here from our nbc team, with the department of justice saying to republicans on the hill, hey, bring it on. the new letter to house oversight. and what it said about any possible cooperate on new congressional investigations. plus the white house going public against a private group who they are now labelling a transnational criminal organization, we ll talk about the sanctions imposed today. and i m hallie jackson and i want to bring in senior white house correspondent kelly o donnell joining us live from outside of the white house. i want to start with you here. and what we ve just heard now, from president biden, as he is casting his eye toward 2024, although with no formal announcement. at least toward the next two years of his presidency. while also having to manage the political footballs that he s got on his plate right now. to mix a metaphor and i m sorry about that. the white house has just released a clip of a conversation between the president and his vp. i want
the start of his third year as president and jimmy carter s approval rating was 42.5%. he see him here delivering the state of the union address at 1979. joe biden approval rating the average 42.8%. so similar there. and coming off the 1978 midterm elections, they weren t great for democrats but they weren t that bad for democrats either. a bit like the midterms last year for joe biden s democratic party and the big story with carter and with the country there in the late 1970s, it was inflation, it was gas prices, it was a bad feeling in the country about where the economy was. where the country was. and so in that second two years as carter geared up for re-election, one was in the summer 1979 he went to camp david and retreated from public view. held a bunch of meetings and then addressed the country. this became known as his malaise speech. but carter tried in this speech