. >> manti te'o, the notre dame star -- >> manti te'o is trying to explain -- >> the manti te'o fake girlfriend hoax. >> biggest manti mysteries. >> in the already strange manti te'o story. >> and if you've heard the story you're probably a bit confused. we're going to run it all down and get some insight from those who know. the experts on this type of con. the producer of the tv show "catfish." another victim who says what happened to manti te'o happened to him. and the pretty face at the center of the controversy. her images stolen right off the internet. >> it's really difficult to wrap my head around this. my true identity is going to be hard to take back. >> reporter: she's here live with our tech pro to arm you with the tools to help prevent anything like this from ever happening to you. all right. it's a story full of unusual names, a story of a football star and the girlfriend who never existed. but it's about so much more than that, and it captures so much about the way we live our lives today. until recently, and unless you follow football, you would not have heard of mant

. >> manti te'o, the notre dame star -- >> manti te'o is trying to explain -- >> the manti te'o fake girlfriend hoax. >> biggest manti mysteries. >> in the already strange manti te'o story. >> and if you've heard the story you're probably a bit confused. we're going to run it all down and get some insight from those who know. the experts on this type of con. the producer of the tv show "catfish." another victim who says what happened to manti te'o happened to him. and the pretty face at the center of the controversy. her images stolen right off the internet. >> it's really difficult to wrap my head around this. my true identity is going to be hard to take back. >> reporter: she's here live with our tech pro to arm you with the tools to help prevent anything like this from ever happening to you. all right. it's a story full of unusual names, a story of a football star and the girlfriend who never existed. but it's about so much more than that, and it captures so much about the way we live our lives today. until recently, and unless you follow football, you would not have heard of mant

manti deserves the benefit of the doubt. until we have irrefutable evidence to the contrary or admission, which seems to be popular these days, he absolutely deserves the benefit of the doubt. there is nothing in his character history that would substantiate this. >> the story is so bizarre is it possible it just reached the silly stage where we'll forget it in a few weeks anyway? >> sure. that's always possible. it used to be a daily news cycle, then 24-hour and 60 minutes. now we live in the age of 140 character journalist. the possibility that could be long forgotten in a week's time is certainly there. >> we'll watch it play out. it is interesting which i guess makes its news. thank you very much. >> thank you. >>> we asked our facebook fans if they think manti was duped or lying. or lying. you can weigh in by voting on our facebook page. at last check 88% of those voted thing manti is lying. 11% think he was duped. >>> the weather is looking dreary. we don't see a lot of snow here. we'll see it further south. let's chec

do you think manti te'o is involved?on to say whether i think he's involved, except to sort of look at the story that he's telling, and especially that his claim that he did not know that it was a fake account until late december, which means that for more than a year, he claims that an individual who we at "dead spin" have associated with te'o as somebody who he knows was pretending to be this person all the while, while presumably a presumably intelligent man like manti te'o never caught on. i really struggle to believe that he could have been suckered for that long. >> so let's talk pro and con on this. people show catfish, it is all about that and in fact the athletic director from notre dame mentioned that in his comments yesterday. i think we can play that for you, he talked about the show exactly about that, people tricked by online relationships. let's play that. >> i would refer all of you, if you're not already familiar with it, with both the documentary called catfish. it is a scam, probably revealing my telev

. >> and tonight, manti mania or should we call it hoax-gate. either way it's all anyone can talk about. what do you, what do his notre dame teammates think about the scandal? well, you're about to find out. plus, the super bowl former winning nfl coach is here to talk about that and manti's future. all that and much more ahead, "on the record" starts right now. >> you've he probably been hearing about this all morning. >> this is amazing, an amazing story. >> notre dame linebacker manti te'o now says he's the victim of a very cruel prank. >> a story that's so bizarre that we're all talking about it, still trying to put the pieces of this together. >> the big question is, was it a hoax and was he a victim? >> why me? why them? why-- >> the only thing that's clear is that somebody somewhere is laying on the blarnney. >> the single most trusting human being i've ever met will never be able to trust in the same way again. >> and if he's in on the hoax and somebody pulled it off, how did he get into notre dame. >> it's a very dark time. >> and my qu

do you think that manti te'o will speak out in the next week? load up greta wire right now and vote. now to the great state of wisconsin who can forget the storming of the state capitol over the collective bargaining fight. that was two years ago, and today, a the federal appeals court upholding governor scott walker's new law that resulted in the pro it is, stripping them of almost all of the collective bargaining rights and finding it's constitutional and automatic deduction of union dues, banning is acceptable. and governor walker issuing a statement calling the ruling a victory for wisconsin taxpayers. straight ahead we're going to take you live to algeria where news is breaking tonight. one american now confirmed dead, the other americans still held hostage, we have a live report from algeria, plus you'll hear from the hostages who have luckily made it out alive. they all have not. that's next. the plot thickens, did fashion mogul missoni's plane crash or was he hijacked. new clues from venezuela and big news from the famous kardashians and

and getting back to manti. if he knew on december 6th, he had been scammed, why two days later did he once again talk about the girlfriend he is now supposed to know is fake as if she was real. listen. >> i don't like cancer at all. cancer, i lost both my grandparents and my girlfriend to cancer. >> again, he make that statement two days after he was supposedly informed of the hoax. did he not understand, was he confused, embarrassed or was he in on and and trying to hide it. here's what we know from gary tuchman. >> you didn't have to be a big cleenl football fan hao hop on the manti te'o bandwagon this year. he nearly won the heisman trophy. hard hitting, but soft spoken and in love with a girlfriend he said he met three years ago after a game. listen to how he described her to e spn. >> i see the most beautiful girl i ever met, not because of her physical beauty, but the beauty of her character, and who she is. she was just that person that i turned to. >> in the same interview, te'o talked about learning th

it's the manti te'o story. dame linebacker manti te'o drawing strength from the supposed death of his grandmother, she actually died, and the supposed death of his girlfriend, they supposedly happened within hours of each other. he drew on that strength to excel and lead the team to the bcs title game. but here's the rub, the girlfriend didn't die. she didn't even exist. now manti te'o claims he was duped. but one editor of deadspin has doubts. >> te'o's story that he's completely innocent in this doesn't shake through with us for a couple of reasons. first, we have a lot of stories about how they met. she was a student at stanford. they met after the 2009 football game. we know that didn't happen. >> of course there are questions about where the story came from in the first place. there are a ton of questions here. we want to wait to hear from manti te'o himself here. notre dame officials claim manti never met this supposed girlfriend and they say te'o was the victim of a cruel hoax. >>> it is billed as a nigh

they are sticking by manti te'o, is that right? >> reporter: absolutely. the athletic director here said he sat down with him for an hour and a half in one session and another hour the next day. he said after listening to this young man he absolutely believes that he was nothing more than a victim. >> what a story. much more coming up in "the situation room." ted, thank you. >>> a day after president obama announced his gun proposals, the lines are drawn. vice president biden says he's under no illusions of what is going on. he met with many of america's mayors and made a very emotional call for action. athena jones is joining us from the white house. looks like a start of a major campaign to get gun control legislation through congress, athena. >> reporter: exactly. it's a major campaign and vice president biden's speech before those mayors is to win public support for the gun proposals. leading that task force to come up with some of the proposals that he talked about yesterday and so it's really no surprise to see him out pushin

at the end of the day, we need to hear from manti te'o.t to hear fram him, the more doubt builds and sin kmp builds. come out, toell your story, and let america know. >> to your point, you would have to be honest about that. you have covered manti te'o for about six years. you met his parents on multiple occasions. i'm curious, did they ever talk to you ability this woman he was dating and whether or not they knew her? >> you know, we never specifically talked about that. one of our news photographers talked to them after a pep rally on october 12th. they brought up lennay and talked about how inspiring she's been to manti's life. we never discussed whether or not they met her, and the othernicate action i had with them came on senior day. we talked after the game about how important that day was to the te'o family, but never necessarily got into specifics about lennay at that point. you know -- >> go ahead. >> go ahead. >> i'm curious, were there any inconsistencies you picked up on? >> not during the process. i mean, i think a lot of rep

it will be interesting to hear manti's part of the story. obviously, he had to be in south bend, doing training, especially in the summer. but i will be interested to hear his side of the story. >> i am interested as l. i hope that, as i said earlier to our other guests, once we have all heard it, we move on. 22 seems old to you. but to pretty much everybody else who has been there, it's young. anyway -- and you can have some bad judgment, too. thank you, sir. >> thanks so much, greta. >> okay. do you think the story could get any wilder? tell us what you think and vote in our gretawire poa. do you think manti te'o will speak out in the next week? load up and vote. and now, to the great state of wisconsin... who could forget the storming of the state capitol over the collective bargaining fight? two years ago. today, a federal appeals court upholding scott walker's controversial new law that provoked that protest, stripping most public workers of most of their collective bargaining rights. the u.s. court of appeal, finding the law is constit

jack tied himself to manti te'o last night. left himself no wriggle room. said that notre dame had done their own private internal investigation and that he was satisfied with the theory that manti te'o is just victim of an elaborate hoax. he tied himself to that theory without any space between that and the idea that maybe manti te'o might have been part of the rus. i got to tell you, this raises much larger questions about the culture of complicity and cover-up in notre dame football which i have written about. there have been so horrible thing that is have happened connected to this program. >> let me stop you there with the cover-up. you believe that notre dame -- because it's interesting after te'o says that he learned, a woman called him and said i'm not dead and he realized that he was the victim of something, he gave an interview where he talked again about a girlfriend dying of cancer and his grandmother and even after he claims he learned of this hoax, he went on to talk about this girlfriend that didn't exist. you believe that notre dame covered

there are new details about manti ta'o's story. >> why me? why them? >> he can't find the time or money to visit her before she dies. >> i have questions. they're not why. just what it would be like? i wonder if it would be like if she stood here. >> he's a kid. he makes mistakes. >> we do not all make up people, go on national television, tell stories about them and tell that story and perpetuate it, after we learn it's a hoax. >> notre dame better hope that all he was was stupid and not complicity. >> the last thing she said to me was i love you. >> if you are the council, you measure years -- >> shovel readies was not as shovel ready as we expected. >> the officials are downplaying the fact that they have not met in a year, saying that the president has found a lot of other ways to have outreach to business leaders. >> white house officials are now saying that president obama is receiving regular updates on the situation, which remain, as you say, ongoing and sensitive. >> this is an act of terror. the perpetrators are the terrorists. >> counter ter

manti's recent statement only muddies the water. listen to te'o speaking to espn back on september 15th. he talks about being reunited with his grandmother and with lennay. >> i miss them. i miss them. but i know i'll see them again one day. >> not i'll finally meet her one day but i'll see her again one day. implying that he had seen her. if as manti says he was the victim of a hoax, that the relationship only skpexisted online, why was he saying back then he'd seen her? also we know that manti says he found out lennay was fake on december 6th when he got a call from someone with lennay's number and lennay's voice who said she wasn't dead. why does he wait until the 26th, 20 days later, to tell the coaches at the school? notre dame investigates and gets a report on january 4th. we know that. why does it wait until yesterday, until after reporters deadspin.com run an expose to go public. and getting back to manti if he knew on december 6th that he'd been scammed, why two days later did he once again talk about the girlfriend he's no

katie has more. >> manti te'o and his parents sat down with katie couric and manti te'o told her when he first knew the online girlfriend was a hoax. i talked with katie couric and she said he was candid but the answer could leave some unsatisfied. >> it started as a love story with a tragic ending. but now gifted story of deceit. manti te'o says he knew about the hoax earlier than he acknowledged and that he lied and he told katie couric why he lied. >> put yourself in my situation, the girl who i committed myself to decided on accept 12 and i get a phone call december 6 say she is alive and i will be put on national tv two days later and ask me the same question? what would you do? >> she describes him as candid and said he was willing to answer all of her questions. >> i think it was a very intense hour of television and i interviewed manti te'o but his parents. there was a lot of raw emotion spilling out during the interview. i prepped him on a lot of issues that people have wondered about. >> some think manti te'o used the scam to help his image as he gained sympathy and headline

let's get back to manti te'o for a moment.ave. >> we have the coach who actually recruited manti te'o to come to notre dame. he spent a lot of time with him, met him about 18 times. we're going to talk to him about whether he believes manti te'o and what kind of a person he is. we'll also be playing, when katie couric asked manti te'o, are you gay, how he answered that question and what he was really saying. plus, we're going to talk about something, wolf, i find pretty amazing. you know how silicon valley is often perceived as very liberal and very democratic. for example, google, you know, had that town hall for president obama, about 97% of money google gave went to president obama. well, one very big executive in silicon valley is getting in bed with a republican likely for 2016. i'm talking about mark zuckerberg. and we've got that story. >> we'll see you at top of the hour and thank you. >>> a top executive with united airlines says he's confident that passengers will want to fly the new dreamliner jet once it's allowed

manti was the victim of that hoax. manti is the victim of that hoax. >> reporter: notre dame athletic director jack swarbrick says in december te'o discovered someone with a fake nape started an online relationship -- name started an online relationship with him and led him to believe she had died in september. >> every single thing about this until that day in the first week of december was real to manti. there was no suspicion that it wasn't. pain was real. the grief was real. the affection was real. >> reporter: in a statement manti te'o wrote, "to realize i was the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke and constant lies was and is painful and humiliating." notre dame fans are shocked. >> i really hope that it's not true that he would have anything to do with it. >> i was incredibly shocked, but you can also see why it is believable. >> reporter: and in te'o's homestate of hawaii words of support. >> he's a good kid and he'd never do anything like that. >> whatever comes out of this we still love manti.

so i had fallen for him. >> reporter: alex walters can relate to manti te'o.ving on an online dating site. e-mails turned into texts, turned into phone calls. he said all the right things. >> he had a job, he had a house. everybody wants that fairytale ending, so we're going to grasp on to it if a guy is telling us how amazing we are and how pretty we are. so i think it's easy to fall for. >> reporter: while the relationship quickly became serious, that face-to-face meeting just never seemed to happen. >> we scheduled a date and the day of, i was getting ready and about an hour before, and he texted me and said he had the flu. >> reporter: the first of many broken dates. the excuses became more and more elaborate. >> he was t-boned by a drunk driver. ended up having a knee replacement. he had blood clots. he fell and had to go back to the hospital. the story unravels into a ton of different excuses and lies. >> reporter: walters started getting suspicious, so she googled his cell phone number. >> so this is the website i was directed to. >> reporter: personal

not necessarily disappointed in manti, but they felt for him.rybody's very concerned about his mental state and how he's feeling right now. it's sad to believe that someone would go out of their way to sabotage his character and what he stood for. >> he said te'o likely believed he met his girlfriend and blamed one man for trying to sabotage his character. the man is named tuiasosopo, the same man that was alleged to have been involved. cnn has not been able to get in touch with him and has not been able to confirm the allegation, but te'o said he and manti met him this november when they played usc in los angeles. he was an athlete, too. this picture from when he was a senior in a california high school. deadspin.com points to him as an instigator who in his weird scenario created lennay. te'o's uncle vouches for him. >> i have known him all my life and this is the first time i heard this. >> we also caught up with manti's father who told us off camera, the truth will come out. god knows our character. one thing we do know, lennay kekua is a fi

katie has more. >> manti te'o and his parents sat down with katie couric and manti te'o told her when first knew the online girlfriend was a hoax. i talked with katie couric and she said he was candid but the answer could leave some unsatisfied. >> it started as a love story with a tragic ending. but now gifted story of deceit. manti te'o says he knew about the hoax earlier than he acknowledged and that he lied and he told katie couric why he lied. >> put yourself in my situation, the girl who i committed myself to decided on accept 12 and i get a phone call december 6 say she is alive and i will be put on national tv two days later and ask me the same question? what would you do? >> she describes him as candid and said he was willing to answer all of her questions. >> i think it was a very intense hour of television and i interviewed manti te'o but his parents. there was a lot of raw emotion spilling out during the interview. i prepped him on a lot of issues that people have wondered about. >> some think manti te'o used the scam to help his image as he gained sympathy and headlines a

so manatee -- >> manti. >> so he can. >> that's a different guy. >> bill, you own a manti which you wearays in chelsea. explain to me your thoughts. >> if there is any pictures of me wearing the man tie, julio get them off the internet. the thing about masapiqua, he is using now his defense is hire is a receipt for when my girlfriend died. he is a receipt from 1-800-flowers of me sending a $30 bouqet to her funeral. say you weren't in on the hoax because this looks 10 times better. your girlfriend dyes of -- dieses of cancer and you don't even go to the funeral. you call up and get her $30 worth of flowers. this guy i can't feel bad for him because it is idiotic. >> i only have a few seconds. here is my theory. i have to defend him through a combination of youth and inexperience, strong religious background, a mormon, and maybe he lived a sheltered life as a saw mow can and maybe -- he is a shy kid. i think he is a shy kid and unfamiliar with dealing with women on the web. he didn't see that he was being messed with. i think this is actually just a fiewr gullible -- a pure gullible naive

they could have said it's not our case, go talk to manti.o, they brought in investigators looked at it came to this conclusion and until somebody proves me differently after having been at notre dame, loving that school, and three of my children graduating from, i have to say i'm going to believe him, support him until somebody proves different and i don't think that will happen. >> sean: obviously, he's he a great ball player. is there any part of this story on the surface that's questionable to you? for example, he played the day the funeral of this girlfriend supposedly took place, he had two interceptions, they beat michigan and he said all she ever wanted was white roses, but there was no funeral. where did he send them? you know, how do you have a girlfriend for that long a period of time and apparently said he had met her at a game and stanford and, do you see holes in this story that concern you? >> i don't know if you're listening when i first came on. >> sean: i heard you. >> i can't believe-- >> the investigation. >> there's no an

te'o, to be loved by manti te'o. this if it weren't true? i don't get the sense that he's a sociopath. i get the sense that he's confused. a lot of people lie about themselves on the internet. it's this perfect place to experiment. >> let me ask you about this. he's sort of transposing, that he is the woman, he's the one having the relationship with manti te'o. he talked about the online relationship and essentially he was carrying it on with manti te'o. here's what he said to dr. phil. >> there are many times where manti and lennay had broken up but something would bring them back together, whether it was something going on in his life or lennay's life or in this case, my life. >> interesting. lennay's life. >> almost like an alter ego. he would be lennay. >> so he is mentally stable? is this the thing that kind of happens sometimes? forget the horrificness of the hoax. >> we see this with internet dating. sometimes people lie. they say that they are a different something. some people lie about being a woman or a ma

manti was the victim of that hoax.anti is the victim of that hoax. >> reporter: when manti's grandmother passed away last fall and word that his girlfriend lennay kekua died, the world got behind the football star. the sports blog "deadspin" now says that girlfriend never existed. >> 22-year-old stanford grad gets in a near fatal car accident, contracts leukemia and then dies. that's a big tragedy. that's going to be written up somewhere. it wasn't. no death notice, no obituary, no announcement of her funeral. >> reporter: "deadspin" says a friend of te'o's is behind the hoax and does not rule out that te'o may have been behind the deception but te'o says he was duped with an online and phone relationship with a woman and that he is humiliated but some question why he never corrected media reports that he spent time with kekua in hawaii. officials say they discussed the hoax with te'o in december before the national football championship game against alabama. the school said it decided not to contact the police saying

the center of their team was the star linebacker manti te'o, and the center of manti te'o's story washe fact he was playing for his grandmother and his girlfriend who both passed away within hours of each other on september 11 or so timber 12, the dates keep changing, which is part of the story. she died of leukemia, the story went. manti te'o was flying with a broken heart but inspired by her memory. the entire nation of fans were swept into the story. people raise thousands of dollars in her name to give money to cancer research. it turns out she never existed. and now here is where we get to two possibilities of what took place. either manti te'o was victim of a hoax that took place over the course of three years, what is called phishing, sunset of this identity online and question the feel he was in love with someone was not real, or manti te'o was the architect of this hoax and did so for reasons that are frankly left to speculation. maybe he was trying to give himself a narrative that would aid his chances to win the heisman trophy. maybe he is trying to keep his personal life e

do you believe manti's story?super naive football player and social skills not up what someone else his age perhaps would be. we're debating this in our room right now. go to facebook.com/newsnation to cast your vote. take a look at what the "news nation" is saying about yesterday. will house republicans give any support to any of the president's proposals to curb gun violence? 8% of you said, yes. 92%, big no. wow. that does it for this edition of "news nation." i'll see you tomorrow. catch us every weekday 2:00 p.m. eastern time here on msnbc. to keep in contact with us off air, twitter, facebook. "the cycle" is up next. get the skills, the savings, and the supplies they need - to go from beginning... to doing... to beautifully done. more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot. right now this ashland vanity is a special buy at just two hundred, ninety-nine dollars. call (star star)thd to shop now. is bigger than we think ... sometimelike the flu.fer from with aches, fever and chills- the flu's a

we're not talking about the manti te'o kind of love. that's later on in the show.he kind that rich guys in silicon valley give with their very obese checkbooks. now, we all know president obama and google's eric schmidt are tight. these guys are bedfellows. schmidt tea schmidt's google employees gave 95% of their campaign contributions to the president in 2012, $700,000. it's safe to say that would be a sweep, 97%. that's a democratic company. there are even rumors that schmidt might join obama's cabinet as treasury secretary, which added to the commonly held belief that rich tech guys are all liberals. rich california guys, a bunch of liberals. but you know what, times appear to be a-changing. facebook founder mark zuckerberg is hosting his first political fund-raiser for -- [ drumroll ] -- republican new jersey governor, chris christie. i mean, look at that pair. made in heaven. buzz feed reporter broke the story and joe lockhart joins me, a former bush secretary and former vp of facebook, knows all sides of this. mckay, your reporting, what brought this marriage

&p3 manti te'oosays he stuck to the story bout a ggrlfriend he'' never met-- brieely ppblic about her even when &phe knnw sometting was wrong.in an iinerview with abc's katie couric, te'o was asked wwy. myself to died on september 12th. nowwi gee a phone call -3 on december 6th sayinggthat going to be put on national tv two-days later, and to ask me about the same quession. what would you do??a source with knowledgeeof the maater tells cnn, a woman pretendiig to be - te'os apparent girlfriend, lennay keeua- called him on & december 6th, ccaiming she'd & faked her death because she &pwas afraid oo drug dealers. te'o went to notre dame officials with he story.the school investigated and, according to our source, & coofirmed that two men and a woman were behind the hoax. pe'o said he didn't belieee that his on-line girlfriend never existed, until & deadspin.com first repprted it on january 16th.now, the woman who says her facebook pictures were used to depict the -fictional irlfrienddon twitterhas told bc news she wasn't part of the hoaxx and never met manti te'o.diane oomeara says this

he knows manti.nd age people can go periods of time without seeing significant other because of social networking. he said manti had extremely rigorous demanding time consuming schedule. he frankly didn't have time for a girlfriend. this fit his life as well. having an imaginary girlfriend fit his life as well. here is what tyler moorehead told us. >> campuses what we have known of manti for the last four years this exactly matches up that he really wanted to care for this girl. he thought this girl was real. and he truly was duped by this human -- this human being who kind of catfished him, i guess. it did seem to kind of come out of nowhere. and i think that people were just really asking questions why and several people knew he had never met this girl. i think there was certainly reasons for skepticism or for people to question, you know, what really was the extent of this relationship. and was atlantic oversold a little bit? >> clayton: among the other things that we learned from this interview a