blankenship responding to president trump's call for his defeat in today's republican u.s. senate primary. joining us now, national political correspondent for nbc news and msnbc steve kornacki. editor in chief of axios, nicholas johnston and political reporter for nbc news and msnbc, alex us. >> the story that's emerging in the last couple of days is in west virginia. it's the late momentum that blankenship has in this race. a three-way race, when you look at the public polling, it looked like he had faded back to third place, ten days ago. it looked like the effort from the republican establishment to suppress him was working. what's happened since then? he's dominated the coverage the last week of the race. he had a stylistically well received debate performance that got him some attention. the comments about cocaine mitch, the comments about his