The Rachel Maddow Show, Transcript 03/20/14

CHRIS HAYES, "ALL IN" HOST: THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW starts right now. Good evening, Rachel. RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: Good evening, Chris. Thank you. And thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. When MSNBC first hired me to do this TV show, I was working at the time at Air America Radio. It was a liberal talk radio network founded in 2004, and you might have heard, it did not survive. But amid all of the myriad ways that Air America Radio lost money, one of the ways that we actually made money was by doing a cruise for Air America listeners. Now, we did not invent this idea for fund-raising, but it`s a fairly straightforward idea. Banking on the fact that people who listen to liberal talk radio might like to meet other people who also listen to liberal talk radio and they might like to also spend time with the personalities who they listen to on talk radio. You then market to those folks the opportunity to pay to take a cruise where they get to hear talks by their favorite radio personalities and have meals with them and do events with them, and in the process, they also get to meet a lot of other people who have the same interests that they do, at least in radio. So, Air America did a bunch of those. I think I went on two of them, but I can`t remember, it might be three. Lots of other similar media outlets do the same thing. "The Nation" magazine, they do a cruise as a fund-raiser. I`ve heard it`s great, actually. "The Nation" is obviously just as liberal as Air America Radio was. But it`s not just a liberal thing. Actually the pioneers of this are on the right. "The National Review," that conservative magazine, and also the "Weekly Standard," they`ve done these cruises as fund-raisers for those publications forever. And in June, 2007, one of those fund-raising cruises for the "Weekly Standard" went to Alaska. And on the day that their cruise ship, the "Holland America Oosterdam," on the day this lovely ship docked at Juneau at the Alaska state capital, some of the people from the "Weekly Standard" cruise fund-raiser thing, some of the people from the magazine got off that ship and went into town. Michael Gerson, who had been chief speechwriter for President George W. Bush, Fred Barnes, who is a talk show host at the FOX News Channel and also executive editor of the magazine. Also the founder and editor of the "Weekly Standard," a man named Bill Kristol, along with their wives and some of their other relatives. Those three guys from the "Weekly Standard" got off of the cruise, got off of the "Weekly Standard" fundraising cruise, and they went ashore in Juneau and they had what the "New Yorker" magazine later reported to be an elaborate, delicious, ultimately very important long lunch. Halibut cheeks were involved apparently. At that fancy lunch and then at a follow-up sightseeing trip by helicopter to a goldmine, those writers for the "Weekly Standard" and particularly Bill Kristol from the "Weekly Standard," they basically fell in love, fell in political love, at least, with the governor of Alaska at the time who hosted them for that lunch and gone with them to the gold mine, a woman named Sarah Palin. That was June 2007. By July 2007, the "Weekly Standard" had already started writing up what ended up a long series of articles praising this then little known Alaska governor as essentially the conservative who was going to save the election. Michael Gerson, the Bush speechwriter, he called Sarah Palin, quote, "a mix of Annie Oakley and Joan of Arc." Within just a few weeks of that luncheon, Bill Kristol was lobbying in an almost over the top way on TV, on the Sunday morning shows, he was lobbying overtly that John McCain ought to pick this, quote, "fantastic Alaska governor to be his vice presidential running mate for the presidential election in 2008. At this point, the Republican nomination was basically sawed up. John McCain had it in the bag. It was still contested between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on the Democratic side. That, however, was not a strategic hurdle for Bill Kristol. He thought Sarah Palin would be the ideal candidate to beat either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. He said, he explained, that Sarah Palin, see, she could beat Barack Obama at basketball and by virtue of her gender, she could steal woman voters who might otherwise be inclined to vote for Hillary Clinton as a historic first woman for president kind of thing. Sarah Palin was perfect. There was no way that John McCain could lose as long as he picked Sarah Palin. Bill Kristol is just as famous, if maybe not just as influential, now as he was back then. But now part of the reason that Mr. Kristol is still so famous is because he`s become kind of an Internet me that stands for guy who is wrong about everything. If you have to boil down the concept of bad punditry, of somebody who`s famous for getting things wrong, the little avatar you`d end up with, the little smiley emoticon you would come up with, would be this guy. If you type "Bill Kristol wrong" into Google, Google suggests Bill Kristol wrong again, Bill Kristol wrong everything, Bill Kristol always wrong. Very quickly, you get to an old BlogSpot page advancing a formal theory that Bill Kristol is always wrong. The Web site is billkristoltheory.blogspot.com. Last summer the media criticism Web site Mediaite finding the vehicle for them summarizing things Bill Kristol has famously been wrong about was to put together a "Bill Kristol is wrong" slide show. Bill Kristol said that Nancy Pelosi had disastrously miscalculated by coming out against the Iraq war, coming out strongly against the Iraq war before the 2006 election. He said because of that terrible miscalculation by Nancy Pelosi, there was no chance that the Democrats would win the House in 2006. Democrats not only won the House in 2006 making Nancy Pelosi speaker, they also won the Senate that year. That same year, Bill Kristol was promoting Sarah Palin as the way the Republicans could win the White House, he also said that Barack Obama, quote, "is not going to beat Hillary Clinton in a single Democratic primary. I will predict that right now." In fact, Barack Obama beat Hillary Clinton 19 different times in primaries, plus all the caucuses and he did, in fact, win the primary overall and became the nominee. Once Barack Obama became president, Bill Kristol said he knew who Barack Obama was going to pick as his first nominee for the Supreme Court. He said he had it on good authority. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BILL KRISTOL, WEEKLY STANDARD: If he has made up his mind, and I think it`s going to be Jennifer Granholm, the governor of Michigan. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: Less than a week later, President Obama did nominate his first Supreme Court nominee. It was not Jennifer Granholm, governor of Michigan. When President Obama was running for re-election in 2012, Bill Kristol announced to the world his exclusive news that Rudy Giuliani, once again, was running for president. Rudy is running, "I`m told by reliable sources that Rudy Giuliani intends to run for the GOP nomination for president in 2012. Rudy Giuliani was just about to declare he was in the running for 2012." Rudy Giuliani did not run for president in 2012. Bill Kristol is amazing. Bill Kristol once went on the "Larry King Show" which used to be on CNN and he told Larry King that what America was going through right in that moment was the high water mark of the gay rights movement. That there would never be further achievements in gay rights in America, that what they were living through right then was the high water mark for gay rights. He said that in 1993. Anything happen since then? Who am I? Oh, wait. Bill Kristol is amazing. Bill Kristol has been amazing for a very long time. Obviously, there`s nothing fatal about making bad predictions concerning politics. I`ve done lots of it. Any of us who talk about politics for a living, are dumb enough to be lured into making predictions, we`re going to get it wrong sometimes. Not as often as Bill Kristol gets it wrong. Everybody gets it wrong sometimes. And it usually doesn`t make that much difference in the world. But Bill Kristol is very frequently wrong, not just about politics but something he believes he`s an expert on, and that is the issue of war. This week is the anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. That was 11 years ago this week. It was a war that lasted more than 8 1/2 years. It was a war that Bill Kristol confidently predicted would last two months, max. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) KRISTOL: Whatever else you can say about this war, let me make one point. George Bush is not fighting this like Vietnam. Whatever -- we don`t need to refight the whole history of Vietnam. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Saddam maybe, that`s the danger of Saddam -- KRISTOL: It`s not going to happen. This is going to be a two-month war, not an eight-year war. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: This is going to be a two-month war, he says there, not an eight-year war. In fact, it was an 8 1/2-year-long war but Bill Kristol said it would be a matter of weeks. Bill Kristol also said it would only cost $100 million to have that war in Iraq. Try multiplying that by a lot. He said that Saddam Hussein has got weapons of mass destruction. Saddam was, quote, "past the finish line in developing nuclear weapons." Bill Kristol said when American troops freed the people of Iraq, that would make us respected in the Arab world. On March 1st, 2003, Bill Kristol said, quote, "Very few wars in American history were prepared better or more thoroughly than this war by this president." Six weeks later, he declared that war was already over with. He said in April of 2003, "The first two battles of this new era are now over. The battles of Afghanistan and Iraq have been won decisively." April 2003, he said that. You ever wonder why it occurred to the George W. Bush White House to have the president of the United States put on that flight suit and declare mission accomplished in Iraq? Well, three days before George W. Bush did that, Bill Kristol had declared mission accomplished in the pages of the "Weekly Standard." Said it was done, the war was over, in April 2003. Also pick Palin, pick Sarah Palin, you`ll definitely win. In punditry, it may not be possible to overdose on wrong. We may have an infinite capacity for wrong, right? If so, Bill Kristol is proving that by never going away. And he hasn`t gone away. Right now, he`s still a pundit. Still running the "Weekly Standard." Right now as Republicans and critics of the president are looking for a political advantage against President Obama, specifically on the issue of Russia and Russia`s aggression in Ukraine, there`s Bill Kristol right now trying to sharpen up the sort of vague and non-specific Republican criticism that President Obama isn`t being tough enough. He`s trying to put a point on that, get them to get to the point by suggesting it might be a good time now for another war. Mr. Kristol this week declaring war-weariness as an excuse. He leads his column by saying "Are Americans today war-weary? Sure." That`s literally how he says it. Sure. Iraq and Afghanistan wars have been frustrating and tiring. Yes. How did we get into those wars, anyway? But if the American public is weary of those early wars, Bill Kristol says that is a curable condition. Mr. Kristol says, "The idol of war- weariness can be challenged. A war-weary public can be awakened and rallied. All that`s needed is the rallying." Yes, land war with standing armies in the Crimea? Anybody ever try that before? How did that work out? The neocon armchair generals like Bill Kristol and the John McCain hawks of Washington, they have not gone anywhere since the last time they got us to start a war, right? They were not able to get President Obama to continue the war in Iraq for longer than he did. They were not able to get President Obama to put boots on the ground in Libya, they were not able to get President Obama to open up an American front in the war in Syria. But right now in Washington, President Obama is making it clear that they`re also not going to be able to get him to start an American war with Russia over Ukraine or anything else. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MARK MULLEN: Message to troops about whether the use of force, militarily in Ukraine, is possible. BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We are not going to be getting into a military excursion in Ukraine. Even the Ukrainians would acknowledge that, you know, for us to engage Russia militarily would not be appropriate and wouldn`t be good for Ukraine, either. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: President Obama speaking last night to NBC 7 in San Diego. Today, President Obama announced essentially a cranking up of what he is doing instead of war, which as of today is a third escalation of sanctions. The first one was announced last week. That was a list of travel bans for some Russian and Crimean officials. The second one was earlier this week, the list of seven Russian officials and four Crimean officials who were subject not only to travel bans but also to having their financial assets frozen. And now at the time that President Obama announced that second cranking up of sanctions, the president also announced that he`d signed an executive order giving himself further authority to impose even deeper sanctions on more people and on some Russian financial and economic interests. Today, that executive order was put to good use when the president took a third shot at it, a third escalation of the sanctions. The president took to the South Lawn of the White House this morning to announce a new blacklist, essentially, of a wide assortment of politically connected Russian zillionaires. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) OBAMA: The United States is today moving as we said we would to impose additional costs on Russia. We`re imposing sanctions on more senior officials of the Russian government. In addition, we are today sanctioning a number of other individuals with substantial resources and influence who provide material support to the Russian leadership. As well as a bank that provides material support to these individuals. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: A bank. You know, what is considered to be kind of the nuclear options when it comes to sanctions include cutting off a country from the banking system. Not allowing a country any access to international capital or currency by isolating their banking system so it can`t do any international work. One senator on the foreign relations committee told us on this show last night he thinks that Russia may be heading for that nuclear option, but, of course, that would take a lot of international work to get the world to agree to do that to them. What President Obama did unilaterally was to sanction one particular Russian bank, a bank that is basically considered to be Vladimir Putin`s bank. It has about $10 billion in assets reportedly. It`s seen as mostly handling financial transactions for the elite of the elite in Russia including President Putin, himself. Because of what President Obama did today, that elite bank in Russia will no longer have access to dollars and as the "Washington Post" says it today, correspondent accounts with U.S. banks will also now be terminated. Although I`m not exactly sure what that means. In addition to going after that one elite bank and locking down the assets and banning travel for all these new officials and all these very wealthy businessmen close to Vladimir Putin, President Obama today also gave himself yet further leeway to hit Russia in a way that wouldn`t just effect, say, Vladimir Putin`s own personal money, just the elites, but might effect that whole country in more of a gut-punch way. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) OBAMA: I signed a new executive order today that gives us the authority to impose sanctions not just on individuals, but on key sectors of the Russian economy. This is not our preferred outcome. These sanctions would not only have a significant impact on the Russian economy but could also be disruptive to the global economy. However, Russia must know that further escalation will only isolate it further. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: This is a big deal. Executive order that President Obama signed today gives him the authority to ban essentially any American economic feelings with whole sectors of the Russian economy, including potentially Russia`s humongous oil sector and humongous natural gas sector. Hello, Exxon. About that world`s biggest oil deal you`re working on with Rosneft right now, President Obama for you on line 2. Critics of President Obama in Washington right now are making this sort of esoteric charge that he`s not being tough enough against Russia. And what a lot of them mean by tough enough is starting a war, just like they always want. That is not going to happen. Not this time. If we are big enough as a country and smart enough now as a country to admit that starting a war is not the only way to be tough, how should we understand the toughness of what President Obama is doing right now and its likely effectiveness in terms of stopping Russia from doing what it has been doing? And what else is President Obama capable of doing? We`ll be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) OBAMA: Diplomacy between the United States and Russia continues. We`ve emphasized that Russia still has a different path available. One that deescalates the situation and one that involves Russia pursuing a diplomatic solution with the government in Kiev, with the support of the international community. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: President Obama today announcing a new round of sanctions against more than a dozen officials in the Russian government, as well as members of Russian president Vladimir Putin`s inner circle, as well as one specific Russian bank. Joining us now to help understand the importance of these moves today is Sandy Berger. He`s former national security adviser during the Clinton administration. He was foreign policy adviser to Hillary Clinton during her `08 presidential campaign and he`s currently co-chair of the Albright Stonebridge Consulting Group. Mr. Berger, thank you so much for being here. SAMUEL BERGER, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR: Nice to be here. MADDOW: President Obama announcing this new round of sanctions today. It`s the third of those, as best I can tell. We expect there may be more. How tough are these in the grand scheme of things? BERGER: I think these are good steps today. Sanctioning Rossiya Bank I think is important. This, as you pointed out, is really the Kremlin bank. It`s the bank of the Kremlin insiders. Authorizing treasury to go after key sectors of the Russian economy, mining, banking, defense, I think loads the gun for further actions. I think that`s important. I think more needs to be done. I think next week`s meetings in Europe the president`s having with the European leaders are important opportunities to come together around a longer term strategy, because I believe this is a longer term challenge. MADDOW: On the specific issue of that bank, as you described it, the Kremlin bank, can you help me understand what the material effect will be for senior Russian officials who`ve been using that bank? This is obviously not a broad international action. It`s an American action. Will they feel it? BERGER: Well, first of all, European banks will be affected by the fact these banks cannot now deal with dollars. They will not be able to do transactions in dollars. And, generally, in other cases, the European banks have followed our lead of these kinds of sanctions. MADDOW: I see. BERGER: They`ll still be able to maneuver, but I think they will have an affect on these leaders. And I think more than anything else, this crosses a line here. We`ve gone from individuals now to institutions. And I think the financial sector is the place where Russia is vulnerable. Russia`s financial sector is interconnected with the global economy. I don`t think this is sufficient. I think we have to go further, ultimately, to make very clear to the Russians that we can`t accept what they`ve done, and if they try to go further, the consequences will be far greater, because I think what Putin has done here in the last few weeks is to fundamentally challenge the post-Cold War arrangement that has accepted the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the nations of Europe based on a fiction -- a fiction that people, Russian speakers were threatened in Crimea and a fiction that Russia has been subjected to an unrelenting campaign over the last 20 years to weaken and humiliate them. I think it`s very important we now respond strongly to -- MADDOW: He has done -- he has done some things that are sort of like this. Obviously in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, to a lesser extent I think in Transnistria. He has essentially extended the Russian empire in starts and bits in different places. And the world was very disapproving, in particular, of what he did in Georgia. But, you know what, Georgian troops were still in South Ossetia -- or Russian troops were still in South Ossetia when the world came to Sochi and they hosted the Olympics. He endured that disapproval. Why -- what would have to happen differently now for him not to be able to endure the disapproval on this arguably larger incursion? BERGER: First of all, I think the Georgia situations were somewhat different. These were frozen conflicts. Those provinces were not within Georgian control at the time of the dissolution -- MADDOW: Crimea was slightly equivalent to sort of northern Iraq in terms of having its own authority as well. I mean, I don`t mean to argue the fine points of that. I just mean to say that I think Vladimir Putin thrives on the world`s discontent and thrives on being seen as somebody who`s willing to stand up to the West. And you can see it in the way that senior Russian officials responded to the first wave of sanctions, by literally laughing at them. What punctures that? BERGER: I think what punctures that is our ability, number one, to sustain them over time, our robust assistance to the new government in Ukraine, both economically and politically. You know, the Ukrainian people have suffered under one incompetent, corrupt Ukrainian leader after another. They`re in dire straits. The international community has now really step in a strong way, help them do the kind of economic reforms they need and to absorb the political costs of that economic reforms. I think we have to reassure the nations around Russia that they`re not going to be subjected to the same kind of harassment. So, I think there`s a series of things we have to do now, because this notion -- the principle here that Russia or any country can absorb its ethnic minorities on its border is very dangerous one in the world we`re living in. MADDOW: Sandy Berger, former national security adviser during the Clinton administration -- thank you very much for being here to talk to us tonight. I was happy you were able to come. BERGER: Thank you. MADDOW: All right. Lots still to come tonight. Including what looks like some unexpectedly good news out of North Carolina that started with a johnboat trip up the canal that you saw on this show first on Monday night. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: Meet the St. Petersburg. It`s a 750-foot-long Norwegian cargo ship. A car carrier that`s run by a company called Hoegh Autoliners. This is a huge ship. It weighs nearly 70,000 tons. The St. Petersburg was on its way from Madagascar to Melbourne, Australia, when the Australian government announced last night commercial satellite images showed what appeared to be large-scale debris in the ocean off the coast of Australia. The moment that debris was spotted, the closest vessel in all the world to that potential debris was the Hoegh St. Petersburg, this giant Norwegian cargo ship that was sailing along in international waters. And, of course, that ship is under no obligation to help search for what or what might not be parts of that missing plane. But when the cargo ship got the call they might be helpful in the search since they were the nearest ship to the potential debris field, they totally stepped up. They said they would help. Hoegh Autoliner executives held a press conference in Oslo. They pledged their full support. They declared their ship and crew of 19 mariners would be at authorities` disposal for as long as needed. According to Hoegh Autoliner, their ship had radar equipment and powerful search lights that would be used to scan the ocean surface around the clock. They said weather conditions near the ship were good, but they hadn`t spotted anything so far. So, the St. Petersburg has been in the general area of this unidentified debris since last night. And without, of course, any certainty that the debris has anything to do with the missing 777, more help is on the way in that part of the world. Five other merchant ships volunteered to help search as well. An Australian warship is on the way. That`s expected to make the scene over the weekend. The new search area defined because of this supposed finding, it`s about a four-hour flight from Perth, Australia, to the area they want to be searching. And planes are currently scouring that, including according to the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, a P-8A Poseidon from the U.S. Navy which is a fancy plane that can do a lot. It`s the Navy`s newest submarine aircraft that flies between 5,000 and 10,000 feet. It can dip as low as 1,000 feet for visual inspections. It can stay aloft for up to nine hours which is handy when the thing you want to look at takes you four hours to get there. The Navy calls it the most advanced long-range anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare aircraft in the world. There haven`t been any reports of any meaningful sightings from any of the surveiling aircraft or any of the ships so far, but they are continuing to look. As the head of the AMSA emergency response division said in his press conference, "This is probably the best lead that we have right now." But honestly, there aren`t very many leads. This is not the first satellite image of debris which has stoked hope the missing plane would be found. Obviously, though, there are governments in the word, including our own, who believe this latest announcement from the Australian government in the middle of the night last night is worth the diversion of assets, to see if what was spotted by the satellite maybe could be part of that plane. So, the search continues. It began today at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time tonight. It`s going to continue in this round until about 8:00 a.m. Eastern Time tomorrow. If the search does turn up anything, MSNBC will report it to you the moment that we know it. We`ll be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: On Monday, we got in this rather remarkable tape from North Carolina. (INAUDIBLE) MADDOW: I didn`t mean remarkable that way in the sense that it`s a still image that makes no noise. But what that was, and I`ll have it for you in just a second, was the beginning of a chance encounter between some watchdogging North Carolinians in a johnboat on a canal and the law. We showed you that on Monday, but what happened today seemingly because of that video is both surprising and turns out to be kind of big news out of North Carolina. And that story is coming up. Stay with us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: In a neighborhood called Humboldt Park on Chicago`s West Side, there`s a church there called the Adalberto United Methodist. Like most store front churches, it`s nothing fancy. Just a handful of short pews and a decorated altar. At Chicago`s O`Hare Airport, a woman had a job making $6.50 an hour cleaning out planes. Not a great job. Not a high-paying job, but a job. She was a young single mother. She got caught up in an immigration sweep of low-wage workers at the airport. She did not have the right immigration status. She was not supposed to be working that kind of job. And although she fought through the legal resources she had after that sweep, eventually she received a deadline notice from the Department of Homeland Security demanding she report to the Homeland Security Office in Chicago by 9:00 a.m. on a specific day whereupon she would be deported back to Mexico. Beyond the fact that she did not want to go, herself, she also had a 7-year-old son named Saul who had been born in this country, who lived his whole life in Chicago. He was a U.S. citizen. She wasn`t going to separate herself from her son. What, leave him here alone at age 7? She did not want to go to Mexico, but she had this deadline notice to turn herself in at Homeland Security. She did not. Instead, she went to the Adalberto Church. She came to this store front church seeking sanctuary, seeking refuge from deportation along with her 7-year-old son. That all happened in the summer of 2006. Her notice to hurricane herself in was August 15th. That`s when she went to the church. Elvira Arellano had first come to the United States nine years earlier in 1997. Her boy Saul was born here in the U.S. She just decided the two of them would try to stay at the church to try to stay together. And again, this is a store front church in a poor neighborhood in Chicago. It`s not like there were a lot of amenities for them. They stayed in a single room together. She and her son shared that single bed. She used the small kitchen inside the church to cook breakfast, lunch, and dinner for her son and herself. Every morning, she would send him off to school. She would see him out the church doors and send him to school, but she, herself, never actually went outside the church and on to the street for fear of being arrested. And the story of Elvira Arellano and her son, Saul, taking refuge in that little church, the dilemma of whether or not the government should force her and her son out of that church by force and separate them, that dilemma started to spread. She pasted the church windows with copies of letters of support she received from Congressman Luis Gutierrez of Illinois and then-Chicago Mayor Richard Daley. She said if she was arrested at that church in what she called holy sanctuary, she said, quote, "She would know God wants me to be the example of the current hatred and hypocrisy of the current policy of this government." She started a group called the United Latino Family to advocate for a change in policy so kids who were U.S. citizens like her son, Saul, would not be forcibly separated from their parents from U.S. deportation policy. There`s a long history of people taking refuge in churches and cathedrals. Back to medieval times, churches offered secure sanctuary for people who sought it for whatever reason. There`s no law or anything like that makes that the case here in the United States that it`s a place where you can hide from the law, but the principle of churches as places after refuge is a powerful idea. At the Adalberto Church in Chicago, the pastor said there was no question for him the church would take her in when she turned up and asked for help. He said at the time, quote, "I`m much more afraid of God than I am of Homeland Security." The thing is, though, legally speaking, the government could have come in at any time and seized her from that tiny store front church. They knew she was there. Everybody knew she was there. The government did not go into the church and pry her out of there. They let her be. She spent her time in the church praying, cooking, gardening, seeing her son off to school, waiting for him to come home. She openly defied the deportation orders. She confined herself to the four walls of that little church and did it for an entire year. What she and her son did in Chicago sparked a sanctuary movement that spread to 16 other states for churches specifically to try to shelter families that were facing being torn apart by deportation. That December, in 2006, December 2006, "Time" magazine featured Elvira Arellano and her son in their person of the year issue, an immigrant who found sanctuary. In the summer of 2007, after an entire year of living inside the church and never venturing out, she finally decided she was going to leave. She said she was willing to face the risk of deportation after year in that church in order to attend immigration rallies in California. She wasn`t just trying to change the deportation policy for herself. She was trying to change it for everyone. So, she left the church and went to California and two to the rallies and action came very swiftly. She was arrested as soon as she arrived in Los Angeles. Her son was there with her. He watched her get arrested. She reportedly asked the officering officer to give her some time so she could talk to her son to calm him down before she was taken away. But they moved fast and that same night she was sent across the border, sent to Tijuana. Her son, by then 8 years old, was sent alone back to Chicago to the store front church since that had become their home. Elvira Arellano was deported in 2007. This week Elvira Arellano came back. She crossed the border again. Seven years after first deported, she led a group of 20 mostly undocumented mothers and children across the border from Tijuana into San Diego, this is part of an ongoing protest campaign organized by the National Immigrant Youth Alliance to raise awareness about what remains the plight of kids like Saul, kids who are born here, raised primarily here, whose country is the United States but who are being forcibly torn apart from their parents by deportation policy. The Youth Alliance has organized four of these civil disobedience border crossings just in the past two weeks. Basically, it`s people with family ties and family members here showing up at the border asking for humanitarian parole. It`s basically temporary permission to stay in the United States for compassionate reasons. They`re essentially turning themselves in peacefully to Custom and Border Patrol asking to be allowed to be with their families. In addition to Saul, who`s now 15 years old, Elvira Arellano also has a new boy who was four months old. She was with her baby boy when she crossed this week. Seven years ago, Elvira Arellano sought sanctuary in the store front church in Chicago. At the time she was holding out hope that Congress would move, they would act on legislation that would allow her to stay here with her American son. She inspired a lot of people in the country with her year-long fight to stay, living in that little church. But ultimately when she daned to step outside, she was deported. Seven years later this week, she crossed over again. Customs and Border Patrol arrested her. They put her and her baby into a detention center in stake San Diego for two days. But then, as we were preparing this story today, late today, they let her and her 4-month-old son out. This is a picture of her today. She`s holding her release paperwork. She`s out of the detention center in San Diego. She`s been giving a court date of April 22nd before an immigration judge in Chicago. Her 4-month-old son has a court date luckily on the same day. He had separate paperwork for his matter and everything. But presumably he will be in his mother`s arms for that hearing. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency can`t tell us exactly what is next for her, but they do have some discretion for who they deport and when they deport them. They`re supposed to, of course, prioritize criminals, people who may pose a threat in this country for some reason. Last week, President Obama announced an executive review of deportation policies in this country to see if there are ways to make those policies more humane. In a White House statement, the president expressed, quote, "deep concern about the pain too many families feel from the separation that comes from our broken immigration system." What changes could that review produce? What can the president do alone since the Republican-controlled House, Republican-controlled House is now clearer than they`ve ever been that they`re going to do nothing in terms of the legislation. What will happen to Elvira Arellano and her son in the short term? But what`s going to happen to the millions of people in this country who are in her same situation and who have been in the same situation for years? What really can change? Joining us now is Jose Diaz-Balart. He`s an anchor, of course, of Telemundo. He`s been covering the immigration reform story intensely. Earlier this month, he also hosted a town hall on Telemundo with President Obama. Jose, thank you very much for being with us tonight. It`s nice to see you. JOSE DIAZ-BALART, TELEMUNDO: Thank you, Rachel. Great being with you. MADDOW: What do you expect from this review that the president has ordered. How much can he do without Congress? DIAZ-BALART: I think he`s going to wait. I think he has a lot more hope than you just expressed. And quite frankly, agree with you, there`s very little possibility we`re going to see in the House of Representatives some meaningful immigration reform package come out of there. But the president seems more optimistic. He thinks that maybe by August when the members of Congress go on their recess, hopefully they will have done something to start an immigration reform process that would really mitigate the pain that we`re seeing in this country for hundreds of thousands of people. I think he`s going to wait until August if nothing is done in the House. I wouldn`t be surprised if he starts making some very controversial executive orders to mitigate the pain of millions of people who face deportation like Elvira Arellano. I talked to her just a little while ago. And she`s hopeful but she knows that odds are that people like her that come back in don`t get very good odds when they got in front of a judge. MADDOW: Jose, when you said you wouldn`t be surprised if the president tried to move further with executive orders, obviously, those would be controversial. Everything about immigration is apparently controversial. What do you think he could do via executive order? How much of a change could he make? DIAZ-BALART: Richard, there is a program, a federal program called Secure Communities that gives local and state cops the possibility of when they arrest or detain someone checking their immigration status through DHS. That has caused more than 150,000 people to be deported. And maybe the president could tackle that specifically. That would mitigate immediately in local communities people who have minor traffic infractions and find themselves deported with like Elvira, U.S.-born children, and those families are divided and destroyed in this country, 1,000 deportations happen every day in this country. MADDOW: Do you think this dramatic and now repeated protests against deportation policies, do you think they are having an effect in Washington? When you -- I mean, you have access to the president that I could only dream of. You`ve spoken to him a number of times I know. And you see how this is debated in Washington. You`ve covered it so intensely. Do these protests have an effect on the people who are making decisions? DIAZ-BALART: I think they do in many ways. I`m not sure they do in the Republicans that have already made up their mind. They don`t want to see immigration reform as an issue before this next November`s elections. But they do, for example, even the president -- I think the president has been very clear recently that he feels the pain of deportations and he wishes that something was done on immigration reform. There`s a group called La Raza, the largest Latino organization in the country, they`ve been behind him on a lot of efforts including the Affordable Healthcare Act. And they recently called him deporter-in-chief. That I think that has hurt the president and his message that he is the person who supports immigration reform but can`t see it done in the House. I think that does cause him to say -- well, let me see what I can do if nothing is done by August. Maybe I`ll have to step forward, even take controversial decisions that right now I`m not willing to take. MADDOW: Jose Diaz-Balart, anchor for Telemundo`s nightly national newscast, Jose, thank you so much for being with us. It`s great to have you. DIAZ-BALART: Pleasure, Rachel. Thank you. MADDOW: All right. We`ll be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MADDOW: Last week, a group of river keepers, folks who basically act as watchdogs for the Cape Fear River in North Carolina, they hopped into an aluminum johnboat and scoot it up the Cape Fear River to try to find out what was going on with whatever this nightmare orange stuff was that seems to be finding its way into the river? They ended up on a canal that leads right now into that river. And at the head of a canal is a decommissioned power plant, a coal-fired power plant owned by Duke Energy shut down a couple of years ago. But while the plant is not still burning coal, the residue leftover from them burning tons of it in a past has been pile the into lagoons, pits of coal ash at the site of old power plant, these toxic coal ash lagoons. So, the river keeper guys were motoring just off the Cape Fear River, up that canal that goes to the Duke Energy plant, trying to figure out what was going on, and then this happened. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) OFFICER: What y`all got going on today? PETER HARRISON: Just cruising. OFFICER: Why when these gentlemen tell you not to go any further, y`all keep going? HARRISON: I thought we had the right to use the water. OFFICER: You do, but what`s the point of going all the way up there? Fishing or anything? Or -- HARRISON: We`re just looking around. OFFICER: OK. Well, y`all have your IDs or anything on you? HARRISON: Yes. OFFICER: Just need to see those real quick. HARRISON: Have we done something wrong? OFFICER: No, I`m just checking your IDs, man, you all coming up. This is all the power plant. This is all the power plant`s property. HARRISON: Including the water that we`re boating on? OFFICER: Pretty sure. I can get wildlife out here. They`ll scratch you a ticket. I`m not going to scratch you a ticket for nothing. I`m going to check your IDs and let you go ahead and go back down there and tell you not to come back. (END VIDEO CLIP) MADDOW: The guys from the river keeper did point their johnboat back down the river, but they`ve already taken samples along the river banks. They had also come up in a plane to see from above what was going on at the head of that canal. And from that aerial survey, they were able to snap these photos of what appeared to be Duke Energy caught in the act of pumping liquid out of those toxic blue ponds into the canal that runs into the river that supplies drinking water downstream. And it turns out they were right. Duke Energy was pumping liquid out of their coal ash ponds into that canal and into the Cape Fear River. When Duke got asked about it, they said it was just routine maintenance, no big deal. Well, today miracle of all miracles, Duke Energy today actually did in North Carolina get cited for dumping that crud into the river. The state today sent Duke a notice of violation in which they informed them that they had pumped 61 million gallons of waste water out of those toxic coal ash ponds and that that does not constitute essential maintenance. The state named more than 100 days on which that pumping had happened. If Duke is found in violation as they were notified of today, they could be fined $25,000 a day for each violation. If that was only one violation a day, that means we`re looking at a fine of $2.7 million. Duke Energy has 30 days from today to respond to the state regulator`s notice. And if you think any of this would have happened without those guys in the johnboat and up in the plane taking the aerial survey of what was going on at that power plant being protected by those sheriff`s deputies, then I have some bridge over some creepy teal toxic blue water to sell you and I`ll sell it to you cheap. That does it for us tonight. We`ll see you again tomorrow night. Now, it`s time for "THE LAST WORD." 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