises napolitano. you do say they get plenty of kudos for how they're running the departments. eric holder is very popular in the department himself, because it seems he's from the department, a history of that, but none of that is translated -- >> they don't come on the sunday shows, don't sell the administration's plan. secretary sebelius was not front and center in selling health care and is not front and center in defending it. if this public understood what they were doing their departments, and another good one, ray lahood from illinois, a republican -- >> and they actually do pitch him more often in transportation, and he does a lot of local media. more so than others. >> and he's been key on those things like the intolerance for airline delays on the on the ground and those kinds of things. but it's really an interesting reflection of this president's personality. one former senior adviser told me, look, he relates to the cabinet the way he relates to

agriculture secretary, tom vilsack, was in the area to talk about what is being done. >> over 140,000 man hours have already been dedicated to this fire. and so it will be some time before the fire is out, but our challenge now is to make sure that we do everything we can to contain its damage. >> the blaze has forced thousands of evacuations and left one person dead. >>> now back to the death of rodney king. he became a household name after he was beaten by los angeles police in 1991. king, who was 47, was found at the bottom of his pool in rialto, california about an hour east of los angeles. the captain with the rialto police department is with us. who called the police and what exactly was said? >> this morning at approximately 5:25 a.m. we received a 911 call from the fiance of rodney king stating she had found him at the bottom of his swimming pool. officers arrived on scene and attempted to rescue him from inside of the swimming pool and he was found to be unresponsive. officers began cpr, at which time the rialto fire department paramedics arrived on scene and began trying to

>> we understand the agriculture sect, tom vilsack, was on the ground there today. >> reporter: he wasalked about the impact, the volatility that the western part of the united states has already experienced due to the fire season, but he also talked about some e encouraging news looking ahead. he said compared to this time last year, the number of fires in the u.s. has actually gone down. take a listen. >> just to give you a sense of this, we are currently looking at close to 24,000 forest fires happening right now across the country. a year ago that number was around 33,000. so it takes a partnership, and what i saw today is an extraordinary partnership starting with volunteer fire departments. > >> reporter: now, of course, it's early in the season and anything could happen. we know that the federal government has recently announced it will be adding air tankers to the aging fleet and so harris, that, of course, can only be helpful. back to you. >> absolutely. we wish them the best. anita, thank you very much. >>> before i move on, i misspoke during the headlines on the fast and fur

tom vilsack was the governor back then. now he is agriculture secretary.ued him you were successful. that is grounds for doing it yet again. how so? >> certainly informed me on the separation of powers issue. then governor vilsack decided he could rewrite the civil rights section of code of iowa by executive order. the attorneys at time told me i didn't really understand it was carefully and deftly drafted to be constitutional. i said no, you can't tolerate that authority assumed by executive. we went to the court case of king versus vilsack is in the books. clearly separation of powers. bill: you won the case. >> executive can not legislate by executive order, memorandum or presidential edict, in president obama's case by press conference which he attempted to do as well. bill: two quick questions. when will you file? >> as soon as possible. we're still put together the legal team and standings argument. bill: you're going forward? you're not stopping here? >> i'm prepared to sue the president and i'm preparing to file. bill: how do you believe this decis

i want to mention the secretary of agriculture tom vilsack and the usda office of general counsel. we had a lot of technical needs as we worked through this. a tremendous need for technical assistance and support so that when we are done, as we completed this bill, it actually works. it works for farmers and ranchers. it works from a department standpoint to support farmers and ranchers and those involved in every part of this bill, and we received tremendous help and encouragement and support, and i want to thank them for their leadership. all the members of the agriculture committee, democrats and republicans, their staff, i am very lucky to have had such a tremendous team that is so knowledgeable and has so much experience and a committee that has so much experience. it's been really quite amazing. so, again, as i conclude, madam president, i would just say this is a proud day for those who hear about having the senate work together well, for producing a product that is one that has real reforms in it, and for something that we can look to the american people with pride at and s