Ahead about this weekend. I know it is funny because a wide radius of producers and staffers in the Rachel Maddow news room show today had to put on headphones this afternoon to block out the loud sounds of snorting and giggling sound to cut tape for that very funny story. That very funny story abyour weekend is ahead. Also very weird news on the turnout from this weeks president ial primaries. The ones that just happened. Lots to get to. Where we start is with a big bunch of new news that just broke this evening about what appears to be a hard turn in the race for president. There are ten states that still have to vote on the republican side there are ten states plus washington, d. C. On the democratic side, while we do have a clear frontrunner in both parties, neither of them has clinched. There are at least 5 1 2 more weeks of voting and campaigning yet to come. Whats now emerging today on the democratic side is that even though the race is not over, it does appear to be going through a massive singular change. We got the first signs that Something Like this something at least of this magnitude might be coming. Weve got the first signs of that this week. Right after those five northeastern states voted on tuesday night, Hillary Clinton won 4 out of the 5 states that voted this week, the following day the Bernie SandersCampaign Announced more than 200 staffers would be laid off. Joy reid reported are the layoff came in the form of a short rather cursory conference call. With the Sanders Campaign manager, jeff weaver. Senator sanders did not make an appearance on that call. Some staffers reported they had no idea the layoffs were coming and they were a little miffed at how they did come. They assumed no matter what happened in the race between sanders and clinton overall theyd still have jobs through june 7th. Internally at least in a swath of the Sanders Campaign, the layoffs this week did come as a surprise. The Sanders Campaign externally spun the layoffs as not a big deal as the kind of thing that was just to be expected at this point in the race as we got down to just ten states left in the calendar. If the length of the calendar if the number of states left is the only thing that drove those layoffs, you would expect that both candidates who, after all, have the same calendar, you would expect both candidates would be making the same kinds of changes. Thats not what we saw. Happen this week. We saw the Bernie Sanders campaign lay off 200 staffers. The Hillary Clinton is not. Even though the primary calendar is getting short. To the contrary, we report as of tonight that the Clinton Campaign is leaving in place their staffers in the upcoming states that have yet to vote in the primary and in addition they are adding staff and assigning people senior roles in states that arent among the last ten remaining states in the democratic primary. They are naming staff leaders and assigning people to go work in states that have already voted in the democratic primary. The bombshell that the Clinton Campaign dropped late this afternoon is that they are starting to staff up in what they see as general election swing states for the november campaign. This was first reported by usa today and the Associated Press. Nbc news has now confirmed that the Hillary Clinton campaign is basically starting its general Election Campaign as of today. Again theyre not pulling staffers out of the remaining democratic primary states but they are reducing the scale of their effort against Bernie Sanders to the point where they are running zero tv ads if all of the democratic primary states that are left on the calendar. They are spending zero dollars on ads, the Clinton Campaign, in these next states that are due to vote. Where they are spending money is by staffing up and installing new state directors in novembers swing states like New Hampshire and florida and colorado. Now all of those states have already voted in the democratic primary but the Clinton Campaign named new state directors for all three of those states today. Basically to get those people in place to try to already start the effort today of trying to win those states in the general election in november. Just in case that turned to the general election was not explit enough, the Clinton Campaign also let it be known tonight their lawyers are now reviewing a list of more than two dozen possible choices for Hillary Clintons wouldbe Vice President ial running mate. There is no new news on who might be on the short list. The new news is that the list is not all that short, if theyre considering at least 24 people. The clig search team is being helmed by john podetsa and cheryl mills. Now just as an aside, that means that if these two are going to follow the dick cheney method of searching for just the right campaign picked himself. However conflicted the Republican Party might be about the state of its primary race and the remaining con ternsd for president , the Clinton Campaign put out word today that they they the republican candidate is clear. They are proceeding starting today as if clinton will be the democratic nominee and donald trump will be the republican nominee, who she is running against in the fall. Now, one of the major points of contention in the democratic primary, one of the main bones that boig has had to pick with Hillary Clinton, one of the key distinctions between these two Democratic Candidates is that Bernie Sanders would not accept major support from super pacs while Hillary Clinton has. Priorities in action is the super pac for Hillary Clinton. When they were formed for this president ial effort, and they started raising money, its anticipate been reported that they didnt anticipate spending any money on the democratic primary at all. Now Bernie Sanders ended up putting up a tougher than expected fight in priorities usa did end up spending millions of dlabz dollars on behalf of Hillary Clinton in the primary in order to fend off Bernie Sanders and try to get clinton the nomination. But what they were really designed for was the general election. We are about to see what that looks like because the Associated Press was first to report today that priorities usa action is planning to start the Hillary Clinton versus donald trump general Election Campaign with a bang and really soon. I had an interview last night on this show with jane sanders, Bernie Sanders wife. In that interview at one point she said that proclinton super pacs had spent more than 70 million on Hillary Clintons behalf already. That actually was not true. Super pacs have not spent anywhere near that much money supporting Hillary Clinton thus far. But we now know that theyre about to, because the ap is reporting tonight that on the morning after the california primary, on june 8th, priorities usa action is going to start a huge 90 million, sevenstate ad campaign against donald trump and for Hillary Clinton. 90 million thats massive. That is like three times what super pacs all super pacs combined did spend on Hillary Clinton in the primary campaign thus far. I know at one level or another like all very large numbers start to sound alike, especially all very large numbers with dollar signs on them. Like once you get above an a amount that you can personally imagine it is all just big numbers. But 90 million worth of ads against donald trump and for Hillary Clinton . 90 . That is enormous. Just for context, at one point in this president ial race, we thought that jeb bush might chase all the other republican candidates out of the race because he had raised 100 million for his campaign. 100 million for everything, his whole effort. This 100 million. Right . That was supposed to be shock and awe, everybody else gets out. This one ad buy for clinton and against trump is going to be 90 million . I mean how are they going to do is . Looking for the most f. E. C. Filing for priorities usa action. They dont have that. They only have half of that cash on hand. So 90 million in ads against trump and for clinton . Do they plan to raise another 45 million between now and june 8th to start this 90 million ad buy . I mean presumably thats their buy for the whole rest of the year. When do they need to raise the money by in order to make that happen . Is this an unimaginably large number because that cant possibly happen . Are they just blowing smoke about something they say theyre going to do . They dont have the resources to do it. Are they just trying to psyche out the republicans here . Are they just trying to psyche out the Sanders Campaign . There is still a primary campaign under way. There are still ten states left, including california. The Clinton Campaign has never explicitly said that senator sanders should drop out of the race but they have now announced they are looking past Bernie Sanders and starting to run as of today against donald trump. There is also an unsubtle hint tonight that if Bernie Sanders does get out of the race any earlier than he is planning on it, this whole ad campaign against donald trump could go on the air sooner. So this is big news today from the Clinton Campaign. Essentially not walking away from the primary but moving on from the primary and starting to run against trump. Is this partly a psychological operation to sideline Bernie Sanders and make it seem like the Clinton Campaign is moving down field past him . Or is this just the Clinton Campaign moving downfield past him . They dont care what effect this has on the primary because in their mind the primary is down . Joining me noun, kristin welker. Thanks very much for being here. Thanks for having me. Great to see you, too. How big a deal is this announcement of this sort of change of direction from the Clinton Campaign and can you tell whether some of it is basically a psychological operation to psyche people out or whether this is real . I think your setup was perfect. To some extent i think it aimed in part at sending a psychological message at senator sanders. Clinton campaign and surrogates have for quite some time have been nudging senator sanders not necessarily to get out of the race but to scale back his attacks and of course this larger message they continue to say to him, when he does get out of the race theyd like him to help them unify the party. This is aimed in part at sidelining senator sanders. I do think the broader point here is to get a head start on donald trump. I think this underscores something that the Clinton Campaign believes which is that he is going to be a formidable candidate and essentially underscores that everything you saw the gop candidates do in the primary race, the Clinton Campaign is going to do the opposite of that. They think that the gop candidates made a major miscalculation by not taking him seriously, but essentially laughing him off by thinking that he was going to somehow implode. What theyre saying tonight is that they dont think thats going to happen, that they need to build up a robust ground game in all of these general election states that are battleground states and that they need to take this very seriously. Youve seen this strategy start to play out in recent days. You know shes been counterpunching. He made these statements about the woman card. She has counterpunched about the womans card quite aggressively. I think it is in large part a statement they are taking donald trump seriously. There might haven been more but i saw the names, actual individual names, of three state directors that the clinton Campaign Announced for colorado, New Hampshire and florida. Dont know if they announced more than that. Those are the three that i saw. But are the folks in charge of these states known quantities . Heavy hitters in terms of political skills . They are, rachel. So far i only have three names. Im trying to get more. Let me run through what we have so far though. These are three key battleground states. Emmy ruiz, the director of colorado. This is someone who ran clintons nevada field office. Shes someone who rallied latinos there. Clearly aimed at rallying latinos in that critical battleground state. Mike vlasic is going to head up the New Hampshire office. He was the former New Hampshire state director. He has deep roots in that state. He worked on jean shaheens 2014 reElection Campaign. Simone ward, florida. Former political director, formerly did outreach to africanamericans. When she was working with the dnc. Were essentially seeing a clear and strong, robust pitch to rally the Obama Coalition which is going to be critical to secretary clinton. Now, i think, the one real challenge here is does this wind up al nating sanders supporters . Do they say, wait a minute, youre rushing this race. The Clinton Campaign insists thats not going to happen but i think thats the potential Political Risk here. The counter is that they are still competing in primary states but will they wind up alienating some of those sanders supporters. Well have to see. Theyre walking that line, were not giving up in the primary states, were still campaigning while were not airing any ads. This is a fascinating moment. Kristin welker covering the Clinton Campaign for nbc, lots of demands on your time right now. Thanks for being here with us today. So glad to be here, rachel. Thank you so much for having here. Lots to come tonight. Very busy news night indeed. Stay with us. My son and i used to watch the red carpet shows on tv now, im walking them. Life is unpredictable being flake free isnt. Because i have used head and shoulders for 20 years. Used regularly, it removes up to 100 of flakes keeping you protected live flake free for Life Customer Service d. Maam. This isnt a computer. Wait. Youre real . With discover card, you can talk to a real person in the u. S. , like me, anytime. Wow. This is a recording. Really . No, im kidding. 100 u. S. Based customer service. Here to help, not to sell. There is a big do in washington this weekend. Well talk about that in a couple of minutes. Well talk about what i think as the good part of that big washington do this weekend. But after this weekend, on monday morning when washington is still sleeping off the hangover from its big weekend, something is about to happen on monday morning that isnt yet really circled on peoples calendars but i think it should be. For a few weeks now weve been covering what threatens to be a new chapter in the d. C. Madam case from a few years ago. Over the past couple of months a lawyer at the center of that case and that scandal from ten years ago has been fighting in the federal courts to release phone records from the d. C. Madam escort service, records that have not yet been seen publicly before. The lawyer says he wants them released to the public now because he says they are somehow relevant to the 2016 president ial election. No, we dont know exactly what he means, but thats the case hes making to the courts. Since january Montgomery Blair sibley, kind of an eccentric d. C. Character has been trying to get a federal gag order record to these records can be made public. Hes taken it all the way up to the u. S. Supreme court. His initial request to the Supreme Court was denied by chief justice roberts. He resubmitted it to Justice Clarence thomas and he did not issue an immediate no. Justice thomas instead decided to distribute the application for conference which means he has put the issue of these unseen d. C. Madam phone records and gag order preventing their release up to the full court for a discussion. And that discussion, that conference about the d. C. Madam phone records was scheduled to take place at the United StatesSupreme Court today behind closed doors. If the justices decide to take up this issue, this lawyer says he looks forward to the Supreme Court considering this matter. If they decide not to take up the issue and they reject his application, he has repeatedly threatened that he might break the gag order himself illegally in order to get these records out there in the pu