If it's Thursday, an intensifying search and siege inside Daza, Israeli forces say they found the body of a hostage near al-Shifa Hospital, as the White House says again Hamas is using the complex as an operational hub. Plus House lawmakers move to a spell in battle Republican Congressman George Santos after a damning ethics report showed he lied to voters and spent campaign cash at designer sores, luxury spots, and more. And clashes and violence erupt outside the Democratic Party's national headquarters here in Washington. After more than 100, pro-Palestinian demonstrators gather to protest the Israel Hamas war and demand a ceasefire.
Welcome to Meet the Press now. I'm Kristin Welker in Washington. Israel's military ramps up as siege inside Daza's largest hospital, and the Biden administration advocates new political fallout over the worsening humanitarian crisis for Palestinians. Last night demonstrators calling for a ceasefire violently clashed with police outside Democratic Party headquarters while members of party leadership were inside.
We will speak with a Democrat who had to be evacuated from the NC headquarters amid those clashes ahead, but we do begin with the war on the ground as White House officials are doubling down on the administration's assessment. Hamas has been operating at al-Shifa Hospital. The IDF now says it found weapons and intelligence materials belonging to Hamas as well as information and footage about the hostages being held in Gaza. The director of the hospital, however, continues to deny any Hamas fighters are inside the complex.
Saying on Al Jazeera, the hospital is completely surrounded and food and water have run out. MEC News has not been able to independently verify any of the claims by either the IDF or the hospital director. In a news conference yesterday, President Biden said Hamas was committing war crimes by operating beneath hospitals and said the only way the war would end was with a two-state solution. Listen to what he said.
You have a circumstance where the first war crime is being committed by Hamas by having their headquarters, their military hidden under a hospital, and that's the fact that's what happened. Israel did not go in with large number of troops, did not raid, did not rush everything down. They've gone in and they've gone in with their soldiers carrying weapons or guns. Now, this afternoon, the Israeli military said it found this woman, one of the hostages abducted by Hamas dead adjacent to Al Shifa Hospital in a structure that was housing military equipment.
Meanwhile, thousands of Palestinian civilians are fleeing the fighting in Gaza city and heading south. Our MBC news foreign correspondent, Ross Sanchez, was inside Gaza, embedded with Israeli forces as children and their families moved through an Israeli checkpoint. Under the watchful eyes of Israeli troops, an exodus of Palestinians from Gaza city is underway. Children with their hands up, their parents clutching ID cards, the white flag flying amid the destruction.
We've been covering this war for more than a month, but this is the first time that we are seeing with our own eyes Palestinian civilians inside of Gaza. This is what Israel's military calls a humanitarian corridor, open a few hours each day for civilians to flee on foot and escape the fighting raging in Gaza city. A quarter of a million Palestinians have taken this route so far, Israel says. As a condition of access, NBC news agreed to blur some faces and submit our raw footage to Israel's military sensors, though not our final story.
I think every Jew in Israeli could be proud of the fact that we're letting innocent civilians out of the fighting area, out of the fighting zone to clear it out. For Israel, this is proof their war is only against Hamas, not the people of Gaza. But for many Palestinians, this feels like forced displacement. We ask Israel's military.
Can you guarantee that these people will be able to return home one day? I think that that is really going to be in the hands of a lot of different players. One of the minions is going to become us. That is the key question.
Thank you. As always for your excellent reporting. We hope you continue to stay safe. Joining now is NBC news correspondent Aaron McLaughlin and Tel Aviv.
Clint Watts is at the big board of Monica Alba is covering President Biden's trip in San Francisco. Aaron, what is the latest on the ground as Israel continues their operation in Gaza and within al-Shifa hospital? Well, Kristen, for the second day now, the Israeli military raided the largest hospital in Gaza, the al-Shifa hospital, according to a military spokesperson, Special Forces entered the hospital going floor by floor, building by building room by room, looking for evidence of a Hamas terror cell tonight, the Israeli military releasing video that it says shows the entrance to a tunnel on the hospital grounds, as well as a vehicle that it says was full of weapons, including RPGs and guns. Now, we have been unable to verify that.
The Israeli military also saying that so far in this operation, no Israeli troops have died and no doctors and no patients have died. Now, we have been unable to verify that because we have been unable to reach the doctors inside of al-Shifa hospital. The Gaza Strip is subject to a near total blackout of telecommunications we've been trying and trying. We are unable to get through.
Yesterday, I managed to reach the director of the al-Shifa burns unit and he painted just this desperate picture. He said that they were running out of food. They had no fuel. No water.
He was worried his patients were going to die. They already buried some 80 people on the hospital grounds and he was calling for the international community to help to evacuate the hospital. Now, the UN says it's working on that, but it's unclear at this point when the evacuation of the hospital and some 600 critically ill patients inside will happen. Kristin?
Yeah, the information coming out of the hospital is just devastating, Aaron. That is for sure. The IDF, of course, announced the death as I just said of a person who was believed to be held hostage. What more do we know?
What's the significance of that, Aaron? Because, of course, there's been talk about a potential deal to release more of the hostages. Yeah, that's right, Kristin. Tonight, the Israeli military announcing the tragic death of 64-year-old Judith Weiss.
She was kidnapped on October 7th when Hamas militants stormed at Kabut's Berry. They killed her husband and took her into Gaza. Now, the Israeli military is saying they found her body in a building near the al-Shifa hospital complex, along with a number of weapons. They did not, however, say how she died in terms of the cause of death.
They did, and it's unclear when they recovered her body. They did say that they performed a forensic analysis and have notified her family of her death. She was the first to shoot a device that was likely to place increasing pressure on these ongoing hostage negotiations, which has been happening for weeks now. No sign of a deal, although the president says that he's hopeful.
Kristin? Aaron McLaughlin, thank you so much. Incredible reporting by you. As I just said to Roth, please do stay safe, Aaron, we really appreciate it.
Let's get to Clint now. Clint, what are you seeing as Israel continues with its military offensive? We're now several weeks into Israel's counterattack into northern Gaza, where they're trying to flush out Hamas militants that conducted an attack, a terrorist attack in southern Israel on October 7th. What we've seen over the last few weeks is a basic ceiling off of North Gaza.
They're in the north, here in the south, intense combat as they initially breach in, but then ceiling off northern Gaza from southern Gaza and establishing battle positions all the way around northern Gaza so that they can conduct military operations at Hamas targets. In the last two weeks, we've seen them advance successively, bounding once, twice, several times, deploying military force in all of these areas. When so doing that, they are now picking keynotes where they say Hamas militants are at. The one that everyone is focused on is the al-Shifa Hospital, which Israel says is a command center underneath of it in a tunnel system, under that hospital, which still has hundreds of not thousands of patients in it.
Looking at that al-Shifa hospital, which is right here, we're seeing a massive hospital complex, and what the Israelis are doing is known as the Kordan and search operation, ceiling this off on all sides, and then doing search operations into this area. So far, they've gone through some parts of the hospital. There have been skirmishes at different points. They found some weapons, but not any of the evidence that they claim of a massive Hamas command center.
It is still early, though, because this fight is not forward and back or left and right. It is up and down, going into buildings, moving up very slowly, or going down into tunnel systems, moving even more slowly, the claim of Israel is that there are hostages and militants down there. This will be taking some time. Those in Gaza say they have no evidence of it, so it's to be determined what will come from this situation.
Zooming out, though, there's been some changes just in the last few hours, and what we might expect in the future of this war. Remember, North Gaza was sealed off. Israel asked everybody to move south in Gaza, and they are now around refugee camps by these Rafa gates, where there are some limited humanitarian aid coming down, but just in the last few hours, there have been leaflets dropped and notice given that parts of Eastern Khan Yunus will be military search operations by the Israelis. This is a change in the story where they have previously sealed off this northern part of Gaza.
Now they're talking about doing military operations down south. It might indicate they have intelligence, that Hamas militants went that way, but there is an increasing pressure. Remember, there are not just a few thousand, likely hundreds of thousands of refugees from northern Gaza that are down here. What will happen if the Israeli military moves down in the southern area, very close to the Egyptian border?
That's what we'll be watching in the next two to three days. That would be a significant indeed. Clint Watts, thank you so much. I want to bring in Monica.
Monica, Monica, you have been traveling with the president. Of course, he held that news conference yesterday. He addressed the latest on the war. He said, reiterated that the administration believes that in fact Hamas is burrowing inside the hospital.
What are your key takeaways from the messaging we're hearing from the president and the White House, Monica? And Chris, I was pretty deliberate in that the president came out and did say that that was in his view evidence of a war crime there, and then he did largely defend Israel's decision to go forward with this military operation, but he did caution that in his own conversations with Prime Minister Netanyahu and other subsequent discussions that the Israelis, he said in his words should be, quote, incredibly careful in what they are doing here, but he did say that until Hamas looks like it will no longer be able to operate and threaten that it could attack again the way it did on October 7 that he believes Israel won't stop doing what they are doing. So a pretty clear defense there while at the same time walking this fine line when it comes to the hostages specifically, which by the way, the president says he is still mildly hopeful that a deal can coalesce in the next couple of days here, even potentially, he didn't want to get into too many details. He said because he was worried that that could throw things off, even though there has been maybe some marginal progress, but that is something that in recent days we have seen a bit of a larger gulf sometimes between the president's comments, the U.S.
position that it does stand staunchly with Israel, and the growing calls worldwide for a ceasefire, even just here in the Bay Area, Kristen, the Bay Bridge from Oakland into San Francisco was shut down some of the Westbound lanes because protesters were unfurling a banner that called for that. So these are growing calls, growing pressure, but the U.S. maintains its position that they believe that a ceasefire at this point would only benefit Hamas, Kristen. Monica, you are right to point out that pressure does continue to grow there where you are here as well in the nation's capital.
Let me get to the historic meeting that President Biden had with President Xi. There were some significant developments, and then at the end of that press conference he referred to Xi as a dictator. Where do things stand, Monica? This is something we see from Joe Biden time and time again, which is AIDS and even some top cabinet officials who are in the room.
We'll probably have preferred for him to have ended that press conference and left. He stood and did take a couple more questions from reporters. It was a reporter who said, do you still consider President Xi a dictator? And that was in reference to comments that President Biden had made earlier this summer at an off-camera fundraiser where he labeled him as such.
And then he did say yesterday, quite clearly, well, he is pointing out the fact that he is the leader of a communist country that operates completely different than the United States, but I'm told by senior administration officials that it didn't really cause too much of a flurry diplomatically. It's something the President has said before, and that the Chinese and U.S. sides are both pleased with some of what they call the real progress they saw made in this summit yesterday. Kristen.
All right, Monica Alba. Thank you so much for your fantastic reporting. Great to see you. As always, really appreciate it.
And we do have a program in OWC News is taking a deep dive into the rapid rise of anti-Semitism in the U.S. In a new special airing tonight on NBC News Now, the anti-deformation lead which tracks instances of anti-Semitism reports since the start of the Israel Hamas War, anti-Semitic incidents have increased by more than 300% compared to the same period last year. For tonight's special NBC's Jacob Soborov talk to Robert Kraft, chairman and CEO of the New England Patriots, of course, in 2019, Kraft started the foundation to combat anti-Semitism. He spoke to Jacob about how anti-Semitic rhetoric spreads online and why he believes it has taken hold.
Also, people under 30 are getting their news and updates from social media. And unfortunately, there's so much false narrative out there. You know, we're told that on the two major sites, 25% are bots, and then 25% of that is repeated. And people, young people are hearing that, believing it, posting that.
And it's unbelievable to me to see on college campuses throughout America the support for a group like Hamas. And you can catch more reporting analysis and interviews on tonight's special report, Epidemic of Hate, Anti-Semitism on the Rise at 1030 Eastern, right here on NBC News Now. Coming up, the growing chance that Congressman George Santos gets expelled after the release of a scathing ethics report, plus Republican senators speaking out against their colleague, Tommy Tuberville, hold on military nominations, but first, we're live outside the DNC's headquarters where pro-Palestinian protests turned violent last night, prompting evacuations and at least one arrest. And one of the lawmakers who was evacuated from the building will join me ahead.
Stay with us. You're watching. Meet the press now. Welcome back.
We are learning more today about last night's chaotic pro-Palestinian protest outside the DNC headquarters right here in Washington. Protesters clashed with police during the rally, Capitol police say six officers were treated for injuries and one person was arrested and accused of assaulting an officer. The top three House Democratic leaders were inside the DNC headquarters when the protests started along with other members. One Democratic lawmaker who was there tells NBC News, quote, it reminded me of January 6th.
NBC News reporter Gary Grumbach joins me now. So Gary, what's the very latest one of the organizers of last night's demonstration saying at this point? Yeah, organizers have been telling me throughout the day that they had planned to have a peaceful protest outside of the DNC here calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and having a vigil in honor of those who have died both in Israel and in Gaza. They were very aware of who was inside this building when they were having this vigil and they wanted to have to speak with people like King Dafries and speak with some of these Democratic members of Congress to get them to also support a ceasefire in Israel.
That, of course, did not happen when Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police showed up on the scene as some of the video you're seeing was turned very violent and very graphic. Right now, of course, on the scene, all you see behind me are some white cracks from the front door and a lot of these votive candles that are shown about the place here, but the damage is certainly done. 90 people, according to organizers, 90 protesters were injured, six Capitol police officers were injured according to police and there was one arrest last night. A man from New York charged with assaulting a police officer after slamming her into a wall and punching her in the face.
Mr. Gary, the images are just stunning and incredibly disturbing. What has the reaction been from some of those congressional leaders who were inside the DNC headquarters at the time? So, which would change over the past 20 hours or so immediately after the events here last night?
We're seeing tweets condemning what they called pro-homass protesters, of course, these were pro-Palestinian protesters that were here last night, but the reaction is sort of calmed down a bit. They released this statement this afternoon saying, quote, we strongly support the First Amendment right to freedom of expression and encourage anyone exercising their right to do so peacefully. Of course, we don't expect any more protests here this evening, but this is an organization, if not now, that has been protesting for the past month in congressional offices and across Washington, D.C. calling for a ceasefire.
Kristin? Here, Grumbock. Thank you so much. Really appreciate your reporting.
I'm joined now by Congressman Brad Sherman, Democrat from California, who was at the DNC headquarters last night and says he had to be evacuated in the midst of the protest congressman. Thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate it. We're glad you're okay.
Good to be with you. So, can you take us inside the DNC headquarters last night as protesters gathered outside, describe what you experienced? What did you see? What did you hear?
We've got a dozen members of Congress there with maybe two dozen candidates from all over the country, and these are the people we need to elect in order for Democrats to be in control of the House. Soon to be Speaker Jeffries was there, along with our other leadership, but it was after they had left that the Capitol Police came in and said, we're on lockdown. You're not allowed to leave. Keep in mind, these are kind of events.
People go to the show for a while. These constant people come in and out. We were locked in. And then maybe a quarter hour after that, they came in and said, we are evacuating you.
Members all come to this end of the room, and they sent us down to the basement. And to the garage, put us in the SUVs with heavily armed Capitol Police. And we're going to say, I'm very proud of the Capitol Police. That is the organization that saved our democracy on January 6th.
We used to be able to certify the Electoral College votes because Capitol Police officers put their lives on the line. And I have tremendous respect for the Capitol Police. And when they say that they were brutalized, six of them were injured, that they were punched and pummeled and pepper sprayed, that gives me great concern. Well, of course, as we just reported, one of your colleagues said that the evening reminded them of January 6th.
You're making that connection now. Did it remind you of January 6th, and were you scared, Congressman? I wasn't scared, but it takes a lot to raise my blood pressure. It didn't remind me of January 6th, except in the extent of the heroism of the dedication of the Capitol Police.
These are not folks that should be punched and pepper sprayed. These are people who wish to be honored for what they did for our country on January 6th and what they do to protect democracy every day. You have said in a previous interview of some of the pro-Palestinian protesters that they are being duped. Can you explain what you mean by that?
Who's behind the deception? Who are they being duped by? Well, look, we all see these scenes and we want the violence to stop, and so they're told let's yell for a ceasefire, but an unconditional ceasefire. What they don't realize is that is exactly what Hamas has very frankly admitted is their strategy.
Their strategy is to rampage, retreat, regroup, and repeat, and a senior Hamas official declared he wants that they are going to repeat October 7th, 3rd, 4th, 5th time until Israel is wiped out. So the people wanted into violence, and the way to get that is to demand a conditional ceasefire. A ceasefire with the release of all hostages and with the disarming of Hamas. Otherwise, you're simply playing in, being duped into the rampage, retreat, regroup, and repeat efforts of Hamas.
And that is effectively what Israel is saying, that they would consider that once the hostages are released. I want to get your reaction. Congressman Becca Ballant has come forward. The first Jewish member of the House to call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
What was your reaction to hearing that? I frankly hadn't heard it, and we all want a ceasefire. I call for a ceasefire, but a ceasefire that includes the release of hostages in the disarming of Hamas. There isn't anybody, very few people in the world that don't want to see an end of the violence in Gaza.
As you know, President Biden has been getting some pressure from Palestinian groups across the country, some members of the Democratic Party who want him to be more forceful in terms of calling for an end to the violence. How do you assess how President Biden has responded to the Israel Hamas war? And are you concerned about him losing support? Well, I'm very proud of President Biden.
We face two major international conflicts. He's handling them very well, and he's showing his decades of experience in foreign policy. And as I said, I think everyone in the world wants to see an immediate end of the violence. And I think President Biden understands that you're just going to have a regroup repeat in less Hamas's disarmament.
That's what Israel's doing, but they're doing it. They're providing food. When, in our wars, we never provided food to our enemy populations. They are, in all of our wars, we bombed the fuel and the fuel depots of our opponents.
And we, of course, always followed the rule of law, a few cases, individual servicemen, then they were punished. But we, we, we are seeing Israel lose lives of its own soldiers because they are going in on the ground rather than just using their superior force. They're using their force too, but they could be more with the Air Force and less casualties on the ground if they weren't concerned about policy and lives. Congressman, I just want to zoom out for a moment and ask you a question about politics if I could.
You have seen some of the recent polls, I'm sure, including some, which show President Biden trailing former President Trump in key battleground states. Your colleague Dean Phillips recently announced he's running for president. I wonder, have you spoken to Dean Phillips? And how concerned are you that his run could weaken President Biden as he heads into the general election?
It certainly isn't helpful. And Dean knows where I stand on this. Biden is going to be our nominee. I think he's going to be reelected, but I don't think it's going to be easy.
And having a Democrat out there saying that Biden isn't worthy of re-election or do a good job in his second term, just plays in the Trump strategy. And just very quickly, have you conveyed that to him directly? You've spoken to Dean Phillips directly and told him that? Yes.
Okay. Congressman Brad Sherman. Thank you very much for joining us. We really appreciate it.
Congress averts a government shutdown, but now faces an ethics crisis as House lawmakers move to expel and battle Republican Congressman George Santos over an ever deepening campaign finance scandal. You're watching the press now. Welcome back. We are following breaking news.
The gag order in former President Trump's New York civil fraud trial has been lifted temporarily. The judge presiding over the case imposed the gag order, which banned the former president from talking about the judge's staff. Joining me now to break this all down is NBC News legal analyst Danny Savallo. So it breaks down why this decision was made.
What's the significance here, Danny? The appeal division here hasn't overturned the gag order. They really just hit a pause button. And so they're staying that and it doesn't surprise me too much.
And it's because Justice in Goron, who is the trial court judge in this case, has issued his gag orders sort of from the bench orally in most cases. So it's not a surprise that there might be some constitutional issues because gag orders necessarily require a balancing test between the importance of keeping witnesses in the courtroom safe and fair and ensuring a fair trial. And on the other hand, balancing the defendant's right to speak and the attorney's right to speak. And of course, sometimes even the press, although most press restraints are almost always per say unconstitutional, presumptively so.
So not a surprise that you're going to get a lot of appellate court decisions on these different gag orders in the different Trump cases because it's such a difficult balancing test. Really fascinating stuff. Danny, is there any sense of how long the gag order will actually be suspended? It's hard to say at this point, I haven't been able to just came down, haven't been able to review the order itself.
But it will be while the final decision is made. And really all this access is a pause button. It doesn't necessarily say that Justice in Goron got it wrong or right or one way or the other. All right, Danny Savallo.
Thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Now to break news on Capitol Hill where lawmakers are moving to potentially expel disgraced Republican Congressmen George Santos after the House Ethics Committee today released a long-awaited and scathing report alleging new criminal behavior. The committee found, quote, substantial evidence that Santos violated federal law by filing false campaign reports and using campaign funds for personal purposes on everything from personal credit card bills to luxury goods.
Ethics Committee chairman and fellow Republican Michael Guest tells NBC News he will introduce a resolution to expel Santos tomorrow. NBC's Ryan Obals is on Capitol Hill with the latest, so walk us through this ethics committee report. What did it find, Ryan? Well, I think the most important part about this report, Chris, is that it was a bipartisan report made up of an equal number of Republicans and Democrats, and they all came to the same unanimous conclusion that George Santos was responsible for a long list of potential criminal allegations and a long list of things that are just violations of the House rules and that it's kind of unbecoming of a member of Congress.
You appointed some of them using campaign funds for personal expenses like his rent for shopping trips at designer stores to pay off his personal credit cards to use the website only fans, the adult website. These are all things that are against the rules, and it's something that could lead to him ending up in jail. At least we're seeing more and more members come out and say at the very least it should mean that he should no longer be a member of Congress, Chris, and of course this has been discussed for so many months, and a lot of his colleagues were just waiting for this ethics report. They wanted him to have his due before they wait in.
Obviously the House has been very busy. They're now out of session. They just passed that short term spending bill. What do you think the timeline looks like for this, Ryan, and do you think it actually goes through?
I mean, this has been such a drawn out process from the very beginning. I mean, you think back to when the New York Times reporting about the inconsistencies in and Santos' bio first came out. That was before he was even seated in Congress. Here we are now more than almost a year into this situation, and I now think that this process could move very quickly.
You mentioned that due process. There were a lot of Republicans in particular that were reluctant to take the step of full on expulsion because they felt as though he hadn't had the opportunity to defend himself. We've seen many of them come out today and say this is enough. He had the opportunity to defend himself.
And in the case of the ethics committee, he didn't even afford himself of that. He did not sit for a deposition, did not cooperate with the committee, and the committee was then able to collect all of this very substantial and hard evidence, and that may be enough to move to expulsion. Now, this vote could happen as soon as they returned from the Thanksgiving holiday. So sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas, so I think there's a real likelihood that he will no longer be a member of Congress by the start of the new year.
The one thing I'll throw out there though, of course, in two things actually, one, we've not heard officially from the Speaker of the House yet, Mike Johnson, who may have a lot of say as to whether or not Republicans move in mass on this. And then the second part of it is it requires a two-thirds majority of the House to expel a sitting member. So that is a very high part across. It seems as though if it's going to happen to anybody though, it's going to happen to George Santos and we'll have to see maybe if he has a clear eye about this and decides it might just be easier to step away on his own.
He's resisted those calls up until this point, but this report could change everything. It sure could. It's a very important caveat there. Ryan Nobles, thank you.
Great to see you as always. Coming up after the break inside the Biden campaign's mission to win the New Hampshire primary without the president's name on the ballot, our Mike Memley will explain next. You're watching at the press now. Welcome back.
The date is officially saved for the 2024 New Hampshire primary January 23rd, but the Biden campaign isn't RSVPing. At least not formally. President Biden's name won't be on the ballot after a disagreement between the DNC and the Granite State. So some supporters are trying to mount a writing campaign to keep the president from avoiding an embarrassing defeat.
NBC's Mike Memley has more. President Biden's first two White House runs didn't even make it to New Hampshire. In 2020, after losing in Iowa, Biden left the Granite State on primary day, while voters were still voting to plan his flag in must-win, South Carolina. Look, you know better than anybody, I'm insane from the very beginning.
This is the first four. The first guy named is the first four, four Caucuses and Primaries. In 2024, Biden's name won't even be on the ballot as New Hampshire booked the Democratic Party's plan to make South Carolina the first primary state. But that doesn't mean Biden's Granite State supporters are giving up the fight.
People know him. They know his record and they know that they want to re-elect him. So Democrats are pretty strongly united in supporting President Biden. Jim Demers and other prominent New Hampshire Democrats have launched right in Joe Biden, calling it a grassroots effort to show support for the incumbent.
We are having a primary, even though it's not recognized by the Democratic Party. And a group of us felt that there was a really important need to make sure that the president does well here. The effort is not without political risk. In 1968, incumbent President Lyndon Johnson won nearly 50% of the vote as a right in Canada here.
But Eugene McCarthy's surprisingly strong second place finish was an ominous sign of LBJ's declining support. Later, Johnson announced he wasn't running. Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips is hoping history repeats itself. Relatively unknown, Minnesota Senator comes here in 1968 for a very similar reason.
The president was very unpopular. Young people completely angry and disenfranchised about their voice not being heard as a related to the Vietnam War. I'm in this to win it. The move to strip New Hampshire of its leadoff role was enough to lead some former Biden backers to break ranks.
I cannot see this idea to write in Joe Biden's name what he's basically said I want to do away with your first in the nation primary. Now Kristen, the Biden campaign says it has nothing to do with this right in campaign. We're focused on organizing efforts in South Carolina and Nevada where he will be on the primary ballot. One Biden advisor telling me that whatever happens here in New Hampshire on January 23rd, does it matter?
Joe Biden will be the Democratic nominee. Kristen? Fascinating stuff. Mike Memently, thank you for that report.
Joining me now on set is Eugene Daniels, White House correspondent for Politico and an NBC News political analyst, former Illinois Democratic congressman Sherry Bustos, and Republican strategist and an NBC News political analyst, Rick Tyler, thanks to all of you for being here. Really appreciate it. Eugene, let me start with you. Just respond, if you will, to Mike's fantastic report.
How big of a risk is this for President Biden? As Mike says, his team is confident he's going to be the nominee. It's more about could he suffer an embarrassing defeat in New Hampshire? That's exactly right.
Most Democrats are very sure that he's going to be the nominee. Most Republicans and most supporters expect that that's going to be the case, but it is about how strong you look going into it, right? Because this is mostly about the general election. The things that they have to make sure happen and continue to happen is that Joe Biden looks like a strong candidate for the general election.
There are places in which it doesn't look like he is at times, right? You look at where black and brown voters are, you look at young voters and their lack of interest in that. New York Times poll last week scared a lot of people, but at the same time, they're saying this, right? And they're saying that we're very hands off, but conversations happen that we don't know about because these people are very close to the Biden folks, and so they're doing this maybe of their own volition, but they are in the Biden campaign complaining about the writing campaign.
Yeah. Sherry, tell us about some of those conversations. None of us know about. What are the real talk conversations that are happening inside Democratic circles when you think about Dean Phillips running?
And what could potentially mean, as Eugene says, no one's concerned about it really costing him in the primary. It's more about could it weaken him? Would it ding him going into the general election? Well, I know there's a call tonight among the supporters of this writing campaign.
The good thing is Joe Biden is pretty easy to spell. You know, it's not like running on a ding dong or a ding dong, you can't spell, right? Dean Phillips is really, he was a colleague. I campaigned for him when he was first running.
He's not a serious candidate and it costs $1,000 to get your name on the ballot there. All right. I think there's 20 names on the ballot there. He doesn't have grassroots support.
So he's not a serious candidate in this. I think Biden will, President Biden will do okay in this, and hopefully it's not even a story when this is all said and done. Yeah. Rick way in from the Republican side, because fascinating things are happening in the New Hampshire primary for the GOP candidates, there's a new poll today, which puts Nikki Haley in second place, former President Trump still, of course, has a commanding lead over the entire field.
Look at that. She's jumped to 20%. Rick. What do you make of that?
Could she have a last minute come back? First. I think we're on the line with ding dong. Now it has to be done.
Exactly. And by the way, I need another worry because he's got both sides of the story. If he wins the writing to vote, wow, if he loses the writing vote, I wasn't on the ballot. So I don't think it's a good point.
That's a fair point. But I think Nikki Haley is a very important moment for her, and she needs to transfer and capitalize on it in a very strong way, because her story now to the Republican Party and the Republican base is, if you want a Trump alternative, and I do think, remember, more than half the people do, because Trump doesn't have 50% of support, he has significant less than that. So more than 50% of people do not want Trump. Nikki Haley is the only plausible narrative where she would be an alternative to Trump, because if the Santis doesn't do well in Iowa, he has no plausible path forward, the party's not going to nominate Chris Christie, as much as I love to listen to him, they're just not going to do it.
So the one person who's on the stage and remaining is Nikki Haley, if she can do well in Iowa and win New Hampshire, she could very well win South Carolina, and that will create a momentum for her to be the alternative. How does the Biden campaign, how do Democrats view Nikki Haley, because when you put her up against President Biden, she actually does better in some polls than former President Trump? Well, she's a legitimate Republican. She's a serious candidate.
She knows what she's doing. And I think that if President, former President Trump is the indictment, he's convicted and can't end up running for some reason. I mean, I think she's a legitimate threat. Eugene the reality check.
What do you think? Can she really come? I mean, she's at 20%, which is significant. She was in single digits, but there's still a huge gap.
There's a huge gap. I will say on the Biden front, I was talking to someone who speaks to the Biden campaign a lot. And what they said to me, this was months ago, before she had, she's having the moment she's having now, they said if they nominate me, the Republican nominee, Nikki Haley, we're going to be in trouble. And that is something that has been bouncing around Democrats for a long time.
And I do think like, you know, it is, this happens almost every time, right? There's a primary that there's always someone who has like a couple of months of a good everyone's like, oh, they're going to win. It happened to everyone. But Carson had this.
Yeah, it's a good reminder. Yes. That is the one person as we're saying, that has the opportunity that if she does well and I wasn't a Hampshire, that South Carolina, usually the person that does well in New Hampshire, if they're the person that's trying to take it, is not the front runner, doesn't have a chance to come out. She's the one person in a very long time on the Republican side who has an opportunity to do that.
The question is, what does Donald Trump do after that? Does it just hurt him going back and forth? And what does that look like? Because as we saw over in the Republican circles, is that the winner take all makes it very hard to catch up on somebody.
That's a great point. I want to talk about someone else who's getting a lot of buzz right now. Senator Joe Manchin. I had a chance to interview him yesterday.
He says he's absolutely considering a potential run. As Virginia, I asked him about polls which show he would potentially be a spoiler for President Biden. Take a look. As you sit here today, do you think President Biden and Vice President Harris are the strongest ticket to represent the Democratic Party in 2024?
No, in the centrist part, no, I don't. And they know how I feel. This is not it. I do not believe that they are basically where Joe Biden has come from and just go back to the campaign.
He's been here for long. He understands the system. And I think he's a good man. And we have good conversations.
We disagree. You're going too far left. I can't go there. So, I did ask him about being a spoiler.
He says he wouldn't be a spoiler. But there he talks about the fact he thinks that the Biden-Harris ticket is too far left. He didn't cite policies as much as he cited their messaging. He said he wants them to start talking more about their bipartisan achievements, things like the Infrastructure Bill, the Chips Act.
What do you make of what he's saying right now? I admire any Democrat who can win a state Trump state, Trump plus 40 state. I admire any Democrat who can pull that off. But I don't want anybody to get in the way of the success of the Democrat winning the presidency.
We cannot have another four years of Donald Trump. And if the polls are showing that candidate like Joe Manchin would take away from President Biden, I don't want to see that happen. And by the way, President Biden is a moderate. And so, and I think, I don't know Joe Manchin's age, but I think he's in his 76.
So, we're going to have another 77-year-old, you know, if he needs to be organized? Okay. That argument goes out. Rick, what do you make of what we heard from Senator Manchin?
And the way in which he could shake up, not just the presidential race, but the balance of power in the Senate. A lot of Democrats say he was the only person, the only Democrat who stood a chance of winning the West Virginia. Well, he was. And look what the Democrats did to him.
They were very critical of him. And they understood. Trump won by what, 68%, something like that. And he held that seat and he voted with Democratic caucus.
And so, he's not going to toe the line on all their issues, but they just kept going after him. I don't know if that's the reason he went. It was a little surprising. But I'd be surprised if Manchin, if he saw the math that enabled Trump to regain the White House that he would do that.
I really am a little bit skeptical, because that would be his legacy. And I'm not sure he wants that to be his legacy. That's a great point. Eugene, what do you make of what we're hearing from Senator Manchin?
What will you be watching for as we wait for this final decision? He says he'll make it by Super Tuesday. Who are the people that are behind the scenes showing him those numbers, right? I mean, he didn't run in West Virginia because it seemingly, he knew that he probably wasn't going to win.
He's also not going to win the presidency, right? Doing it this way. And so I think that is something that the more people that tell him that is that actually going to work. He doesn't like being in the Senate.
He likes to be in charge. Whether or not he runs this time is anyone's guess at this point. All right. Well, fantastic conversation.
Thank you so much. Eugene, Sharon, really appreciate it. And Silicon President Biden calls Chinese President Xi Jinping a dictator again following yesterday's highly anticipated summit. What it means for the White House's effort to improve relations with Beijing?
You're watching Meet the Press Now. Please stay with us. Welcome back. We want to turn out to the fallout from the president's highly anticipated meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, rising economic and military tensions with Beijing.
There were no breakthroughs, but in a press conference following yesterday's summit, the president said real progress had been made and according to the White House, the two leaders agreed on steps to stem the flow of fentanyl from China to the U.S. and to reopen military to military communication channels. I believe there's some of the most constructive and productive discussions we've had. I've been meeting with President Xi since both of us were vice president over 10 years ago.
Our meetings have always been canceled straight forward. We haven't always agreed. But they've been straightforward. And today, built on the groundwork related with the past several months of high-level diplomacy between our teams, we've made some important progress heavily.
And as we reported at the top of the hour in a sign of how complicated the United States relationship with China is, here's the president's response to a question about whether he still considers Xi to be a dictator. Look, he is. I mean, he's a dictator in the sense that he is the guy who runs a country that is finally a leader based on the former government over the U.S. I'm joined now by Victor Shaw, senior vice president for Asia and Korea at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Victor, thanks so much for joining me. I really appreciate it. My pleasure. So, Victor, big picture.
Do you consider President Biden's meeting with Xi Jinping to be a success? What are the key takeaways for you? So I would say, Kristin, that it was a success in the sense that the purpose was to reestablish communications. The two leaders had not spoken in a year.
And moreover, next year, there's very little chance that they'll be able to meet again because their elections in Taiwan in January are elections in November. Xi Jinping is not going to come to the United States two years in a row, and President Biden won't have the time to go to Asia. So it was important for them to meet, re-establish contact. It's still a very competitive relationship, but at least there's dialogue to ensure that this competition doesn't escalate into a conflict.
So in that sense, it's important, but modest progress. Let's talk about what happened at the end of the news conference there. The president was asked if he considers Xi Jinping to be a dictator. He said, well, he is.
You heard his response there. There was some reaction, of course, from the Chinese side. The White House is downplaying this and saying, look, big picture, this was a success. This is nothing new.
What do you make of it? What should we make of a moment like that? Does it in any way undercut the progress that was made? I don't think so.
What was interesting this time, Kristin, was that he was asked a question. And then President Biden paused for a second and then he said yes, which again reinforces the way he frames the relationship. This is democracy versus dictatorship. And again, some of these items that you mentioned that they made progress on establishing military to military communication, stemming the flow of fentanyl precursors from China to the United States, trying to regulate the use of artificial intelligence in the military.
These are very important things. And both sides see value in making small progress, again, just establishing working groups on this, but making small progress on them, because they're very important issues for the relationship going forward. And indeed, for the world going forward. One of the key concerns, of course, has been the issue of Taiwan.
There has been increasing concern among people that I've been talking to that China would in fact invade Taiwan. Do you think that this meeting lowered the temperature and lowered the chances that China might take that step? I think it did. I think the Chinese wanted a more forward-leaning statement from President Biden about opposing the independence of Taiwan.
In fact, in their readout of the meeting, they referred to language that President Biden used in Bali a year ago, rather than the language he used in the meeting at APEC in San Francisco. The United States is very clear on this. It doesn't support any sort of unilateral change to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait. So President Biden certainly didn't give any ground in terms of the U.S.
support for Taiwan, and also certainly didn't give any license to Xi Jinping to think that he could exert any sort of influence or use of force or economic coercion on Taiwan. And just finally, what are the benchmarks you will be watching for in this next year, as you say, the president is entering a reelection campaign. So it's not like there's going to be a second meeting that is expected. What will you be watching for?
So on these three items, military to military communication, will all the channels be reopened? The Chinese didn't agree to stop venting on precursors to the United States, they agreed to a working group. So how that moves forward? Same thing on AI.
But also, are the Chinese going to do anything with regard to the war in Gaza or the war in Ukraine, where they arguably have influenced both on Iran and Hamas, as well as on the Russians? All right, Victor Chas, thank you so much. We really appreciate it. Great to see you.
Really appreciate your insights. And thank you for tuning in. Don't forget to tune in for tonight. WC News now special epidemic of hate anti-Semitism on the rise.
I am back tomorrow with more of me the press now. The news continues with Halle Jackson right 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 Maykowitz, and this is Trace of Suspicion, an all new podcast from Daily Land.
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