Fingerpointing begins, inside a desperately struggling rubio operation, as ted cruz goes for the jugular. Buckle up, everybody. We are in the midst of a primarypalooza that could be make or break for frontrunners donald trump and Hillary Clinton. In just 14 hours now, polls are set to open in michigan. Weve also got primaries in mississippi tomorrow for both sides, and Republicans Holding contests, as well, in idaho, and in hawaii. We have got a lot in the show for you tonight, so lets dive right in. In the smashmouth republican primary, it is looking more and more like a twoman race between donald trump and ted cruz. Over the weekend, trump took don te contests in kentucky and in louisiana, while trump won big in maine and kansas. Marco rubio notched his second victory, but puerto rico like his earlier victory in minnesota is hardly a republican powerhouse. Trump picking up 61 delegates over the weekend, cruz adding 70 to his total. That makes to a very top race at the top. Only 87 delegates now separating trump and cruz. Meanwhile, rubio, though, falling to a very distant third place. And there is increasing evidence that he is in big trouble in this race. Heres why. In louisiana primary, rubio grabbed roughly 20 of the early vote, the vote that was cast before primary day. But among those who actually showed up on saturday to vote in the primary, his support plummeted to less than 10 . The super pac supporting ted cruz is now looking for a knockout blow to take rubio out of this race, once and for all. Theyre unloading a torrent of new ads, targeting him ahead of next weeks florida primary. For years, marco rubio has been making it snow for big sugar in washington. Do you know he skipped 18 defense votes . Marco rubio, absent on national defense. Marco rubios tax plan will hurt you and your family. You coauthored a bill with democrats two years ago that allowed a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. You said an earned pathway was amnesty, yet youve changed your mind here. Why . Keep the promise is responsible for the content of this advertising. Some and maybe even all of those ads could be hitting the airaways in rubios home state of florida. And if rubio loses on his home turf next week, his campaign is all but finished. Check this out. A new Monmouth University poll out of florida today shows donald trump Still Holding on to an eight of point lead over rubio. Ted cruz is way back in third place with just 17 . But here is a cache22 in that race. If cruz knocks rubio out of contention in florida with those ads, the effect could be to pave the way for an easy victory for donald trump in florida. And if donald trump wince florida, thats a winner take all, you get 99 delegates, even if you win by just one vote. If trump wince florida, if he also wins ohio on march 15th, another winnertakeall state, he is going to have a massive lead in the delegate race. That would make him potentially unstoppable. And at that point, cruz might then get the twoman race that hes looking for, but with that kind of a delegate lead for trump, it might be too late for ted cruz to do anything about it. But out of nowhere today, john kasich suddenly looks like hes surging in michigan. Our new nbc news wall street journal marist poll in the great lakes state that was in the field last week, trump holds a commanding lead in michigan. Kasich back in fourth place there. But today, a new monmouth poll in the field through sunday shows kasich now edging up to third place, and just two points behind cruz for second place. And heres the kicker, the monmouth pollsters note that kasich closed that gap even more with trump based on interviews conducted over the weekend. So there are a lot of signs here pointing to john kasich rising in michigan and rising fast. In all of that is just onehalf of this wild race. On the democratic side, the drama is building there as well. Bernie sanders coming away with three wins over the weekend. He took nebraska, kansas, and maine. Meanwhile, clinton racked up a big victory in louisiana. More importantly, though, despite only winning one of those states, she nonetheless, expanded her dominant delegate lead. She now has 1,100 delegates, that is roughly a 600delegate lead over sanders. That is including super delegates in Hillary Clintons column. She heads into tomorrows big contest in michigan with a 17point lead, this according to the latest nbc news wall street journal marist poll. That new monmouth poll out of michigan today also shows Clinton Holding a doubledigit lead, a little bit smaller, but still a 13point advantage over Bernie Sanders for her. But the Sanders Campaign thinks this race is tighter than the polls show, at least they have to hope so. And as we saw at a fight last night in the debate last night, a fight boiling over at the democratic debate in flint, michigan, with sanders and clinton exchanging serious fire on trade and on guns. Were going to stop this kind of job exporting and were going to start importing and growing jobs again in our country. I am very glad, anderson, that secretary clinton has discovered religion on this issue. But its a little bit too little. Essentially, your position is, there should not be any guns in america. Period. That is like the nra position. No. Can i finish, please . talk about corporate greed, the gun manufacturers sell guns to make as much money as they can make. But the biggest fireworks came when clinton ripped into sanders on the topic of bailing out the detroit Auto Industry. He was against the auto bailout. I voted to save the Auto Industry. He voted against the money that ended up saving the Auto Industry. I think that is a pretty big difference. Well, i if you are talking about the wall street bailout, where some of your friends destroyed this economy you know excuse me im talking. Let him respond. If youre going to talk, tell the whole story, senator sanders. Let me tell my story, you tell yours. I will. Your story is voting for every disastrous trade agreement and voting for corporate america. Sanders fired back today while speaking to crowds in kalamazoo, michigan, and then he spoke to reporters in detroit. The only problem with her assertion is that it is categorically untrue. On december 11th, 2008, there was one vote. The only vote we had in the senate. Whether or not we support the Automobile Industry, and i, of course, voted yes. But to suggest that when you vote against a bailout of wall street and against the crooks on wall street who have destroyed this economy, to suggest thats voting against the Automobile Industry is very disingenuous and factually incorrect. It may be good politics, but it happens to be just incorrect. And we also have some breaking news coming in just in the last few minutes. Nbc news can now confirm that former new york city mayor Michael Bloomberg has decided not to run for president in 2016. Bloomberg has posted a piece on Bloomberg News titled the risk i will not take and he writes in this piece, quote, but when i look at the data, its clear to me that if i entered the race, i could not win. I believe i could win a number of diverse states, but not enough to win the 270 electoral votes necessary to win the presidency. So Michael Bloomberg writing this afternoon that he will not wage a thirdparty bid for president in 2016. This is something that bloomberg had flirted with in several recent election cycles, as well. Now well into his 70s, this is probably the last time Michael Bloomberg will walk up to the starting line of a president ial race. Again, Michael Bloomberg saying he will not be a candidate in 2016. Thats news just in the last few minutes. Joining me now is a supporter of Hillary Clinton and former michigan governor, Jennifer Granholm. She is the seminar adviser to the proclinton super pac, correct the record. Governor, thanks for taking a few minutes. So i want to pick up this exchange we were just playing there over the auto bailout, thats obviously a very important issue where youre sitting right now in detroit. And in your state, Bernie Sanders is saying that that argument that Hillary Clinton was making in the debate last night is disingenuous. She was saying he voted against the funds for the bailout, the funds were coming from the t. A. R. P. Fund, from the wall street bailout. But when it actually came to the auto bailout itself, Bernie Sanders was a vociferous proponent, supporter of the auto bailo bailout. Doesnt he have a point there thats a little disingenuous . No, this is what happened. There was a vote in december of 2008. It was one of the last thing that george bush did, which was to say, lets take some money and give the autos a sort of bridge loan to the next administration that was a 17 billion vote and he did vote for that. But when it came to the big bailout of the Auto Industry, not just the bridge loan, that was tied up with the t. A. R. P. Money. He was so against wall street that he couldnt bring himself to support the Auto Industry, even though all of the senators from this region were in favor of it, the president was asking him to bail out the Auto Industry. And when she said last night, if everybody had voted the way Bernie Sanders would have voted, we would have lost the auto indust industry, 4 Million People gone. This area would have decimated. I know it was a hard vote, because it was mixed up with the t. A. R. P. Money, but the bottom line is, he was more antiwall street than he was proAuto Industry. Thats a pretty heavy thing to say, that Bernie Sanders, who was a supporter of the excuse me, of the auto bailout, originally, would have let the Auto Industry die. He says he simply wanted the mown to be paid for out of the stimulus. The stimulus was something that was being drawn up at the time this vote youre talking about was taken. He said it wasnt right that the money come from the wall street bailout package, that he had major problems with. It should be part of the stimulus instead. Reporter well, this is exactly what she meant when she said, when you go, sometimes you have to make difficult calls. This was what was presented. He may not have liked the way it was wrapped, but ultimately, this was the vote that counted. This was when when push came to shove, this was the vote that stated you were in favor of the Auto Industry, even if it was a tough vote. Yeah, it was a tough vote. But you know what would have been much tougher if we would have lost the Auto Industry as a result of people like Bernie Sanders voting no. Jennifer granholm, thanks for the time. Appreciate it. You bet. Here to respond from the sanders camp, don regal, a u. S. Senator from michigan and announced his support for Bernie Sanders just yet. Thanks for taking a few minutes. Lets stay on this issue. I think you heard what Jennifer Granholm just said there. She said, senator sanders might not have liked the wall street bailout, but when it came down to it in early 2009 and detroit was depending on getting a cut of that wall street money, Bernie Sanders was so preoccupied with standing up to wall street, that he would have let detroit be collateral damage. What do you say to that . Thats complete nonsense. Thats political talk and thats what people say in order so sort of confuse people and confuse issues right before a primary election. I was there last night in flint, i grew up in flint and i know exactly whats happened to flint over a period of time by a number of policy actions that have really devastated the community, ending up, of course, with a poisoned water supply. But, you know, the bernie, when he cast the vote to protect and defend and permit the Auto Industry to survive the first vote that you mentioned, that made it very clear where he was on the issue. And theres no doubt about it. And hillary tried to fuzz it up last night, but putting into a combination bill to bailout wall street, especially why were we bailing out wall street . Because but senator regal, i want to get some clarity here. Because what governor granholm was just saying there, she said, hey, look, fine, he didnt like the fact that we were bailingout wall street. He was against bailingo ining o street. That bill went nowhere, so bottom line, if you wanted to bail out the Auto Industry, you had to take a piece of it from t. A. R. P. What do you say to that . Well, i served in the senate for 18 years and in the house for ten, so i know how these votes go and how theyre put together. There was no way the Auto Industry was going to go down. They married these two to great a ransom to wall street, in order to package it up with the Auto Industry money. The Auto Industry money would have been passed. Theres no question about it. And so, when it comes down to paying that kind of a ransom, and to create that situation to bail out wall street, bernie took a stand against it, although he clearly was in favor of the Auto Industry. But steve, what you need to understand, and what Jennifer Granholm didnt say and Hillary Clinton didnt say, is that the deregulation of wall street, earlier in the Clinton Administration, when they repealed the glasssteagall laws and let wall street run wild, thats what forced the whole Financial System to collapse. It had a tremendously damaging impact on the Auto Industry. That plus nafta, the north American Free trade agreement, which was another Clinton Administration initiative that they shoved down everybodys throat has cost us with mexico in the trade deficit, part of whats devastated flint, michigan, and other places, now nearly 1 trillion. Its over 900 billion. So, when Hillary Clinton tries to move the focus to Something Like a single vote, to confuse the issue, you have to see why it was the Auto Industry was collapsing in the first place. And thats also part of the story of why flint lost all of its job base, why its been drinking poisoned water for the last two years. These things are connected. The Clinton Administration, back in that period of time, planted a couple of big time bombs. And they went off later. One was the nafta time bomb, which was not supposed to create these huge trade deficits, but did, now 1 trillion. And then secondly, the deregulation of wall street, which caused the collapse and helped flatten the Auto Industry. And thats what needs to be addressed and it needs to be tracked back to how was this chain of events set in motion. Then youve got to also put on top of it the iraq war vote, which has cost us at least 2 trillion. And thats also whats held flat in this country, and created a situation where we havent had money for infrastructure, whether its clean water pipes or other things that need to be rebuilt here in america, including job creation. All right. Don regal, former u. S. Senator from michigan and a supporter of Bernie Sanders, thanks for your time. Appreciate it. Thank you, steve. Well turn back again to that breaking news. Again, this just in the last few minutes, that former new york city mayor Michael Bloomberg has decided he will not run for president in 2016. Joining me now on the phone is Howard Wolfson, a top bloomberg adviser. Howard, thanks for taking a few minutes. Just take us through this, if you would, how close did he come to saying, ill do it, this time . Close. You know, last year, he began to become increasingly concerned with tenor and tone of the race and particularly concerned both parties were moving towards their extremes and might nominate candidates who were very much out of the mainstream. And he asked those of us who are advising him to take a look at what a race might entail, and we did. We began that process and did an awful lot of examination to see what it would mean for a Third Party Candidate to run. And what we found is that if the democrats nominated Bernie Sanders and the republicans nominated donald trump, that there would be a tremendous opportunity for a candidate who was speaking to the center, like mike bloomberg. That was less so, less the case if the democrats nominated Hillary Clinton. And so it sounds like this decision maybe, in part, is a statement of confidence that Hillary Clintons going to emerge as the democratic candidate. I think, you know, from what i know about the democratic nominating process, which given my experience in 08, is probably more than i care to remember, there is, you know, every likelihood that