cnn's senior political reporter, manu raju just spoke with the senator and he joins us from capitol hill. manu, this is a big thing. >> it is. harry reid becomes the highest ranking democratic official to get behind hillary clinton. a sign the leadership that the party can consolidate behind her as she struggles to fend off the surging candidacy from bernie sanders. bernie sanders is a senator but he doesn't have any senator support at this time. 40 senators have publicly expressed their support behind hillary clinton. harry reid becoming the latest and most significant. had a chance to sit down with him and he told us why he decided to put his weight behind secretary clinton. >> i think the middle-class would be better served by hillary. i think that my work with her over the years has been something i looked upon with awe and she was the first lady she started the trend toward doing something about health care she understood the issue well she was on the front of health care during that administration. i also think she's the woman to be the first president of the united states that's a

calling for no replacement nominated for the supreme court until after november elections as cnn's manu raju says the white house has no intention of honoring. >> reporter: good morning. president obama said he would wait until next week potentially or maybe after to choose the replacement to justice scalia. that doesn't mean the battle lines are not already being drawn. especially in the senate. the schedule is set of who is nominated and confirmed. decided the next president should not name, not the current president. president obama did not listen to senate mcconnell and is planning to move forward. now the big question from mitch mcconnell and the republicans is will they allow a vote on the floor to confirm or deny the next supreme court justice. this is something they have not fully decided yet because senator mcconnell wants to take the temperature of his conference. you have various camps forming. republicans are dead set against any nominee being confirmed now. you have moderates who are uncertain. you have the most influential group. the senate republicans who are up for re-electio

with us to share their reporting and insights, julie pace, manu raju and jackie kucinich. let's start with the death of antonin scalia and a big political fight that happened within seconds. almost sad that that happened so quickly. this is not just about an election year war of wills. this is about the ideological balance of the supreme court. so many recent decisions have been 5-4, and the conservative majority has won. a democratic president now has a chance to make his third pick and to reshape the court for years. we would have -- it would be the obama court with this. so inside the white house, you spend a lot of time covering the president, they think they're going to move forward, but do they think they can win? do they think they can get the country to force a vote? >> they're going to try. this is going to be the fight of obama's final year in office. i think the other issues have gotten put by the wayside. this came as a surprise. often when you have justices retiring, you get a little advanced notice at the white house. this is as much of a surprise to them as

let's talk about it with the man who broke the news cnn political reporter manu raju. also with us for analysis paul callan will be with us in a minute. and constitutional attorney paige paid. manu this comes at an interesting time. a day when the gloves came off in the fight. mitch mcconnell said there won't be a hearing, he will not meet with any nominee until the mex president takes office. how did this happen. >> sandoval is a former federal judge. he is popular in his home state of nevada. he had been viewed as a possible supreme court nominee for a while. but it's unclear how seriously he is being considered. he stopped by harry reid's office, the senate minority leader a nevada democrat on monday, and the two actually discussed the issue of being vetted. that was part of their discussion. i had a chance to talk to harry reid about brian sandoval just a while ago and he had some interesting things to say about the prospects of him as a nominee for the supreme court. >> he has been mentioned as a possible supreme court justice. do you think -- >> well i don't pick

. >> joining me now is cnn senior political reporter manu raju.nate minority leader harry reid of nevada. what did he say about the possibility of sandoval being the nominee? >> reid and sandoval have a long and complicated relationship. sandoval later ran for governor and defeated reid's son in the 2010 elections. sandoval was heavily courted by republicans to run in 2016 for the senate seat that reid now holds. but sandoval declined. reid said it would be smart for them to give sandoval a lifetime position on the supreme court. you met with sandoval. he's been mentioned as a possible supreme court justice. do you think he'd be a good supreme court justice? >> i don't pick the justices but i know if he were picked, i would support the man. he's a good person. has a great record and he's been a tremendously good governor. in spite of having to deal with some very big problems there. >> do you advise the white house to pick a moderate republican who could divide the republican party or pick a progressive that could fire up the liberal base? >> i'd

and also, manu raju's sources telling him that rubio's camp is going to dump more into tv ads. and bringing the total -- >> south carolina, senator kim scott will endorse marco rubio. that's a big deal. >> let's take a moment to listen to what marco rubio said when he took the podium tonight. >> this is the moment they said would never happen. for months, for months they told us, we had no chance. they told me i needed to wait my turn. that i needed to wait in line. but tonight, tonight, here in iowa, the people of this great state, sent a very clear message. after seven years of barack obama, we are not waiting any longer to take our country back. >> i will make one ironic note here. marco rubio, his first words on the podium, this is what -- no one said would happen. literally everyone, the last week, has said that marco rubio would finish third. the question is -- >> not that close. >> much, much closer. that's what they didn't expect. you just said, poppy. "the des moines register" poll, which is supposed to be one of the most reliable, said he would be at 15%. he was at th

and our manu raju keeping an eye on all the candidates. brian, where you are now, are we seeing a good turnout anecdotally? what are you seeing? >> reporter: wolf, a very good turnout. this is the precinct in hudson, outside the city. nashua. this is as thin a crowd as we've seen all day. it has been packed since the polls opened at 7:00 a.m. with lines out the door. we saw a line of cars to get into the parking lot that stretched six blocks down the street. very excited shorts at the hudson precinct -- voters at the hudson precinct. they check in and tell them which affiliation they want to do and if they're undeclared, they tell them which way they want to vote that way. they say they're independent, undeclared. they ask which way they want to vote, they give them a pink ballot if they want to go republican. a blue ballot if they're a democratic voter. they go into the booths over there. we've timed it. it takes the average voter here roughly 35 seconds to move in and out. doesn't take long at all. a simple process. they come in, and the

cnn's senior political reporter manu raju joining me now from klum baa south carolina. this was a solid win for the trump campaign, despite his comments about the pope and george w. bush lying. >> a big win for donald trump. who would have thought a year ago that donald trump would have driven out a man who hailed from the dynasty in republican party politics. that of course being jeb bush. what a night that really reordered the republican race and put donald trump on solid footing to win the republican nomination. he has taken two of the top first three contests, he heads to nevada for tuesday and has a very good chance coming out the winner in nevada ahead of super tuesday. what's very encouraging for the trump campaign was just how resounding a victory he had here in south carolina. there were questions about whether or not he would pull off enough support from evangelical christians who are very important in this southern state and he did absolutely that. even though ted cruz, his biggest rival in the state had been aggressively courting the same voters. last night

>> manu raju, thank you. >>> our final tracking poll before the voting begins has just come out. joining us to break it down is republicans and democrats by the numbers. our chief national correspondent john king. so, clearly donald trump still in the lead, right? more good news for him. >> more good news in the final tracking poll, anderson. the question is going to be, much as we had in iowa, does donald trump underperform or overperform his polls. trump in our final tracking poll is at 31%. that's up three. tracking polls, some people say they are not so reliable. you want to look at the trend line. trump is at 31% and 17% for rubio and ted cruz at 14 and kasich at 10 and bush at 7. the trend for donald trump is good. he's up three points over the past four days. the rubio campaign putting out our poll numbers today, distributing them to donors saying it's flat lined. that was encouraging news for the rubio campaign. senator cruz up a point. essentially flat at 14%, running third after winning iowa. the cruz campaign would be thrilled to come in third in new hampshire. what do

and manu raju, senior political correspondent for cnn. announcer: award-winning reporting and analysis, covering history as it happens, from our nation's capital. this is "washington week with gwen ifill. corporate funding for "washington week" is provided y -- >> we're committed to strong. we're committed to sure. we're committed to smart and light, secure and bold. in a world of enduring needs, the men and women of boeing are proud to build and deliver critical capabilities for those who serve and protect our nation and its allies and that's an enduring commitment. >> thousands of people came out today to run the race for retirement, so we asked them, are you completely prepared for pre -- retirement? ok. mostly prepared? could you say -- save 1% more of your income? it doesn't sound like much, but saving an additional 1% now could make a big difference over time. >> i'm going to be even better about saving. >> you can do if. it helps in the long r. >> prudential. >> additional funding is provide the by newman's own foundation, donating

manu raju, thank you. i want to take our voters live to bluffton, south carolina.uz -- donald trump is talking about ted cruz being a liar. >> i'm self-funding my campaign. i'm not controlled by the pharmaceutical companies and all of the different interests, whether it's the electrical companies or utilities. they have hundreds of them. they control the politicians because they contribute. i don't take the money. so i'm self-funding. i don't know if i get any credit for that, to be honest. costing a lot of money. costs a lot of money. but you know, the nice thing is they can't come to me and say, we gave you money. ford or general moertors or somebody. we need this, we need that because we gave you money. i'm going to do what is right for you folks. okay? >> and just for full disclosure, my wife sent a check for 25 bucks. look, one of the questions that i think everybody in here wants to know is why is the media in general afraid of a trump presidency? >> oh, i get treated so badly. i was watching fox this morning. they treat me so badly. fox treats me like worse

. >> again, with us to share their reporting and insights, julie pace, manu raju, ryan lizza and jackie kucinich of the daily beast. the republicans say this has never happened, that n part because we haven't had retirements or deaths in election year. there was a vote in 1988 of justice kennedy. the hearings had been conducted. most of the work had been done and then they had the vote in the election year. that was a democratic senate, though, giving a republican president his pick in an election year. can president obama use that against the republican senate now, saying it's not exactly analogous, but our guys gave one to you. it's your turn to step up? >> i think he'll try to some degree because it is probably the closest precedent that we have here. >> politics were a little different back then. >> they were a little bit different. you know, i do think, though, that this is interesting when you hear people like kasich and others talk about, you know, giving the american people a vote in this. giving them say. the american people had a say. they voted for barack obama twice and gave

. >> i'm joined by manu raju live in new hampshire with more on what marco rubio had to say. >> reporter: good mormg, carnin carol. indeed marco rubio has taken a more stricter stance on immigration since running for president. now he says that he does not support the bill anymore and says that we need to do other things first, secure the border first. he said there should be no amnesty. he's still open to citizenship but criminals should be deported and it's clearly an issue that should be on a campaign trail. also, there's been attacks from other folks and so-called establishment lane and chris christie says marco rubio has been too closely to his script and jeb bush who says he's had a chance to talk to cnn and defended himself from those attacks. >> boy, i think when people attack you, they don't attack someone who isn't doing well. you usually only get attacked in politics if there's a threat to someone. both jeb and chris have had a tough few days. they are saying things that later on they will probably regret. >> reporter: so clearly it shows where the focus is in this

with me now is chris freights, and manu raju. let's start with manu.e us the latest reaction to president obama not attending the funeral. >> reporter: you're hearing a fair amount of criticism from the republican side, but a lot of democrats puzzled. they are questioning why give republicans more fodder as we head into the battle. the white house press secretary was asked about it and he gave us a little bit of a sense of what the president was going to do this weekend. >> i don't have a sense of what the president's plans are for saturday. the president, obviously, believes it's important for the institution of the presidency to pay his respects to somebody who dedicated three decades of his life to the institution of the supreme court. it will be an important moment. we'll have some more details for you at about the president's plans for friday and saturday. >> reporter: now, after the funeral arrangements and funeral concluded for justice slcalia, we'll head into the fight. what we've learned over the last several days is it looks increasingly unli

his comments were very interesting to manu raju. he says we need to put this thing to bed. he wants to stop the campaign of bernie sanders before this does too much damage to the democrats. for him looking forward it's not too hard to see republican nominee donald trump. you need someone strong as the democratic nominee if you are going to take him on in november. having a drawn out battle to the convention in july does not help the democrats. >> all right. tom lobianco, we will talk to you again later today. most of the issues here in houston where the five remaining republican candidates meet head-to-head on the stage. this is before next tuesday. it all begins at 8:30 p.m. tonight only on cnn. christine, i just cannot emphasize enough how much these other candidates, the non trump candidates, need to do tonight. they need to do something to change the trajectory of the campaign. trump keeps getting win and win. >> the question about taxes doesn't dent his support. john, for many years, reporters following donald trump and his business wondered if the "e" in ceo stands fo

manu r manu raju, four different american presidents. manu, if i could begin with you, saying the president will not rush, to nominate someone, but the recess is really just a little more than a week away. the president has said that he will nominate someone this year. i just wonder, looking at this politics from where you sit, president nominating someone, is there any chance that he could get that nominee past the senate, picking someone fairly middle of the road, sheree voisin, got by partisan in the house. >> there is always a chance, jim. i'm just not sure how much of a chance at this point. when you look at the senate republican conference, it's really divided into several camps. folks who are dead set against any nominee whatsoever. those folks will not support anyone. but then you have some moderate whose are uncertain whether they'll get behind anyone. then you have real endangered blue state republicans in tough races. those folks, if they put -- they feel a lot of heat back home, and they put pressure on senator mcconnell to ha

manu raju conducted that interview. tor reid waited until now to make this endorsement? why not endorse before the caucuses in his home state of nevada when it was really kind of up in the air whether or not she would succeed there? >> harry reid wanted it to look that he was being as neutral as possible. he didn't want it to look like he was being unfairly tilted to hillary clinton. what we know is that during the nevada caucuses, harry reid was on the phone with casino executives saying they should let their casino workers come into the caucus sites, also with the powerful culinary workers union, he urged them to get more involved in the caucuses and both of those things were viewed as helping hillary clinton. but i asked him specifically about that and he said he was not doing that to help hillary clinton. he said he wanted to be neutral in this race. he also told me he had a phone conversation with bernie sanders right before he made his announcement. >> i talked to bernie sanders yesterday. it was a really wonderful

ma manu raju is live there.mehow a compliment to jeb bush. >> potentially, but also as we know, donald trump has sort of thin skin, and bjeb bush has ben going after donald trump as he's been doing for months and as he did at saturday's debate. jeb bush himself is fighting a bit of a two-front war. he's going after donald trump because there is a very strong anti-trump contingent among voters. 36 % of voters according to a recent cnn poll have ruled out trump. that is far more than any other candidate in the field. bush believes he can do okay if he peels away from some of the voters who refuse to support donald trump. he has to worry about the establishment lane that we've been talking a lot about. the other governors and rue owe. there's a feeling that they are making headway, but they need a strong showing. if they're in the single digits tuesday it's going to be hard to make the case that they are the true alternative to donald trump and that they can be the party's nominee, jeb bush, all of which raises the

let's go to manu raju.re predetecting a third place finish, they got one, and it looks like it's going to be strong. >> it looks like it's going to be better than what public polls showed. >> the des moines register had marco rubio at 15%. if they could get in the high teens or low 20s, that would be a big night. as dana was saying earlier, the trump supporters have been going toward marco rubio in the closing days. i heard from campaign officials who told me that anecdotally, when volunteers have been reaching out to voters. trump supporters are coming toward them. what does a marco rubio campaign want to argue going-forward? they're telling me they're going to make the case that this is a two or three man race going-forward. this is either between him or donald trump if ted cruz does not win this race. it's an implicit message to the governors, they're going to try to make the case, the governors in this race, jeb bush, john kasich, chris christie, they cannot win this race. they're going to make that mor

he was asked about how long this might go on by our own man manu raju. >> we've had these races go on for a long, long time. so certainly no one can say there haven't been enough debates. >> do you think there's any possibility that they could be going into a democratic convention without a consensus nominee? >> i don't know, but it would be kind of fun. >> i mean is it possible for a brokered convention? >> sure, sure. i seriously -- some of the old conventions produced some pretty good people. >> harry reid longing along for the days of estes kafaver versus stevenson there. do you think it's possible, a brokered convention on the democratic side? >> it's possible in some universe but i think it's very unlikely. the clinton campaign expects to have this wrapped up in march. the sanders campaign has the benefit of small dollar fund-raising and the potential to do well in caucus states. but in big states with diverse populations, i think that will favor the clinton campaign and favor it pretty quickly. >> s.e., i want to play a little bit more of the ted cruz ad that is playing in sout

manu raju. >>> john kasich told jamie gangel he'd neertither be a pin cushion nor marshmallow if he came under attack from donald trump. he's made a name for himself without too much of this kind of thing. >> it is no surprise that donald is throwing yet another temper tantrum or if you like yet another trumpertantrum. >> he's a nasty guy. >> donald trump say jerk. >> it's time to give up, jeb. >> he can't negotiate his way out of a paper bag. >> the senate, what is it like a french work week? >> this clown, marco rubio. >> he's like a kid. shouldn't be running. >> jeb, low energy jeb bush. you fall asleep looking at him. >> you started off all the years. you're moving over further and further. pretty soon you'll be off the end. >> my girls are 5 and 7. and caroline and kathryn are better behaved. >> just a small sampling of tough talk over the last couple of months. so far it's yielding success for donald trump which raises the question, can governor kasich be just as successful by doing the opposite? gary tuchman reports. >> reporter: at john kasich's first campaign stop after his seco

as cnn's manu raju reports the white house has no intentions of honoring that request. >> reporter: presidentose the replacement to justice scalia. that doesn't mean the battle lines will be drawn in the senate. mitch mcconnell decides the schedule over who is nominated on and confirmed. decided the next president should nominate, not the current president. the current president did not listen to senator mcconnell and planning to move forward. now the question for the republicans is will they allow a vote on the floor of the senate and the senate judiciary committee to confirm or deny the supreme court justice. this is something they have not fully decided yet because senator mcconnell wants to take the temperature of his conference. you have various camping forming. republicans are dead set against any nominee confirmed right now. you have moderates who are uncertain. you have the most influential group. members of the senate republican conference up for re-election in blue states and purple states. at the end of the day, those members and how they deal with it will determine whether republi

manu raju is waiting for trump. >> he's doing something unusual behind me. he's addressing voters in a town hall, getting questions from voters. it's common among candidates doing this in this state that's known for its retail politics, but it's something that donald trump is not known for. he's been doing huge rallies instead. he'll have one later today. he increasingly is getting into a war of words with one of his rivals j jeb bush. he took direct aim at him when talking to voters earlier today. >> he's a stiff, jeb bush. here's a guy, honestly, if you weren't in government, if he weren't in government, you wouldn't hire him to do anything. okay? you wouldn't hire him. if you had a company, you wouldn't hire him. he's on every show. donald trump said that and that, and then he says said, i'm the only one taking on donald trump. i'm not afraid of donald trump. he's like a child. he's like a spoiled child. he spent $110 million on a campaign, and he's nowhere. >> reporter: really, really rough words there from donald trump. but jeb bush didn't hold back his

cnn's senior political reporter manu raju joins us from south carolina. the trump campaign must be motivated ae but move to the south on march 1st. >> a very encouraging victory here. this is ha man who has never run for office before. and taking two of the first three primary states is such a resounding manner really gives him a head of steam into nevada where he's a heavy favorite to win the caucuses there on tuesday ahead of the march 1st super tuesday states and a lot of southern states in that march 1st primary. what was very encouraging for the trump campaign was how well we did in a state that has dominated by evangelical voters. his main rival in the state ted cruz had aggressively courted those voters and really at one point was seen as the possible -- seen as possible favorite in this state. but donald trump did incredibly well with those voters all across south carolina. and when he addressed supporters he did not hold back his excitement. >> i love you all. again, south carolina we will never forget you. we will never forget you. we will never

. >> reporter: senate minority leader harry he'd telling cnn's machi manu raju he's all in for the secretaryf state. >> she's a very quick learner. all you need to do is look what happened after 9/11. gee, did she do a good job. >> reporter: her victory in saturday's nevada caucuses and could give the front-runner a boost heading into super tuesday when democrats vote in 11 states. bernie sanders is hitting the road, rallying supporters in oklahoma and missouri. clinton is keeping her focus on the next state on the calendar, south carolina, where she holds a big lead in the polls. democrats in the palmetto state will cast their ballots on saturday. and while sanders splits his focus with other states, he's not conceding the first in the south primary to his rival. >> we're not writing off south carolina. you all know on march 1st there are a dozen states holding elections. and the nature of the world is that we've got to go out. >> reporter: south carolina played host to cnn's town hall tuesday night providing both cand dhidates an opportunity to make their case to african-american voters wh

manu raju is outfront. >> reporter: donald trump believes there should be no questioning of his staunchly pro-israel view. >> we will protect israel totally. >> reporter: but a deeper look at his record shows his relationship is much more complicated than he lets on. trump abruptly canceled a trip to israel last year after benjamin netanyahu criticized his plan to ban muslims from entering the united states. at last night's debate he came under fire after asserting he remain neutral in the israeli-palestinian conflict nrd in order to be a fair arbiter. >> this is another area on which donald agrees with hillary clinton and on which i disagree with them both strongly. >> reporter: trump defend his position. >> i may not be successful in doing it. it's probably the toughest negotiation anywhere in the world of any kind, okay, but it doesn't help if i start saying i am very pro-israel, very pro. more than anything on this stage. but it doesn't do any good to start demeaning the neighbors. >> then the gloves came off. >> the palestinians are not a real estate deal, donald. they're not a real

and our manu raju keeping an eye on all the candidates.ou are now, are we seeing a good turnout anecdotally? what are you seeing? >> reporter: wolf, a very good turnout. this is the precinct in hudson, outside the city. nashua. this is as thin a crowd as w

with us to share the reporting and insights, julie pace, cnn's m manu raju and cnn's nia-malika hendersonwe brace for a very consequential week ahead. one reason chris christie, for example, has endorsed donald trump on friday is he believes the gop race is all but over and that trump will romp to a huge delegate lead after 11 super tuesday contests. >> america wants strong, tough, leadership. america's tired of being walked on. america is tired of being treated second class around the world. we need a first-class president, and we're going to have it in donald trump. >> and after hillary clinton's giant victory in south carolina last night, she, too, can open up a big delegate lead tuesday if she carries her margin with african-american voters into super tuesday. >> despite what you hear, we don't need to make america great again. america has never stopped being great. but we do need to make america whole again. instead of building walls, we need to be tearing down barriers. >> let's start with the democratic race there. fresh results from south carolina. they tell us a number of things.

our senior political reporter manu raju is live also, and a arian a devogue. >> it could be any timehis term. this is president's day. presidents get four year terms. it's totally within his rights and some would say his only dpagss to go ahead and put up a nominee. the question is just what republicans on capitol hill are going to do with that since they control the senate. >> well, i'll pose that question to manu. republicans are likely to block any nominee and they can delay if they want to because they control the senate. >> absolutely. that's what mitch mcconnell signalled on saturday. he stated the next president should nominate the replacement, but he did not say that he would deny a vote at all costs. that's still a question. it's unlikely a vote will happen. he's not explicitly said so. the senate judiciary committee would have the first crack at taking up the nomination, and the chairman of that committee, said the next president should nominate the next supreme justice, but he has not said if he would not hold any hearings or whether there would be a vote in the committee.

if they want it to be this way, manu raju. this is about politics. not the law per se.ence. >> let's look at the republican conference writ large. 54 republican senators. very few moderates. a handful of senators in very difficult reelection races. right now two of those 54 m members are calling for some consideration. the rest of the republican kmpx, most are taking a hard line. even other republican senators in tough races. rob portman of ohio told us yesterd yesterday. the number two republican yesterday told me no. we shouldn't move forward with hearings at all. so collins and kirk are decidedly in the minority and if you are democrats you are hoping that as there is a nominee more fissures will show they can bang the drum and republicans will cave. but right now the republican leadership is holding a firm line. >> this is one of those cases jeffrey. it is not about whether or not you have the right to do it. it is whether or not it is right to do it. and the republicans say hey what are you looking at us like we're inventing something here what about what, what abo

manu raju is with the rubio campaign. how confident is rubio's camp feeling as we head into the last couple of hours of voting? >> reporter: i can tell you they're confident they'll end up in the top tier of candidates but not as confident as they were coming out of iowa that they would have been perhaps number two right behind donald trump and it's longerly because of this relentless media coverage after that debate performance in which marco rubio repeated the same line repeatedly going after barack obama and his critics said, look, this is a candidate who will fall under the spotlight. that's something that has potentially tripped up marco rubio heading into the final days. now, i can tell you that the rubio campaign no matter what happens here still feels pretty confident going into south carolina. they have spent a lot of money on tv. they expect to at least of a good showing tonight, be in the top tier so they can get enough delegates to say, look, we can still become the nominee because at the end of the day this i

manu raju, thank you very much. >>> i want to bring in ron brown.tanding out here in the cold with me. i want to start with donald trump. holding relatively steady. maybe down a very slight amount from where he was before iowa. >> right. >> reporter: why is new hampshire a different, maybe better state for donald trump? >> two words, fewer evangelicals. ted cruz won iowa the same way rick santorum and mike huckabee did in '12 and '08. he won evangelical voters but he lost those that were not evangelical. he can expand beyond the base as we go forward. new hampshire is a state that is much more secular, it is divided between the blue collar and the white collar. the fact is donald trump even in iowa won those blue collar voters who are not evangelicals. he is leading among them again today in new hampshire. he can consolidate that base. that's a big, strong foundation to go forward. >> reporter: he has that link more or less on his own, more on his own than the others are. >> yes. >> reporter: if we put up a poll on the race in general, donald trump

manu raju with more. >> marco rubio was hear this morning, greeting voters, feeling positive about last iowa. the polls going into last night had him about 15% of the vote. he did much better than that almost beating trump, exceeding expectations. today he's making the argument about electability. saying only he's electable is the big argument. and he's been very bullish about his chances as he talked about last night. >> we have taken the first step. but an important step. towards winning this election. if i am our nominee. and i will be our nominee thanks to what you have done here in this great state. when i am our nominee we are going to unify this party and we are going to unify the conservative movement. when i am our nominee we are going to grow the conservative movement. we are going to take our message to the people who are struggling paycheck to paycheck. to the students living under the burden of student loans. to the families struggling to raise their children with the right values, we will take our message to them. and we will bring them to our side. >> of course he's got t

joining us, jamie gangel, our senior political reporter manu raju and jeffrey toobin. jamie, the gop has a risk if they get too tough and simply avoid any hearings and simply avoid doing anything, just delay, delay, delay. >> first of all, there's just the point of seeming to be completely lying in the sand, not willing to compromise. but here's something. what if the next president is hillary clinton or bernie sanders? will they be any happier with that appointment than now? they had an opportunity here, maybe i am being a cock-eyed optimist to pressure the white house into perhaps coming up with a candidate that would be more palatable to them. they're not even giving that the chance with this kind of rhetoric. >> most people are working, manu, and you know the hill well, on the assumption that the rips would use the filibuster to prevent even a final vote, if you will, an up or down simple majority. that means you need 60 votes. the democrats have 46. so they would need 14 more which right now seems highly, highly unlikely. >> it's a pretty heavy lift if you look at

senate democratic leader harry reid telling manu raju he supports hillary clinton.d lead going forward and going to be on the south carolina trail all day today alisyn talking about breaking down barriers. that is going to be huge as she talks to the african american community. bernie sanders however saying that he will be back in south carolina on friday. and that they have not written off that state yet. alisyn. >> chris, i know it's great that a horn section follows you around to announce the pageantry of your live shot but it does make it harder for you. thanks so much for the update from that event. >>> we're three days from another big event, the oscars. and the drama is building towards the 88th academy awards. will leonardo dicaprio finally win his first oscar? it is his first nomination and we'll see if the his role in the revenant scores him the golden statue. and it could make for the director. no director has ever had back-to-back best picture wins. everyone will be watching the host chris rock to see how he addresses criticism over the lack of diversity

joining me is mark preston and political recorder manu raju.what will the senate do. it seems to me mitch mcconnell made crystal clear what the senate will do. that is nothing. they will not entertain the notion of the president nominating someone to replace justice scalia. >> mcconnell has not ruled that out yet. he does not weigh in on whether or not allow a vote on the senate floor. senate judiciary committee grassley has not ruled out having a hearing and a vote even though he wants the next president to actual nominate someone. now, we do think it is very up likely there will be votes on the floor and in the committee. but that has not been something they have ruled out yet. why? mcconnell has not taken the full temperature of his conference. there are a number of republican senators who are in very tight reelection races, particularly in blue and purr pep states. if they start feeling a lot of pressure and demand a vote that could potentially change the calculation. but as we know, john, it will be hard for the white house to get anybody

manu raju, cnn. >>> i want to bring in jeffrey toobin and ron brownstein. thanks for being with us. the appel as court. president obama admits sort of he has been part of the problem the last 10 years in washington. when he was in the senate, he talked about the idea of standing in the way of samuel alito becoming supreme court justice. but now he says it's too much too far. >> and one back drop to all of this is that republicans have been more motivated on legal issues on judicial nominations than democrats have been. then senator obama talked about a filibuster against samuel alito they could only muster 24 senators which is useless in filibuster terms. but republicans are much more united on trying to stop president obama's nomination. and i think that tells you something about the issue on both sides. >> jeffrey toobin is saying democrats don't have the stomach or perhaps another part of the anatomy to fight the fight when it can pls to supreme court justices going forward. one of the bets you hear democrats maying right now is, oh, this will be a big issue. this will help democ