Meet the Press NOW — January 13

Welcome to Meet the Press Now. I'm Kelly O'Donnell in Washington. We begin today with President Trump hitting the road this afternoon, trying to refocus his message on the economy and affordability. That as voters sour on his economic agenda and as lawmakers criticize his administration's criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

Now, ahead of the president's remarks this afternoon, the White House issuing a statement declaring that President Trump has, quote, defeated the inflation crisis, heralding new economic data showing consumer prices rose 2.7% last month. Now, that's significantly lower than the 9% inflation that rocked consumers post-COVID. It's also roughly in line with the inflation rate that President Trump inherited when he took office. Stubbornly, it's still higher than policymakers want.

This afternoon, the president touting his economy as a success, part of a lengthy, and at times meandering, set of remarks at the Detroit Economic Club. Under our administration, growth is exploding, productivity is soaring, investment is booming, incomes are rising. Inflation is defeated. America is respected again like never before.

The results are in, and the Trump economic boom is officially begun. We have some great things happening with housing. This will include a ban on large institutional investors buying up single-family homes all over the country and making it impossible for people to buy a home. In addition, I proudly called for the credit card companies to cap interest rates at 10% for one year.

The president's comments come as he's recently borrowed a page from the progressive economic playbook with populist plans to cap credit card debt and to lower housing costs. In fact, the president spoke with Massachusetts progressive Senator Democrat Elizabeth Warren yesterday about some of those plans. Now the bitter rivals finding common ground on these issues, with Warren saying she urged him to take action, and the White House calling the conversation productive. However, the administration's efforts to refocus on affordability have run into first headwinds into the blowback over the criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

That's all, of course, tied to the testimony he gave to Congress about renovations to the Fed's headquarters and cost overruns. Some of the president's allies on Capitol Hill are speaking out. I don't think Jay Powell is a criminal. I think he's a bad Fed chair.

I think he's missed many opportunities to demonstrate his own independence, quite honestly. But again, I don't like the idea of an investigation. If you wanted to design a system to cause interest rates to go up and not down, you would have the Federal Reserve of the United States and the executive branch of the United States get into a pissing contest. We don't need it.

We need it like we need a hole in the head. If there's nothing there, and I would hope and think there is nothing there, then this is destabilizing and it looks like the Justice Department is being used as a weapon. And I don't want that to ever happen under any administration. Sources tell NBC News that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessen spoke to the President and is frustrated with the situation as an unnecessary distraction.

Now, despite that, the President continuing to attack Powell repeatedly today. So either he's incompetent or he's crooked. I don't know what he is, but he certainly doesn't do a very good job. He either doesn't know what he's doing or it's worse than that.

You know what I mean by that. So hopefully he'll be out of there soon. If I had the help of the Fed, it would be easier. But that jerk will be gone soon.

Powell's term ends in May. Joining me now from Detroit is senior national politics reporter John Allen. Senior justice reporter Ryan Riley is with me here on set. And NBC's Melsonona is on Capitol Hill.

John, let's start with you in the Motor City. What were your key takeaways from what we heard from the President at what is an important venue for economic speeches? Absolutely, Kelly. As you well know, many American presidents have addressed the Detroit Economic Club.

The motor industry, automobile industry, has been such a staple of American life for more than a century. What struck me was the President wasn't really ready to lay out more details on this agenda. He's still feeling his way around affordability. There's a contrast between his boasts that the economy is great, that inflation has been defeated, and him also rolling out some of these new policies, particularly the ones that lean progressive, like you were talking about, the price controls for credit card interest rates to try to bring down the cost of mortgages through a couple housing things.

He actually said, wait a second, I'm going to wait a week or two. I'll start detailing some of these things in Davos at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland next week. And beyond that, in the weeks following it, come out with more policies. So I think he's still struggling a little bit and maybe rolling the dice here and trying to tell folks in Michigan that inflation is defeated, that they should believe him, not their lying eyes and not their lying wallets when it comes to inflation.

There was a poll that came out today commissioned by the Detroit News on a local television station that found that two-thirds of voters in Michigan believe the prices have gone up. 48 percent believe that the economy is weaker under President Trump, while only 38 percent believe that it's stronger. So he's fighting a messaging war about how well he's done with the economy. At the same time, he is admitting that there's still more to be done and asking voters to believe him that things are great or at least will get great.

It reminds me vaguely of concepts of a plan, which we think of in health care and now here with some economic policies, some ideas, but not fully fleshed out. And yet he's on the road in what is now a midterm year. It is 2026. Do you think that that disconnect between the President not wanting to acknowledge that things aren't as rosy as people would like, but also trying to provide some specifics that aren't all that conservative, too?

That's also part of it. Do you think they are finding their footing or is this a we really do need to check back and see where this hits? No, I think it's throwing spaghetti against the wall right now, Kelly. I mean, it's not just my opinion.

I mean, you watch it one day, President Trump's doing something very conservative. The next day he's doing something very progressive. One day or even in the same day claiming that the economy is in great shape while he is at the same time promising that he will bring affordability while he is at the same time saying that affordability is a fake word, as he did today in this speech here in Michigan, a fake word invented by Democrats. So he is very concerned about the possibility Republicans will lose in the midterm elections.

But if he were to stop saying that the economy is doing well, it might feed a frenzy. It might create a vicious cycle, if you will, to make the economy worse. So, you know, we've heard him say before that he believes he's a cheerleader for the United States and a cheerleader for the economy. And part of that is that if the president shows that he's concerned, voters may become more concerned and the president and his party may do worse.

And in many ways, that's where he's most comfortable, right? Being that salesman. John, thank you so much. Glad you were on the road for us today.

Appreciate you. I want to turn now to one of the issues that has been certainly driving some of the conversation around the economy. And that is the unexpected investigation of Jerome Powell. And this came to light, of course.

And Ryan is here. And you have new reporting on how did we get here? Fill us in. When did this start and how much of a surprise was it?

Even the main justice, the main headquarters of the Justice Department. Yeah, along with our colleague Mike, we reported out how this was really closely held. This was not something that was very well known within the Justice Department. And, you know, Janine Pirro over the course of her time in office has kind of got a reputation among career employees for actually kind of being pleasant.

They're being pleasantly surprised by how she's handled a lot of these investigations. I've had numerous career folks joke to me that, you know, had you told them a year ago that, you know, they would be very excited about how Janine Pirro was running the office. They might they might have called you crazy, but she has handled these very high profile incidents in a very sort of professional manner. Former judge has experience.

Exactly. And now you're in the situation where she's running this investigation, but very closely held herself. This was not something from our understanding or reporting that was very widely known within even within the U.S. attorney's office for D.C., which, of course, has lost a lot of people in the past year since the beginning of the Trump administration, not only through forced departures and firings of some of those January 6th prosecutors, but also through voluntary departures.

So it's an office that has gone over on a really big sea change. They've run into some obstacles, but now she seems to be championing this investigation, which is very much so in the president's interest and purview and sort of running that up the chain and championing it on her own, it seems like. And we're at a point where subpoenas have been issued. And do we have a sense of what offenses they are looking at?

We've heard Powell say it. We think it has to do with his testimony before Congress. And do you get a sense that the office around Jeanine Pirro had expected more of a response from the Fed when they made early inquiries? That's part of your reporting as well.

They had done some email outreach and then had not heard back. Yeah, and I think that, you know, this is around holidays, maybe not as much urgency as they were thinking, you know, they're thinking. But that's basically where this investigation That was more than 100 people affiliated with the Iranian government or military. They also say more than 16,000 people have been arrested.

The group says they compile numbers from primary source confirmations and other independent sources. Iran state media today acknowledging the high death toll, claiming many of those who were killed were martyrs. Now in response to the escalation, President Trump announced yesterday an immediate 25% tariff on countries doing business with Iran. And this morning ratcheting up pressure even more, writing on social media, Iran patriots, keep protesting, take your institutions, take over your institutions, and this is key, help is on the way.

For now, it doesn't appear as if the regime in Iran is backing down. Iran's Foreign Minister telling Al Jazeera, quote, If Washington wants to test the military option it has tested before, we are ready for it. And joining me now is NBC News Senior National Security Correspondent Courtney Kuby and Bilal Saab, Managing Director at Friends USA. Now, Courtney, let me start with you.

You've been working the phones and doing reporting. What are you hearing about perhaps the tempo of when any kind of U.S. action could or should happen? So at this point, the U.S.

could do something right now based off of what they have in the region, but we haven't seen any kind of a surge of additional forces. So if we compare this to what happened back in June when the U.S. struck strikes in Iran, there is nowhere near the same level of capability in the region. That doesn't mean that they can't do something, but we're not going to see.

We don't expect anything along those lines. I think what we should focus more on is, yes, there's the possibility for the military we call the kinetic strikes, you know, actual airstrikes or strikes from ships. But it also appears that they're looking at what the military would call the gray zone option. So things like providing them help, providing them additional communications, providing them information, whatever it would be, that's fall short of actual military action.

Both of you are on the table right now. And are there other nations weighing in on this and giving the president a nudge one way or the other? Yeah, so we now have learned that not only have Israeli officials, both at the military and the political level, but also some Arab nations have weighed in with Trump administration officials and urged them not to take military action right now. And they're not saying don't ever do anything, but they are saying right now.

And that may seem counterintuitive, but the reasoning appears to be that they are urging the Trump administration to wait until the regime may be more on its heels before taking some sort of more decisive action. It does appear that there is a real hope that there is momentum for potential regime change here. That's certainly what the protesters are asking for. And the concern seems to be that if they were to strike too early, it may have potentially even the opposite effect, maybe demoralize protesters, but not have the impact of actually changing the regime here and that it may not have the actual effect versus the potential threat and the potential for retaliation that they could face.

And how would the U.S. military try to factor in the risk to protesters with anything that is considered that kinetic kind of strike? It doesn't. The officials we're talking to aren't talking about anything that would come anywhere near civilians or protesters in this case.

So we should consider things like military locations, military headquarters. But I have been struck when talking to officials about the possibility of leadership moving on leadership. And no one is ruling that out here. So I think it really does appear.

This is sort of a talking point that we hear out of administration after administration that everything's on the table. But in this case, it really does seem like everything is still on the table. There are a series of meetings today that I think will be decisive in what the administration decides. Oh, that's so interesting.

And after the Maduro extraction, what you said about leadership is certainly fascinating. We'll be watching that closely. Thank you, Courtney. And Bilal, let me ask you about this.

When we consider the U.S. and Iran, there is plenty of historical baggage when it comes to regime change. What do you think would be an effective U.S. intervention in support of protesters?

What would that look like in the here and now? Yeah, what a million dollar question, right? So I think as you and I are speaking right now, the National Security Council is holding its meeting, presenting the president, if he does decide to show up with the multiple options, which were very nicely described by Courtney. Look, I think the most important question is the one that you raised, which is before we should, before we strike, I mean, can we please have a crystal clear understanding of what is the intended effect here and what try to goal are we trying to achieve, right?

Because if it's decapitating the regime, we can do that, right? But then what happens after that? What happens after that is something that is incredibly unclear. Then we could also see the objective of just changing the behavior of the regime.

So keeping some elements within the regime intact, right, coming up with some kind of a deal with them, but then making sure that we communicate to them that we have the condition that you will have to change your entire destructive agenda abroad. I don't know if they would agree to such a deal. President Trump himself and his press secretary mentioned that there were some elements that reached out to him privately asking for a deal. He said, I'm not interested right now.

I don't want to meet with you until you stop the lethal force. Something's got to give. But he's cornered himself now where I would find it incredibly difficult to believe that he's not going to strike. He has to strike, otherwise he's going to look weak.

He's going to look like he's bluffing. And you know what that president does not want to look like. He's weak. And what did you take away from the president talking about Iran reaching out, seeking some kind of negotiation?

We don't have the specifics on that. And then the president saying, as you sort of hinted at there, that he doesn't want to negotiate now. Do you see that as being a time of particular vulnerability or high stress in this moment when it comes to anticipating, is this like a moment when something could actually happen or is this a pause to see what the regime does? Well, I don't suppose so.

Let me just use an analogy there. This is a classic handle everybody. Right. And they feel like they're in such deep trouble.

This is sort of like a last resort to offer to negotiate on the nuclear program. Not the first time they do it. Trying to kick the can down the road and trying to kill some time. I think the president was quite clear that he's not interested in entertaining that.

He was in the past, Kelly, before the uprising. You remember when he said, you know, I want to make a deal with the Iranians. I want to make Iran great again. That calculus has changed after the uprising.

He's not interested in that as much, at least. Or maybe it's a pressure tactic. Who knows what this president? He's so unpredictable.

But to Courtney's point, it might not be an opportune moment right now for him to conduct that strike and perhaps wait for that greater moment of vulnerability. I don't know when that's going to happen, but the moment for diplomacy, in my mind, and I hope I'm wrong, seems to be dissipating with time. And is there any sense that there is active day after planning in the region? What would happen if the regime was toppled?

Who steps in? No, no, Kelly, there's no day after planning. Like I said, the president has cornered himself. He should have thought about, you know, day after scenarios.

He should thought about planning before issuing those threats. But I suspect that no such planning was ever really seriously considered by the National Security Council. This is not Venezuela, as you very well know. This is a nation of 92 plus million people.

It is a very brave and determined protest movement, but it also lacks organization. It lacks leaders. I hate to say it, but it's true. And so who would fill the vacuum is obviously not an easy question to answer right now.

I would suspect that the president privately would say that we are comfortable, just like he was comfortable in Venezuela, of keeping some elements of the regime intact in order to prevent that chaos from emerging. But obviously that would go completely against the wishes, the dreams and the hopes of the Iranian people. It is so complex. And thank you for your insights and your experience over time looking at these issues.

Bilal Saab, we thank you so much. And up next, a top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee and combat veteran joins us next with her reaction to U.S. military operations abroad and federal deployments at home. Senator Tammy Duckworth of Illinois is standing by.

Please stay with us. You're watching Meet the Press Now. Welcome back. The states of Minnesota and Illinois are fighting back against the Trump administration's escalating deployments of immigration agents and officers to their cities.

This is a look at some demonstrations out of Minneapolis just moments ago. Both states now suing the administration, alleging unlawful and dangerous tactics are being used by some federal agents. The president this afternoon now saying that his administration will withhold federal payments to those states and others like them. Starting February 1st, we're not making any payments to sanctuary cities or states having sanctuary cities because they do everything possible to protect criminals at the expense of American citizens.

And it breeds fraud and crime. And joining me now is Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth of Illinois. Senator, it's always good to see you. Thank you so much.

You have knowledge and experience on a lot of the topics that are front and center in the news. And I wanted to This is not just about Donald Trump, this is about any future president declaring war. The people of the United States of America, you know, Donald Trump won the last election, they voted for him because he promised that he would end forever wars, that he wasn't going to get us into any more wars. They voted for Donald Trump to become president of the United States, not the acting president of Venezuela.

He campaigned to bring costs down here at home and getting our nation out of those forever wars, not into them. But his actions in Venezuela proved that America first, according to Trump, is basically BS. He clearly cares more about trying to run a foreign country than the nation who was actually elected to lead. That's why this vote is so critically important because we have to rein in this administration.

But it's not just about this administration, it's about future administrations as well. And it's a real tension point. I'd like to also ask you about your colleague, Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona. He is suing the Pentagon over the Secretary of Defense's efforts to reduce his military rank and pension.

And as a reminder, this was perceived to be punishment for Senator Kelly filming a video telling service members not to follow unlawful orders. And, of course, you are a veteran. We thank you for your service. And what do you make of how this is playing out for someone with the kind of record in history of Mark Kelly in the Navy?

Well, it's wildly inappropriate, dangerous, and I mean, it's flat out wrong for the Trump administration to go after political critics like this, let alone heroes like Senator Mark Kelly. I mean, Mark has earned his rank and retirement from 25 years of service in the United States Navy. He's an American patriot who's always put democracy first and has always supported our service members and the rule of law, something that basically neither Trump nor Hegseth can say. And this is what tyrants and this is what authoritarian regimes do.

They try to silence political critics, especially those who sacrifice for their nation. This has no place on our democracy. Think about it. If they can do this to Mark Kelly, an American hero, an astronaut, a man who flew combat missions, multiple combat missions, what message does this send to the American people?

We don't stop them. It tells the average American that, hey, if they can go after Mark Kelly, they can come after you. They can come after you and your neighbors. So you better shut up and let this president get away with whatever he wants to do.

We're not going to let that happen. When I served in the military, when I declared my allegiance to the United States and I was willing to die for this nation, it wasn't for any one president. It was to defend the Constitution. And the most patriotic thing you can do as an American is your First Amendment right to speak your mind.

And they're attempting to stop that and trying to go after somebody like Mark Kelly to shut everybody else up. And that is being tested in many ways. Thank you for spending time with us and giving us your views. We appreciate it so much, Senator Tammy Duckworth.

And we'll be seeing you on Capitol Hill. And the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, James Comer, says he will launch contempt proceedings against former President Bill Clinton after he failed to show up for a scheduled testimony in the House's Epstein investigation. That was earlier today. Bill and Hillary Clinton, in a letter to Comer, said they are refusing to testify, telling him, quote, you have forced the victims to relive their painful experiences while doing little to give them and everybody else what's deserved, truth and justice.

There is no plausible explanation for what you are doing other than partisan politics. That's end quote. Now, three weeks from now, a congressionally mandated deadline, we have been waiting for some developments from that with the Justice Department and the requirement to release the Epstein files. There are fewer than 1% of those files that have been released with more than two million documents still to be released and still to come.

Meet the Alabama Democrat who scored a surprising win in the Ruby Red state nearly 10 years ago and is now running for governor, even though the state hasn't elected a Democrat for that job in nearly 30 years. Keep it right here on Meet the Press Now. Welcome back. You know, of course, this is a midterm year and former Democratic Senator Doug Jones launched his campaign for Alabama governor late last year, looking to flip that deep red state while also setting up a potential rematch with Senator Tommy Tuberville, who announced his own gubernatorial campaign in May.

Now, remember, the former senator lost his reelection campaign to now Senator Tuberville by more than 20 points back in 2020. A year where some other Southern Democrats were able to make major gains, including in neighboring Georgia. And joining me now is former Senator and Democrat and now gubernatorial candidate Doug Jones of Alabama. Thank you so much for making time to be here with Meet the Press Now.

My pleasure. Thank you. Good to see you. And of course, we're stating some of the obvious here.

This is tough terrain. You're facing an uphill battle in deep red Alabama. You don't need me to tell you that, sir. So what does your path to victory look like?

You know, this path to victory, quite frankly, is the same one that we took in 2017. You know, Alabama had not elected a Democrat in 25 years when I ran in 2017. Well, we were able to talk about the very things that Democrats are focusing in on now. And that is kitchen table issues, affordability, building coalitions among everyone in the state from one end of the state and every zip code across the state.

And people are responding to that. People are concerned about what they see going on in Washington, D.C. But more importantly, they're concerned about how to feed their families, how to clothe their families and their healthcare, which is a huge cost. So the whole issue of the affordability and kitchen table issues is going to be a big issue.

And quite frankly, I think people are ready for a change. People in Alabama do not believe the folks in Montgomery are listening to them and attending to their needs as opposed to the special interests that control most everything down there. And sometimes context is very important. And the last time that you won statewide in those conditions you talked about, you were up against what we could call a deeply flawed candidate in Roy Moore.

And he had been facing sexual misconduct allegations. And you'll likely be facing off after incumbent Senator Tuberville, the football coach. And you lost to him in 2020 by more than 20 points. So why is this race going to be different now?

Is it those kitchen table issues you just talked about or is there something bigger happening? No, I think there's a combination. I think certainly the kitchen table issues are huge. But you know, look, all politics is personal.

So people want to know what are you going to do for them and their families? Not in a selfish way, but a survival way. That's what they want to look at. But look, you know, Tommy Tuberville is as deeply flawed as Roy Moore.

Not in the same way, but he now has a record that is deeply flawed that people of Alabama are going to be re-educated about those flaws, about the times they withheld military nominations, promotions for almost a year, about all of his day trading while he was on the agriculture committee, all of the flaws and the things that he has not done for the people of Alabama. The votes that he has taken in the last year alone are going to really affect Alabamians from one end of the state to the other and state government because we're not going to have the same kind of economic benefits and revenue. So he's got a record that he's got to run on this time. He cannot hide like he did in 2020 during COVID.

And we're going to make sure people understand and know that. So it is a combination of what we're going to do for the people of Alabama and contrast that with what Tommy Tuberville has done and not done for the people of Alabama. And often getting a message out like you're describing, that takes cash in the political space. And Senator Tuberville has a major advantage there with cash on hand.

As I understand it, of course, he's been in the race longer and he's a sitting senator right now. But as I have seen from the records that the team put together that he's got like a six million dollar advantage over you. How do you make that up? And is there enough time to do it?

Oh, absolutely. There's more than enough time. Look, we have consciously not tried to raise money. We're putting together a recruiting campaign.

No one in elective offices, no one consciously tries to not raise money. No, I didn't say. I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way. We have not had fundraisers.

We have not made calls. We have raised some money, but it has been really organic through some emails and text messages. And we've had like close to 10,000 people that have contributed to this campaign. About 5 or 6,000 that came from the state of Alabama.

And we have raised a good bit of money for the first like six weeks that we've been in the campaign without a full blown fundraising effort. That's what I was talking about. I understand. What we're seeing there is momentum.

And the second thing I'll tell you is we will run a lean campaign. This is not your grandfather's campaign that we're going to be running. We're not going to be spending all that money on TV ads that very few people watch these days. We're going to go directly to people.

We're going to be in every county. We're going to be working with other candidates. And we're going to do the social media things to reach people where Democrats in Alabama haven't been reaching them in a long time. on what they're willing to push back on, and I'm happy to see that this is one of those things, because this would be a really bad precedent to set.

We've seen what can happen before when you politicize the federal reserve, and it's not going to have the effects on the economy that Trump thinks it will. In the short term, it might be good, there might be a little boost, but long term it's not actually going to address the issues that people have with the economy in this country. And Joe, you've been watching when Democrats or people perceived to be opponents of the president, of James Comey, of Letitia James, have been the focus of what critics would say is retribution using the arm of the Department of Justice to seek some kind of penalty against them. Do you think that there's something different about the Powell investigation that stands apart here?

Are you suggesting that there may be a pattern here? No, I think that this is par for the course. I think that whenever he gets a resistance from someone or he perceives them as a political enemy, he threatens them in some way or another. And using the Justice Department, I think the Justice Department has lost all credibility.

Whether it's on this issue or something that's happening in Minnesota as we speak, the approach to these investigations, the use of this arm of the government to after political enemies, it's clearly blatant. And it's got to scare some Republicans as well. You know, if they ever get a line, maybe they're coming after them. Is there something about the nature of the federal reserve that makes this not just the story of the history or conduct of James Comey or Letitia James or any of the others?

Is there something that is setting people off in a different way because of what it means to international markets or how the dollar is? I think it is. And I think it's also because even in terms of the pushback, people are saying, I don't necessarily agree with Powell on everything. In fact, I think he's wrong on some things, but people don't believe he's a criminal.

People don't believe that he's actually in this for his own gain, particularly when it comes to the building or the revamping of the Fed building. Cost overruns happened. You know, I think it's... And it's not taxpayer money.

They finance themselves. And getting pushback, pushing back the president so publicly. I mean, the president is not being pushed back at all, but now he thinks he has the goods and then he turns it right back on him publicly. That didn't go well for Powell, but I thought he did a great job.

But that I think is the beginning of the end in terms of what Trump's next move is going to be. I want to introduce another topic. Today at the Supreme Court, there were arguments about transgender athletes. And depending on how that plays out, we don't know where it's headed yet, but it certainly sounded like there was some sympathetic comments from justices on the conservative side.

Again, can't prejudge it. How do you think that issue plays out in the midterms? Because often these social, cultural issues can be very galvanizing in certain races. What's your take?

And this was an issue that Democrats widely tried to stay away from because it was such a political issue that really riled up the independent voters when it came to these quote unquote woke issues, social issues that brought voters to the polls. So it is an important issue, but it does seem, you know, I caught a little bit of the oral arguments today and it seemed like we heard Chief Justice Roberts, Gorsuch be very, more sympathetic than normal about this kind of issue, which was interesting because we've seen the Republican base be, you know, very anti having trans athletes. And so it's interesting that this is the case that they took and it sounds like they might, they're leaning towards upholding the state bans, which is interesting, not trying to get a federal issue. And Joe, do you think for Democrats, is that a problem?

Because this often an issue like this often drives conservatives to come to the polls. Does it affect Republicans? I think it's interesting that they may uphold those decisions, but be more sympathetic towards them, towards the individuals here. I think what we have to keep in mind as well, we're talking about primarily young people who are struggling.

You know, these are not easy decisions for themselves and for the families that have to go through all this. And now to be subject to a Supreme court decision as to whether their life can go on or not. I do think the Republicans have used this, they and them, I'm for you, they're for they and them type of thing. It was a very effective commercial that was used in the last cycle.

I do think though that people this cycle are continuing in more so to focus on pocketbook issues and whether or not they can have affordability. It really does. It hurt us with Biden. And I think it's going to hurt the president as well.

And we have to leave it there. There's so much to talk to you about. I'm so glad you were here for our panel today, Joe, Sarah and Daniela. Thank you so much.

And we thank you as well. We hope you will be back tomorrow. We will be with more of meet the press. Now.

And there's more news ahead right here on NBC News. Now. He was a young Marine. She didn't care about convention.

They made a life together. Then one night the Marine died and then the death investigation took a wild, unexpected and utterly bizarre turn. I'm Josh Mankiewicz. And this is Trace of Suspicion, an all new podcast from Dateline.

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