Preparing to deliver his state of the union speech tonight under the cloud of his Senate Impeachment trial. Republicans are hoping he avoids that subject entirely. I think most of us are tired of impeachment. I think theres a lot of things that he needs to talk about. And before tomorrows final vote on the president s likely acquittal, signs that both sides are looking for a way out. Censure would allow a bipartisan statement condemning his unacceptable behavior in the strongest terms. The house could have pursued censure and not immediately jumped to the remedy of last resort. I cannot vote to convict. And good day, everyone. Im Andrea Mitchell in washington where after failing to get any explanations last night, the campaigns are finally being briefed at this hour by iowas Democratic Party about the total failure to produce results. Now its onto New Hampshire for most of the candidates where the primary is a week from today. Joining me now, msnbc katy tur and Vaughn Hillyard in des moines, mike memoli covering the Biden Campaign, Steve Kornacki at the big board and david ploufe, Campaign Manager for president obamas campaign. The only fun thing that happened last night was watching you go up and down the stairs. We were all sitting in awe as you ran up and down those stairs. Great interviews. But for all the fun and excitement of that caucus that the number of caucuses that you went to, what about the system and what it means for the Democratic PartyGoing Forward . Reporter yeah, yesterday was a bit of a microcosm for what happened in iowa. We saw a lot of confusion between the first alignment and the second realignment, the meticulous counting of people, the filling out of cards, the collecting those cards and putting them into plastic pins. What we did not see was anybody using any app yesterday at that caucus site. Thats because they did not get to use it in time, were told. Instead they walked those results over to the iowa Democratic Party headquarters last night when they were done. Here is the thing, a lot of these caucus chairs have been doing this for years. They were comfortable with the old way and this year a new system was introduced. Only with the app, but also with reporting out three different results and were told that the confusion came in not only in the downloading of the app, the trying to install the app, the not road testing the app with all the caucus chairs beforehand, but also in the new way that they were counting and tallying all of the votes. It used to be you got one result at the end. At this time they were trying to say how many people were in the popular vote, the first realignment, how many people for each candidate were in the second realignment and how many delegates you got. This seems to be an example of the more transparency the iowa Democratic Party gave us into how the caucuses work, the more confusing and perplexing it got for why this system is this way in the first place. There are a lot of questions not only from the campaigns but from the Democratic Party as a whole and a lot of voters about why iowa does it this way and why they are awarded the first to decide state every year, why so much importance is being put on these caucuses when so many people arent able to do it, arent able to commit three hours of their evening to caucus, need child care, or have to go to work or may not be comfortable saying who they support from front of their friends and neighbors. What i can tell you, though, andrea, is that every Single Person i have talked to from Campaign Sources to caucus chairs to Election Security officials, they say that this is a mess. They used more colorful language than that, but nobody is happy with how this played out. The good news is that there are paper ballots. They will be able to count all of the pledge cards and say who got what eventually. Unclear when that will be, whether it will be today or later. The bad news, yes, theres the paper trail. The bad news is all of this confusion is creating a very prime place for the internet to go and claim that this whole system is rigged, to use misinformation to try and make it so voters are not confident with the results and that was the biggest concern, the confidence with the results, the biggest concern for officials going into 2020, is that voters would not be able to trust the system and were seeing were seeing it play out right now in realtime here in iowa. Its so fortunate, especially against the backdrop of the russian interference in 2016. This is the Third Straight election in iowa where there have been difficulties in results. Hillary clinton and Bernie Sanders, there was a disputed outcome, he was still claiming and still is claiming that he won the popular vote and she got the delegates that were assigne republicans had Rick Santorum not winning until the day after. The process itself even before they made it more complicated was always subject to flaws. Vaughn, youve been talking to the Democratic Party there. You were rooted in iowa for many months and certainly for several years before that were still here. Yes. Your third year in iowa. Lets talk about what the campaign is telling the candidates. Because they still have not produced the results that have been promised. Theres a call between the campaigns and the iowa Democratic Party that is slated to take place any minute. This would be the third such call between the iowa Democratic Party and these campaigns. The question is, what sort of information is iowa Democratic Party able to offer up to these campaigns. The first two calls insighted frustration. It was not unlike that that the one press call that has taken place, lasted a little over a minute yesterday. So were waiting to hear the details that come from the iowa Democratic Party. We should note they intended to release results today, but i had conversations with Democratic Party officials and these votes are not only still coming in, the paper trail as well as initial those initial phone calls, but the issue the underlying issue is with the data coming in. Thank goodness that this was a caucus system here in iowa because if it were not for that paper trail, i think there would be much more up in the air. Because the way that the information was coming into the system did not match up with the data that was being sent. Youre looking at an iowa caucus system here that has had two particularly close caucuses and, you know, for the amount of money, i was talking to one precinct chair, hes also the chair of a local democratic county about three hours west of here, he said why would any democratic candidate want to come back to iowa and spend the resources that these campaigns spent over the last year, not only time, money, but also those field organizers, when they could go elsewhere, all for the realization that come caucus night, youre not going to have a result. The Pete Buttigieg campaign, over the course of this year built up an operation in which they had nearly 200 staff on the ground. They had captains in all 1,700 at 1,700 caucus locations. Ultimately what do they get out of it . It looks like theyre going to get a few delegates and they had an 11 30 p. M. Local speech, 12 30 p. M. If youre in New Hampshire, and theyre still waiting for the chance to perhaps call themselves caucus victors. And i watched buttigieg last night. I watched all of the speeches as we were still on the air and the buttigieg speech was one of the best speeches i ever seen him give. He was pumped up by what they were claiming to be a victory. I guess anyone can claim a victory, certainly the entrance polls were good for him. But what about joe biden . This almost gave him a get out of jail card because he if these results were reported last night before they might be overshadowed by the state of the union and the impeachment trial tomorrow and other events, a debate on friday. The joe biden results unofficially looked pretty gloomy. Instead, he could be, you know, legally challenging the party and claiming that things were not tabulated correctly. Mike memoli is with biden in New Hampshire. What are they saying . Reporter well, andrea, first of all, separate and apart from the Biden Campaign, its a good thing were in New Hampshire. Every single ballot that will be cast here will be cast on paper. There are some smaller towns here that still use ballot boxes that were issued in the 1800s. We will not have any app crashes. In 104 years, theres never been a recount and so we should not have those kinds of issues. To your point about the Biden Campaign, it was clear in the days leading up to the Iowa Caucuses that they were very much feeling the pressure, worried about that kind of disappointing outcome. My indication of how things were definitely turning south for him last night was when we were seeing precinct after precinct in which biden was not viable. They expected to be viable in 90 of the precincts across the state. And so the Biden Campaign, using terms like acute flaws to describe the results here, theyre very much emphasizing at the same time mike memoli, im sorry thanks for powering through that. I think a very enthusiastic biden adviser is behind you. There are those who did better than expected. Others, amy klobuchar, who might have had more momentum if she had gotten out of the senate trial sooner. But where do you see the fact that the field has not been winnowed as you would have expected. When we get these results, lets see. The entrance poll was indicating as you said a good night for buttigieg. Also a good night for sanders. And i think we had talked about this in the runup to iowa, the possibility with these multiple counts that multiple candidates might be in position to claim victory and certainly one of the things we know about the way this formula works in iowa, the state delegates, which is how they end up deciding the winner in terms of National Convention delegates, College Towns in iowa pay a price in that formula. Places where sanders was strong in 16 and strong last night, places around iowa city, Iowa State University here in ames, places where sanders probably ran up the score, i think would put him in contention, potentially, to win that statewide popular vote, raw vote, whatever you want to call it. Perhaps for buttigieg, just looking at that entrance poll, we will see if that bears out. But maybe more of an opportunity to be competing in the state delegate category. Thats one thing im going to be looking for when we start to see those results. Were those entrance polls correct . Thats always something you dont know for sure. And if they were correct, if they were capturing the essence of the race, is that dynamic there where one candidate is doing better in this metric and another in that metric. Why do we have all of these metrics . It bears remembering where this came from. It came from this, four years ago at this time you mentioned this, the 2016 Iowa Democratic caucuses, the closest in history. The margin was four state delegates. Clinton beat sanders by four state delegates. In the wake of that, the Sanders Campaign said, hey, those college areas, iowa city, ames, we think we ran up the score there and if there was a raw vote, a popular vote, we think we would have won that and the dnc after the 2016 campaign said, iowa, next time, you got to do that. You have to have the state delegates and you have to have the raw vote and thats why were in the situation were in right now. Thats called a know iowa is New Hampshires first primary in the country. If theyre going to do both, its no longer a caucus and thats what made it so complicated. David ploufe, youve been through this on both sides of the fence. From your experience, is it over for iowa . Certainly as we know the Iowa Caucuses. I think i think its likely iowa wont be first again. If they are, theyre going to have to change their whole approach. As you mention, New Hampshire has been the first primary. I think there are a lot of questions building about the caucuses. Obviously i have a personal experience with the caucuses. I think theres a lot of positives to them. Its hard to argue now because weve had cycle after cycle where there are issues. Were going to have to wait seven days for the winnowing. So someone like pete who needs to win and win and win to overcome the advantages of Bernie Sanders or biden may get is not going to probably get the full measure of his performance last night if it comes to pass. Some of the people underperformed, you mentioned joe biden, amy klobuchar, get to stave off seven days of brutality where youre in New Hampshire and the coverage is all about how poorly you did. I dont know how materially it changes the race. I think those who did well in iowa arent going to get the full measure of the momentum bounce. Iowa is much more about momentum than delegates. And those who did poorly are not going to pay the price. If we have a democratic president , which i hope we do, maybe we wont have a contested primary in 2024. Were going to have to look at the rules. The next time we have a race, i think the calendar is going to be much different. Its hard to argue when you look at the last three cycles that something fundamentally is not going to need to change. How vulnerable is joe biden now with Mike Bloomberg just waiting and also campaigning and pouring money into a campaign and looking for vulnerabilities there. First, i would say bloomberg has moved in National Polls if theyre accurate. Hes moved to 10 or 12 which is better than not moving. To really be a threat to be the nominee, youve got to get into the high 30s or 40s. He has a long way to go. For bloomberg, a lot will depend on things he doesnt have control of, coming out of the South Carolina primary, what does the field look like . Who has the most momentum . If a joe biden and or Pete Buttigieg are coming out of South Carolina with momentum, its more challenging. If Bernie Sanders is able to run the table, there may be more of an opening for bloomberg. This is a chess match and the nature of the race changes dramatically. Even New Hampshire is a lot different than iowa, then you go to nevada, South Carolina, then its a National Primary where bloomberg has the money, but i think we should not overstate, hes made progress. But to become the nominee, youve got to get into the high 30s or 40s. Whether its bloomberg or Bernie Sanders or joe biden or mayor pete or elizabeth warren, thats the test we have who is showing the capability or the potential to grow from 15, 20, 22 to 38, 40, 42, and that person will become the nominee. David ploufe, thank you so much. Thanks to all and you guys in iowa call us the minute you get some word from the iowa Democratic Party. Presumably, sometime today. 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