Fridays crushing defeat. But a new report says that steve bannon is leading the way to resuscitate the bill. That will work. This morning senator Bernie Sanders is going to be our guesting. My daughter is so excited. She waited in line for three hours at Johns Hopkins to see him speak. Hell be on at 8 30. Welcome to morning joe. Its march 29. With us veteran columnist and msnbc contributor mike barnicle, former Campaign Director for ted cruzs campaign, rick tyler, msnbc anchor and Political CorrespondentSteve Kornacki is with us. New york times reporter Jeremy Peters and senior political analyst for nbc news and msnbc Mark Halperin. The Trump Administration and the whole sort of trump era is shining a light on people. You look at everybody a little differently to see how do they respond. The one that is shining the brightest light on and i think has certainly changed the opinion, Mitch Mcconnell. I love yesterday trump and bannon came out, were going to do this, do this. Mitch mcconnell was like, no, no, you aint. Mitch mcconnell is showing why he is the he is the grownup in washington, d. C. He said, weve got bake, lets see how this goes. You know this better than anyone here at the table and i know a bit of it from talking to a few people. You talk to more people. They are so insulted by the level of incompetence that theyre dealt every day from the white house staff, that theyre living in a state of shock. The thing is, you have these people blow into town and i guess the best comparison is when jimmy carters squad pulled into town and they treated tip oneill like he was some backwater dupe from south boston. Tip oneill taught them very quickly. I was interviewing Mitch Mcconnell about a month or so ago. Its like the scene out of absence of malice where Wilford Brimley says to paul newman, youre smart, mr. Whoever, im pretty smart, too. Mitch mcconnell said, they think theyre the only smart guys in washington. Wea weve got some mart guys here. The smart guys, rick tyler, are making them look dumb every day. The city has its own rhythm, own pattern, own inertia. The new people dont tend to change it. The question is, trump was brought in not to assimilate into the town, but the changes you have to be competent. Reagan changed washington. Reagan brought in james baker. Reagan brought in reagan brought in professionals that actually knew how to help reagan do it. Hes brought in a website operator who had never been in politi politics, as john said in his tweet, until august of 16. If you were running a website until august of 16 and go to capitol hill and say ye shall bow before me . You cant move the city. Its impossible. From your reporting in the New York Times, the new talks which quietly began this week involved stephen bannon, the president s chief strategist and members of two republican factions that helped sink the bill last week, the hard right Freedom Caucus and the more centrist tuesday group. Vice president mike pence went to the hill for lunchtime talks yesterday and there was a closed door meeting of House Republicans to air out what happened and what might be next. Today we broke down many of those dividing lines within our conference. Theres too much at stake to get bogged down in all of that. After this morning, the resolve of our conference to repeal obamacare and replace it has never been stronger. I think were closer today to repealing obamacare than weve ever been before and certainly closer than we were friday. Oh, my goodness, i think where we are on obamacare regretfully at the moment is where the democrats wanted us to be, which is with the status quo. Whose fault is that . Well, its pretty obvious we were not able in the house to pass a replacement. Our democratic friends ought to be pretty happy about that because we have the existing law in place, and i think were just going to have to see how that works out. We believe it will not work out well, but well see. Rick and i were both laughing at the same time. The best strategy. He doesnt say it like trump, its going to fail. Its going to die hes just like a southern judge going, well, tell you what, so you want to do that . Tell you what. Well just see how that works out. By the way, the Freedom Caucus, wpa did some polling, the Freedom Caucus did its constituents will. They did exactly what their voters in their districts said to do. This is joes reaction to all of that. He tweeted this. A scene from dumb and dumber. Jeremy peters, help us out here. Narrate. Listening to Steve Scalise he thinks the will has never been stronger. The will may be there, the statement theyre closer than theyve ever been is just false. Look at all you have going on on capitol hill right now. You have a tax bill that the president wants to do, an infrastructure bill hed like to see. You have all these Intelligence Committee investigations going on. You have the confirmation of a Supreme Court justice. Oh, yeah, and then the government runs out of funding next month and they have to figure out how to solve that. Jeremy, are they just going to repeal it for the 58th time and have the senate say, no, no, were actually not going to move on it . I dont think so. I think whatever they do, they want there to be some reasonable logical course of action in the senate, some kind of path. Right now that doesnt exist. Especially, Steve Kornacki, because Mitch Mcconnell said when he was told yesterday, he said oh, my goodness, which in the south is the same as saying bless their heart. What he couldnt say and what no republican in washington can say out loud is how relieved they were that this seemed to end last friday, this was not going to make it through the house, not going to go through the senate, not going to have the Conference Committee, not going to have the next three or four months dominated by this issue. When you look at polling, this was unpopular even with republican voters. 17 . 17 . Thats why on the right side of the republican conference, you could oppose this and be popular, on the left side, the moderates, folks from pennsylvania and new jersey they could be opposed for different sets of reasons. The Silver Lining for republicans last friday was this thing would be off the table. The appetite to revive anything like this now to open up a threemonth fight would be nonexistent. This is idiotic for them to be talking about this because, Mark Halperin, theyre pointing back to their failures of last week and the week before, and the broken promises. Mitch mcconnell has got it right. Democrats have what they want. They have the status quo. Lets just see how that works out. Why is steve bannon is he trying to help his falling standing inside the white house. I know hes in this battle to the death with other members and hes trashing everybody else inside of there to other reporters. Is this steve bannon trying to save his hide inside the white house . I think youre right and senator mcconnell is right about the overriding dynamic. I think there are three factors propelling them to try and try again and not just walk awayment on a matter of policy, republicans are united, they dont like status quo, dont like to be saddled to the downside. Two, they really werent that far apart for a deal that could win a majority in the house, not necessarily in the senate, but they were not that far away from trying to get to the next step. Finally, you know, if they dont get health care out of the way, it complicates everything, as speaker ryan says. It makes tax reform harder, makes it harder for them to move on with the agenda. Its not so clean to say were done when onesixth of their economy is going down the tubes. You say thar were close to it. The more they gave to the Freedom Caucus, the more they would lose from mainstream republicans. There was no way that was going to work. You take away the essential Health Benefits that were taken off the table by the Freedom Caucus, that lost all the moderates, most of the people in the middle. They wanted to go further right. There is no way Mitch Mcconnells senate would ever pass that in a billion years. I agree theres nothing today that would pass both bodies. But the only way to get this done is get past the first step. While youre right, there didnt seem to be a way to compromise, the policy and political implications of the failure, did influence, is there a way to compromise and everybody gives Something Else just to get the bill to the senate. I agree with you, the overriding dynamics are the same and a lot of house members dont want to vote for a bill thats going to go to the senate and fail. Lets be clear, mika, there is no way for them to reach majority in the house. Maybe they can find out the hard way again. Theres no way they can reach a majority in the house by just talking to the republican caucus. You want to reach the majority, you have to say goodbye to the Freedom Caucus and pick up 30 to 40 democrats. Im not saying thats good. Im not saying thats bad. Im saying thats the political reality. Youre not going to pass republicans and get it through the senate. Look at the states rushing to expand medicaid because of the expansion and its going to make it even harder. If these pathos things, even more people that will potentially lose insurance. One of the innings i was looking at, yesterday i was questioning sean spicers credibility. I think its at risk, in jeopardy or shot. If you think about it and go through a timeline, now you might want to add questioning his stability. In yesterdays press brief, did you see him yesterday . He kind of snapped. I think things are getting in his head which is really early for that to be happening. Then again, think about it. It happened when kpchbt april ryan questioned him over the administrations image. I didnt really see her shaking her head. Did anyone see her shaking her head . What does it look like . Like this, right . She was looking down at her paper. Theres two shots going on. I never saw any head shaking. I dont know whats going on. Take a look. 2 1 2 months in, youve got other things going on, youve got russia, you have wiretapping. No, we dont have that. On capitol hill. I get it. Ive said it from the day that i got here until whatever that there is no connection. Youve got russia. If the president puts russian salad dressing on his salad tonight, somehow thats a russian connection. [ inaudible ]. I appreciate your agenda here. Hold on. At some point report the facts. The facts are that every Single Person who has been briefed on that subject has come away with the same conclusion, republican, democrat. Im sorry that that disgusts you. Youre shaking your head. Understand this. At some point the facts are what they are. Hold on april, hold on. It seems like youre hellbent on trying to make sure whatever image you want to tell about this white house stays. Because at the end of the day. I am reporting youre asking me a question and im going to answer it. Im sorry. Please stop shaking your head again. What is wrong with him . Is he kidding me . Mike barnicle, she wasnt shaking her head, first of all. Secondly, how condescending can anybody be . Third, this is not a first grade class. That was just simply beyond the pale. Someone is in way over his he head. Yes. Theres a part of me that has great sympathy for him because hes got an audience of one that hes dealing with, the president of the United States. The other thing is, he clearly does not have the temperament to be press secretary. Josh earnest was in here the other day, he had the temporary. Mike mccurry was there when hell was raining down from above and stayed calm. Tony snow was there during a really tough time for bush. We remember tony snow. The thing is, you just dont have to be abusive, and in that situation, Steve Kornacki, i never heard anybody be as condescending from that position and abusive, accusing somebody of doing something they werent even doing. Im kind of where mike is on it, too. Im trying to imagine the sort of political professional, the Communication Specialist who could step into this role and meet the demand being placed on him or her by donald trump, by the boss, by the guy who is behind the scenes every day when these press conferences are going out and a reporter like april ryan speaks up, and its in your mind that donald trump is judging you on how tough you are, how forceful you are, those sorts of things. Im not saying he did himself, im not saying he did the white house any favors in that situation yesterday. No, he didnt. Its like youre sitting at a casino losing on the slot machine and youre getting mad at the machine and its the guy who programmed the machine. The guy has no ability, none at all, none, to say President Trump this is the wrong thing to do. He cant do it. He doesnt have the ability. Mika, mika he gets out there and loses his you know what because hes tied up in his head because he has an inability to speak his mind. Sean spicer should tell donald trump im not doing your bidding anymore if it means being abusive. But nobody around donald trump is telling him the truth. I know. Nobody. It would be nice if somebody tried. Well go back to the first day, and i wont reveal my sources, but the first day somebody tweeted pictures of the crowd sizes before spicers press conference. I picked up the phone and called somebody very high up at the white house and i said, i just want you to know this is the dumbest thing. This is the stupidest thing ive ever seen in my life. If on the first night in the oval office you talk about crowd sizes, were going to strip the bark after your tree, were going to kill you. That is unmatched. Should have said no. Let me finish. Thank you. The story will be a lot shorter. Stop shaking your head, joe. If youll just let me finish, the stories will be a lot shorter. Continue. Thank you. And so they said after it was over, you just couldnt help yourself, you all look like total idiots. I added a word in there. Frauds. He said this person said, you should have seen how bad it was going to be. And after sean finished his press conference that youre screaming at us about, he then went into the oval office and the president screamed at him for being too weak and then screamed at him for wearing a light suit. Thats when you say, mike, this job is just not for me. Joe, what you raise and what steve just mentioned is who can go into the president of the United States, who can walk into the oval and say, President Trump nobody. Even if you had a jim baker walking into the office, you have to have someone who is receptive to hearing that kind of counsel, and i dont think it appears that the president of the United States isnt receptive. Chicken or egg. Somebody has to give that kind of counsel. Hes not receptive, great, leave. Sean spicer leaving on day two would have said a lot and done a lot for this presidency. It would have been better than him staying there hanging on like a complete shill lying. Mark halperin, the question ive been asking the past two days with a smile on my face, and i just want a yes or no. Is sean spicer credible . Not within the Briefing Room with people that cover him every dwa. Some people use the white house podium to get through the day, not make news. Hes become such a voice and such a face of the administration, theyre not winning most news cycles. In part its because that Briefing Daily is setting them back rathe than getting them going forward. Theres no reason why he had to do that with april ryan. April asked a question, answer the question and move on to the next person. Temperament. He takes a lot of simple questions and turns them into big fights. He takes a lot of abuse day in and day out. Guess what . Read marlon fits water said, thats the presss job, whether its george h. W. Bush what about carney. Carney was a loved guy at time magazine. We loved him, we chatted on the show. He got behind that podium. It didnt take long for him to be a total jerk. Every day it is a tough, tough job. It might be time to rethink the job itself. You have the virtual cream of the crop of network broadcasters, print people sitting in the White House Press room, you get no news out of there. Why not send in some younger people, interns to just record what the press secretary says. Youre not going to get any big stories in that White House Press room. If you look at what the job is, hes not serving the president or the people. Not doing the job. Still ahead on morning joe, senator Bernie Sanders joins us live. Plus hopefully it will start being bipartisan because everybody really wants the same thing. We want greatness for this country that we love. So i think were going to have some very good rips. Right, chuck . I see chuck. Hem low, chuck. And i really think that will happen. Donald trump once said on our show he would get things done with Chuck Schumer. According to some reports they havent talk since he took office. Was there a thaw in the icy relationship last night at the white house . First, bill karins with a check on the forecast. You guys want to see the sun today . Why not, right . Some sunshine for about two days in the northeast while the middle of the country will suffer from the severe storms and heavy rain. Lets get into the dangerous stuff from yesterday. 14 tornadoes reported but they happened where we want them to, out in rural sections of western tex