democratic senator from new jersey bob menendez, thank you for your time.e experience of the issue of immigration and you have an aggressive advocate. i wanted to ask you about this report that has just been published saying that an employee and legal immigrant which is a registered sex offender in your office is under arrest by immigration authorities. do you know anything about this report, senator? >> i just heard before i came on your show from the ap. here's what we know. we know we have a non-paying college intern program. this young man applied to that process and got recommended by the school. we asked status of all of those college interns and nothing indicated anything about his status. we certainly wouldn't have known through any background checks since he is say minor about any sex offender status. once it came to our attention, our new jersey staff director let the young man go from the program. that's all we know. >> he was arrested december 6th. do you know when this was brut to the attention of your office. >> my understanding is this monday

. >> well, an unpaid 18-year-old intern for bob menendez is arrested after it was learned that intern was an undocumented immigrant and registered sex offender. immigration officials deny reports of the arrest were delayed until after election day. >>> for the first time ever, our nbc news/"wall street journal" poll finds that a majority of americans favor same-sex marriage. >>> the mitt romney campaign ad about jeep manufacturing being outsourced to china has been declared the lie of the year. >>> and finally, new mexico senator jeff bigaman went on the colbert report and you can say stretched the truth a bit. >> we know the house of representative is a bunch of losers compared you to guys. do you have the power as a senator to just walk up to anyone in congress and give them a wedgy? >> yeah, i guess i do. >> all right. that's worth it right there. >> okay. and that's your morning dish of "scrambled politics." and now for a look at your national weather, let's turn to dylan drier. she has your weather channel forecast. he didn't know how to respond to that. okay, it's worth it. >> g

bearing that in mind here is craig with the senior latino senator, bob menendez, democrat of new jersey. >> i think what was incredibly encouraging was to see a significant increase in latino turnout. >> senator men anyone des, -- menendez when you learned the latino vote was the decides factor in the leaks, what was your reaction? >> a coming of aim. -- coming of age, this community has grown so in the country. served in the armed forces of the united states over many, many wores, contributed economically, finally here was the constantly referred to sleeping giant awakening. >> the awakened giant was enormous. 71% of the vote. making the difference in states like florida, virginia, new mexico, and colorado. and all exit polling saying the difference was immigration policy the ugly rhetoric attached to it. >> the republican party didn't understand that even for all of us who are united states citizens, the community knows someone who is a relative, a neighbor, a friend, who is undocumented. and they shared a seasons sense of that play. they looked at it, is a called them to do as the ci

senator bob menendez from new jersey apparently had an immigrant who was in the country, an intern inntry illegally, all right? >> right. >> bill: and a registered sex offender to boot. pick it up. >> well, then, that intern just got arrested. is he only a young kid. is he 18 years old. he got arrested. sex charge is against him? because it was sealed? >> juvy register as a sex offender. i'm confused about this case it happened here in the united states. and yet why was he still here? >> bill: because they don't deport people. you know. >> they illegal immigrant register as sex offender and get a job in the senator's office. >> bill: tomorrow on the factor "boston globe" big investigation on illegal immigrants committing horrendous crimes and nothing happens to them we'll have that tomorrow. you shouldn't be surprised about this. have you seen this before. what about menendez. >> the allegation is the associated press claims one u.s. official familiar with the case who is telling the a.p. that ice snuffed out the guy, went to the department of homeland security and said this is going

. >> senator bob menendez said he had no idea an unpaid intern in his office was an illegal resident a sex offend per. had was arrested last week. >> he's unpaid. it's not like he's a staff paid person. number two, there's no way we could know about status. we ask about status. number three, there's no way we could know about any allegation as a juvenile what his background would be in terms of in criminality. >> california governor jerry brown is being treated for cancer. the 74-year-old is getting radiation for early stage pros prostate cancer. his prognosis is excellent. >>> scott walker will not end same-day registration in his state because he says it's just too expensive. it would cost $5.2 million to end that practice. >>> 11 other republican governors want to meet with president obama over the health care law. they want to talk about how to set up health exchanges on expanding the medicaid rolls. they've sent a letter to the white house asking for time with the president. >>> and senator scott brown said good-bye to his colleagues in the senate, but he hinted you have not see

. >> that was new jersey senator bob menendez, using the arrest of an unpaid intern in his office asatest example of why we need comprehensive immigration reform. that intern and up documented immigrant and registered sex offender now faces deportation. comprehensive immigration reform is expected to take center stage in the new year and it feels like maybe now, more than at any time in the last decade, there is actual real momentum behind making significant changes. so, has this last election set both parties on the true course to reform and will this be a topic that boards us to use washington's dirtiest c-word, compromise? what were you thinking? the guest spot is jose antonio vargas, pulitzer prize-winning journalist, founder of define american, an organization dedicated to bring new voices to the immigration conversation. back in 2011, jose revealed himself as an undocumented worker. thank you so much for being with us. >> oh, thank you so much for having me. >> so as an activist, looking at the political landscape right now, knowing that republicans still have control of congre

i worked with some of my cuban- ileanaan friends, ke ros-lehtinen and bob menendez and we worked hard to put sanctions on castro to try to bring that regime down. it was not until the soviet mig that was shot down, they shot a couple of them down. one of them made it back. that created a huge for error -- furor. bill clinton was put in a difficult position. i was the author in the house and the jesse helms was the author in the senate and we worked together on the bill along with my cuban-american brands. >> that regime is still around. at the time, a number of our allies protested the bill. in the rearview mirror, how effective was it overall? do you feel good about that? >> it shows the repression is so strong in cuba, the ability of fidel castro to reach out to some of his "friends" around the world that he has been able to circumvent sanctions. i think we ought to do everything we can to bring freedom to the people of cuba. the helms-burton law was not as effective as i would have liked. >> another issue out you are associated with is autism. how did that get started? >> my grands

. >> brian: intern for newly reelected senator bob menendez busted for being in the country illegally field into a wedding proposal, only problem? he spelled his girlfriend's name wrong. it's supposed to say jody will you marry me? he misspelled the j. he have put the j backwards. despite the typo, she said yes. congratulations. yody. gretch? >> gretchen: better thanoda. all right. thanks, brian. with less than three weeks until the u.s. economy falls off the so-called fiscal cliff, house speaker john boehner says he and the president are still not close to reaching any kind of a deal. >> the president's plan to avert the fiscal cliff still does not meet the two standards that i laid out today after the election. his plan does not fulfill his promise to bring a balanced approach to solving this problem. it's mainly tax hikes. and his plan does not begin o solve our debt crisis. it actually increases spending. the longer the white house slow walks this discussion, the closer our economy gets to the fiscal cliff and the more american jobs are placed in jeopardy. >> gretchen: so with bot

i worked with some of my cuban- american friends, ileana ros- lehtinen and bob menendez and we worked hard to put sanctions on castro to try to bring that regime down. we were not able to get it done --it was not until the soviet mig that was shot down, they shot a couple of them down. one of them made it back. that created a huge furor. bill clinton was not going to sign the bill. bill clinton was put in a difficult position. so we got it passed. i was the author in the house and the jesse helms was the author in the senate and we worked together on the bill along with my cuban-american brands. >> that regime is still around. at the time, a number of our allies protested the bill. in the rearview mirror, how effective was it overall? do you feel good about that? >> it shows the repression is so strong in cuba, the ability of fidel castro to reach out to some of his "friends" around the world that he has been able to circumvent sanctions. i think we ought to do everything we can to bring freedom to the people of cuba. the helms-burton law was not as effective as i would have liked. >>

joining me now is bob shrum and alicia menendez, host and producer for huff post live. will it take for the party to learn the lessons of this election? >> they've got to get past the immediate crisis in terms of the fiscal cliff. no matter what is true, no matter what he says, john boehner is going to have to sound like he's resistant and putting up a fight but at the end of the day he's going to have to make a deal that is going to go by those term. and then we're going to go on to the debt ceiling and if the republican party in the house crashes this economy and crashes the markets by refusing to extend the debt ceiling, the business community is going to go nuts. and, b, this will become the party of recession, tax rates for the top, hating social security, and hating medicare. that's a recipe for long-term political irrelevance. >> now, alicia, let me give you a news flash that came in. conservative blogger erick erickson is up with a petition to have john boehner fired. it says, quote, speaker boehner is undercutting conservative principles by putting forth a liber

i worked with some of my cuban- american friends, ileana ros- lehtinen and bob menendez and we workedard to put sanctions on castro to try to bring that regime down. it was not until the soviet mig that was shot down, they shot a couple of them down. one of them made it back. that created a huge for error -- furor. bill clinton was put in a difficult position. i was the author in the house and the jesse helms was the author in the senate and we worked together on the bill along with my cuban-american brands. >> that regime is still around. at the time, a number of our allies protested the bill. in the rearview mirror, how effective was it overall? do you feel good about that? >> it shows the repression is so strong in cuba, the ability of fidel castro to reach out to some of his "friends" around the world that he has been able to circumvent sanctions. i think we ought to do everything we can to bring freedom to the people of cuba. the helms-burton law was not as effective as i would have liked. >> another issue out you are associated with is autism. how did that get started? >> my gra

subcommittee on the environment of the senate foreign relations committee for her work, senator bob menendez on the foreign relations committee. all those were very instrumental in dealing with this. senator durbin who has been a real champion on human rights. i want to acknowledge kyle parker, a staff person from the helsinki commission who was very instrumental in the development of this legislation, and i want to also acknowledge senator lieberman's work. i know he will be speaking in a few minutes. it was senator lieberman and senator mccain and myself that first suggested that we should pass the magnitsky bill, it's the right thing to do, but we certainly shouldn't let pntr go without attaching the magnitsky bill. i want to thank senator lieberman and thank senator mccain for raising that connection. it was the right thing to do. first of all, it allowed us to get this human rights tool enacted. secondly, i think it gave us the best chance to get the pntr bill done in the right form. so i want to thank both of them for their leadership on that. in 1974, we passed the jackson vanik law.