How will Rand Paul, Marco Rubio respond to the SOTU?

>>> many of you implored washington to please stop spending money we don't have. instead of cutting, we saw an unprecedented explosion of government spending and debt. it was unlike anything we've ever seen before in the history of the country.

>> on behalf of the tea party and citizen people across this country, with all due respect, mr. president, some of us are not stupid. the state of the union is not goo good.

>> the state of our party is not good.

>> not good. not good at all, as my dad would say.

>> representative michele bachmann and herman cain delivered the tea party responses to the president's state of the union . rand paul will be the voice of the tea party and here to weigh in on the senator's speech and senator rubio's rebuttal. senator from you saw, senator mike lee and contributor of the daily column and columnist, matt lewis . and al hunt is still here.

>> al, talking about the good old days, talking about twitter and he's talking about the good old days when he first got into washington , pony express bring something from washington to new york.

>> stagecoach.

>> so fast, it's unbelievable. i'm looking through my twitter feed as i always do in the morning and the next president of the united states hanging out at the biltmore hotel in miami. marco rubio , time calls him savior of the republican party , a lot of talk about this immigration bill . can you support the rubio immigration bill ?

>> i support probably 75 or 80% of what's in it. there's a lot of good things in that approach. i do think we need secure the border. i definitely think we need to fix legal immigration because we made legal immigration so difficult people choose the illegal option instead.

>> what don't you -- let's talk about the pathway to citizenship. do you agree with that?

>> i think the pathway prinesents some problems. we're allowing people who have been here illegally through that proposal. i have to say we don't know exactly what it's going to say. what it indicates so far we take people here illegally and put them in the 39 become citizens. that causes some heartburn. i think we ought to allow them come in on a non- immigrant visa fist and one way or another fix the immigration system snooimts be gradual but we can get there.

>> do you think the press is getting swept up in the sight of passing an immigration bill because the press for the most part supports the immigration bill . do you think it's a harder slog than predicting?

>> i think the ghosts of 2006 are still caught up in congress and a lot of people caught up in 2006 over comprehensive illegal immigration reform may still find those same wounds are aliv alive.

>> matt, do you agree with that? when george w. bush was talking about this and you were here, everybody saying it was going to pass, a fete accompli. subtly --

>> it's not just going back to 2006 , two years ago, mitt romney effectively demagogued the immigration issue and helped finish off rick perry and newt gingrich with it.

>> and mitt romney with the general election getting 22% of the hispanic vote.

>> there's two different issues. should republicans pursue immigration reform ? i think they should. there's almost this tragedy of the commons thing happening in the house, if you're a member of congress, you're incentives are different than if a member of the house, your incentives are different than the republican brand, but it is inagreediblely dangerous to talk about it and it is risky, but he is doing the right thing.

>> sorry marco rubio the savior?

>> stop it.

>> you know how i know he's a great politician and reaganesque? after "time" magazine put that on there, he said there is only one savior and it ain't me.

>> i didn't see it that way, actually.

>> say it for the clarification.

>> it was needy.

>> i thought it was humble. i thought so.

>> really?

>> i thought it was segas iou s. you have to be humble.

>> you have to be humble.

>> it should be.

>> let's talk about another issue the president will bring up tonight. newtown is going to be discussed. a lot of parents of children killed in newtown . chris matthews and everybody on the set agreed, it's not going to be an assault weapon ban passed. probably high capacity magazines are not going to be passed. what about the universal background checks ? what about the gun trafficking out there with bipartisan support? is there a possibility those could be passed?

>> it's hard to say. a lot of us when we look at that and universal background checks , they believe it's hard to make them work unless you have universal gun registration.

>> why can't you divide those two things where i can check and make sure you are not a felon and you don't have a mental condition that makes it dangerous without me tracking the gun.

>> unless you track and register the gun, it will be hard to know whether you are covering a significant portion of the sales. that's one concern raised that it will lead or require.

>> i think you are right. you can have somebody purchase a gun and have it with thorough and have that person transfer the gun.

>> have it stolen.

>> if somebody knows they will illegally traffic guns to a convicted felon or somebody that shouldn't be having it, you catch them on the other side too. this is a 90-10 issue. do you think -- we know that most republican voters and most gun owners support a universal background check and gun trafficking laws. do you see the senate republicans and the house republicans moving on these two issues that are 90-10 issues?

>> i don't know. i think there will be intng conservatives, with the background checks the next step is universal registration and the next step they fear is confisication.

>> that's like ted nugent .

>> i don't oppose them, but i don't think they are panacea. they could have worked them in tucson, but wouldn't have made a difference in aurora and newtown . you have people taking this tragedy and admitted it and trying to push through legislation that probably wouldn't help.

>> it probably would have. do you support any changes to gun laws ?

>> i haven't seen a law or proposal i'm excited about and would necessarily solve these problems. when people abuse rights to harm other people, the solution is not necessarily restricting the rights of the law-abiding and that is what happens when we restrict the rights. i'm open to consider a bill, but i haven't seen one yet i'm excited about.

>> thank you very much for being with us. we appreciate you dropping by. matt, great to see you.

>> stay off twitter.

>> i'm addicted. the kids love me.

>> the message on jobs. the director of the white house national economic counsel gene

sperling joins us: you are watching " morning joe ."