I believe that we must be suspicious of legal classifications based solely on sexual orientation. Independence in the territorial integrity of ukraine is extremely important. The winds of change are knocking again at ukraines doors. The will of the people must be done. We have serious concerns about some issues in venezuela, include democracy and human rights. Children in california strickenned with a polio will like virus. More than children have not recovered the use of their are or leg. We know very little about whats going on. Attorney general eric holder who told a conference of state attorneys general on tuesday that they do not have to defend their states laws against game marriage if they think they discriminate in a way thats not constitutional. This is the extraordinary task with which the American People have entrusted the leaders in this room and the challenge that all justice professionals are called for address. Not merely to use our legal system to settle disputes and punish those who have done wrong but to answer the kind of really fundamental questions about fairness and about equality that have always determined who we are, and who we aspire to be both as a nation and as a people. Mr. Holder has said that he views Marriage Equality as an extension of the Civil Rights Movement but now hes facing criticism from those who say his job is to defend the law, not to tell people which laws they can ignore. For more account we are joined by ilya shapiro a senior fellow of constitutional studys at the Kato Institute and editorinchief of the Kato Supreme Court review, he has an address junction prefess or at the of the school of law. And from San Francisco, Christine Pelosi and the attorney and chair of the California Democratic womens caucus former District Attorney for the city of San Francisco. Good to have on you the show. Ilya i want to start with you. Holder says any decision not to defend laws must be exceedingly rare and exceptional circumstance but he says game marriage is an exception because he called it one of the defining civil rights challenges of our time. Does he have a point . Unfortunately, not. First of all there is something problematic about the u. S. Attorney general telling state attorneys general how they are supposed to behave. There is something tissue about federal over reach in to state prerogatives. But moreover, when you are a lawyer you have to duty of zealous representation of your client. If there are any nonfrivolous arguments to be made to support the law at issue the state attorney general is bound to present those no court. If he hats an ethical problem beyond that he should recuse or resign. I think holder is way over the line on multiple levels. And christine, holder said the decisions should never be political or based on policy objections. In effect isnt that what hes asking attorneys general to do to take a position based on policy or politics . No, hes not. In fact we live in in california in 2006, i chaired the California DemocraticParty Platform committee when we affirmed our support for Marriage Equality and at that time we were struggling with proposition 22. Now the voters passed a ban on samesex marriage our then attorney general jerry brown, refuse today defend it. He was successful as you know in becoming governor. When she was running for attorney general then San Francisco da Pamela Harris said she wouldnt defend the constitution at of proposition 8. And both of them were overwhelmingly elected and supported by the voters. Governor brown by a very large margin. And so i think what we have here is a fundamental responsibility to the constitution first. And in california, and just as recently as virginia attorneys general are running on equality platforms and saying they are reading of their their reading of the United States constitution which is in their oath of offers says that fundamentally speaking Marriage Equality is constitutional and a ban on Marriage Equality is unconstitutional. But that hasnt been decided on a National Basis yet, though. And ilya, holder but polledder, yo holdercited the brown versus board of education case that forced integration. He said he would have never defended that case had he been an attorney general back then in that state s that not a fair comparison . Its hard to do retroactive history. I mean, i am for gay marriage i am filing next week in fact a brief in the 10th circuit supporting the challenge to utah and oklahomas restrictive marriage laws, but thats not the issue here. The issue is is there a nonfrivolous argument that can be made to support the law in question. And i think the answer is yes, in these cases. Until there is a definitive ruling one way or another by the supreme court, just your decision as an attorney general, as a lawyer, about who has the better of the case, is irrelevant to this consideration, its whether you think there are nonfrivolous arguments to be made. Christine, doesnt ilya have a point n colorado a republican who called holders comments inning a front rat warned about making descensions about which laws to defend and which no to. This is something that he wrote in the Washington Post earlier this month, he said i personally oppose a anybody of colorados laws as a matter of publicist policy and a few few are contrary for my religious beliefs but as may states attorney general i have defend go ahead them all and will continue to do so. Can attorneys general just pick and choose what they want to do . Of course not. Thats no the not what eric holder said. What aircraft holder said was, the constitution comes first. Its a very rare extraordinary situation he absolutely said it shouldnt be based on policy as you mentioned and there are plenty of laws that eric holder has upheld that the United StatesJustice Department has upheld, in which he doesnt believe personally think so lets not take this as a stampede away from the courthouse. Thats not what is happening here. Holder is making a principled argument saying in a very, very rarefied instance, such as Marriage Equality, that an attorney general can make a determination that the law as written in their state, is unconstitutional. And if they make a finding that it is unconstitutional, they can further decide not to spends their public dollars and their office defending it. The house of representatives went through this very exercise when the House Republicans claimed that they were for fiscal as tear at this and yet spent 3 million defending doma long after all the public polls said people were against it. I think that its interesting that some of the same people who made a political decision to go after eric holder today and made a political decision to keep defending doma, arent listening to what he actually said. Which is respect the constitution and do this in a very rare instance. Thats rich coming from an administration that violates the constitution every chance it gets. Its the only it doesnt violate the constitution. [speaking at the same time] lets base the conversation in fact. The federal government extease its powers on so many levels the executive branch and the president and attorney general holder according to you but not according to law. But according to the law they dont. Lets not get in to a debate about the executive oughts and all of this right now lets stay on topic. We are seeing in arizona, kansas bills that may or may not make their way through the legislatures or signed by the governors enshrining rights to discriminate against gaze. These are religious freedom rest raise act passed unanimously in congress. They go further never allowing businesses n to not provide services to game couples and so there is a certain most people do think these are discriminal that tory and seems like most of the legislatures ls and governors think that way. But my question to you is, aside from the issues in no particular cases is there not a point where an attorney general does have to say, something is discriminatory, i cannot argue for the enforcement of that discrimination, its the question of, if if good people dont speak up that evil will thrive. It depends what you mean by discrimination, i discrime made every day we deciding to act, not to act, call somebody or not. Be a friends or not. The law chooses who it served and doesnt serve. That argument then restaurants in the south could continue to segregate if they were so inclined. Jim crow is a different situation because that was enforced by the power of the state. Here its individual businesses that are being given the decision if i dont want to serve people in red tshirts that should be my freedom well see how businesses thrive. I have a feeling that those businesses that advertise themselves being open to gays will be doing better off than those who say that we will not serve them. The fact ta of the matter tht law in arizona and missouri and georgia and kansas is completely unconstitutional by the kato argument if there was a state that passed a referendum allowing slavery you wouldnt let the government that would violate the 13th amendment. I see. And so by the same argument, you are violating the 14th amendment when you discriminate people based on race, based on gender, based on sexual orien station. [speaking at the same time] its not a matter of red. Reporter shirts its a matter of the color of their skin or being gay, lesbian this is a hot topic for all of us. There is a difference in state action and individuals and private businesses, states should not discriminate on any bases private individuals should be able do what that i want and the response to that is to shun and boycott and publicly oppose them. And also outlaw discrimination in all its forms and that will be the result by the supreme court. In the meantime lets remember eric holder didnt say anything radical today. Sure, he did, disregard says eric holder. We have to being its honor the constitution. We have to leave it there. I appreciate you both being onto discuss this important topic. Look forward to having you both back on. Thank you. My flesh. You are thanks antonio. Switching topics to ukraine. A any government was supposed to be announced tuesday but its been put off until thursday ukraine is a fiscal basket case so a government needs to be in place before western nation including the u. S. Will offer financial help that could stave off collapse, interim president who announced the day also warned the country faced a serious threat. That regions with large populations of ethnic rushing ans could tear the country apart apart. Gave authorities five days to capture fugitive president victor january cove switch bring hiyanukovych and bring himto tr. For more on the possibilities of a split lets go to Eastern Ukraine and al jazerra correspondent nick schifrin. Nick you were in kiev now there in the east, you ever seen protests there. I am sure its a completely different approach than what you saw in kiev. What is going on there . Is there a sense that there is a government that there are city officials that anyone is in control . Reporter well, antonio, right behind me where city officials usually work. Thats the Administration Building and for four days its been occupied by the very same people who are in Independence Square kiev. So right now the local officials including the local governor is missing because they know that their office is being held right now. For lack of a better word by the opposition. Throughout this city there is a well sense of divide. Here we are only about 20 miles from the russian boarder and keif. They believe that yanukovychs out of ther is illegal and they are not accepting whats happening in kiev especially not accepting the new government. But i would say that they actually stopped short of calling for any kind of division or any kind of break up of the country. As you just played out, they know its imperative that the future begins quickly in terms of politics because the economics are so bad think the country is a couple of months away from default and needs the government in order to stave off that collapse. And these people know that, yes, they dont support the people in the building behind me, they dont support the new politicians who are running the show in kiev, but they do not think that the country should split and so they are trying to figure out a way to make sure that they are still counted as they have been for so many decades here. Now, there were protests tuesday. Pro russian ukrainians surrounded a statue of lennon and protests there with dozens of people speaking out about what they call the bandits in keif trying to form a new government. So there is a separatist feeling, it seems, in other parts of ukraine. I would imagine that people there are not cap i that president yanukovych was deposed . Thats an under statement. Absolutely. Reporter there was a humor that he left his home and came here. After he left the presidency. That was never confirmed. And there is no sign of where he is now. But this city very much identifies itself with him, with that pro russian camp. And so now its just trying to figure out what the future is, its trying to figure out thousand push forward on this street. I am on a street right here and this divide really is a division between the people in that ahead pin straight i have building, the opposition and the pro russian group. We were about 100 feet that way the lennon statue is right there. Its within of the largest in all of europe and the last one in the ukraine thats still in a city center. And so its extremely symbolic, lennon statue extremely symbolic that those pro russian, we can call them protesters i suppose, are defend that go statue and believe that there was a resume their the statue was going to come down thats high they rushed to defend it and saying they are not leaving and making sure it stays up no matter what. Very big divisions in ukraine. Nick schifrin, good to have you on the show, thanks no your time. For more now on the ukraine efforts to launch a new government rejoined by skype from kiev from a member of ukraines parliament from the father land party, the party of former mime minute year Yulia Tymoshenko who was just released from prison. Good to have you on the show. The interim president warned about the serious threat of accept rah tim that ukraine might split apart. How serious do you see that threat . And is there anything parliament can do about it . Will, we are a little bit concerned about the movements in the Eastern Ukraine and we see people who and we see some people who are trying to talk of breaking away from there to russia. In general, as we see you the new administration being being launched will bring the country together and keeping its territorial integrity. The new administration, a delay on tuesday as to naming who will be a part of it. Do you expect that to be announced on thursday . Absolutely. And antonio, you should understand that the revolution raised politics so high. Now its extremely challenge to go put a new government together. It should be accepted by the people who are still in the streets. It should reflect the difficult political balance in the parliament and we need good professionals who are capable to take the country out of the economic crisis where it is. But we do hope to see it new government on thursday. Now how big ive problem are the people who are still on the streets, we saw some police go there to apologize to the people who are still out in the square. But it does seem like the people who are still in the streets are taking a pretty hard line. Exactly. I think people demand real substantial changes. They are saying its not enough just to change the names of the president and the prime minister, they want deep reforms and i think we are witnessing historical moments when this country is in a way being reestablished. Will all of the opposition parties be represented in this new government. I hope so. I think the government will be real inclusive. And professionals, activists, good managers, good experts from no matter what Party Affiliation they have. Really want to see a new quality of government and new quality of administration. Officials from the International Monetary funneled, the European Union and other interested parties say they want that they want to help the ukraine with the economic crisis its going through, but they cant do that until the new government is formed. Will a new government, though, once it is formed, be able to make commitments that ukraine will follow even i if that means an Austerity Program that might not be popular in ukraine and could push the economy in recession . We perfectly understand that we need to build trust to bring a government from scratch. But unfortunately ukraine has had the reputation of one the most corrupt countries around the world and i than the new administration and the people of ukraine are really committed to deep profound reforms, so when we are talking about the future it means fighting against corruption, respecting human rights and means trust from your friends around the world. We just saw a picture of vitale klischko on the floor of parliament there, he has announced that he will run for president. Hes a former heavyweight boxing champion of the world and one of the leaders of the opposition, we have also third that Julia Tymoshenko may or may not run for president. Already people are positioning themselves for the future of ukraine. Is all of this making things more complicated because you start seeing all of these different interested clashing with each other . I think this is what democracy is really about. Well have the National Election on may the 25th and its quite right well see separate candidates who represent the democratics parties and i think its probably a good ti