Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES Date: January 22, 2016 Guest: Ben Domenech, Sabrina Siddiqui, Charlie Pierce, Ilyse Hogue, Lucy Flores, Harry Enten, Bill de Blasio
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST (voice-over): Tonight on ALL IN --
SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Donald seems to be a little rattled.
HAYES: With just ten days until Iowa, the fight between Cruz and Trump is getting ugly.
AD NARRATOR: When Trump colluded with Atlantic City insiders to bulldoze the home of an elderly widow.
HAYES: Plus -- Clinton and Sanders continue to battle over women`s health.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Nobody will be a stronger defender of a woman`s right to choose than Bernie Sanders.
HAYES: As a new poll shows one candidate leading Iowa by nearly 30 points. Then, as a massive winter storm bears down on his constituents, Governor Christie will come home.
GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE (R-NJ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: They`ll feel better if I`m there.
HAYES: Was he shamed into returning by New York City`s mayor?
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK CITY: Look, this is more important than politics.
HAYES: Mayor Bill de Blasio joins me live tonight.
And Jeb picks up a lukewarm endorsement from mom.
BARBARA BUSH, JEB BUSH`S MOTHER: Of all the people running, he seems to be the one who could solve the problems.
HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.
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HAYES: Good evening from New York. I`m Chris Hayes.
And for months Donald Trump and Ted Cruz have been circling each other warily at first, declaring allegiance to each other, refusing to go negative, then testing out jabs in press interviews and eventually on the campaign trail itself in front of voters and last week battling openly for the first time face to face on the debate stage.
Now, with the Iowa caucuses just ten days away the first votes about to be cast, the two front-runners are taking their increasingly ugly rivalry to the airways, releasing their very first attack ads against each other in early primary states. The spots from Trump`s campaign use Cruz`s own words to raise questions about his stance on the 2013 comprehensive immigration reform bill that`s stalled in Congress.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRET BAIER, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: It sounded like you wanted the bill to pass.
CRUZ: Of course, I wanted the bill to pass -- my amendment to pass. What my amendment did --
BAIER: You said the bill.
CRUZ: -- is take citizenship off the table, but it doesn`t mean -- what it doesn`t mean that I supported the other aspects of the bill.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Now, Cruz has said the amendment he proposed was intended as a poison pill that would derail the legislation.
Meanwhile, Cruz`s ad expands on his central argument that Donald Trump is not a real conservative.
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AD NARRATOR: Eminent domain -- fancy term for politicians seizing private property to enrich the fat cats who bankroll them. Like Trump.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think eminent domain is wonderful.
AD NARRATOR: It made him rich. Like when Trump colluded with Atlantic City insiders to bulldoze the home of an elderly widow.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: While eminent domain may be an issue that motivates conservative intellectuals, it is not clear how much it speaks to the average Republican primary voter. That`s yet to be seen.
In an interview this morning, Cruz also questioned whether Trump`s temperament is suited to the role of commander in chief.
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CRUZ: Anyone who wakes up every day and sees a slight drop in the polls and responds in a frenzy of tweets, I would suggest that the next commander in chief instead of living or dying by the daily polls and by the latest Twitter storm should focus on identifying our enemies and doing whatever is necessary to keep this country safe. And as president that`s what I`m going to do.
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HAYES: Trump`s tweeting actually did 4r57bd him in hot water this morning. He retweeted a user the handle and I am not making this up, I wish I were, white genocide, whose feed is littered with white supremacist and neo-Nazi content.
Now that Trump`s Cruz alliance is over and the two are openly warring, their rivalry is literally dividing conservative families. Last night Trump was endorsed by Willie Robertson of "Duck Dynasty" fame whose father Phil Robertson recently endorsed Ted Cruz.
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PHIL ROBERTSON, DUCK DYNASTY: Ted Cruz is my man. I`m voting for him.
(GUNSHOTS)
CRUZ: Cruz, the reason we`re going to vote for you, all of us, is because you`re one of us, my man.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Maybe not all of them.
The new endorsement gives Trump a slight edge in the all-important reality star primary. Note that Trump and Cruz don`t have a single endorsement from a sitting Republican senator or governor. All along, the conventional wisdom has been that once Trump and Cruz took each other on, it might create space for the other candidates to gain some traction.
But now that Trump and Cruz are in that cage match the others seem to be too busy fighting each other to take advantage of the moment.
After the Jeb Bush super PAC ran an ad in New Hampshire hitting John Kasich for bucking Republican orthodoxy, Kasich`s super PAC countered with this.
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AD NARRATOR: Jeb Bush once stood tall. Before his campaign sank like a rock and he started desperately slinging mud on fellow Republicans. That`s not presidential, Jeb.
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HAYES: Kasich`s own Twitter account unleashed a series of memes alleging Bush raised fees as governor of Florida including fees on pet snakes. Tough luck, snake owners!
Today, the Bush campaign released an online ad featuring a strong character witness for Jeb Bush. His mother.
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BARBARA BUSH: When push comes to shove, people are going to realize Jeb has real solutions rather than talking about how popular they are, how great they are. He`s doing it because he sees a huge need and it`s not being filled by anybody. Of all the people running, he seems to be the one who could solve the problems. I think he`ll be a great president.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: He seems to be the one who could solve the problems. Points for honesty, I guess.
Meanwhile, Marco Rubio, whose team has produced some of the most aggressive attack ads in the race, is now reportedly scaling back. According to "Politico", the campaign reduced its ad buys in Iowa and New Hampshire shifting its resources to the next primary state, South Carolina.
Now, with the more establishment candidates failing to break out, members of the Republican elite are turning to desperate measures to try and stop the long-time front-runner. Conservative publication "National Review" published a special edition devoted entirely to making the case against Trump, featuring essays by conservatives across the conservative ideological spectrum, from libertarians to neocons. And writing in an editorial, "Trump is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones."
This was Trump`s response.
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TRUMP: "The National Review" is a dying paper. It`s got -- its circulation is way down. Not very many people read it anymore. I mean, people don`t even think about "The National Review." So I guess they want to get a little publicity. But that`s a dying paper.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Republican National Committee has now disinvited the national review from co-hosting a GOP debate next month.
I`m joined now by Ben Domenech, publisher of "The Federalist", author of the against Trump -- a contributor to the against Trump edition of "The National Review".
Ben, good to have you here.
BEN DOMENECH, THE FEDERALIST: Good to be with you.
HAYES: So, here`s my thing about all this. Good for you guys, right? I agree. I do think this guy represents this sort of monstrous and dangerous kind of ethno-nationalist populism. But it really does seem there`s a lack of grappling with why it is there`s a connection between the conservative base and this guy.
You talk about it a bit in the piece you write. But here`s what kind of bothered me. You say, "To the degree we take him at his word, what he advocates, Trump is a rejection of our Madisonian inheritance" -- OK, great -- "and an embrace of Barack Obama`s authoritarianism."
That just seems like an abuse of the term and in some ways an abuse of the term authoritarian in precisely the way that has paved the groundwork for the rise of Donald Trump.
DOMENECH: You think so? I think -- first off I have to say this entire enterprise was undertaken in a method to try to give you a living example of your book "The Twilight of the Elite."
HAYES: Yes.
DOMENECH: And to show how little we can actually do when it comes to telling people, reminding them what conservatism actually represents, what the Constitution represents, what the rule of law represents.
From my perspective, this is something that Donald Trump has used to great effect in terms of the promises that he makes on the campaign trail. There`s never any actual specificity to it and when there is, it`s often unconstitutional, things that fly in the face of everything that we understand about the rule of law.
And I think he`s able to get away with this because the perception that many on the right and a good many in sort of the independent, disaffected voter community have of this president and of this White House is that they have really operated at whim, that they`ve done things according to their will in order to achieve their ends --
HAYES: That is a different --
DOMENECH: -- and all they want is someone who will basically operate the same way, who will do whatever is necessary in order to achieve and offer them -- you know, basically the way to think about is this: if the case of the Tea Party, if the case of the sort of dedicated conservatives who are mostly supporting Ted Cruz this time around was we shouldn`t have any bailouts anymore, then the answer of the Trump voter, the answer of the moderate disaffected high school-educated guy who hasn`t voted in the last couple of primaries is, where is my bailout? Obama has been giving things to other people, I deserve one too.
It`s a blatant white identity politics play, and it`s what I think Donald Trump has been offering since the day he came into the race.
HAYES: But authoritarianism has a specific valence. You could say look, the imperial presidency has increased under Barack Obama and I would say yes, it has.
DOMENECH: But I`d say --
(CROSSTALK)
HAYES: Right, of course. But authoritarianism, the point is many conservatives have spent years talking about this president in apocalyptic terms. There were -- I remember going, covering people who thought, literally thought the president was going to decide who lived and who died. There were going to be death panels. There was that guy going up on the Tea Party saying you`re not going to put down my son. And he believed every word of that, right?
That is part of what has produced the groundwork for Donald Trump.
DOMENECH: Well, but I don`t think that that`s something that`s exclusive to one side or the other. I think both sides have made Donald Trump. I mean, you know, the fact of the matter is the Republican Party has been led and ruled for a long time by a lot of people who essentially have the same view on fiscal policy as the "Wall Street Journal" editorial page.
HAYES: Yes.
DOMENECH: That`s not one that speaks to a significant chunk of their base at all.
HAYES: At all.
DOMENECH: It doesn`t speak to those priorities. And I think similarly to that on the left, you see the rise of Bernie Sanders as being part of that too. When you have people that are able to go out there and say the elites don`t know what they`re doing anymore, they`re stupid, as Donald Trump says, they don`t know what they`re doing anymore, you just need to give me the power to fix it --
HAYES: But the difference here and Bernie Sanders is ideologically is just squarely in the ideological left of the party, right? I mean, the guy`s not heterodox at all. In fact, say what you will, like he`s a down the line lefty liberal, right?
DOMENECH: Yes.
HAYES: And that aligns with the base which is more or less what you anticipate.
What I think is interesting about the case of Donald Trump and the reason that this editorial right is that it`s unclear what this guy believes, aside from this sort of build the walls and make America great.
DOMENECH: Well, I think -- and I said in the piece that I wrote that I think all of this is a negotiation tactic for him. None of this is actual beliefs. None of this is --
(CROSSTALK)
DOMENECH: -- beyond the point where -- but at the same time I think that we have to recognize this is something that speaks to a portion of the electorate that doesn`t just exist within the Republican Party. It exists sort of in this mushy middle independent. And you`ve seen it happen before in the sense of these kind of proto-economic nationalist figures like Ross Perot who have come along in the past.
I think the difference this time around is conservatives are finally wake up to the fact that the leadership of their own party has been so distant from these effects that it has been unable to meet any of the measures, meet any of the demands that they`ve made over the course of the years.
HAYES: And they have convinced themselves, I think the key thing is they convinced themselves that the people in their base believe what they believe --
DOMENECH: Yes.
HAYES: -- about trade or whatever --
DOMENECH: Or have the same priorities overall.
HAYES: That`s the key.
All right. Ben Domenech, thank you very much.
DOMENECH: Thank you.
HAYES: Joining me now, Sabrina Siddiqui, political reporter for "The Guardian", and Charlie Pierce, a writer at large for "Esquire" magazine.
Sabrina, there`s this sort of other election happening where you are in New Hampshire which is this very, very brutal fight between basically Kasich, Rubio, Christie, and Jeb Bush, and it doesn`t get the same press because Ted Cruz and Donald Trump are the front of the pack. But in some ways it`s nastier, more money`s being spent, and they are beating the stuffing out of each other there in New Hampshire.
SABRINA SIDDIQUI, THE GUARDIAN: Absolutely. And I think you hear from more and more voters here on the ground that they want an alternative to Donald Trump.
But you have these four candidates who are splitting that alternative vote fairly evenly. They`re just within a couple points of one another. The polls have gone up and down and fluctuated. So, there`s no consensus alternative. Instead you have this circular firing squad that you just alluded to where all of the effort on the part of these candidates is being put into advertising attacks on one another rather than coalescing around someone who could really potentially emerge as a mainstream alternative to Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.
And I think that what voters are left with then is not only not having a consensus alternative, but not even knowing who they can really trust and who they can support. I think there`s a lot of doubts among the voters increasingly here as to whether any of these candidates is even poised to go the distance against Donald Trump or Ted Cruz, much less Hillary Clinton in a general election.
HAYES: Charlie, those two ads we played before on the sort of Trump-Cruz part of these parallel races, to me the Trump ad`s effective because we know that there`s a certain portion of the base that you can`t be too right for them on immigration, right, and anyone is a squish. What do you think about that eminent domain ad? Do you feel like there`s traction there?
CHARLIE PIERCE, ESQUIRE MAGAZINE: No, because I think what you said about it is absolutely right. It`s a very big issue on what is occasionally called the intellectual right. But except for the only people I know that have actually been politically active on the issue of eminent domain are the farmers in Nebraska who helped stop the Keystone Pipeline. There it was really an issue.
But in terms of a general issue for a national campaign, I don`t think it has any legs at all.
HAYES: So, here`s my question for you, Sabrina. Does -- do you get a sense -- because you`ve on on the trail and you`ve been in New Hampshire -- do you get a sense for how much spillover we`ll see from Iowa? Meaning, can you imagine momentum coming out there have or does it feel like that really is a different race being run and there`s this race for third place among those four figures?
SIDDIQUI: I think it largely depends on the margins. So, if you have a complete blowout in Iowa, then I think it`s going to be really troubling for these four so-called establishment mainstream candidates, however you want to define that lane.
At the same time, if Marco Rubio I think who is best positioned in Iowa is able to post a strong third -- you know, a win for him would even be to come in second behind either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz. That could really reshape the nature of the race going into New Hampshire where he has been a comfortable second for the last several weeks. It`s in recent polls that he`s lost some of that standing to Kasich and Christie and Jeb, partly because of all the millions of dollars in attack ads being spent against him.
But again, it really depends on the margins. If he`s still trailing overwhelmingly in Iowa, then I don`t think that`s going to send any kind of clear message to New Hampshire voters that he is clearly the alternative.
HAYES: Charlie, it`s remarkable to me as we talk about where the ideological center of this race is, how far shifted right and how easy it is to lose sight of that. I mean, Kasich was a crop of very hard right governors. Anti-union when he was elected in 2010. He is now the liberal squish.
Ted Cruz -- Ted Cruz is being attacked from the right on immigration for trying basically to blow up the immigration bill by just saying we shouldn`t have mass deportation but we shouldn`t have citizenship, this will be some sort of legal status. It is remarkable.
PIERCE: Yes. I keep waiting for most of the Republican Party to fall off the edge of the world. But there`s more room to the right I guess than I ever anticipated there being.
You know, you`re right about Kasich. Kasich was a Newt Gingrich acolyte, back when we thought Newt Gingrich was the furthest right American politics could go. John Kasich still believes in the balanced budget amendment, the worst idea in American politics.
John Kasich, trying to be Scott Walker and got kicked around by his electorate basically when he took on the public employee uniform -- unions, excuse me. But at the same time, he accepted the Medicaid benefits. So that marks him lousy.
Quite frankly, I don`t know -- I mean, and I read that "National Review" thing too. I don`t know what American conservatism is anymore. It`s this pile of adjectives -- it`s this pile of adjectives by the side of the road.
(LAUGHTER)
HAYES: All delivered in a sort of stentorian tone to imply big and grand principles.
Sabrina, am I missing something on this Barbara Bush web ad? That is it just -- is it just natural wasp reticence, not wanting to boast too much about your son? Does the whole thing feel a little underwhelming from a mother talking about her son?
SIDDIQUI: Well, you remember that she infamously said that we didn`t need another Bush in the White House. I think we already know how she may have perceived her son`s prospects early on.
But look, I think that Jeb Bush, you know, he has put all of his eggs in the New Hampshire basket, and I think that he has seen somewhat of an uptick in his poll numbers here. You know, he really at the end of the day at this point is going to rely on his family, to rely on the legacy because as much as that was kind of viewed as his biggest potential kryptonite early on, clearly it was not enough for him to try and trot out his past as his own man to just run on his record as governor of Florida. He needs to pull on the powerful ties he has with his family, the influence there.
It might not be the most convincing ad. But I think at the end of the day, he really wants to live to see another day in New Hampshire. That`s what their attention is focused on, and obviously see if they can compete into South Carolina.
HAYES: Trump, of course, attacking Jeb for running to mommy in a tweet today, which is predictable.
All he`s got to do is come in third. If I`m writing the screenplay for, this just purely narratively, Jeb Bush second place finish in New Hampshire is the best plot twist this campaign could see so far.
Sabrina Siddiqui, Charlie Pierce, thanks very much.
SIDDIQUI: Thanks, Chris.
HAYES: Still to come, Hillary Clinton pushes Bernie Sanders on his women`s health platform. His response today.
Plus, how the race between the two Democratic front-runners could be decided by the supporters of Martin O`Malley.
But next, an update on the dilemma facing New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. Keep courting New Hampshire voters or govern his state during a blizzard?
Those stories and more, ahead.
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HAYES: You are looking at the first big snowstorm of 2016 hitting Washington, D.C., which is right now starting to feel the brunt of a storm that may affect up to 85 million Americans. More on the storm and preparations for it later in the show.
But yesterday, we brought you the news that Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey would stay in New Hampshire campaigning instead of returning to the state he governs. Now, he has changed his mind. In a video released by his campaign, he explains to the voters in New Hampshire how the people of his state will basically just feel better if he`s there.
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CHRISTIE: I want to make sure that the people of my state feel safe and secure and know that despite the fact that I`ve been on the phone, you know, seven or eight times in the past two days they`ll feel better if I`m there. So I`m going to go back this afternoon if conditions are worse than what I expect, then I may not see you Sunday, may not see you until Monday. But I will be back. And I`ll be able to do both things.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: What he didn`t mention is that he may have been shamed into going back by New York City`s Mayor Bill de Blasio, who called him out saying, quote, "I think he needs to come back. Look, a day or two ago it might have been a question mark. Right now, it`s not a question mark anymore. Obviously, we are being warned it could even be worse. So, for any governor, it`s time to come home."
Mayor De Blasio is here in New York, and he will join me live just ahead.
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HAYES: Today with just ten days to go until the Iowa caucuses and the polling frankly all over the place the race, though, seems to be clearly tightening and women`s health is front and center.
Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders both today touted their record on reproductive rights on the 43rd anniversary of Roe v. Wade.
Clinton making her case this evening at an event sponsored by NARAL Pro- Choice America, which has endorsed her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We all need a champion in the White House -- and not just someone who says the right things but someone who does them as well, who will stand up to each and every attack, and who will do everything she can to protect reproductive rights.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders, three days after he called Planned Parenthood and NARAL part of the establishment, which he then walked back, pledged to fight Republican attacks on women`s choice.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SANDERS: They want to get the government off of your backs. They want you to be free people. Get the government off your backs.
Except if you are a woman having to make a very difficult decision. Then, they love the government and they want the government to make that decision for every woman in America. That, my friends, is hypocrisy.
So, let me be very clear: that nobody will be a stronger defender of a woman`s right to choose than Bernie Sanders.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: NARAL has criticized Sanders for not matching Hillary Clinton`s call to repeal the Hyde Amendment, a budget rider that bans low-income women from using Medicaid to pay for abortions.
Clinton has called for the repeal of that amendment which has been voted on annually for almost four decades. Sanders, who has voted against Hyde, has not made it a campaign focal point. That is, until now. Earlier today, the senator from Vermont also pledged in a statement to repeal the Hyde Amendment.
Joining me now, Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America.
Ilyse, I`m curious about the calculus here in terms of your organization`s endorsement of Hillary Clinton. Do you think Bernie Sanders` record on this issue is insufficient? Do you think it`s a lack of emphasis in his campaign?
ILYSE HOGUE, PRESIDENT, NARAL: Yes, I think it`s exactly that. I mean, it`s not just the emphasis in the campaign, but when we considered the endorsement in what`s card an absolutely crucial year for abortion rights and reproductive freedom, we looked at a lifetime of records.
And there`s no doubt Bernie Sanders has been a great ally. But 2016 is a pivotal year for us and we need more than an ally. We need a champion.
When Hillary was in the Senate, she co-sponsored and introduced bills. Bernie voted correctly. Hillary has made women and children a focal point of her career, whether as a private citizen or a public servant. And that`s the kind of leadership we need to take us into the future.
HAYES: Let me ask you this. As an organization that was -- and you and I have known each other a long time and known each other in Washington, D.C. circles in various capacities. There`s a sort of flap about the establishment.
Isn`t it also the case that, look, if you`re your organization or Planned Parenthood you`re making a judgment also about who you think is going to win the general? I mean, these are high stakes, particularly for groups like yours. How much of that is a calculus in who you`re deciding to endorse?
HOGUE: I think it`s less a calculus of who can win than what they can do when they do win. So, centralizing the issues of abortion access, especially repealing Hyde, which as you said discriminates against low- income women, understanding that integral nature of economic opportunity with family planning, that`s where Hillary has not only led in her votes, in her sponsorship of bills, and in her rhetoric, but she also knows how to move things once she`s in office.
He`s been in the State Department. She`s had to manage a lot of different elements of government. And you know, that`s really different than being a senator who is standing up every day for what he believes -- absolutely -- but not one known for the actual kind of negotiation that results in forward advancement.
HAYES: Analysts had this, Ilyse, to say about Bernie Sanders. Senator Sanders` attacks on Planned Parenthood, this is after the now infamous establishment quote, "Senator Sanders` attacks on Planned Parenthood are rooted in the same exact type of political calculation Republicans make when advancing their extreme agenda." Agree? HOGUE: I think it is unfortunately divisive. Whether he intended it or not, what he actually was saying is that he knows better than we do about where our members are. And we`re in touch with our members all the time. We`ve got a million members.
Our members in Iowa have been knocking doors not just in terms of Hillary`s endorsement, but for nine months to make sure that reproductive freedom is central to this debate. They`re committed. They`re hard-working. And they stand united with each other, with us, and with the values that we stand for.
And it`s really -- you know, it`s very important to remember that as we go into these next critical weeks.
HAYES: Finally and briefly, your members did not vote on this, right? This was done by the board and the president of the organization.
HOGUE: We don`t have a member vote, but we`re in constant contact with our members and we certainly receive feedback before the endorsement.
HAYES: Ilyse Hogue, thank you for your time. Appreciate it.
HOGUE: Thank you.
HAYES: Joining me now, Lucy Flores, a Bernie Sanders surrogate and Democratic candidate for Congress in 2016.
Lucy, my understanding is that choice is a very important issue to you. You`ve worked, I believe, with Emily`s List. I think you`re getting a NARAL Award at some point.
But you have come to a different decision in terms of who you`re backing.
LUCY FLORES (D-NV), CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: I have. Yes, and absolutely on this anniversary of roe v. Wade, someone who`s had very up-front and personal experience in talking about choice, talking about abortion, talking about my own choice to have an abortion, and the terrible, terrible experience I had in actually having that conversation.
Yes, this is a very important issue for me. But when it came time to decide on who I was going to support for president, this really was more expansive than that. This was about whose vision for the country, whose priorities, whose values aligned with my own and for me, that was Bernie Sanders.
HAYES: One of the things we`ve seen in this debate between Sanders and Clinton in the last few days is a question of priorities. And obviously priorities are important. I mean, presidents are going to set some sort of agenda if they`re elected and they can`t do everything all the time all at once. They will put things in a queue.
Is it not fair to deduce from the campaigns being run so far that reproductive choice and championing that is a higher priority for the Clinton campaign so far than it has been for the Sanders campaign?
FLORES: You know, honestly I think they`ve been on par. You know, when you look at records, when you start comparing records, and you know, Ilyse just admitted it, that those records are identical, virtually identical. The Hyde Amendment has come up every single year, and we`ve never been able to do anything about it.
And that`s really what draws me to Bernie Sanders, is he talks about the fundamental problems that we`re having, that it`s about the millionaires and billionaires that have taken over our entire political system, that this requires a reset, that this is about bold and forward thinking and expansive thinking.
And frankly, I think that that`s necessary. I think that, you know, if we continue doing the same old, I mean, it`s the definition of insanity. You`re going to get the same outcome. And I really believe that, you know, when he talks about a political revolution, that`s really what he means. This is about every single American. This is about millions of people who are now saying yes, absolutely, we need someone who is going to be bold and who`s going to take on these bigger fundamental challenges that we`re experiencing.
HAYES: All right. Lucy Flores, really appreciate you joining me. Thanks a lot.
Coming up, mayor Bill de Blasio joins me to discuss the winter storm hitting the east coast right now and the politics of emergency management. That is next. Stick around.
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HAYES: This weekend`s winter storm could wind up being one for the history books. This is a live look at Washington, D.C. The national weather service has issued a blizzard warning for much of the entire mid-Atlantic region, one of the most densely populated regions in the country, and warns that getting around will be nearly impossible.
In fact, they`re saying flat out, do not travel, and if you must have a winter survival kit with you.
According to NBC News, the storm has already led to more than 6,000 canceled flights and caused at least six deaths. Forecasters are saying this is a textbook example of the system that can produce record-breaking accumulation.
The Washington Post warns that there is some chance that snow amounts will be so great that poorly built roofs and structures will collapse. In Washington, D.C., where snow has been falling since noon, more than two feet is expected.
In Philadelphia, the national weather service is calling for 12 to 16 inches of snow from Friday night and through Saturday. And while those same weather models are calling for a similar forecast to engulf parts of New York and New Jersey, because much of the storm will coincide tomorrow night with a full moon there is also, and this is important, the threat of dangerous coastal flooding.
Joining me now by phone is New York City mayor Bill de Blasio. Mayor, I know you`re preparing for the storm. Thank you for making a little time for us.
How do you deal as a mayor with the wide band of estimates that come in these forecasts in terms of how much you prepare, how many resources you marshal?
BILL DE BLASIO, MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY: Yeah, Chris, we have to prepare for the worst. That`s the governing assumption. So when we started out in the last few days, it sounded like it would be less than a foot of snow. Right now we`re working from the latest weather service report, which would say a foot to a foot and a half in New York City.
But we always assume a storm could show up even sooner, and certainly could be bigger. So, you know, we`re preparing as if it could be as much as two feet because we have to. So we have, for example, 1,800 snow splows that will be out and ready early in the morning tomorrow. And we have over 300,000 tons of salt on hand. So we`re ready for anything.
HAYES: One of the most -- probably the most destructive part of Sandy, of course, was the storm surge and it coincided with a high tide and the full moon. And I saw some very worrisome estimates for Cape May, New Jersey. Are you concerned about any of that downtown around the Battery or in the city?
DE BLASIO: Well, we`re going with the weather service`s estimates now, and thank god they have not suggested the kind of flooding that would really be devastating. Now, certainly there will be some coastal flooding. It will certainly be inconvenient and something that people have to take very seriously, but at this moment it does not look like the kind of flooding that would cause a real risk to human life.
And that being said, we have a lot of assets out. We`re going to have fire department and police department out there with swift boats, rescue boats, ready to go if needed. We`re going to have high-axle vehicles. So police and fire can get into flooded areas.
We`ve been reinforcing our beaches and adding to our sand dunes for preventative measures. So we don`t take the flooding issue lightly. But so far it seems to be staying within parameters that we can handle.
HAYES; You seemed to call out Governor Chris Christie for attempting to essentially manage the storm by phone from New Hampshire while he runs for president. He`s now come back. Is that out of your lane?
DE BLASIO: No, look, I got asked a question. I didn`t do it proactively,but I spoke from my heart. I mean, at this point, by this morning it was quite clear this was going to be a very serious storm. And anyone in executive office, a mayor, a governor, has to lead from the front. It`s our obligation to be home when something like this happens.
This is more important than politics. I understand it`s a political season, but I think it`s a very common sense point. It`s time to get home.
HAYSE; You just mentioned the political season. I know you`re preparing for this storm. I rarely get a chance to talk to you. So I do want to ask you, I`m sure you`ve been following this primary campaign. You`ve endorsed Hillary Clinton. You have a long record with Hillary Clinton. You`ve also been someone who championed the cause of inequality in your campaign here and throughout your mayorality.
What do you think about the tenor of this primary so far? Do you think it`s gotten nasty? Do you think this is about what you expected?
DE BLASIO: Look, compared to many presidential races this has been pretty high road. And look, the debate the other night, that debate and some other debates I have to say, I was very impressed that in the course of the last year the issues of income inequality have come to the fore intensely. I think it is a tremendous moment for potential change in this country.
So the fact that leading Democratic candidates were competing to show who had the more aggressive approach to Wall Street, who was going to do more to tax the wealthy and raise wages and benefits, I mean, this is something that I think is very, very promising.
And in the scheme of things, the candidates have been pretty respectful toward each other.
So this augurs well for the future of the country. And I have to say the juxtaposition with the Republican debates is breathtaking because not only have there been a massive amount of divisiveness certainly coming from Donald Trump in particular but the Republican debates have had a very exclusionary tone on issues like immigration and national security.
Democratic debates have been much more focused on income inequality and how to rise up to working class and middle class people. If that keeps playing out in this fashion, it`s a very uneven match-up in favor of Democrats and progressives in the fall.
HAYES: In your third year as you`re starting your third year of your mayorality. I wonder does mayor Bill de Blasio have more sympathy than candidate Bill de Blasio for just how hard it is to get things done and how hard it is, the obstacles one might face transferring campaign pledges to a government agenda?
DE BLASIO: You have to.
I mean, if you`re a human being with a pulse and you do this work, you have to recognize, especially after a couple years, that it`s a lot easier to talk about things than to actually do them.
I`m proud. You know, we did some things like full-day pre-K for all our kids that were supposed to be in some people`s eyes impossible. We got it done. We`re making huge progress on affordable housing. And clearly one of the things I`m very proud of, we proved that you can have a different and better relationship between police and community. We greatly reduced the stop and frisk strategy. And at the same time made the city safer.
So I can say from experience, progressives can get a lot done, but anyone who thinks it`s easy obviously hasn`t spent time in one of these jobs.
HAYES: Mayor Bill de Blasio, good luck tonight. Thank you for joining us. Appreciate it.
DE BLASIO: Thank you, Chris.
HAYES: All right. Coming up, new polling shows one of the Democratic candidates with a nearly 30-point lead in Iowa. What the heck is going on? That story is next.
Also, have we mentioned that the Iowa caucuses are a mere ten days away? Stay with us.
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HAYES: With just ten days to go until the Iowa caucuses, it`s as good a time as any to start clearing out our candidate book report vault. We here at All In were curious about the books written by the current crop of presidential candidates, but we didn`t actually want to read the books ourselves. So we asked Jeb Lund, columnist for The Guardian and Rolling Stone, to do the work for us. And he`s had quite a run, dutifully plowing through Ben Carson`s "A More Perfect Union," Mike Huckabee`s "God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy, Donald Trump "Crippled America" and Ted Cruz "A Time for Truth."
Now with Iowa just on the horizon we`re starting to get worried some of Jeb`s book reports might have a short shelf life.
Before the caucusing begins here`s the fifth installment of our book report series Carly Fiorina`s "Rising to the Challenge." You know, just in case.
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JEB LUND, THE GUARDIAN: "I have never been someone who backs down from a challenge. I have, in fact, found that challenging myself is the best way to learn and grow. Nor am I someone who takes on things that are unachievable. I don`t tilt at windmills."
Come on, let`s hurry up. I`m double-parked.
Bureaucracy is this book`s Voldemort, except it gets named on almost every page. For instance, there`s not a war on women, there`s just bureaucracy. If you`re a poor woman who can`t work because America does not have universal pre-K, that`s actually bureaucracy`s fault. No idea why, but it is.
"The rollout of the Affordable Care Act provided the best evidence for reform of all. The merits of Obamacare aside, how can a website costing hundreds of billions of dollars and several years of effort fail? Answer, because a series of government bureaucracies was in charge of building it."
On the morning I was reading this book a website that is nearly ten years old and is a darling of Silicon Valley VCs has a $12 billion marketcap failed for about six hours. Its name is Twitter.
Carly Fiorina created a get out the vote project called the unlocking potential project, and because of that quest for branding variations on the words unlocking and potential appear in this book about as often as the word Malkovich does when John Malkovich crawls inside his own head.
JOHN MALKOVICH, ACTOR: Malcovich? Malkovich? Malkovich?
Malkovich Malkovich.
Malcovich?
Malcovich!
LUND: At less than 200 small pages of fat type, this is a very slight book. IOt`s an even slighter campaign book. Politics are mentioned in the intro and then again at the end and then sort of intermittently brought up in between.
For the most part it`s an update to her 2006 memoir "No, HP Didn`t Fire Me, I Fired Me." don`t read the book, either of them.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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HAYES: It`s safe to say this year`s Academy Awards nominations created an uproar. For the second year in a row an all-white slate of actors were nominated in all four acting categories. But it was not just a matter of nominations, say critics, it`s a reflection of an industry that is overwhelmingly dominated by white men, including the members of the Academy itself.
Today the academy responded. Its 51-member governing board voting unanimously on rule changes with the goal of increasing diversity.
According to the New York Times, the board said its goal was to double the number of female and minority members by 2020. Most striking of the changes, a requirement the voting status of both new and current members be reviewed every ten years, or put another way, maybe The New York Post won`t be able to run another cover like this next year.
Of course it is too soon to tell if the changes by the Academy will help, but it`s a start. Just ahead, voting for the next president. Who has the best shot, and who are the long shots? Stick around.
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HAYES: With the first voting of the 2016 race just ten days away the presidential candidates` campaign schedules are absolutely packed. Tonight, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have been holding dueling town halls in New Hampshire. Recently polls have consistently showed Sanders with the edge in New Hampshire. Right now Sanders is leading Clinton by about 12 points there, 52 percent to 40 percent, with Martin O`Malley a distant third place.
But in a first in the nation state of Iowa where both Clinton and Sanders are campaigning tomorrow the latest polls have been all over the place. Today we had a new poll that I had to look at about five times before I could even process what I was seeing. We`ll tell you about it next.
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HAYES: CNN/ORC poll out yesterday found Bernie Sanders leading Hillary Clinton 51-43 in Iowa, giving Sanders an eight-point lead in that first in the nation caucus.
Now, that was high for Sanders.
But today a poll from Loras College told a very different story, showing Clinton with an edge over sanders in Iowa by a huge margin, 59 percent to 30 percent, 29-point advantage.
So, what the heck is going on here?
Joining me now to break it all down Harry Antin, senior political writer and analyst for the website 538 where they spend a good amount of time trying to figure it all out. What is this poll?
HARRY ENTEN, 538: We`re trying to figure it out.
This is ridiculous. I mean, we see a lot of times polls having differences, but not this wide. But I`ll give you a few ideas of what`s going on.
Number one, we don`t really know who`s going caucus. Look at 2004 to 2008 the turnout doubled. There`s no real good list of people who caucus. So there are different ways that pollsters try to figure this out. Either one, they call a list of registered voters and those polls have tended to do better for Hillary Clinton, or two, they`ll just call everybody and ask are you going to caucus? Those polls have tended to do better for Bernie Sanders.
HAYES: so there`s a huge amount of uncertainly as to who shows up and obviously the way that Barack Obama won victory in 2008 was getting people to show up that no one thought would show up.
ENTEN: That`s exactly right. So, if you look at that CNN poll, Clinton in fact is leading fairly significantly by nearly 20 points among those who showed up and voted in 2008.
HAYES: Oh, wow, well that is interesting.
So, this is -- if he`s going to be competitive in Iowa or win Iowa, Bernie Sanders has to pull off something similar to what Obama pulled off in 2008 in terms of organizing people into attending something they haven`t done before.
ENTEN: That`s exactly right.
But I would throw a caution to Bernie Sanders. Ann Selzer, who`s the best pollster in that state, has consistently had Hillary Clinton ahead. Their last poll only had Clinton ahead by two, but certainly nothing close to a Sanders lead.
HAYES: Right. And you guys have in your model Hillary Clinton favored to win Iowa.
Now, one of the complications here, too, is another candidate in the race, Martin O`Malley. And the caucuses are this -- I don`t know, we`ll do this next week, I think we`re going to break down how these caucuses work, because it`s fascinating.
But basically you`re in a room, right, and if your candidate doesn`t get above a 15 percent threshold what happens?
ENTEN: Those voters have to be reallocated to the other candidates. There can be multiple rounds of voting.
So, if you go back to 2008 Bill Richardson in fact made a deal with Barack Obama and his voters when they didn`t reach the 15 percent threshold, went and supported Barak Obama which is part of the reason why I think Obama`s margins were wider than most of polls indicated that it would be.
HAYES: So, you`re in a room, you`ve got 100 people and you`ve got 45 Bernie Sanders supporters and 45 Hillary Clinton supporters and there`s 10 Martin O`Malley supporters, and they look around and they say we don`t have the theshhold, they`ve got to go between those two camps.
ENTEN: That`s exactly right.
HAYES: And so they actually could end up being, if it is close, pretty crucial.
ENTEN: That`s exactly right. In fact, I`ve written about that. There is still a question of who they would go to. There is some suggestion...
HAYES: Who are they is the other question.
ENTEN: well, that`s the other question. I don`t really know them. But there is some suggestion they would go to Bernie Sanders but the polling on, that they`re such a small percentage of the electorate.
HAYES: You can`t get really good cross-tabs.
ENTEN: Exactly.
HAYES: OK. Let`s talk about this sort of trafficjam between Kasich, Rubio, Chris Christie and Jeb Bush. This is sort of one month ago versus today. The only person who seems to be making gains is Kasich. It looks like he was up on the air early. He from the very beginning I think made the choice that he was going to only fight in New Hampshire, hasn`t really tried to contest in New Hampshire.
There are people who say that Jeb Bush let him go up on the air too long. But it does seem like there`s actual movement for Kasich.
ENTEN: It does, but it`s among a very particular group of voters. It`s undeclared and pretty much moderate or liberal undeclareds who might otherwise be voting in a Democratic primary. In fact there, was a poll out this week that suggested the large percentage the undeclareds make up of the Republican field the better Kasich will do.
HAYES: And this is something about the New Hampshire primary which is you don`t have to be a registered Republican to vote in the Republican primary.
ENTEN: That`s right. Undeclareds can vote in either the Republican or the Democratic primary.
HAYES: And that has played a crucial effect in races every four years.
ENTEN: That`s right. John McCain was very, very close with George W. Bush in 2000 among registered Republicans but among undeclareds he swept and that gave hmm a large victory back then.
HAYES: All right, Harry Enten from 538. Great thanks, we`ll have you back.
ENTEN: Thank you.
HAYES: Appreciate it.
That is All In for this evening. The Rachel Maddow show starts right now.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END