Meet the Press NOW — December 13

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Visit HyundaiCanada.com or your local dealer for details. If it's Friday, new information in the search for a missing American in Syria who's been missing there for more than a decade. A former prisoner tells NBC News who saw Austin Tice alive with his own eyes years after the journalist went missing. We'll get a live report from Damascus.

Plus new hope for a hostage deal in the coming days. As Secretary of State Blinken says there are encouraging signs and NBC reports that President Elect Trump's recent threats against Tamath have been a big factor in the negotiations. And as Washington prepares to take on the Trump agenda, President Elect Trump tells me he's open to possibly making a deal to raise the federal minimum wage. But will he have the support to get it done in a closely divided Congress?

Welcome to the press. Now I'm Kristin Welker in Washington. We begin in the Middle East where we're tracking multiple developments as the Biden administration is in the midst of a last-ditch diplomatic push. Both National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Secretary of State Antony Blinken are in the region right now.

And there is new hope today for a ceasefire and hostage release agreement in Gaza. After meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, National Security Advisor Sullivan told reporters he's looking to get a deal done by the end of the year. And while we've heard some more messages before, Sullivan explained why this moment may be different and why there's new reason for optimism. Take a listen.

I would point out that Hamas's posture at the negotiating table did adapt following the announcement of the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon. From that moment forward, we've had a different character to the negotiation. And we believe that it puts us in a position to be able to close this negotiation. NBC News can now confirm what was first reported by the Wall Street Journal that Hamas has relented on two key roadblocks to securing the agreement, including allowing the temporary presence of Israeli troops in Gaza after the fight against a senior Biden administration official acknowledges to NBC News that President Elect Trump's recent warning about, quote, all hell to pay was a, quote, big factor in getting those concessions from Hamas.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Lincoln is shuttling throughout the region, making a surprise visit to Baghdad today, where he reaffirmed the importance of supporting the Syrian people amid their political transition. What's happening in Syria does have an important impact and it's very significant that Iraq, along with many other countries in the region and beyond will allow them to make it best efforts to support the Syrian people as they emerge from the Assad years. Now, on the ground in Syria today, thousands gathered for the first Friday prayers since the fall of the Assad regime. You can see here, worshipers waving Syrian revolutionary flags in the courtyard of one of the most historic mosques in Damascus.

Those celebrations continued into the Capitol City Center with thousands of people packing the streets with those images. Similar scenes unfolded in cities across the country, including in one of Syria's major court cities, a one-time Assad family stronghold. But even as Syrians celebrate, many are continuing to search for clues about their loved ones held in Assad's notoriously brutal prisons. The rebels who overthrew the regime have broken into those prisons to free political prisoners, which has created opportunities to find out more about those who are missing, including potentially American journalist Austin Tice, who disappeared in Syria more than 12 years ago.

NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engle spoke to one former detainee, someone who had very specific details about the location where he says he saw Austin Tice with his own eyes. It's possible to find information about Austin and return him to his mother, but we have not reached a result, he said. Then a lead. We spoke to Sahir Al Ahmad, now in Dubai.

He was an activist and citizen journalist arrested for filming anti-regime demonstrations. This is the first time he's showing his face on camera. He told us he was in a prison cell across from Tice and last saw him alive in July 2022. On one occasion, he says, they punished me for four hours because I violated the instructions and looked at a detainee.

We went to the location this morning, Assad's former general intelligence prison. Ahmad said he memorized the location here and he said you had to descend 27 steps to get to the right area, 26, 27, it all checks out. He said the steps would lead to a row of cells about a hundred yards long. This is the tiny, exactly solitary confinement cell where Ahmad was kept with a tiny slot in the bottom and just opposite.

This is the cell where Tice was kept. Ahmad said most of the prisoners in this wing were foreigners. The calendar, counting down days, this, I know that. It would have been absolutely miserable to stay here.

Look, there's still cockroaches crawling out of holes in the walls. We showed pictures of the cells to Ahmad and he confirmed were in the right place. He said Tice was thin and, like other prisoners, had his hair and eyebrows shaved off, but appeared healthy, able to walk, eat and communicate. We don't know what happened to him after that.

And Richard Engle joins me now from Damascus, Syria with me on set as NBC News, Chief Washington correspondent and Chief Horn of Affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell. Richard, I want to get to you first. What a just absolutely extraordinary report. Frankly, we've never seen anything like it.

The fact that you were able to get inside those cells where Austin Tices believed to have been held. What war did you see in that prison? Well, that is the uniqueness of this moment. This country was completely closed off.

It was a country of secret prisons. Every day we are learning about another detention facility. You think of prisons as their own independent locations, but the Air Force had prisons. Each intelligence division had its own prison.

There were special prisons that were just designed effectively as execution facilities. That's the Saydaya prison. So there were secret dungeons all over this country. And now you can get access to them.

They are guarded by the rebels. The rebels moved in. They broke the locks. They freed the prisoners and with negotiations, and if you know where you're going, you can get access to them.

And I will say, there are still documents all over the place. Documents that have not been fully explored in this particular prison. There were also what seemed to be video cameras, perhaps cassettes. Not sure what was on them.

They were behind locked doors. So this collapse of the regime has created a tremendous opportunity for people who are searching for their loved ones. And Syrians every day are going to these prisons. They're asking the local authorities.

They're carrying pictures of their relatives. And they are searching for answers. That said, they're also starting to look for mass graves here. Well, it is just unbelievable to see those images.

Richard, you are there on the ground. You've been there since the fall of Assad today, as we reported, was the first day of Friday prayers. Obviously, as you said, there is optimism that perhaps this could be a new beginning in Syria. But there's also so much uncertainty and fear about that uncertainty.

What is the move like in Damascus today? Well, the one thing that is keeping Syrians united, to a degree, and there are serious divisions here, there's the Alawai community that is very nervous, and they're keeping silent. Bashar al-Assad himself was an Alawai, which is an offshoot of Shia Islam. They are the Kurds who are very nervous, who work with the United States.

But the majority, the main is united because the last several decades were so miserable, particularly the last 10 years of the civil war. So they're celebrating that someone won. Yes, they're not all, not all Syrians back, this particular Islamist faction. And there are many Syrians who are worried that an Islamist group is now in charge.

Let's not forget the leader of this group, was once the leader of al-Qaeda faction. He now says that he's going to be more moderate. He has denounced al-Qaeda, and he's done that consistently for the last several years. He put out many statements saying that they want to have an inclusive Syria that is open to all, he's saying all the right things so far.

They've been doing pretty much all of the right things. That's why they have these mass rallies today to show a national unity. So there is a sense of celebration and relief that the civil war is over, that the Bashar family is gone. But there was concern that this particular group of rebels that led the charge into Damascus, that people are worried if they can be trusted, and if they are going to be as moderate as they are promising.

Well, Richard Angle, why for us in Damascus, Syria, we know you will continue to report this out. Thank you again for bringing that just incredible view inside that prison. I can't imagine what it took to find that prison to get inside those jail cells and to report it out so thoroughly. So thank you very much, please continue to stay safe.

We really appreciate it. And Andrea, let me turn to you now. We know that you've been in touch with Austin Tice's family. What is the very latest that you're hearing from them, this renewed hope that Austin Tice is alive?

You know, Debra Tice, who I know you're going to be speaking with on Sunday on Meet the Press, is encouraged, as she said at the National Press Club, encouraged that they have credible sources. She's been meeting with Jake Sullivan the week before last on a Friday, Thursday or Friday, I believe. But the fact is, you can imagine the emotional world would cost you. And the family was alerted when, you know, Chairman Liz American was found, and there was an initial thought by some people who had found him, oh, with an American, a prisoner, or maybe it's Austin Tice.

So this was at 4.35 in the morning, and they were being asked, you know, take a look at these pictures. You can only imagine the disappointment, of course, happiness for the Chairman family, that their loved one is coming home, but Austin Tice has been there for so many years. And now there's a report from Reuters that we are working on, that back in 2012 or 2013, that's not quite clear from all of the reporting, that he was actually seen credibly, according to several observers, having escaped from itself. And so he was, the US government knows this, that he was at least alive then.

And so there's been a going presumption that he is alive, and it has been, as many of these regime prisoners have been held, those who are American, because they have some leverage with them, held in reasonably good conditions, so that is the hope. And Andrew, just for our audience, so that you and I have been talking about this, and I find it so helpful to hear about this from you, the fact that we're hearing from President Biden, the fact that we are hearing from top officials that yes, there is renewed hope that he's alive, they wouldn't just say that. I mean, you know so well from covering President Biden, he is not going to say, and if he had been spoken, that would have been clarified, and it was not, so they do believe that he is alive. And there's so much going on, Secretary Blinken has been today in Baghdad, now flying back to Turkey where he had been, he's going to Jordan.

That is a focus on Syria. We have huge interests on deconflicting with Turkey. They go after the PKK, the Syrian Kurds, Turkish Kurds in northeast Syria, whom they view as terrorists, we don't, and we have other groups, the STF, also Kurdish in northeast Syria, who we support, they are guarding ISIS prisoners, they have got valiantly against ISIS on our behalf. We have our forces, we have 900 troops there, so there are so many different groups, and the main thing is HDS, and I should point this out in the context of Austin Ties, they're credible reports that HDS, the group that had led the rebellion, and had roots in al Qaeda and ISIS, but have disavowed that for several years, and they're now speaking moderately, you know, the julani, the leader there, that they are signaling that they are going through the prisons themselves, trying to find Austin Ties, it would be very much in their benefit to find him to turn him over to the Americans, because they're trying to get taken off the terror list.

The US isn't interested in that, weighing how to deal with that, don't want to do it prematurely, because they're trying to get humanitarian aid in, they can't, because he's on both UN and US terrorists. And Andrea, obviously, the other angle that we are covering in the Middle East, the comments by Jake Sullivan, that they believe they are closer to a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, that would include the release of some hostages. We've heard this quite a few times in the past, this time feels a little different. It is different.

It is, okay. Now, and it could be in Lucie in the football, we don't know that, but this time, Jake Sullivan is, you know, in Doha tonight in Qatar, he had been in Cairo in Israel. This is a Cairo initiative. This week, earlier this week, the Mossad and the Shin Bet, the two spy leaders from Israel went to Cairo, they thought there was enough there.

Netanyahu has blessed this with some details that still have to be ironed out. It's complicated, but for the first time, Hamas has said Israeli forces can stay in Qatar. The big difference now is that Hamas, it has lost its allies. Iran is weakened, Hezbollah is vastly diminished.

Assad is collapsed and is in Moscow, and so they know that they're weakened, and importantly, President Trump went on to social 11 days ago and said to Hamas, turn over the hostages before I take office, or all hell will break loose. So that threat from Hamas, to Hamas, signal to Hamas and signal to Netanyahu, don't hold it back, we want this now. And so everything could be coming together, I spoke to several people directly involved on the road and back home, and they say, it could be happening, but wow, it's the Middle East. Right.

Fingers crossed. Fingers crossed. We could get hostages out, starting with the women, the elderly, and the ill, and an accounting for the first time by Hamas, of who's alive, who's not, of all the remaining hostages. What a development that would be that the whole country, the whole world has been hoping for.

Andrew Mitchell, thank you for starting us off. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you.

Yes, I appreciate that very much. As Andrew just noted, we do have a special programming announcement. I will have a live exclusive interview with Deborah Tice, the mother of the missing American journalist, Austin Tice, it will be this Sunday, only underneath the press. We are so honored to be able to have that conversation.

Coming up, President Trump's sweeping immigration plans. I'll get reaction from a House of Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee, who knows firsthand the struggle of undocumented immigrants in this country. Stay with us. You're watching me press now.

Welcome back. As President Trump doubles down on his pledge to make mass deportation a day one priority, he's stacking his Homeland Security team with immigration hardliners. Now, one of those picks, Tom Holman, is threatening to go after state and local officials if they impede the deportation process. Look, you also said, if he, I mean, the mayor, if he impedes us, if he knowingly harbors or conceals, an illegal alien, I will prosecute him.

So you will not only go after the illegal migrants, you may go after some mayors who aren't helping. If they step over that line, they can sit back and watch us, which again, I find incredible. You don't want to take public safety threats out of the community to help us, but there are laws on the books that we will prosecute. Joining me now is California Democratic Congressman Robert Garcia.

Congressman Garcia, thank you for joining me. I appreciate it. Happy to be here. Thank you.

So last time you joined us on this program, you called Tom Holman's comments that the administration would pursue mass deportation with or without Democrats shameful. Now he's actually gone a step further. We just heard him there, suggests he would prosecute, take actions against governors or mayors who don't cooperate. What was your reaction to hearing that?

I mean, again, just completely un-American comments. I've been in Congress in my first term of a freshman. I was mayor of my city for eight years before I got to Congress. I can tell you that mayors want to see their police officers focus on the things that matter on the ground.

And that is ensuring that there's traffic tickets being given out. There when people call 911, something's there to help. No one is interested, including, by the way, most major city chiefs are spoken out in being somehow these immigration force policies across the country. Police officers have actual work to do in these cities, and their job is not to enforce immigration law.

Let alone their job is certainly not to be some sort of police force for Donald Trump. And so that is not realistic and not going to happen. And in fact, we'll make the country less safe. And in addition, as an immigrant myself, one of the few in Congress that for part of my life was not documented, it is very clear to me that this is someone that wants to attack people like my family and like my community.

We've got to be vocal and stand up against it. Let me ask you about something else that we heard from President Electron. I had my one-on-one sit down with him, which aired last week. In it, he seemed to suggest that he does want to find a path for dreamers.

An immigration advocate made this a call to action. Was here on this program yesterday, let me play you a little bit of my conversation and get your reaction on the other side. I think we need to really come together and hold the president accountable and say we want to work with you. It's been 23 years, as I said.

We've seen bipartisan dream acts. We've seen legislation come from Republicans like Succeed Act. We've seen the dream and promise that there's 12 different types of legislation. And so I think we've already done this exercise.

We just have to be ready and prepared. That is exactly why I made this video. I'm hoping that President Trump sees it and sees there's willingness from folks to work with him and are ready to applaud him if he's able to get this done. That is Gabby Pacheco.

She's a dreamer who is now here with legal status. Do you agree with her? Do you want this to be a moment? Do you think it can be a moment where you can get something done by working with President Trump?

I mean, first, obviously, everybody would love to see some type of immigration reform or protection for dreamers. There is no question. But I am not holding my breath. Donald Trump will say one thing and do another.

He'll come out with their proposal and they do a complete flip on it. We've seen already how he speaks of immigrants and folks within our community. In one breath, he wants to help dreamers and another. He wants to deport their parents and separate families.

And then actually not even think about issues as far as families that have mixed status in their home. So I have a hard time believing that Donald Trump wants to do anything productive with immigration. But look, if Republicans, if Donald Trump, if anyone actually wants to pass a meaningful reform, which we have not had in decades in this country, I'll be the first one in line. Democrats will be the first one in line.

I just don't see it happening. So and I hear your skepticism. But just to be very clear, you are saying you're willing to work with President-elect Donald Trump once he's in office. If you think that he is being serious about getting a deal on dreamers.

If Donald Trump is serious about getting a deal on dreamers and ensuring there's a pathway for them to be here in a way that's legal and protected. Absolutely, I don't think there's a Democrat in Congress that wouldn't want to see protection for dreamers. But again, we can't trust anything he has to say. So we'll wait and see.

But again, I'm not optimistic. Given that Democrats are in the minority, do you feel like you have any leverage on this issue or frankly, any other issue at this point? Look, one thing I learned as a freshman member of Congress is that even the minority, you can stop a lot of bad things from happening in the House. So I think that under the leadership of 15 Jeffries and others, we were able to stop a lot of bad legislation, a lot of bad budget deals.

And that was because of course, as we know that majority was slim. It is even more slim in this conversation. So I do believe that by speaking out, by being tough, by negotiating tough, by not just collapsing to whatever Donald Trump and Republicans want, I think we do have an ability to push back. And I've encouraged my colleagues as well.

We have to also be tough and fight back. I'm hearing from folks back home. They want us to stand up for our values as Democrats and to push back, especially when you have folks like Elon Musk trying to essentially destroy the federal government. So it's important that we're loud and active.

Well, let me ask you about another aspect of what we heard from President Trump, comments that he made about jailing members of the January 6th Committee. NBC News has reported that President Biden's actually now considering pre-emptive pardons for people targeted by Mr. Trump, folks like Senator Adam Schiff, former Congresswoman Liz Cheney, maybe even Anthony Fauci. Do you think that President Biden should issue those pre-emptive pardons and should they be accepted?

So I think that we should expect Donald Trump to be as vindictive. As he always has been, look at who he's putting in charge of the FBI or wants to. Look, I support President Biden making a wide use of his party power and his power to commit sentences. I think that obviously he just did that in a way that was historic and substantial.

I think he should continue to do that, particularly those that are facing death row in the federal system. But it's force protecting members that could be vulnerable to the FBI and their attacks and being weaponized. I absolutely would support that. I think the President and his advisors from what I understand in my conversations are actively looking at this day to day.

So I think we're going to hear a lot more about pardons and commutations here in the days ahead as we close the Biden presidency. Okay. Well, that was a little bit of news there that you think this could come in the days ahead. Let me, before I let you go, ask you about some of the battles that we're seeing starting to brew already between younger members of the Democratic Caucus who are challenging some of their more senior colleagues for key committee positions.

Do you think it's time for a new generation to step into seniority matter at all, Congress? And what do you make of this? Well, you can do both. I think, look, seniority is important because you have experience, you have folks that have relationships that know how to be in the system.

But people that are coming in, young folks, fresh perspectives and new ideas, is also very important. So the party should welcome both. I believe that in our ranks and committee chairs and leadership, you should have a mix of people with experience and people that are coming in with Russian new ideas. I don't believe that a seniority only approach is the best approach for our caucus.

I think you're seeing that play out. I mean, look at the King Jeffries. King Jeffries is, in Congress years, a relatively newer member. And he's leading our caucus.

He's bringing a fresh perspective. And I think folks are coming in and wanting to serve as committee chairs or the leadership roles. I just got elected to leadership myself as an incoming sophomore. I think it's good to have those different perspectives.

And I support it. I think it's good for the party. All right, Congressman Robert Garcia, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

Anytime. Well, also today, we got news that Speaker-America Nancy Pelosi is in the hospital after sustaining an injury during a congressional visit to Luxembourg to mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge. Now, a spokesperson for the former speaker did not provide details about what kind of injury the Congresswoman sustained or how long she would need to be in the hospital, saying, quote, Speaker-America Pelosi is currently receiving excellent treatment from doctors and medical professionals. She continues to work and regrets that she is unable to attend the remainder of the CODEL engagements to honor the courage of our service members during one of the greatest acts of American heroism in our nation's history.

We will, of course, bring you any updates as we get them. Coming up next, as Democrats look to the future, how much do they also need to be looking back at the past? One of the men vying to be the next chairman of the party will join me in studio with his take on what went wrong and where the party should go from here. Stay with us.

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Trump, despite having the advantage on money and manpower, one candidate with Wisconsin State Party Chair Ben Walker told NBC News, quote, it's about reckoning with what works, what didn't, what we can learn, how we can win as many elections as we can and stretch every resource as far as we can in the years to come. Learning from what just took place is a good way to do that. Joining me now on set is another one of the candidates to be the next chair of the DNC, Minnesota Democratic Farmer Labor Party Chair, Ken Martin. Chairman, thank you so much for being here.

Really appreciate it. Thank you for having me. So let's start right there and talk about the idea of a post-mortem. What do you think needs to happen in order to conduct that post-mortem?

And what are the questions that you want to answer? Well, first off, I don't like to call it a post-mortem because the Democratic Party is not dead. We're still alive. We're still okay.

I do believe we need a post-election review after every election. And frankly, I was a little disappointed we didn't have one after the 2020 election. You see, there's a tendency when you win elections, everyone thinks they're a genius. And when you lose elections, everything was wrong.

And neither one of those are completely true. Every election cycle, we do some things well that we should continue to do. And every election, we do things that we shouldn't continue to do. And we need to learn those lessons the right way.

We know we lost ground with Latino men, we know we lost ground with working-class households with white women, et cetera. What we don't know yet, and we won't know for some time until we do that review, and we get our hands on all the data, is the how and why we lost ground. Do you have a sense, though, preliminarily, of what were some of the problems that you identified in watching this all play out? I mean, I think there were some real macro issues that we were dealing with.

One, of course, the headwinds in this election never really changed from the right track, wrong track numbers from the beginning when Biden announced all the way through the same. Meaning, this was a change electorate. And people were facing a lot of economic anxiety and pain, and they were going to take it out on the party on power. And so that was true all the way through the election.

The second thing, which surprised me, was last spring, and this should have been the canary in the coal mine. There was research that showed for the first time in modern history, the perceptions that the two political parties has actually changed. The majority of Americans now believe that the Republican Party best represents the interests of the working class and the poor, and the Democratic Party is the party of the wealthy and the elites. And sure enough, the only two groups that we overperformed with were wealthy households and college educated voters just approved the point.

So we have a lot of work to do because our brand, obviously, is not where it needs to be. Do you think that's a problem of messaging or the candidates? Well, I would say it's definitely a branding problem. The perceptions of our party are completely upside down.

And it's a messaging problem. It's not a message problem, by the way, because if you look at states like Missouri, where they passed a minimum wage increase, they passed a paid family leave, they passed abortion protections all by wide margins, those same voters went down ballot and voted for Trump and the Republicans. So the policies we champion as a Democratic Party are very popular around this country and they're passing in wide measure, but they're not connecting those policies back to our party and candidates. That's a messaging problem, not a message problem.

Based on what you've assessed so far, and again, I know that it's still the very beginning of really looking into what some of these metrics and issues look like. How would you fix this problem? Well, first off, we need to get our hands on all the data, make sure we know exactly how and why this happened, and then start being prescriptive in terms of the solution. But the other piece we need to do is bring all of our stakeholders together, right?

Bring them around to the table. There should be no sacred cows, right? I think there's a perverse profit incentive in the business of politics that drives so much of our ad spend to broadcast TV. As an example, one of the lessons we've learned is that the Republicans did a masterful job over the last four years of just beating the heck out of Democrats, our party brand and Joe Biden in non-traditional news places or information spaces.

We have to do a better job of getting our message out and competing in those spaces, and we need to make sure that we're doing it on our terms, defining ourselves before they define us. And that's one clear lesson from this election. That is not a Kamala Harris problem. I think what we asked Kamala Harris and Tim Walls to do in 107 days, they did everything we asked them to do.

Frankly, we asked them to do the improbable, going up against some very significant headwinds. There's more systemic challenges that we face as a Democratic party that we have to dig into. Given what you're saying, the headwinds, the improbability of having such a short campaign and coming and coming back and winning the person we are running against, do you think President Biden should have dropped out sooner and given her a longer runway? Well, look, it's an academic exercise.

It doesn't matter what I think at this point, we can't change the past. So what I'm looking for is information that can help us inform the future and help us actually change what's broken in our party so we can actually win again. There's lots of people in Washington, by the way, that want to win the argument. The only thing I want to do is win elections.

That's what's important to me because at the end of the day, our party has to start winning again so we can improve people's lives. A lot of work ahead of you. Why do you want to be the person at the top of the ticket? Well, it's a big job for sure.

There's no doubt about it. But I'm excited about the opportunity to help bring a little bit of what we've done in Minnesota, arguably the Minnesota DFL, which I've led the last 14 years, is one of the strongest state parties in the nation. I'm 25 and all on winning statewide races. We've had two trifectors which have delivered some of the most progressive legislation for Minnesotans.

And I think we can scale that up here with the DMC and make sure that our party is actually organizing everywhere with all 57 of our state parties and contesting races up and down the ballot. Very quickly, under the Biden administration, they changed which state boasts for us. It's now South Carolina. Do you want to see that stay that way or do you want it to go back to?

Well, it's not up to me. Yeah, it's not up to me to make that decision. Well, what would you like to see? What I would like to see as a robust conversation within our party about what makes sense to make sure that we actually have a rigorous, efficient and fair process that battle tests our nominee so we can win.

So you're open to changing it back. I'm open to whatever our party thinks is best for us to win. All right. Thank you so much.

Really appreciate it, Ken Martin. Great conversation. Great to have you here in studio. Coming up after the break, the federal minimum wage has not budged in more than a decade.

Now, President Trump tells me that could change potentially. Potentially in a second term. Don't go anywhere. We'll delve into all of that.

You're watching at the press now. Welcome back. President-elect Donald Trump is not ruling out an increase to the federal minimum wage during his second term in office. Here's what he told me last week.

Look, are you going to raise? It's a very long number. I will agree. It's a very long number.

Let me give you the downside though. In California, they raised it up to a very high number. And your restaurants are going out of business all over the place. The population is shrinking.

It's had a very negative impact. But there is a level at which you could do it. Absolutely. What does that level do?

I don't know. I mean, I really don't know. I can say this. You have a lot of businesses that are open and thriving because of the lower minimum wage.

If you raise it too much and you understand this, if California went crazy, they went crazy. And people, the restaurants are closing all over. Many more people are hurting. So I hear you saying similarly to what you said in 2020, will you consider this something you're going to look at?

I would consider I'd want to speak to the governors. And the other thing that's very complicated about minimum wages is places are so different. Mississippi and Alabama and Great Places are very different than New York or California. I mean, in terms of the cost of living and other things.

So it would be nice to have just a minimum wage for the whole country, but it wouldn't work because you have places where it's very inexpensive to live, where a minimum wage, which is eight or $9, might have very little effect because the cost of living in certain places is really low. Joining me now on set is Crystal is a founder of the So What newsletter and a senior advisor at Tensions Global Advisors, Simone Sanders Townsend, former senior advisor to President Biden, Vice President Harris and co-host of the weekend on weekends at MSNBC. And Mark Short, former Chief of Staff, Vice President Pence, former White House Director of Legislative Affairs, and an NBC News contributor. Thank you all for being here.

Let me start with you. So what did you hear in that answer and just against the backdrop of the political reality, we've been talking about the minimum wage for a long time. It's really hard to raise the federal minimum. Yeah, I think that's the underlying thing is it's probably not going to happen.

I do think there's two interesting things though. One, I think his natural tendency when he doesn't have a very specific knowledge of a policy spirit. Yeah, we might do that. Well, you ask, well, what should that number be?

I would have to figure it out. So I think that's point one. It's going to be like his default. Point two though is I do think like it is, I think of this all the time.

Like in 2012, the 2012 Republican Party and the 2024 Republican Party feel like almost unrecognizable for one another. And like he is someone who's put together a different coalition. You would not have heard, let's just say that Jeb Bush got elected President. I think it is unlikely Jeb Bush would be like, yeah, we should think about maybe raising.

It's just, it's a reminder how different he has wrenched the party on things that, you know, big things and small things. Yeah, absolutely. Mark, you and I have spent a lot of time talking about that. How much the Republican Party has changed under Donald Trump?

When you hear him talk about that, when you hear him talk about, yeah, maybe we can find a pathway for Dreamers. As someone who used to be the point person on legislative affairs in his White House, do you think, as Chris says, look, it's probably very tough to get done. But is there a possible area where we could see some bipartisanship? I think that might be one.

I don't think there's going to be a lot of bipartisanship. I think when you have such incredibly narrow house majority, be very difficult to get a lot done. I really think Chris's point is the right one now. I think that raising the national wage is a terrible economic idea.

If you have, let's say a fast food restaurant and you have 10 employees paying $8 an hour, $80, and you raise it to $10 an hour, you're going to fire two employees to say $80 an hour. But the economic nationalism inside our party and the populism is replaced, the free market lays a fair approach to the Republican Party on a lot of issues, particularly in trade too. So I'm weighing on this. I'm going to be talking to Senator Bernie Sanders on Sunday.

He's going to say, I grew up talking about it. Some of these are everybody's answers. That's what I'm going to say. That's what I'm going to say.

That's what I'm going to say. I mean, I will just say, I think you're right. The last day there has been replaced by this economic populace. But the point that the president-elect was making an interview with you about, oh, well, if you look at the restaurants, you know, if we're just close, it has been, it's the head of the restaurant industry in the DMV area.

And one of the things that is often talked about here locally, but also nationally, is what is it for workers? And then also what is good for the business owners? Because if the businesses are going out of business, you have no workers to work anywhere. And so there is a balance that has to be struck here.

And I think that that is a dance that Senator Sanders will be more than happy to engage in. Well, that's why I was just so fascinated when he said there is a number where you could do it. So the conversation continues. I want to talk about economic populism.

I want to talk a little bit and get everyone's reaction to something that Maxwell Frost had to say. If a president who lied to people and said he was going to fight for class families, but yet he's amassed the richest cabinet in the history of our country. So you expect him to believe that someone like Elon Musk, who's worth over $340 billion, is going to be in charge of helping to decide what my mom's social security check is going to be? Mark, what do you make of that?

I'm not too much, honestly. I mean, I see, I think he has a lot of people in his cabinet that are wealthy and they've been successful, but as we just talked about, where his appeal has been, is actually winning over blue-collar workers in the Midwest in ways that Republicans have not before. Yeah, but I would just say, I think he won them over by the promises that he has made it what people believe about Donald Trump. You know, when I talk to folks that have been supportive of the president-elect or at least vote for him at least one of the last two times, they say, well, they think he's a disruptor.

They think he's going to get it done. And so the thing about making promises, which he admitted to you in the interview, you know, or I want to make too many promises because he knows that there are some things he cannot get done. But on this point, I think the Democrats have to be intentional. They have to pick what they're going to fight about.

Everybody's kind of got rich people. Okay, so I'm going to lean in on the rich people point because the line has, the line is moving. And I think the question now is not what is normal or Donald Trump normal because normality is subjective at one point. It was normal to black people weren't enslaved in this country.

That was normal. The question is where is the line and who gets to drive? Just one thing to pick up on Simone said, I think it is utterly dumb strategically to be like, look at all these people, they're so rich, Elon Musk is so rich because I think it misses at least part of Trump's appeal that wasn't Republican versus Democrat, which is it was aspirational. Yeah.

They were like, he's rich now. I always say to people like, he is rich. He's a billionaire. He's not as rich as he is.

But he's so rich. But I think that I think people, they're like, I don't necessarily need somebody. Like I think they're like, this guy's been successful. Maybe you can make us successful surrounding yourself with other success.

What do they think of Elon Musk? The guy went into the space industry. He disrupted the car industry. He is an innovator, whatever you think of his politics.

So I think like trying to villainize him. I just don't, I don't think it works for the average person. I think people don't preach it how much in 2016 when he was in fresh Canada. The apprentice helped him for that exact reason, the mystique and the perception of that success is what's aspirational.

Absolutely. And so it's condemned as cabinet for being successful, I think it's a mistake. Yeah. I think the one thing that Congressman Frost, I do agree with that he said, is that this notion of like archibald touch and one of the critiques that folks have had kind of about the Democratic priorities is that they are out of touch with regular folks.

No one would say that Maxwell crosses out of touch. And so when you do surround yourself with people that like haven't been until Costco lately, or don't even know how to go, she's getting frustrated just saying that doesn't mean that that can lend itself to having conversations, making decisions that do not connect with the everyday people that don't actually fix their problems. I want to ask you guys about, since Maxwell Frost commented on the cabinet, what are you anticipating, Chris, as we watch this battle play out over Pete Heggsett, and the question I just have, are Republicans going to sink a second nominee? Are they done?

I mean, you're hearing a shift in tone from Republican senators when it comes to Heggsett. They're more accepting. I would say like history is predictive until isn't anymore. You know what I mean?

Like we always say like, well, in the past, this happened. It's like, well, in the past, I'm sure when it got elected. Usually, in the last three or four presidents, they lose two, maybe three of their initial picks. You can't do two and a half, but somewhere between two and three people, which would suggest there's maybe one more.

And the Gates thing was so quick. I feel like by the time we get to jail, we'll be like, remember what? I mean, wait, did that actually happen? So I think, yeah, I think maybe one more.

I still think, I know this is not becoming popular, like if I had to pick between the field and then Tulsi Gabbard, R.K. Jr. and Heggsett, I still will say Heggsett, because I think the stuff that's out there on him, when there are confirmation hearings and it gets re-aired, maybe, problematic? There's no doubt that confirmation hearings are going to be really challenging for him.

Who do you think? We only have a minute left. I think Heggsett's on a stronger standing than he was. I encourage your viewers to read Kimberly Strussell's piece today, whilst you're on R.K.

Jr. I do think there's still going to be more bombs, honestly. I think there's upside down in so many nominees out early, shows, organizations. But leaving people out for 90 days to pick the part by the media, Republicans didn't take down the Matt Gays.

The media took down Matt Gays for exposing him as a sex trafficker. That's a big difference. And so I think that having these nominees sitting out there for another six weeks, will be possibly going to vote, there's a lot more to happen. Or he took himself down for paying 17-year-olds.

I don't know. I mean, look, Matt Gays. Look, my point here is that I think every... I think a lot of people, not everyone, because Marker will be able to qualify.

When he agrees with his policies or not, I think he's qualified to serve in the role. Pete Heggsett, his qualification is that he's a veteran. Yeah. Well, again, our qualification is what?

Then she was a positive person to him. She couldn't have a harder time getting concerned. I think that the line has moved to the point where unqualified people are now seriously being considered for very serious roles. And my question is, are the senators going to stand their ground?

All right, all right, guys, unfortunately, we're out of time. Thank you. This is a great conversation, Chris Simone, and Markerly. Appreciate it.

Still to come with all the votes from the presidential race now counted. My next guest has seen enough. He'll explain next. You're watching me at the press now.

Welcome back. More than a month after Election Day, now that nearly every ballot has finally been counted, we are able to look at the election results a little differently. Despite winning all seven battleground states, President-elect Trump won less than 50% of the vote. It was the closest popular vote result since 2000.

He was also the first Republican to win the popular vote since 2004. I'm joined now by Dave Wasser, and senior editor and elections analyst for the Cook Political Report. Dave, thank you for joining me. I really appreciate it.

We're excited about this segment. So what surprised you most about this election? You know, if you had told me the day before Election Day that Trump would sweep all seven battleground states and win the popular vote, I wouldn't have been that surprised. That was well within the realm of possibility, as polls were very close and Trump was doing better than polls than he was heading into 2020.

But I was surprised by elements of how it happened underneath the surface. The fact is that Trump expanded his coalition not only by winning higher shares of working class and on white voters, but also at the highest income end of the spectrum as well. He actually improved his vote share by more in places like Fairfax County, Virginia, and Aspen, Colorado, than he did in some of the stereotypically white working class parts of Pennsylvania, whether it's Erie or places like Wausau, Wisconsin, or Saginaw, Michigan. And then also Trump, he expanded his margin in Texas and Florida close to where his margin ended up being in Kansas.

And New Jersey ended up being just about as close as Arizona. Well, it is so fascinating. Dave, to hear you break it down like that. You've also said that Kamala Harris should get credit for limiting Mr.

Trump's gains in the seven battleground states. Explain what you mean by that. That's right. And I think it's important to differentiate Harris the candidate and some of the deficiencies that have been picked over since Election Day from the Harris campaign.

The reality is that the swing towards Trump across the seven battleground states was 3.1 relative to four years ago, whereas the swing in the other 43 states towards Trump was 6.6. And some of that has to do with the fact that Trump made his biggest strides among non-white voters who tend to be more numerous in places like New York, California, Florida, and Texas. But the Harris campaign deserves some credit in terms of its ground operation and its paid communication for limiting Trump's gain, particularly in the context of the swings we've seen against incumbent parties globally. Let me ask you about something that Steve Carnegie outlined for us yesterday.

He outlined why New Jersey may actually provide an early indication of whether President-elect Trump's coalition is holding. What do you make of that? And are there any other races that you think could be bellwethers in the next cycle? That's true.

Unsceptical Trump's appeal is transferable down ballot. We saw a lot of cases in this election where Democrats outperformed Kamala Harris. And had it not been for the Harris campaign keeping these battleground states as close as they were. Keep in mind, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, they were less than two-point margins.

Then Democrats would probably be sitting on 43 Senate seats right now rather than 47. And we saw 70,000 voters, for example, in Nevada who voted for Trump but didn't bother voting for San Brown, the Republican nominee. And I think that portends trouble for Republicans in 2025, 2026 because Republicans can't necessarily count on Trump fans to come out and vote in large numbers for someone not named Trump. Dave, we only have about 30 seconds left.

If you are a Democrat looking for a silver lining in this election, is there one? You know, I would look down ballot because Democrats have a variety of younger, talented, new generational leaders, whether it is McElphrost or Marie Glus and Cam Perez or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, people who span the ideological spectrum, but who overperform Harris because they can communicate authentically with voters and they know how to use social media to reach them. All right, Dave Wasserman, it is always so fantastic to have your perspective. Thank you for being here.

We will be back Monday with more Meet the Press now. And if it's Sunday, it's Meet the Press on your local NBC news stations. Senators Bernie Sanders and Lindsey Graham will join me. You don't want to miss it.

And of course, Deeper Tice. The news continues with Tom Costello in for Hallie Jackson right now. I am over here just like winging it. Hey, I'm just trying not to screw my own kids up.

I'm not giving you advice on how much screw yours up. Search the parent chat on YouTube, and wherever you get your podcasts.