much for joining us tonight. really appreciate it. that is tonight's last word. the "the 11th hour" with brian wae williams starts now. tonight, donald trump, the 2020 election. he received information about russian efforts to aid his contain. plus, the doors close in the nevada caucuses in less than 16 hours. introducing the first contest with a significant number of minority voters and raising the stakes for campaigns on the edge of running out of momentum and money. how elizabeth warren's knockdown of michael bloomberg in wednesday's debate got the billionaire to bend as "the 11th hour" gets under way on this friday night. good evening once again from you're nbc news headquarters here in new york. i'm steve kornacki in for brian williams. day 1128 of the trump administration, and 256 days to

go now until the 2020 presidential election. on the eve of the nevada caucuses, we have brand-new reporting from "the washington post" about russia and the 2020 campaign. quote, u.s. officials have told senator bernie sanders that russia is attempting to help his presidential campaign as part of an effort to interfere with the democratic contest. president trump and lawmakers on capitol hill have also been informed about the russian assistance to the vermont senator. the post adds it is not clear what form that russian assistance has taken. late this afternoon, sanders weighed in on the reporting. >> mr. putin is a thug. he is an autocrat. let me tell mr. putin, the american people are sick and tired of seeing russia and other countries interfering in our elections. the intelligence community has been very clear about it.

whether trump recognizes it or not or acknowledges it or not, they did interfere in 2016. the intelligence community is telling us they are interfering in this campaign right now in 2020. what i say to mr. putin, if leaked president, trust me, you are not going to be interfering in american elections. >> when were you briefed on this? >> guessing about a month ago. >> we were told russia, maybe other countries are going to get involved in this campaign. look, here's the message to russia. stay out of american elections. they tried to divide us up. that's what they did in 2016. that is the ugliest thing they're doing. they are trying to cause chaos, they're trying to cause hatred in america. >> just last night "the new york times" reported that u.s. intelligence officials had warned house lawmakers that russia is meddling in the 2020 election to help get the president re-elected. trump responded to that at a rally today in las vegas. >> i see these phonies, the

do-nothing democrats. they said today that putin wants to be sure that trump gets elected. here we go again. here we go again. >> i was told a week ago, they said, you know, they're trying to start a rumor. it's disinformation. that's the only thing they're good at. they're not good at anything else. they get nothing done. do-nothing democrats -- that putin wants to make sure i get elected. listen to this. so doesn't help the to see who the democrat's going to be. wouldn't you rather have, let's say bernie? wouldn't you rather have bernie? >> and this morning trump called the "times" report, quote, hoax number seven. trump has spent the bulk of this week on the road out west. "the washington post" reports, quote, over stops in arizona, california, colorado, and nevada, trump was buoyant almost to the point of giddiness bounding over to greet supporters as he deplaned air

force one and chatting off the record with his traveling press corps, including when he led a clasp of reporters aboard the 747 to watch the democratic debate. trump witnessed the democrats attack one another for two hours on a stage here, basked in the che adulation of the cheering crowds. his approval rating is now at 46% according to real clear politics. that's the highest that number has been since early february, 2017 a few weeks into the trump presidency. meanwhile democratic presidential candidate michael bloomberg, who has been sparring all week with trump, saw a drop in support among democratic primary voters after wednesday night's debate. the morning consult poll found that voters who named bloomberg

as their first choice was down three points from before that debate. at that wednesday debate, elizabeth warren pressed bloomberg to release former employees from confidentially agreements that bar them from speaking publicly about sexual harassment or discrimination suits. >> mr. mayor, are you willing to release all those women from those nondisclosure agreements so we can hear their side of the story? [ cheers and applause ] >> we have a very few -- nondisclosure agreements. >> how many is that. >> let me finish. >> how many is that? >> none of them could you see me of doing anything other than maybe they didn't like a joke i told. and let me -- [ audience reacts ] there's agreements between two parties that wanted to keep it quiet and that's up to them. >> today, though, bloomberg announced that three women who worked for his company would be released from those nondisclosure agreements if they so desire. campaign senior adviser tim

o'brien explained what pushed him to make such a major reversal. >> of course senator warren flagging this played a role in the decision. we're happy to try to resolve this by becoming much clearer with the ndas that have been in question. >> bernie sanders is also speaking out about bloomberg's performance at that debate wednesday, saying that bloomberg will need to make changes if he hopes to take on trump. he's what sanders said in an interview with "60 minutes." >> were you surprised by how unprepared he seemed for basic questions at a debate? >> i was. if that's what happened in a democratic debate, you know, i think it's quite likely that trump will chew him up and spit him out. >> bloomberg is conceding that he didn't do well at that debate and says he's now focused on what happens next. he sat down with reverend al sharpton for an exclusive interview set to air this weekend here on msnbc. >> you tell me, what did you

feel about your performance and what can we look forward to? >> it wasn't my best night, blame nobody but me. in the end i get advice from people, but it's up to me what i decide what to do. they were yelling at each other and they weren't focusing on donald trump, which is what we should be focusing on in the democratic party. i didn't have a chance to really say what i wanted to say. have another debate coming up on tuesday. >> here for our lead-off discussion on a friday night, annie karni from "the new york times," catherine lucy from "the wall street journal," and beth fouhy, nbc senior politics editor. dlirn kathryn, let me start with you and this news we've been talking about for 24 hours or so about what the intelligence community has judged russia to be up to when it comes to the presidential election. donald trump and his re-election prospects in 2020, we saw the

president's public reaction to this on full display. is that in contrast in any way to what is being said and behind the scenes at the white house? is there any greater level of concern or what you see in public what you're getting behind the scenes? >> i think a lot of what we see with the president's comments are usually what he says in private. typically his remarks and his insights toned come out in public. that's how he works. what he heard from him isn't keeping with what he's been saying for a long time about russian interference. i think the thing we know is that this is going to shadow the 2020 race in the same way that it did the 2016 race and much of his presidency. and he's been very consistent throughout questioning the intelligence conclusions about election interference, trying to cast blame. you see him trying to blame democrats this week when of course we're talking about intelligence briefings at an

event that was a bipartisan meeting of democrats and republicans. but you're also seeing in the context of this week which you were talking about, the president was out on his western tour. he's feeling very empowered post-impeachment acquittal in the senate, and you're going to see the same kind of pushback and rhetoric from him as he moves forward. he is increasingly confident about his re-election prospects. >> annie, there's a question when it comes to russia and trump and now tonight this reporting about russia and bernie sanders and his campaign for the democratic nomination. there's a question of what does it mean when the intelligence committee is apparently judging russia to be interfering? what form is that interference taking? do you have a sense of at least the range of possibilities here? if there is anything that's in place or anything that's being done outside of what the president is saying publicly here that might counter that in any way? >> we don't know yet the full

scope of what it means they're interfering but in the past online advertisements boosting one candidate or putting false information about another. one thing that i think was striking was bernie sanders' response was kind of what we expect politicians to respond when we hear that a foreign country is meddling in our elections. it was strong. it denounced the news. it stood in stark contrast to how the president reacted. behind the scenes what we're seeing is the president is more concerned -- he was more concerned that this briefing, a, happened without him being told ahead of time, and b, political enemies like representative adam schiff were given the briefing. adam schiff became a nemesis of his during the impeachment hearings, and he privately was concerned that they would weaponize this information against him. that was concerning him that a political enemy at home would have something on him more than

a foreign power would be interfering in our elections. like kathryn said, it's a not out of line with how he's dealt with this issue over three years, but the fact that we saw another candidate running for president react 180 degrees off highlighted how the president disregarded the actual issue and only see it in terms of what's being done to hurt him. >> beth, i'm curious what you make of that response we played from bernie sanders. he did also suggest that the timing of this, the night before the nevada caucuses, we'll talk about nevada later, that might have had something to do with this in some way. given how much attention, especially in democratic circles there's been to this issue of russia for the last three, three and a half years, what did you make of his response and how that might go over approximate with the voters he's trying to win over? >> he reacted the way a top tier politician of the united states

would normally react to disavow anything russia is trying to do, whether to help him or somehow boost him in order to help trump. he reacted the way one would expect and it's the president of the united states who is the one who continues to push away from all the evidence that russia helped in 2016 is doing so again this time. your question is how it's going to affect tomorrow. it's interesting. yes, the timing -- i mean, bernie sanders did imply there was something fishy. many supporters are being convinced this was done in tandem with this very important contest in nevada , that first diverse contest we're seeing in the first early states. he is doing very well there, by some accounts favored to win there. this notion that there's russian assistance, perhaps russia wanting bernie sanders to be president trump's opponent that might help push him over the edge there and win in nevada. obviously that is not something that bernie sanders is going to want to consider as part of

this, but obviously we don't know what they're trying to do or why they're trying to help bernie sanders at this point. is it because they see him as the strongest candidate or are they doing, like, garden variety meddling wherever they can to invoke this conflict? >> amy, in terms of the president and what we've seen from him this week, today in nevada, kathryn was getting to this talking about his confident mood out there on the campaign trail. is that something you're picking up from him and around the white house in the wake of impeachment and his acquittal? wending the polling this week that puts his approval rating at the highest point it's been in his presidency. i say highest point, it's still 46%. that's still perilous territory for incumbents, but it's better than he's been doing. has there been a change in his mood that you detected. >> yeah, i think he's definitely

happy to be investigation free, to have impeachment behind him. the polls are buoying him and the democratic field is buoying him. the person on his mind is michael bloomberg, and i think in addition to moving past impeachment, watching the poor performance that bloomberg delivered earlier this week boosted trump's confidence in what he's likely to face in the general election. so i think that the campaign feels very confident right now about their re-election chances. they're looking at places to expand the map. it will be hard for them because trump still hasn't shown an ability to win over new voters, but looking at the field of who he's going to match up dependence, they're feeling like they're all weak candidates compared to trump. so yeah, he's definitely upbeat compared to how he was during impeachment.

>> beth, staying on the topic of michael bloomberg here. this news today his campaign now saying bloomberg himself saying that three who i am signed nondisclosure agreements would if they wanted be release from them. that is departure obviously from what he said in that debate. is that a concession on his campaign's part that he didn't handle that well in the debate? >> yeah, sure looks like it. they're trying to do course correction. they named three specific women that, of course, prompted elizabeth warren and others to say why not release everyone? we don't know how many women are bound by nondisclosure agreements but it obviously gave elizabeth warren another bit of fod tore push the mayor a little bit further and to keep a spotlight on this issue. that clip you played from the reverend al interview where mayor bloomberg said i need to do better in the next debate, that's only a few days away, as you know, steve. it's on tuesday night, not even a week after our debate in las vegas. these candidates are barreling forward f. they're going to do course correction, it has to

come fast. certainly mayor bloomberg is going to be the one most under the spotlight. >> this time in two weeks most of the votes will have been cast in primaries. it's happening very quickly, absolutely. kathryn, quickly, the issue here, we talk about the reports from the intelligence community about russian interference. it was the director of national intelligence himself, joseph maguire, former director now who earned trump's ire. who do we know about the search for a full-time replacement there? >> the president was tweeting about this today. he says he has four possibilities they're looking at. they have not said exactly when, he says in a few weeks he'll have an announcement. we know he likes to draw these things out, so we'll see how he does that. but this comes at a moment when there's a lot of questions about the future of that job, how the president is going to view that in the future. given the way he has treated and

thought about the intelligence community so far, i think. >> kathryn lucy, ann canny and beth fouhy. the two-word strategy to keeping the house. his campaign calls it biden country but with his lead in south carolina shrinking, will that be the case eight days from now? "the 11th hour" just getting started on a friday night. [cymbals clanging] [knocking] room for seven. and much, much more. the first-ever glb. lease the glb 250 suv for just $419 a month at your local mercedes-benz dealer. my body is truly powerful. i have the power to lower my blood sugar and a1c. because i can still make my own insulin.

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for him, therefore, to oust a director of national intelligence and put somebody in with absolutely no credentials

whatsoever for the job for something that is very much a part of our national security, this is dangerous. this is dangerous to our country. >> it would be like sending me in for brain surgery on somebody. what? >> house speaker nancy pelosi react to go president trump's selection of a new interim director of national intelligence, richard grenell. "the new york times" reports that pelosi with an eye on protecting her party's house majority is pushing democrats to highlight health care and jobs over investigating trump. quote, health care, health care, health care, the speaker said describing the party's message during a recent closed-door meeting according to a person in the room. for more tonight, we welcome to the broadcast "new york times" congressional correspondent sheryl guy stoleberg, a pulitzer prize winner. thank you so much for joining us. it's interesting. i'm curious how pelosi navigates this. if the strategy is health care, health care, health care, as she

says, we just played in the introduction there what it seems keeps happening. the president says or does something, it commands all sorts of attention and a response or demands a response, i should say, from the house speaker, from every democrat in the house. you saw that on this question of grenell and the dni. you saw that for that matter from the way democrats have talked about it with impeachment. they said they were forced, they were compelled by trump's actions to impeach him, to go through that process. realistically, can they focus like she wants on health care in the era of trump? >> well, she's going to try, but that is her big challenge. every time they try to change the subject and democrats try to focus on things like health care or infrastructure or jobs or the acade economy or trade, president trump has a way of pulling them back, of doing something that's so outrageous that once again they're on the topic of trump and his behavior instead of their own agenda, which they

know is what is going to help them keep the house. it's what did it for them in 2018, and it's what they want to do again in 2020 if only trump will let them. >> one of the factors is whether democrats will retain the house. the identity potentially of the democratic nominee, one of those democrats you mentioned here, democrats winning the house in 2018, one of the freshman democrats from that class, joe cunningham from south carolina, he won a republican seat in that 2018 wave. he said that south carolinaens don't want socialism talking about a bernie sanders nomination. bernie's proposal is to raise taxes on almost everyone is not something the low country wants and not something i'd ever support. bernie sanders will not be the nominee. that's one of those class of 18 democrats speaking out there. i'm curious, what is the mood among that strain of democrat, the democrat elected from a republican seat in 2018. is what cunningham saying near the consensus? are they nervous about sanders?

>> yes the mood is nervous, and cunningham is not the only one. a number of centrist house democrats shared with me both on and off the record that they are very worried about a sanders candidacy, one of them dean phillips of minnesota told me that his district went democratic for the first time since 1958 when he was elected. so more than 60 years. and a lot of those who voted for dean phillips were independents and maybe even some who had voted republican in the past, and they're just not going to go for a socialist candidate. if you look at president trump's rhetoric, he's going to label any democrat a socialist. he call michael bloomberg a socialist. so can you imagine what it would be like if sanders, an actual democratic socialist is at the top of the ticket? that is a very challenging situation for these centrists. it is the centrists who are essential to keeping the

democrats' hold on the house. >> it's funny. i do wonder sometimes with these discussions if there is a cautionary element of this too for all of us talking about it, myself very much included. when you think back to 2016, i remember when the "access hollywood" tape out a couple weeks before the election and paul ryan, then the house speaker, the republican house speaker had this emergency conference call with all his republican members running for re-election and basically the message was cut him off, cut trump off. he's going to take you down. don't let him take you down with you. a couple weeks later trump won and basically all of them won too. it does raise the question of how much any of us know anymore about what actually works at the top of the ticket and what doesn't. >> yeah. i think that's actually a fair point. and i'm remembering my own reporting in 2016 when a lot of voters told me i like trump and i like bernie. and you would think, how could that be because their philosophies are so opposite one another, but i think both of

them appeal to that kind of populist outsider ethos that voters are looking for. we really don't know what's going to happen and, of course, senator sanders argues they would bring in a whole new segment of the lecturing, people who hadn't voted before. but the democrats, the centrists are still nervous about him. >> function for joining thank y what you must know about the nevada caucuses, we are hours away. we're going to have tons of coverage tomorrow. we're going to give you an essential viewers guide when "the 11th hour" continues. ♪ ♪ you work hard for your money. stretched days for it. ♪ ♪ juggled life for it. ♪ ♪ took charge for it. ♪ ♪ so care for it. look after it.

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i don't quite have the name identification, as you know, of some of the people in the race. i certainly don't have the bank account of some of the people in the race. but what's happened to us is one by one through speeches and these public events and the debates, regular people have just started helping me me in a big, big way. we raised $12 million since the new hampshire debate in that first week just online. >> amy klobuchar making her final pitch in nevada. guess what, about 15 1/2 hours from now they're going to close the doors at the caucus sites

across the silver state and they're going to begin. i have to say "if" because we remember what happened in iowa. but if everything goes according to plan in nevada, we will very quickly start getting results, know within a few hours who has won the nevada caucuses, the third contest up. folks will be going to the caucus sites tomorrow. a lot of people have already gone to the caucus sites. let's look to the question of potential turnout. in 2016 it was 84,000. in 2008, the first time they did in, obama/clinton that year, it was 117,000. guess what. 75,000 or so people have already participated in these nevada caucuses because for the first time ever they have allowed early voting. folks have over the past week or two gone out, filled out preference cards, first choice, second choice, third choice, whatever. and 75,000 people have done that. nevada is state where early voting is popular so we expect

75,000 will be the majority of all votes that end up being cast. we don't know what the final turnout will be. we expect it to pass 84,000. let's see it can rival the 2008 number. of course there's also the lay of the land. you saw amy klobuchar making that closing case. klobuchar here in the average of the polls we've seen in nevada, she is bringing up the rear here, 11%, tied with tom steyer. it is bernie sanders. it is bernie sanders if you look at the polls that are out there who goes into this thing tomorrow as the favorite. there's a lot of uncertainty. it's a caucus state, there hasn't been a ton of polling. the polling isn't the most reliable in nevada so we will see. but certainly just based on the polling that's out there, based on the fact that he just came off that win in new hampshire, bernie sanders goes into this the favorite. one of the reasons sanders goes into this as the favorite is nevada's diverse lecturing. more than a quarter of hispanic or other, that's largely hispanic in this group. also some asian. this is a large hispanic population. this is the first state with a

large hispanic population. and we've seen polling that shows bernie sanders running in the lead with hispanic voters. his campaign thinks that's one of their strengths that hasn't got a lot of attention. if that is real, if that's a real thing, we will know tomorrow about bernie sanders. in terms of what to expect tomorrow, let me show you the empty leaderboard right now. this thing will hopefully start filling up about 16 or so hours from now. but one thing to keep in mind, you'll be seeing this mind all day tomorrow, all afternoon. you'll see counties that are filling in. this is a big state geographically. there are a lot of spaces here. 70% of the vote is going to come out of this one county, clark county. this is las vegas, henderson. 70% and 20% is going to come out of this county where reno is. 90% is going to come out of two counties. all of the space here, not a lot of people live there, only 10%. keep in mind it's a big state, but there's really just two population centers here. keep that in mind tomorrow.

we have a lot more to do with this tomorrow. hopefully. coming up, there are more than just delegation riding on tomorrow's results. a look at the candidates at risk of looking too broke when "the 11th hour" continues. have you ever wondered what the motorcade driver drives when they're not in a motorcade? [ upbeat music starts ] [ engine revving ] ♪ this one drives a volkswagen passat. ♪

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butter poached, creamy and roasted. or try lobster sautéed with crab, shrimp and more. so hurry in and let's lobsterfest. or get it to go at red lobster dot com . the corporate elite is getting nervous. donald trump is getting nervous. [ cheers ] the republican establishment is getting nervous. [ cheers ] the democratic establishment is getting nervous. [ cheers ] and they're going a little bit nuts. how can we stop bernie? >> with just hours to go now until the nevada caucuses, the contenders out there are spending their time campaigning across the state. all, that is, except for bernie

sanders. bernie sanders spent most of the day in california where the most delegates are up for grabs super tuesday march 3rd. here to talk about all of it, we welcome to the broadcast lily adams, communications director for kamala harris' presidential campaign, and back with us again, karine jean pierre, alum of both the back home campaign and back home white house. both of you, thank you for joining us and welcome. let me start with you, lily. i want to put a graphic up on the screen. this is financial picture of these campaigns on the eve of the nevada caucuses, and just a week or so ahead of super tuesday. you see there bloomberg, $55 million on hand, although really he has limitless money on hand. that ought to go to eternity there. >> it should be an infinite symbol. >> but you see stories, sanders, and after sanders everyone under

$10 million. i was looking at some of the ad spending in those super tuesday states this week. i looked at virginia and saw $4 million worth of ads from bloomberg on the air and zero from all of the other democratic candidates. i wonder, is there a story with major implications for super tuesday that's being "undercovered" here? >> nearly every single state has some form of early voting except for virginia. so nearly 40% to 50% of the ballots for super tuesday are going to be in for super tuesday so not being on the air in these states and ceding the air waves to michael bloomberg, it's a huge disadvantage for campaigns like elizabeth warren and mayor buttigieg and vice president biden to be completely absent. >> karine, we were try to play an expectation setting at the

last segment for nevada tomorrow. i think it's safe to say the expectation, the favorite going into this would be bernie sanders. hey, nevada is the legalized gambling capital of the world. we can say the favorite in nevada is going to be bernie sanders. i wonder, though, is there a difference for him when you start talking about trying to get this party to unite behind him, is there a significant difference between winning this thing big tomorrow in nevada, double digits, 15 points, something like that, versus another one of those new hampshire-like victories where it's two, three points, he's under 30, that talk of the ceiling is still there? >> yeah. so it's really interesting because nevada is the first state that is diverse. we had the first two states, iowa being 90% white, new hampshire being 93% white, here we have a totally different kind of electorate for democrats. and a lot of young latino voters are excited about bernie

sanders, which is incredibly important for him in the turnout for nevada. look, as you laid out, we had a high turnout in early voting, 75,000 people have voted already. and caucus state worked really well for bernie. we saw that in 2016 because he has these really loyal, extremely loyal base, and they come out with these caucus contests. so i think one of the reasons he's not in the nevada right now is because they probably feel very confident with the early voting, with the numbers that we have been seeing where he's at double digits in that state going into tomorrow. and because it's a more diverse contest, i think he can do much better than he has in the last two contests. >> lily, you heard that clip there coming into this segment, bernie sanders telling that crowd today that the democratic establishment is scared of him and scared of his success.

is that true? and if it is, is the democratic establishment in position to keep him from getting this nomination? >> look, i don't think there is a secret democratic establishment meeting going on in some back room somewhere where we decide as a democratic establishment whether we are afraid or not afraid of bernie sanders. i think what he wants to do right now is go from being the front-runner to being the prohibitive front-runner, and that starts in nevada. i agree that if he posts a big win there, that will have huge implications for the rest of the cycle, and it will put him in a good position to close the gap in south carolina and then going into super tuesday. and i think if those things happen, this is using a lot of f ifs, he will be the front-runner because the most important thing to democrats, more important than any candidate they love, more than any candidate they don't like is beating donald trump in november. and i do think democrats will

rally around that. >> karine, this suggestion has been talked about quite a bit this week that there's sort of a pileup behind sanders in this race and you've got bloomberg, but then you've got biden and they're kind of chasing the same voters. by the way, so is buttigieg and so is clochklobuchar. there's not a clear path for any one of them to get a clear and direct shot at bernie sanders and that because of that, sanders might be able to skate by at 30%, 35% in different primaries and build a insurmountable lead. do you think that's a realistic prospect that it could go that way, and do you see a way tomorrow for one of these candidates to get that clear shot at him? >> i think it's going to be very difficult. look, there is a battle for that moderate lane, and there are many moderates battling for that lane. and with the weakness of biden unfortunately for his campaign, it hasn't helped, which is why

bloomberg is in the race. look, sanders has been able to consolidate that progressive lane. we will see how warren's fiery performance the other night in a debate which debates have mattered as we saw in new hampshire with klobuchar. she got a rise and she was able to move up and did really well and raised money off her debate performance. we will see what happens with warren tomorrow. does that help her? does that help her in south carolina? i've been talking to folks on the ground where there's a buzz about her because of her performance in the debate recently in nevada. so now people are watching. they're watching, where are they going to place? where's biden going to place? where's warren going to place? that's going to play into south carolina and moving forward into the super tuesday states. >> i think elizabeth warren might be wishing that debate had been held before the early voting period began. we'll see if that ends up -- >> that's so true. >> all those cast ballots. maybe there's enough still out there for her to get a late move. we'll see.

karine jean-pierre, and lily adams. the nevada ballots, many have been cast. they haven't been counted yet and a lot of the focus is south carolina, the state that comes after nevada. one of the state's political reporters on what's at stake there when "the 11th hour" continues. (whistling) (whistling)

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, look, all i know is i'm meeting everybody combined with black voters. name me anybody who still remotely close to the support i have with the african-american community nationally. >> joe biden support among black voters is slipping, though, ahead of the south carolina primary. a year ago the former vice president led bernie sanders by as many as 30 percentage points, now they appear to be running close to even nationally among black voters. a new nbc news "wall street journal" poll puts biden ahead by two points among black voters nationally. we should note there is a large margin of error with this poll, 8.3%, so it's hard to tell

exactly where things stand there. with us more, we welcome to the broadcast joseph bustos, state government and politics reporter for the state, that's columbia, south carolina's paper. we talked about nevada, 15 hours or so from now the doors are going to close there. hopefully we'll get a result out of nevada tomorrow. there's a possibility here joe biden does very well in nevada tomorrow, maybe a strong second. maybe he actually wins the thing and there's a chance that he does another new hampshire, another iowa. he's a distant one. how much will his finish in nevada tomorrow affect his standing in a must-win state in south carolina? >> i think south carolina is joe biden's firewall. one thing to keep in mind about nevada and south carolina, they're two very different states. nevada has more unions than south carolina. it's also heavier african-american electorate in south carolina.

so i think those are two differences you got to keep in mind between the two states. >> joe biden has talked about he is confident that jim clyburn, veteran congressman, one of the influential black leaders in th going to be out there supporting him. is that going to happen? >> we don't know yet if representative clyburn has said he knows who he's going to vote for, but he hasn't made that public yet. we're still waiting for when he'll make that announcement. we're wondering if it's going to be soon because who jim clyburn votes for is seen as a very important endorsement and one that carries a lot of weight in the state. >> i was looking. we put that poll up there of black voters nationally. i've also seen some of the numbers from south carolina among african-american voters. we should say it's about 60% of the democratic electorate there in south carolina in this primary will be black. the polling i've seen in south carolina has suggested biden's doing well with black voters.

bernie sanders and tom steyer. tom steyer, i've seen 15%, 20%, something like that among black voters in south carolina. what is he doing to cultivate that support? >> he's spending a lot of money in the state. he has put a lot of tv ads on the air, a lot of digital ads. he's also hired some state lawmakers as advisers on his campaign, and he's gotten other support from some black state lawmakers in the state to help his -- to help gin up support for him. he's also invested heavily in black-owned media as well as talking about reparations in the state, as well as investing in hbcus. >> we've also talked about pete buttigieg and the struggles he's had to win over black voters. he did very well in iowa and new hampshire, two states with largely white populations. i am not seeing from afar when i look at these polls any signs of significant movement there among non-white voters towards

buttigieg. is there anything different hatching on the ground in south carolina? >> well, i think part of it is it's a heavily black, african-american electorate, and that's going to be where a lot of the support's going to have to come from for candidates. pete buttigieg did recently get an endorsement from a black state lawmaker, j.a. moore, but that's the only one he's gotten so far. >> all right. joseph bustos joining us from the palmetto state. all the eyes of the world will be on you in about 24 hours. again, if we get these results out of nevada, and that is finished at this time tomorrow. we will see. that's politics in 2020. coming up, if you don't understand why bernie sanders is having a moment, we show you why when "the 11th hour" continues.

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>> senator klobuchar. >> let the process works. >> senator sanders. >> the process includes 500 superdelegates on second ballot, so i think the will of the people should prevail, yes. >> bernie sanders had a different answer than all the other candidates on that question. why would it be. they're probably all thinking the same thing. the possibility you get through these primaries and if one candidate right now at least -- you look at sanders in the national poll compared to all the other candidates here. if one candidate looking at this national poll is positioned to get the most delegates without getting that outright majority of 1991 in the primary season, at this moment you look at this poll and you would say that's bernie sanders. so there's bernie sanders saying that should be enough to make me the nominee, and there's every other candidate onstage saying, know, no, it shouldn't. i guess strategically not a big surprise. let's take a look at bernie sanders' prospects from this point forward because the big question i should say with sanders is can he grow this 29% support substantially if he wins

nevada tomorrow? let's take a look at nevada. if he gets a big win out of nevada tomorrow, can that national support rise? can he have a bandwagon effect that benefits him here, or you've heard this possibility put out there certainly by his rivals. is there a ceiling on sanders' support as he wins in new hampshire as the prospect of a sanders nomination grows stronger, do democratic voters collectively say, wait a minute. let's not do this, and do you find he really can't get past 30 percent in these primaries? that's the question with sanders right now. so again, nevada we say tomorrow in the afternoon of polls right now, sanders goes into this thing the favorite. does he end up with a big tomorrow, a double-digit win tomorrow? does he end up with a win that shows folks he can get the hispanic, that he can get the hispanic vote by a large margin, or at this time tomorrow are we talking about, wow, that was a very close race in nevada? did sanders underachieve? did somebody else rise up and nearly beat him? did somebody else rise up and actually beat him tomorrow? big test there in nevada. then of course you go a week

later to south carolina. if you look here, new poll out of south carolina just yesterday. biden still in the lead. it's only five points over sanders. in the world where bernie sanders gets a big win in nevada tomorrow, in a world where maybe joe biden doesn't do that well in nevada tomorrow, could bernie sanders rise up and win south carolina? if sanders got nevada and south carolina and already had new hampshire and got whatever you want to call out of iowa, sanders could come out of those first four saying i won three, arguably four of the first four? would that build a bandwagon effect? this is the baseline of good will that these democrats have with -- in the most recent poll, sanders continues to have the strongest thing here. democratic voters at least right now, they like bernie sanders in this poll. that's the question for him. can he parlay that good will into some big numbers on super tuesday, particularly in california?

anyway, i could go on and on. i'm going to have so many chances tomorrow with our coverage. you can catch us tomorrow. you can catch brian, myself, the whole msnbc team coveraging the nevada caucuses. 2:00 p.m. eastern tomorrow we go on the air. good night from nbc news headquarters in new york. it is friday, which is awesome. that said, it is a friday during the democratic primary and the nevada caucuses are tomorrow on saturday. so if you are at all a political animal the way most all of us are having to become these days, even though it's friday this upcoming weekend doesn't really feel like a typical weekend, right? i mean, it is friday but tonight friday night as we speak, as you've been seeing all night long in our coverage here on msnbc, this is, you know, the down to the wire last chance for all the democratic candidates to finish strong in their get out the vote efforts and in their