language. >> joining us with the newly released newt gingrich freddie mac contract in hand, is michael isikoff. mr. isikoff, thank you for joining us. >> great to be with you, rachel. >> first, give us a sense of what this document is. what it describes, and who has released it. >> center for health transformation, an arm of the gingrich group, which is the consulting firm founded by newt gingrich that had the contract with freddie mac released it today, tonight, just a couple hours before the nbc news debate and this is in response to the sort of mounting drumbeat from the romney campaign saying show us what you did for freddie mac, show us your contract, show us everything you've got. and at the same time gingrich has been pressing for release of romney's tax returns, so in order to, i think, to sort of basically help support gingrich's drumbeat for disclosure by romney, he preemptively or had his former firm release the contract. i have to say it raises more questions than it answers. first of all, it provides no light on what gingrich actually did for freddie mac. the contract itself provi

language. >> joining us with the newly released newt gingrich freddie mac contract in hand, is michael isikoff. mr. isikoff, thank you for joining us. >> great to be with you, rachel. >> first, give us a sense of what this document is. what it describes, and who has released it. >> center for health transformation, an arm of the gingrich group, which is the consulting firm founded by newt gingrich that had the contract with freddie mac released it today, tonight, just a couple hours before the nbc news debate and this is in response to the sort of mounting drumbeat from the romney campaign saying show us what you did for freddie mac, show us your contract, show us everything you've got. and at the same time gingrich has been pressing for release of romney's tax returns, so in order to, i think, to sort of basically help support gingrich's drumbaeat for disclosure by romney, he preemptively or had his former firm release the contract. i have to say it raises more questions than it answers. first of all, it provides no light on what gingrich actually did for freddie mac. the contract itself prov

nbc's michael isikoff reporting today that mitt romney had more money stashed away in offshore accounts than he had previously disclosed. so mr. romney is now having to go back and change what he declared when he became a candidate. both this time and from the 2008 race. he's having to change his candidate disclosures to reflect this previously hidden offshore money that has now been found. joining us now with some new reporting on mitt romney's overseas investments is nbc news national investigative correspondent, michael isikoff, who will absolutely forgive me the fact that i'm interviewing him in a fake space suit. mike, thanks. >> i'm honored. this is the first time i've ever had a chance to report to a space woman. so it's really good to be with you. >> we come in peace. >> yes. some pretty interesting developments. you know, the romney campaign had been thrown on the defensive by those gingrich super pac attack ads on bain capital and his wealth and was forced to make this big disclosure this week of his tax returns, months before they wanted to. and so, of course, everybody is st

it seems to me, michael isikoff, this is going the message out of iowa.e third party or super pacs, where you don't put the candidate's name on it, don't put the contributors' name on it, the money is unlimited, and you can destroy your opponent if you have enough rich friends, legal, right? >> right. this is the message of this campaign. two figures really leap out after seeing those ads. $2.8 million, nearly $3 million. that was how much was spent on tv ads by restore our future, the super pac. $1.5 million, that was spent by the romney campaign. so the super pac, the romney super pac, spends nearly twice as much as the actual presidential campaign of the candidate himself. so that tells you a lot about the direction of this campaign, the roll of these super pacs, how they are going to be the dominant force in this presidential election. >> of course, the great irony is the people on the right, like gingrich, basically supported that court decision. they thought it was free speech, money is speech, as they see it. and it could have destroyed his campaig

michael isikoff had a story talking point fact newt gingrich has his own super pac and that super pac has been in defense to his desire to not go negative, been doing mostly positive ads and michael isikoff said we'll turn things around so we could see from that super pac coming into new hampshire we could see those negative ads start to flow. all right. so the story people aren't talking about and it's understandable because there was nothing on the line, the democrats had a caucus tonight, as well. and i was struck by the fact that the republican caucus north of 100,000 or so. the democratic caucus had 25,000 people turn out. that's not 100,000 but that's 25,000 people in the middle of winter in iowa for no discernible reason in the fact there's nothing at stake. the president will be the nominated party and there were pictures from some of the obama organizers of packed rooms and i know that i should say full disclosure of my brother works for the campaign in nevada and i know from him and other peoples, they are staging this shadow organizing enterprise. there was a piece in "the

he was ve correspondent michael isikoff joining from us washington bureau. another good morning to you, michael. good day rather. >> good morning. good afternoon. >> so tell me, you spent so much time there on that campus investigating everything, the investigation following all the allegations of child sex abuse from members of his football staff. talk to me about the joe paterno you uncovered and the reaction of students and people on that campus. >> well, first of all, one of the really striking things having been there throughout the whole jerry sandusky scandal is just how much support and irreverence there was fordown and among the students and faculty. many of whom were so stunned by the clis closures in the scandal because it didn't match with the joe paterno they knew, somebody that had high academic standards and cared about the institution of penn state as well as winning football games. in fact, he was sort of a -- he was an icon. not just because the most winning football coach in history in midge or college football history but because amid all

. >> reporter: tonight, nbc's michael isikoff is reporting mitt romney is amending his financial disclosure forms to include tax return information that did not initially get put in those forms from overseas investments. >> ron mott from florida tonight. thanks. now we turn to those exclusive new numbers on where this race stands nationally in our nbc news/wall street journal poll. we turn to our political director chuck todd in our d.c. bureau. gingrich seems to be winning over the republic at-large in the party right now. >> reporter: at least republicans nationally. we matched them up in a two-way race with mitt romney. his lead actually grows to 52/39. let me explain why he does it. his advantages are among the core of the republican party. among conservatives that call themselves very conservative, he leads by 39 points. among those folks who call themselves southerners, it's 37. tea partiers, 35-point lead. our poll shows if gingrich is the nominee, he's got a huge hill and perhaps mountain to climb to match up against president obama. he trails 55-37, an 18-point gap. even rick santo

nbc news investigative reporter michael isikoff has more on what the role of those ads has been.vening, rachel. look, one of the biggest stories out of tonight's iowa caucuses the power of the attack ads funded by so-called super pacs. the best example, the pro-romney super pac called restore our future. a figure to keep in mind, 2.8 million. that's how much restore our future spent on tv ads in iowa, and it's actually nearly twice as much as the 1.5 million spent by romney's own presidential campaign, and almost all of that super pac ad money has gone for hash attacks against newt gingrich like these. >> newt has more baggage than the airlines. he was fined $300,000 for ethics violations and took $1.6 million from freddie mac. >> i made a big mistake in the spring. >> haven't we had enough mistakes? restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> how much of an impact did these ads have? look at this. on december 4th gingrich is number one in iowa with 26% in the polls. that's the -- that very week the super pac ad blitz girns and by the end of the month, n

nbc's michael isikoff more with mitt romney's plans for south carolina. mr. isikoff, what do you have for us? >> actually, just in the last couple of days, starting before tonight's returns, but continuing, the romney super pac has bought up nearly $6 million in ad buys in both south carolina and florida. that exceeds that $3.4 million that the gingrich super pac has bought up that we were talking about earlier. and what it really does underscore is the romney folks are trying to close the deal right now. below away their opponents by the end of the month, and they've got the financial muscle to do it. we've all been talking about sheldon adeleson, who gave that donation to the gingrich super pac. the romney super pac is flush with cash. it's become quite the financial juggernaut making a major difference in this race. >> michael isikoff, thank. let's go now to chris matthews in manchester, new hampshire. he's now with john harwood. >> john's with us now. john, you were talking about before we came on here about santorum. he's kind of the mystery man now. he d

here is michael isikoff. >> reporter: legendary penn state coach joe paterno was abruptly fired last november in the wake of the jerry sandusky sex abuse scandal, setting off a near riot by the penn state students. now the 85-year-old paterno speaks for the first time about the scandal in an interview with "the washington post." >> and then i called in my superiors and i said, hey, we've got a problem, i think. old you guys look into it. i had never had to deal with something like that. i didn't feel adequate. >> reporter: paterno said he was confused in 2002 when mike mcqueary first told him he had seen sandusky fondling a young boy in the penn state locker room the night before. he reported this to tim curley, but acknowledges he never followed up. i didn't know exactly how to handle it he tells the post. in hindsight i wish i had done more. he said he had no inkling about any allegations about sandusky prior to that time. and was never told about a 1998 police investigation of him. his relationship with sandusky was professional, not social, he says. sources close to paterno say h

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nbc's national investigative correspondent michael isikoff is joining us from the washington bureau.own as the winningest coach in college football. good morning. >> good morning, alex. just this morning at 10:17, the family issued a statement announcing that joe paterno had passed away. his loss leaves a void in our lives that will never be filled. he died as he lived. he thought hard until the end. stayed positive, thought only of others and constantly reminded everyone of how blessed his life had been. paterno had -- the family announced back in november just after the jerry sandusky story broke that he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. joe paterno did not speak for the next two months then just a week ago when this looked like things were going downhill, he gave his only interview on the subject to sally jenkins of the washington post. it was clear he was suffering then. he was in a wheelchair from having broken his pelvis. he was undergoing radiation and chemotherapy. he was frail and weak. but he did give his perspective on the scandal that has -- did tarnish his legacy and

let's get the if the details from michael isikoff.he reasons there's grumblings among his financial supporters. >> the optics were not very good. on the very day he was being pounded over the 15% tax rate he pays, he flies to new york for this big gala fund-raiser, and then goes to the park avenue apartment of steve shwarzman who helped put that event together. he is the chairman of the biggest private ecity fund in the country, blacktone group, that has lobbied in washington to maintain the 15% tax rates on private equity managers, the very one that mitt romney has benefited over the years. this was an event not on the romney public schedule, about 40 wall street kingpins, other hedge fund billionaires like john paulson and private equity moguls were attending. this is a core constituency for romney for his financial contributions, but it's not one he wants to have publicly out there displayed precisely at this moment when there's this growing controversy and debate about his tax returns. >> without a doubt. michael, thank you so muc

he's been pouring through the documents with michael isikoff. we have the rest of the mega panel with us. karen and susan. we don't have all the information until midnight. what do we have? what do we know? anything about the romney money? >> no. we don't. they are waiting until the last minute to file the stuff. >> they are going to wait until midnight? >> yeah. i think they think the new cycle ends tonight at midnight. we won't realize that our country is being bought. it's kind of embarrassing. romney gave a good indicator about this. he said today that all the negative ads that he and his outside groups have been running for him have served him well. >> they have through the accumulation of power. >> served him well. and i think at our expense. so we don't have a lot of data. >> what do we know? anything other than huntsman? we know sheldon adelson is funding gingrich. you have a casino billionaire decide he's going to fund newt gingrich and just basically hijack the whole apparatus to that end. we just found out that huntsman's money from h

>> we are hearing, and this is reporting by michael isikoff and others and people close to the gingrich they are really preparing to fight back. newt gingrich told us on msnbc today he was going to fight back and mitt romney would have a target on his back. they realize that they really made a mistake, a tactical mistake in not fighting back against that romney supporting super pac which issued a barrage of really nasty campaign ads. the negative advertising here, there were $17 million of advertising. nearly half of it negative. a lot of it directed against newt gingrich. so he has decided to fight back. we hear that there is going to be in the new hampshire union leader a full page ad describing him as the only reagan conservative and that his super pac is going to go on the air with really tough ads against romney. first of all targeting romney on abortion policies and on gun laws. now, it remains to be seen whether they have the money to really compete. they had raised about $9 million in the last quarter and spent a lot of it in iowa. whether they have the money to really go up aga

michael isikoff has more. good morning. >> reporter: good morning. the past two months joe paterno kept his silence while watching his legacy tarnished by the penn state sex abuse scandal. he now wants to give his side of the story. 85-year-old joe paterno, frail and battling lung cancer, is speaking out for the first time about the events that led to his firing aspen state's football coach. >> and then i call mid superiors and i said, hey, we got a problem i think. woul you guys look into it? because i didn't know. you know, i had never had to deal with something like that and i didn't feel adequate. >> reporter: in an interview with the washington post paterno said he was confused what to do when an upset mike mcqueary first told him he had seen long-time defensive coach jerry sandusky fondling a young boy in the penn state locker room the night before. paterno reported the incident to athletic director tim curley but acknowledges he never followed up and according to investigators sandusky's child abuse continued for six more years. i didn't know

nbc's national investigative correspondent michael isikoff says there is a man with deep pockets who helped him. >> reporter: good morning. newt gingrich may owe much of his political resurrection to a friend. a las vegas casino mogul whose big money is causing big controversy. multi billionaire sheldon adelson and his wife are the money behind newt gingrich giving $10 million to the super pac, bank rolling attack ads against mitt romney. >> how can we trust him? >> reporter: it's the biggest cash infusion yet in the race and it revived gingrich's candidacy when he needed it most. >> the money before south carolina enabled us to answer attack ads run against speaker gingrich. >> reporter: adelson made his fortune from a gambling empire stretching from the vegas strip to asia. he's anti-union, a supporter of of israel and wants president obama out of the white house. he was infuriated when obama criticized tourists who blow cash in vegas. >> he's the president of the united states. he shouldn't be belittling any city or part of the country. >> reporter: adelson's political consultant

joining us on the birthday of citizens united is nbc's michael isikoff from washington. >> yes, look,ory tonight is newt gingrich's comeback, one big reason is that super pac winning our future, the gingrich super pac -- >> that's some sort of conspiracy, the with isikoff's microphone. am i trending on twitter yet. we're going to be able to, can we go back to mike right now, do we have it fixed? okay. we can't start that, okay. on the subject of the super pacs, what was fascinating to me about the super pac spending is in new hampshire, almost all of the negative ads were against newt gingrich. in south carolina it was evenly split between newt gingrich and mitt romney. as much as everybody complains about the super pacs and everybody complains about negative advertising, i don't know of any more powerful force in politics than the negative ad. does the negative ad spending against romney in south carolina, partly explain what happened in terms of his collapsing numbers? or, lawrence you're arguing almost all the debates? >> i wasn't, certainly the debates were a factor. when you look