Meet the Press NOW — November 8

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We're going to tackle all of that throughout this hour. We start with Mara Barrett ahead of the big debate. Gary Grumback is in Richmond, Virginia as the dust settles there on last night's results. And I'm joined once again today by NBC News Chief Political Analyst, Chuck Todd, to help put all of this in context.

So, Mara, I'll start with you obviously not a great election night for Republicans last night. How do we expect those results to shape what we see on this debate stage tonight? Okay, when you talk about the abortion issue in Ohio specifically, I think there's no doubt that we see it shape both the debate tonight and what the landscape looking into the election over the next year as well. Because abortion specifically, they can't at all agree that they oppose it, but they have different methods of getting around to it.

And I think we saw Ohio the rest day that it is. The fact that the right to the abortion is now enshrined in the Constitution there is really telling us what we can see going forward. In that case, we heard from Ron Santos' campaign basically blaming former President Trump for the results in those elections that we saw last night. He's one that will definitely have to answer for his stance on abortion as well.

Chris Christie also speaking out specifically around the race in Kentucky considering Donald Trump had endorsed Daniel Cameron. And so these are all things that are definitely going to play a role, especially as these candidates are looking to break away from former President Trump and how he has shaped the party with those past elections and what they're going to be looking for going ahead to 2024. And what with your little bit of the different goals here? Some of these candidates are trying to break out and some of these candidates are just trying to make sure the bottom doesn't fall out from them on stage tonight in terms of fundraising, in terms of polling numbers.

What should we expect to see in terms of strategy broadly here? Well, first off, we're hearing from both Nikki Haley's campaign and Ron Santos that it's I think it's safe to expect that they're going to be going ahead to Heather. In fact, we tied for a second right now far behind former President Trump, but still in a position where they're looking to stand out and break away from the remaining three candidates on stage. And looking ahead past tonight, it's really going to be important for those breakout moments, both to capture additional polling bumps, as well as donor bumps to basically confirm that they can be on the next debate.

So this is the only time that these candidates have on their own separate from the shadow of former President Trump to really go up against each other to try to have that stand out moment. And so it's really important from their end to nature that they are on that debate stage and continue in the race going forward. All right. So Gary, yesterday, Glenn Yunken had kind of door A, good door B, bad, the elector in Virginia opened up door C for him, which seemed to be even worse.

What last night's results mean for his legislative agenda, his own personal path forward? Yeah. I mean, a couple of late nights in the building behind me as they worked for revamp this legislative agenda because it was an absolute repudiation from voters of everything that Glenn Yunken wanted to get done over the next two years on education, on the economy, and on that big issue of abortion. Glenn Yunken was very clear as to what he wanted to do.

He wanted a 15-week abortion ban with exceptions, and voters right back were very clear back to him saying that they want status quo, they want to keep it as is, which is 26 weeks and a single day. But as you talk about what his potential future may look like here, this is, of course, a term-lended position in Virginia. He'd only serve one term. And he talked to us reporters right at the building behind us just a few hours ago.

He said he is staying in Virginia. He said he's not going anywhere. And he won't be running for president in 2024. Yeah, there may not be anywhere for him to go.

I mean, Gary, Virginia is DC Beltway, Wank's favorite belt weather because it's the one in our backyard. We see all the ads. What are national Republicans looking at in terms of the results from Virginia and what lessons they can take away from them? Well, something Yunken said during the press conference was that he realized how purple the state is.

And I think it's an interesting case and an interesting election that happened yesterday because there was no Donald Trump effect of yesterday. Joe Biden and Kamal Harris did not campaign in the state either. It was really about the issues, whether it was in Norfolk, whether it was in Richmond, or up in Nova. It was about the issues.

And it was clear the abortion issue was one that's going to matter here in Virginia and any other swinging kind of state around the country. All right. I'm our Barrett and Gary Grumback. Thank you both for your reporting and Chuck.

I turned to you and Gary set us up about the issues, but it really does seem to be one issue that was dominant last night. And it's that abortion issue, which we've talked about a hundred times. Are you at all surprised at how salient that was now more than a year past the DOM's decision? Not if you look at every single election that's been held since the DOM's decision, right?

We sit there. We can just talk about the two big nights, which were 2022 and 2023, the two November's. But it's been every other election, right? There have been a special elections here.

The County Auditor's race is where it pops up and suddenly it works. You know, part of it is that more you do have a group of voters. Republicans have lost a whole bunch of group of normal regular voters. The shift of college educated Republicans away from the Republican Party has really hurt the Republican Party's ability to do well in low turnout elections.

Democrats are now dominating more and more in these places. But the abortion issue has become such an important issue to fundraise off of, organize around. I mean, it really is just jet fuel right now for the blue team on this. And I don't know what the Republican Party does.

I will say this. I bet you Donald Trump will flip on this issue. As soon as he finds a way to do it. But I don't know how everybody else in the party handles this at this point.

Trump's been consistent in his inconsistency on abortion, right? I mean, he's the one person who refuses to be pinned down on a specific timeline, specific restrictions he would put in place. I mean, he has tried to remain strategically slippery on that point. I mean, were there any other big surprises for you?

I feel like the other races that we kind of talked through yesterday, when a larger like we thought they would. And Mississippi could have been a surprise. It wasn't for sheer held on up until a week ago. That's what all the polls had indicated would probably be the place.

The depth of the Virginia law seemed to be the thing that if you're looking for a bellwether, particularly from the Republican side, you have to pay much closer attention to that. I think there was a fuzzy red vested hug that sort of enveloped Republicans after Glen Young had won. And this was not the hug anymore. Well, it's interesting.

You're right. You can sit here. If you want to be a Republican and make yourself feel better, you can say, well, you know, Ohio was lost in August when the referendum was held that didn't raise your threshold. Well, Andy Beshearsen and Comic Governor, and everybody just likes the guy, right?

So you can write that one up. You can write that one up. But in Virginia, Republicans actually had an aggressive message. They had more money than they had spent on an off off-year election than they ever had before.

There was a concerted effort. There was a real attempt at finding a position on abortion that they thought wasn't as a extremist some of the other positions that had happened in other states. So that to me, I'm with you. Virginia should be the cold water on the face of the GOP because they did everything they say you need to do for them to survive in a swing state on the issue of abortion.

And it didn't work 15 weeks. And I would have this debate with these Republican pollsters, Garrett, that would swear to me, no, no, no, no, 15 weeks. It's the compromise the public's okay with. And I want to say, okay, he's doing a lot of work here.

Look, C plus can get you out of high school, but I prefer to have it A, right? Yeah, so voters would accept 15 weeks if the choice is zero, but they would prefer what the law already is in Virginia. So Chuck, if you're, if you're, you know, if we're going down the hallways to the green rooms and we hear, well, these candidates are getting ready for tonight's debate. How are last night's results?

How is that abortion result affecting the way people approach this? I mean, it's high if you're around the census, there's not much more you can do, but somebody like Nikki Haley who's trying to keep, make it hard to pin her down. I mean, how do you see that those results affecting what we'll watch on stage tonight? I think it's going to feel as if they were living on another planet because they're going to act as if those results didn't happen on an abortion issue.

And why? I got one word for you, Iowa, right? They're going to be afraid to offend. Social conservative is on this issue.

So look, I think you're right. I think Nikki Haley has already given herself more room to roam on this on this issue. You know, she says, look, you're not going to get a national law. This is going to be in the States.

So she's probably given herself more flexibility. Rhonda Santas has painted himself into a corner on this. I think his position is on elective. That's him, Scott.

Right. And you have a guy like Tim Scott who's desperate to sort of break through tonight. And this issue is not one he's nimble at as one that would be easy to break through. So this could be a huge night for, for, for, for these challenger candidates, but on an issue that none of them are very good at presenting themselves on.

And Chuck, earlier you mentioned the idea that Republicans are trying to make themselves feel better with some of the messaging today. The White House has been pretty comfortably taking a victory lap today saying that, you know, voters have spoken, they want to hear from voters, not polls, and that the Biden brand is somehow fine. But you know, the exit polls, the CNN poll that shows only 25% of respondents say he had the stamina to sharpness to be president. There's Ohio polls.

I mean, all of that says, you know, I think you could argue Democrats, Brandon's okay. Biden's brand is seriously has some issues. They got to look at here. There's another poll out today in Wisconsin.

And ready for this one, Garrett, I'm obsessed with this number. It's all these match ups with Trump and Biden and Haley. What was interesting among those that somewhat disapprove of Joe Biden's job, he led Donald Trump by 19 points. So it is interesting, this sort of, and there's plenty of proof that Biden can be unpopular in win.

Okay, there's no doubt about it. But it is interesting, he certainly is weaker than the Democratic brand or the Democratic campaign that was able to put itself together last night. Now look, they can take comfort in the fact that Cameron and Kentucky close with all things Biden, Reeves and Mississippi close with all things anti-Biden, you know, and it barely registered, right? Like I do think that in that sense, the voters and this may make Biden feel better.

They are judging Biden separately than they are judging the Democratic party. Well, I think about another Kentucky politician, Mitch McConnell, who's like, whole MO when he runs elections to be the second least popular guy in Kentucky. And I feel like that's the race we're getting into now, whether it's Joe Biden or Donald Trump will be or whoever else emerges, we the second least popular person in the country. That would be enough for Biden if the issue said is good for him otherwise.

Chuck, we can do this all hour, but we got to move on. Great to see you for two days in a row. Thanks for doing this. Hey, I'm too busy now.

I can't. It's too much to be for. Yeah, Miami doesn't play till Saturday, you're fine. All right.

Coming up, we'll be joined on set here in Miami by Ron to say this is campaign manager plus a 2024 candidate turned Nikki Haley supporter and speaking of digging in, our NBC news political embeds have been catching up with the candidates on how they're preparing for the spotlight tonight. Here's just a taste of what they told us. What's your pretty big meal? Angelines.

Post-amble. Angelines. Usually has french fries in it. If I had my choice, I'd have a big knife in french fries, but I typically have salmon in some asparagus.

Pre-debate, you don't want to do anything to upset the apple cart. And after the debate, are you ravenous? Are you like digging into a burger or what are you doing after the debate? We will let her rip.

I'm picking the restaurant after the debate. That's bad. Welcome back to a special edition of meet the press now live from Miami, ahead of tonight's third Republican presidential debate hosted by NBC News. We're already seeing campaigns previewing their strategies tonight on the big stage.

Haley campaign, for example, is out for a new memo touting her electability over Ron DeSantis and Trump in a general election. Meanwhile, the DeSantis campaign is hoping to leverage that new endorsement by Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds you may have heard about and trying to cast the rest of the GOP field as spoilers. Joining me now on set is the Santa's campaign manager James Uckmeyer and James Alsar right there that Haley campaign has this new memo out. And we're touting her electability that she performs better in these battleground states than does Trump or Ron DeSantis.

How do you respond to that argument in general? You guys have tried to be Trump but electable. She's saying I'm more electable than you guys. Yeah, you know, there's a lot of ridiculous polls out there.

But one thing you see over and over and over again is that Ron DeSantis is consistently the second place option, whether it's a Trump supporter or somebody that's not for Trump. They'll come to him second. He's the only candidate that can actually unite the entire party. And he could do so because he's a leader who not only has a vision for the country, but he has proven results.

Every promise he's ever made in the state of Florida, he's backed up and delivered on. And I think that's why Governor Reynolds came out and did give him the endorsement, a big endorsement from a very popular governor in the state that's going to be the gateway to winning this thing. Not only states are using ranked choice voting though, right? I mean, being the second choice is only good if you can get people off the first choice.

What does that strategy look like on a night like tonight? Yeah, I think that strategy is continuing to show up and everybody knows the governor's a fighter. But the difference between him and everybody else is he doesn't just fight, he wins. He wins big over and over and over again.

So he'll come in tonight. He'll talk about his vision. People will again be reminded of all the many victories he's had, namely a 20-point victory last year during a night that was kind of disappointing for Republicans. And a red wave did not arrive, yet he still led Florida to a tremendous victory.

They'll see that tonight and then going forward as candidates continue to face challenges and drop out of the race. He has the biggest infrastructure, the biggest team, the most resources in a state that's going to make a big difference. Does that infrastructure, does that team become a drag though if you're not able to turn around what's been going the wrong direction in polling? I mean, I know you've called these polls ridiculous, but even the one registered poll that we do with them at MediaCom shows you guys sort of like stuck in this distant second place.

At what point does the infrastructure become an Albatross? Sure. Well, thankfully polls don't elect presidents, voters do. There's a big difference between a caucus.

White House, we agree with you. If we elect presidents based on polls, we'd have Ben Carson and John Kasich perhaps in the White House. So that's not the way things worked. It was not a single poll that predicted that big 20-point victory he had in Florida last year.

So we're just going to get to work on a night when it could be in the teens and you got to get people out to caucus, having those connections, a chair in every single one of the 99 counties, having been there week on end, traveling the state, getting to know the voters, introducing them to the vision, the family, and again reminding them, Ron DeSantis doesn't just fight. He wins. And he's ever said he would do. He has done.

So one of the things he did after that win was this six weeks abortion ban in Florida. I wonder how you view that politically after what we saw last night, voters all over the country, including in some fairly red states. I think Ohio qualifies as a red state now saying, this is not what we want. Is a position like that a problem for Governor DeSantis now?

Well, look, Ron DeSantis never backs down from his principles. He's a pro-life governor. He's not going to change that viewpoint based on whatever the preferred narrative might be. But look, and there's a narrative.

And there's a voter coming out and saying, we don't want this. That's not me. That's not the media. I mean, there's a voter saying, Ohio.

Sure, look, in the wake of the Dobbs decision, the Supreme Court kicked a lot of that responsibility that powered back to the states. Governor DeSantis recognizes that. The idea that Congress is going to send some 15-week or 12-week bill to the Oval Office, that's just not reality. However, there are places like in California where people are advocating for abortion all the way up until birth.

And some people even after. That is a time when the federal government would need to step in and prevent some really heinous things from taking place. I was struck at the last debate that Ron DeSantis made the point a couple of times that Donald Trump was basically disrespecting Republican voters by not showing up. That argument didn't seem to resonate much after the debate was over.

Is he going to bring something to the stage tonight to convince people who do see him as number two? I don't dispute what you're saying there. But they've got to get off to the number one. What's the argument that moves those voters when so far nothing has worked?

I think the argument, all you've got to do is look at last night and then early on, it wasn't just last night. Republicans have been losing elections now for a couple of years now. Loss after loss after loss, we need a new leader for the party, somebody that's a proven winner. And that person is Ron DeSantis.

I think last night it teed it up perfectly. We need somebody that delivers results. And that's just not the former president anymore. Including down-dollar.

James, we've got to leave it there. Thank you for coming. Have a good time. And I turn now, we'll turn quite literally now to Will Hurry as a campaign surrogate for Nikki Haley.

He's a former Congressman from Texas. You may remember he was also a candidate for president. I remember Congressman. He's good to have you.

He has talked about some of last night's losses for Republicans in this campaign memo that came out. I'll say you guys broadly because you're in the door sort of the campaign, but not working for the campaign. And you just heard it from James a little bit talking about the idea of down ballot success. To what degree do you look at the elections we saw last night and say Donald Trump's responsible for this too?

Absolutely Donald Trump's responsible for the problems that we saw last night. He was responsible for the problems in 2022 when we everybody fought and polling had predicted a red wave and we saw a red trickle. He was responsible for losing the house and the Senate in 2018. And so the message from last night is we need a new generational leader who's actually going to help down ballot candidates.

And I think that person is Nikki Haley. She's the one person that has consistently been on the rise. The most recent polling that I've seen shows her a solidly second place in Iowa and New Hampshire and South Carolina. And she is someone that is having a lot of momentum and that momentum has continued to build rather than starting up the top and falling like a ton of bricks.

Now, you argue that momentum that she's generated has been picking off points here and there from a lot of these other candidates who aren't named Donald Trump. Same question for you that I had for James with the DeSantis campaign. Is at what point do you have to start going through the front runner to make this a real race and not just be the try hard second place candidate who did the best they could but didn't take off any of his shine from the leader? Well, look, I think and Batsra Haley's been very clear when it comes to Donald Trump.

She agrees with him on some things disagrees with him on others. She disagrees with him on some of the policies on China. You know, the Chinese, the leader of the Chinese government is an authoritarian figure, not someone you should cozy up to. She disagrees with the president on Vladimir Putin.

Vladimir Putin is a thug and we should treat him that way. She disagrees with the president, the former president, excuse me, when it comes to Israel and the support to Israel. So I think Batsra Haley's been very clear and what we need right now is someone who has that moral clarity, who understands who our friends are, who our adversaries are and make sure that we do things appropriately and by the way that we're better together. She's not an isolationist.

I think one of the things you should see tonight on this debate stage is you're going to see many other candidates up there but talk about their isolation tendencies. The only way we ensure that America has this role that we currently hold is by doing it and building a policy and having friends and that's something that Batsra Haley knows intimately comes to be one of the reasons and is one of the reasons that you're starting to see and she has been building this momentum through this campaign. I ask you also about the abortion issue too because I do think it's going to be silly, not just tonight but continuing. I mean, voters keep telling us this is a thing that they really care about.

I think the first debate, she drew a lot of attention because her position was basically like, I'm not going to sign it. You talk about theoretical questions about what else signed or not. Congress is not going to send me a 15 week ban. You just heard from the DeSantis campaign and now sort of looking at it in a similar way, right?

Like, what Congress is going to send us a 15 week ban. But if states are doing this now, basically saying we don't want your ban, we want to enshrine this in the Constitution, how much of a problem is that for an anti-abortion candidate, a Republican candidate to basically say, yeah, we're going to give it to the states and the states don't agree with us. The voters don't agree with us. Well, look, I think this is going to be an issue.

I think abortion is going to be an issue in 2024. That's why we need a leader like Ambassador Hated because in that first debate, she talked about how she's very clear that she's been 100% pro-life her entire political career. But she also recognizes there are areas where there's a ability to work together. Most people in this country are not supportive of a late turn of abortion.

Most people are supportive of increasing access to kids being put in foster and being adopted. This is an important issue for her because her husband was adopted. She recognizes that we can protect babies and protect mothers at the same time. And I think she's outlined that.

I think a lot of people in that first debate saw that perspective. You saw her numbers with independent women increase because of that. I think she's the kind of leader that is going to help the Republican Party, not just in one election, but in the next couple of cycles to ensure that we have conservative thought and conservative leadership in the White House. A little bit of time we have left.

I want to ask you about why you think more people haven't done what you did in this race, which was to basically see the writing on the wall and try to consolidate your support behind somebody else who you thought could win. Vice President Pence just dropped out of there, other candidates who were still out there kind of hanging on to hope at this moment. Quickly, why do you think more folks haven't followed the will-heard modeling? Well, more people need to recognize and check their ego at the door and recognize this is about the country and that we are at an inflection point and we have a number of generational finding challenges that we have to address.

And the only way to do that is to ensure we have a leader in the White House that can bring conservative thought. And that's why I thought it was important to get out when I did and get behind someone who has the momentum, who's a next-generational leader who understands a foreign policy who has a record on domestic policy to ensure because she's the one that can beat Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Everybody's been talking about those New York polls and the New York Times poll. Guess what?

Part of the leaving out is Nikki Haley performed better against Joe Biden than Donald Trump. All right, we will have much more to take in on this. We'll hear it. Thank you for your time.

And when we come back, we'll have the view from the Tim Scott campaign, the other South Carolinian in this race. Much more from Ethan Press now from Miami, right after this. Welcome back to this special edition of Meet the Press now live from the debate hall spin room as at least one campaign is predicting and perhaps rooting for a quote slug fest on stage tonight between Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis. That prediction came from South Carolina Senator Tim Scott's campaign in an aggressive pre-debate memo, which not Haley as a quote darling of never trumpers and attacked the sentence as a quote failing candidate.

For Scott, it signals a potential shift in strategy tonight after a less combative approach in the first two debates. Joining me now as a member of the Tim Scott campaign, there's senior communications advisor Matt Gorman and Matt, Senator Scott said it himself last month, he is all in in Iowa. Our poll has him in fourth place now. Can any amount of a more aggressive Tim Scott turn the battleship in the Hawkeye state?

Well, I think we'll see we feel confident. I mean, Gary, you remember back in the day we had Rick Perry, Michelle Bachman, Newby Rick, leading the Iowa polls and folks like Ted Cruz and other like Rick Santorum who ended up winning were in the single digit as well. So a lot of time between now and then we feel good. We love going Iowa.

No, when I think aggressive and combative, I don't think Tim Scott though. No, I mean, it's not only as I covered him in Congress, dude, like this is an uncomfortable position for him to be and to have to start throwing some of his own punches on stage. How does he do that as the guy who was kind of run as the moderate, but sort of the calmer conservative in this field? What I would say is optimistic.

But that doesn't mean there won't be policy contracts. We saw that the last debate between Nikki Haley, the vague Rama Swami and look as you saw with the memo earlier today, look, Ryan Nikki, it'll be a slug fest. But what are some kind of differentiation between us and them? We believe that we can be the candidate who can win and also, unlike either of them, Donald Trump did make our political careers.

So I wouldn't expect to hear some more of that later tonight. How do you start peeling away the Trump voters? I mean, to me, that's the thing. If five other candidates are scrambling for the smaller percentage of people who aren't with Trump, none of you are getting anywhere.

How does Tim Scott, who's pointed out, is not somebody who's dependent on Donald Trump or is political corrupt until this point, start taking some of the shine off the front runner and not just make this a fight for second place? Yeah. I mean, look, I was in Iowa just a couple of days ago when he talked about his contrast and abortion with Trump and Haley and the Sandis and others, too. That's an issue that he's very passionate about.

He hasn't been shy about going after Trump on that. And also, when it came to Israel, he stood very firmly with Benjamin Netanyahu and chastised Trump for his comments, criticizing Netanyahu at this volatile time. So he's not afraid to do it, but he's not going to do it too easily. If there's a real contrast that he believes in, whether it's President Trump or anybody else, he'll make that contrast.

I'm glad you brought up both of those issues. I think both will come up tonight. This is the first debate since the war started between Israel and Hamas and in our poll. Something like 2% of Iowa voters said they thought that Tim Scott was best positioned to handle something like that.

How do you, as a senator, as a candidate, convince folks that, yeah, there's a war on the world's on fire and I'm the guy? Well, he's talked a lot about how we believe state and shoulder to shoulder is real important, but also how we tamp down on the anti-Semitism on college campuses. He's done a lot about that in the Senate as well. Expect to hear more tonight about Israel and how he'd react as President of the United States.

But also, I think that he is going to outlay a plan of foreign policy. He believes peace through strength. Again, expect to hear more about that world you tonight. The other issue you mentioned, which obviously come up tonight, we talked about it all shows this issue of abortion.

And the senator's got a very conservative on abortion. And voters, including in places like Ohio, keep saying, you know, this is not what we want. Does he, does any of that change, I don't think it changes his personal view, but does it change his political view about how that issue should be handled by Republican President, by Republican Senate? Look, I think what he says is that majority of voters do believe in some sort of 15-week standard.

Majority of voters where? Like, that's not an enough one to be voting. Yeah, exactly. But it does come as a majority of voters do believe that is a standard.

He pushed for Ron DeSantis to join him on that. DeSantis did the last debate, though I heard his campaign manager was kind of backing away from that a little bit today. And he believes that this is just personal for him. It's not, it's beyond politics.

And look, when you talk about extreme, you have Democrats, California, Illinois, and New York want to push for a warshop at the day of birth. So a 15-week standard would stop that in a place where it's broadly popular. He's so, like, a 15-week national standard as policy that he can win on. Yes.

All right. I want to talk a little bit about his day job as it relates to this race. I mean, obviously, there's a lot of talk right now back in Washington about funding for Israel and for Ukraine. I mean, you talked about standing shoulder to shoulder to Israel.

The Congress has been able to produce anything in terms of additional funding for Israel. Is that an opportunity for him to show leadership on that issue? And where does he stand on any of these bills that are, or concepts even that have been floating around to get this done? Yeah, there's a lot of concepts, not a lot of bills to your point.

He believes that Israel should be separate. Give them the aid, give them now. Look, he has a border of making sure that Ukraine has the assets they need to degrade the Russian military. But the separate issue, he believes getting the assets to Israel, getting them quickly, and as soon as possible is important, he believes that it should be separate, though.

But to your point, no bills I believe yet that have come about. Not in the Senate. Yeah. How does he avoid, as a senator, getting caught up in the backwash of people who just don't think Congress can get anything done?

He's one guy. But how do you stay out of that sort of undertow of ineffectiveness when you're out here making your pitch? You know, look, I think he's not been shy about talking about his record. He talks about how he wrote the tax reform bill, the personal side of it, which brought single moms, a tax cut, families, a tax cut.

But also he's very well known for passing what's called opportunities, which brought private investment in some of the most impoverished in the country, which really helped the authority across the country. I just think the old McCain line about Congress is approval rating is basically so low. It's like family members and paid staff. It's a very difficult thing to deal with.

Mac Gorman, thank you for your time on all this. We got to leave it there. And after the break, hometown headliner Trump is back in Florida, but not for this debate. We're on the ground in Hylia, we're the latest on the former president and current 2024's Counter-programming strategy.

You're watching a special edition of Beat the Press, now live from the Miami debate halls spin room. And welcome back, guys. My Republican presidential candidate prepared a ticket to Bates Day here in Miami. The front runner will be on a different stage, about 10 miles from here.

As he has with the last two debates, Donald Trump will be skipping tonight and counter-programming the evening, this time with his own rally in Hylia, Florida. My colleague, von Hillier, joins us now from the site of that rally. So, von, how should we expect Donald Trump to handle this event tonight? Does he treat it like a general election rally?

Does he even mention what's happening down here in Miami? I think he mentions all of the above there. We're about just 10 miles away from where the Miami debate is taking place in Hylia. This is a Cuban majority population here.

And for Donald Trump, this is a key part of Miami-Dade County toward a general election win here in Florida. But I think this afternoon there was actually a preview on a conservative radio show. Donald Trump made it clear exactly where his mind is at. And it is essentially everywhere as it pertains to not only the debate, but also the indictments that are against him, as well as the election last night.

I think the headline out of this interview from this afternoon with that conservative radio talk show, Garrett, was Donald Trump suggesting there were, quote, improprieties and last night's Republican losses. Of course, Donald Trump provided no examples. And this has been the theme that he has reported to the millions of followers of his in previous elections and including his 2020 election. He also suggested this afternoon that there was new information about how the 2020 election was stolen, but that would be coming out in the months to come.

Of course, we've been hearing that mantra from Donald Trump over the last three years. But for Donald Trump, the past is very much a part of his own political future. Vaughn, this rally is going to come 48 hours, less than 48 hours. After Trump was on the witness stand in New York, he's been spending a ton of time coming in and out of this courtroom in New York in the fraud case there.

How much do you anticipate that that case in particular, but his legal issues where broadly are going to be focused is up tonight and I've been kind of waiting on the way he's been approaching his day job running for president? Right. Every single time on the campaign stage, you know this, we have seen Donald Trump really echo his own social media accounts in which he has focused on those who are prosecuting him, but also the judges overseeing his case. And every expectation is that we should hear the same thing tonight because while he was testifying on Monday, the question was, would he have a more, I guess if you may, a calm, more focused demeanor in which he was focused on the actual questions from New York Attorney General's office asked of him, but instead you saw him attack with Tisha James, who is the one who filed the civil lawsuit against him in his family business, but he also saw him attack the judge who was sitting only mere feet away from him in that case.

And so for him tonight, he's going to have thousands of folks, hours before he's in Texas stage that are already at this football stadium here to hear him and we should very well expect him to make the case to Republican voters around the country that they need to focus on taking down Joe Biden so that they can go after those who in his words have stolen the last election and are unfairly prosecuting him for political purposes. All right, Von Hill here. Thank you for your reporting. That Trump rally playlist is burned into my brain and I know yours as well.

We'll be hearing it for a while. For more on what we can expect ahead of tonight's debate, I'm joined by our panel here, Al Cardenas former senior advisor, the Jeb Bush 2016 campaign and former chairman of the Florida Republican Party and Hogan Giddley, who was part of the press team in both Trump White House and during his 2020 campaign. So, Hogan, I'll start with you. I mean, we've heard from some of these campaigns here already, but who do you think has the right strategy to try to either break out or stand out or survive in this field right now?

Well, they all have the opportunity to do that because as we all know, these debates are about one thing and that's creating a moment. Right. But taking that moment and then turning it into some type of momentum and then ultimately a movement, it's been very difficult to do that in large part because the person who is leading in this primary by 40 points doesn't show up here. So you have a prime time audience, you have a prime time showcase, but the prime time candidate is not going to be here.

So it's very difficult for anyone else to break through. Yeah. I mean, I think about Nikki Haley, who I think has done a pretty good job of manufacturing those moments in these debates, but also every time you do well, the expectations go up, it is harder to keep beating expectations into Hogan's point. You just don't have the same oxygen.

How does she in particular take advantage of what appears to be pretty undeniable momentum, at least sort of with a small M coming into tonight? Yeah, I think small M is the right word here, the right letter. It's very hard in these debates to have a moment. We've had debates in the past, Lloyd Benson, you know, others who've had that moment that made a lot of sense.

We haven't really had in the debate so far that one candidate come up with something where you say, Oh, wow, and they carried through at least for a while. Trump's doing the right thing. Haley, I'm at home from Hylia. They love him there.

Tell you the truth. He's planning to think perfectly. I think what's going to happen with him. I don't think this day to day coverage of the trials make much sense.

I think the public at large is only going to be interested in the outcomes and the outcomes may have a very but day to day trials really don't. Okay, I've never done a trip for a long time. You've worked for him for a long time. He does seem somewhat more distracted.

I think by this New York trial than I've seen in some of these other things. This is very personal for him. He's affecting the way he's viewing the campaign like I called up with Von his day. Oh, look, I don't work for him.

Obviously now I was with him the last week. I do think he is more focused than I've seen him in quite some time, but he also understands here you hit on the word. It's important. It's personal.

This is his town. He changed the landscape, the skyscape, if you will. That was his building there, right? So I think he does have a visceral reaction to some of this.

And you're not just going after him politically. Now you're going after him, his family, his staff, his empire that he has built that made him a household name that made him a billionaire that gave him a show on NBC for heaven's sakes. So I think it is something he is frustrated with in large part because it's never happened before. The bank should be the one bringing this forward and said it's a weird thing when you consider no one was wrong in this situation.

He has to the degree he's been focused on politics. Still been very focused on banging on Rhonda Santas and trying to knock Rhonda Santas down a peg. Does that tell you anything about the way Trump used this race? Is Rhonda Santas in your view still the primary threat to Donald Trump to the degree that there still is one?

Well, if you look at the bank accounts out there, of course, you know, money still means anything in politics. Rhonda Santas still has the biggest treasury. And he's going to spend it all in Iowa or a lot of it. Yeah.

In my opinion, Rhonda Santas is shooting for Iowa. Nicki's shooting for climbing up the polls. I don't know that Iowa will particularly be very effective for her. And RNC is actually winding down to candidates by shortening the number of people you have on stage.

They're doing it all tonight. So I think until we get down to one or two candidates that are out there focusing on Trump, they may well be the Santas and Nicki's. But you know, not excluding the others, but they seem to be the ones that won with the money and the other with a little bit of a lower case momentum. To that end, I mean, Huggins, Rhonda's been tens of millions of dollars or super PAC has trying to improve his numbers and take the shine off some of these other candidates.

And it's not working. I mean, he's going in the wrong direction if you believe the polls. I understand his campaign doesn't. He has had a target on his back.

I would argue the last two debates, but people haven't really gone after him. It's tonight, the night that happens and would you rather be, let me ask you this one, would you rather be run to say this or would you rather be Nicki Haley or somebody else on that stage coming into tonight? Well, I'd rather be down Trump with a whole company. Yes, I understand.

For the purpose of this exercise. Yeah, but look, I've done I went out many cycles. I know you have to. I work for someone named Mike Huckabee and someone named Rick Santor, both of whom were at 1% at this point.

So catching fire and I was something that does happen for folks. I understand that the difference though, in this matter of whom became president. True, but the difference here though is you have a former president of the United States who is also running. It's not just a governor or a senator saying, look, if you let me I promise I'll do these things to that as personality.

It's the crowded lane. As you said, there's so many in it trying to take that same mantle. I don't know that it has the ability to break through and I would look, the Santa's has spent a lot of money. A lot of people do like in there.

I do know that I friend on the ground. But I also know if he somehow finishes third in Iowa, Nicki shoots ahead of him, then it's going to be serious trouble for him. Well, she's better built to do well in New Hampshire and beyond our New York City, South Carolina, of course, but he leads in all the states too. Yeah, the order of the states means so much.

You know, haven't been a victim of a Jeb Bush campaign. And Nevada had come before South Carolina. I would have made it just how the polls were, but the states are the states. That's why Biden moved his day.

Well, he's not. You know, it's almost no time left, but very quickly for each of you, almost a little like lightning round here, which of these issues do you think will be the most salient tonight of the things we've talked about is the abortion. Is it the war? Like what do you most expect to see these candidates try to highlight tonight?

Well, look, I don't think abortion and the Republican debate stage is going to be a predominant issue. Interesting. Most people think I believe that they want to try to be presidential. I'm a broad stroke guy.

And I believe that that these single issues are not going to get you a lot of points unless you have a great message. Style, not policy. I think it's going to be the economy and I do think it's going to be the war. I think abortion will be an issue because it will be one in a general election.

So the Republicans have to understand that grasp this issue better message and go on the offense here. We'll see if anybody takes that advice, gentlemen. Thank you both for coming in today. And up next, it's a big Ramas Swami's turn in the hot seat here in our debate spin room.

But first, here's how the candidates say they're going to be pumped up for tonight. What's your go-to debate pump up song? Gosh. You know it's all the old-school cameo burn numbers?

Yeah. So for the first debate, my song was Under Pressure by Queen. My second debate, it was Joan Jett's I Love Rock and Roll. You used to listen to Usher.

Pre-debate. But that seems to have gotten dated now. My kids make fun of me for that, so I don't listen to Usher anymore. My default is always to listen to Bruce, but I need something a little bit different.

I think Bruce would understand. Welcome back to this special edition of Meet the Press Now live from Miami where five Republican candidates will square off in their third debate in a little more than three hours from now. Among them, the Vague Ramas Swami, whose campaign tells NBC News that he will be quote, unconstrained on the debate stage tonight. Joining me now is Tricia McLaughlin, senior advisor and communications director for the Vague Ramas Swami's campaign.

What does unconstrained Vague Ramas Swami look like? I didn't realize there were constraints on him in the prior two debates. He's going to keep being himself and speaking the truth, even when he makes people uncomfortable. We came into this campaign 0.0%.

No one knew who the heck the Vague Ramas Swami was, much less could say his name. And here he is, we have a long way to go. But we waited until we saw the whites of their eyes. People were not making decisions September, October.

Now we're getting into the landscape. When people are actually starting to decide who they're going to vote for, we're starting to spend more money, real resources on the ground now, I want to hear him sure. And I think you're going to see that momentum tonight on the debate stage. And a lot of people are talking about Nicky Haley and Vague Ramas Swami.

Or excuse me, Nicky Haley and Ron DeSantis. I think tomorrow they will be talking about Vague Ramas. Well, you guys certainly shown a opportunism when it comes to taking his shots on the debate stage. I want to ask you about how he approaches a guy who won't be there.

And I've asked all the different folks we've talked about in this program, a version of this question. And for you guys, I'm mostly interested in this because how do you start to take some of Donald Trump's share of the pie, which you're ultimately going to have to do if you want to be the nominee, while your candidate's walking around saying he's still the best president we've ever had, I can't make that make sense in my mind. So you know, Gary, of course, to us, Donald Trump was a wonderful president. But there's three things that the Vague can get, Donald Trump simply can't.

It's disaffected Democrats, independents, and young people. Young people are coming out in droves for a vague. We say at our events, about 40% of people who go to our events and donate in small dollars to the vague are either not registered Republicans or independents or have never voted before. Is that a stylistic thing or are there issues that you can draw that out on?

Do you need to make that contrast more directly on a stage like the one you'll have tonight? I don't. I think you're going to see it tonight. But I think he's going to continue spreading his message.

People are still figuring out who the vague is, what he stands for. He's not a reformer. He is a revolutionary. You're going to say that on stage tonight.

He voted in that Ohio election that we've been talking about today. He voted against in trying to these abortion protections. Is there anything about what we saw in those results last night that make him question either certainly, well, I presume not the policies that he supports, but the politics of how we have to approach this issue with an electorate who keeps telling Republicans we do not agree with the way you're trying to handle this. Absolutely, Gary.

I think that last night showed the Republican Party at least the establishment piece is not in touch with our own base. We don't know what our own base is asking for. Vague did vote no on both issues yesterday and he is unapologetically pro-life. That being said, how do we talk about those tough issues like abortion?

We should talk about more sexual responsibility for men. Birth control access adoption. We need to talk more to women. Even these deep red states like Ohio, they're not voting with us.

We need to stop being complacent and start actually wanting to win elections. And that's what the vague rum is on the actually brings of the table. We need to make a youthful vigor those fresh ideas and that's what we need to win these upcoming elections. Do those conversations still include bans based on certain number of weeks?

I mean, is that an effective policy for Republicans going forward? I think you do have to look at weeks. I think that's unequivocally a question we should ask. But what are reasonable limitations and also what we have to revisit?

The other issue that I think is going to be hanging over this entire debate is the war, which obviously this has been only going on since the last debate. Vague got banged up on foreign policy the last debate. Mickey Haley was very aggressive and criticized him. So too was the former vice president now former candidate Mike Pence.

How does he establish himself as credible on those issues with the war going on given he doesn't really have a resume that speaks to them? Yeah, very very much has made foreign policy front and center of his campaign. What I think is very interesting is you look back to last debate with Nikki Haley beating him up. I wonder if she'd be saying the same things on that debate stage she said about Ukraine when we have now Israel, it looks like there's a good chance we could be going into that war too.

Do we have any munitions? Do we have that industrial base to supporting both wars? We think grew up in the wake of 9-11, right? A lot of his friends, people his age, classmates, peers, those were the kids who went to war, pot and died for this country in Afghanistan and for what?

Last question very quickly before they opened the trap door that drops us out of the bottom and what we said if we go over but how will you judge victory tonight? What does a successful night look like for your campaign? If rates speaks true, if he's going to make people want that debate stage uncomfortable and they're going to get mad and maybe we'll see if some Michael Spot off but he's ready and he's not going to hold back. He's going to be unconstrained as I mentioned.

Unconstrained. It's on the record, Tishw bi, we have a full slate of coverage coming up in critic pre debate, post debate shows by my colleagues and Halley Jackson, and then of course there's the main event kicking off at eight o'clock Easter. My colleagues, Lester Holt, Kristen Wilker, and Hugh Hewitt in the moderator chairs. You watch it right where you're watching right now or wherever you get NBC News.

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