How has the last week of impeachment hearings altered the trajectory of the 2020 race in terms of messaging or outcome . The messaging issue is interesting on the republican side. Both sides, it is a little different. The republican side, i have not changed my opinion the democrats, the socialist democrat majority in the house literally gave away its majority the day it started this impeachment proceeding. The polling over the last week shows it. Since they have socalled made it socalled public, independent voters, they are losing quickly. We knew from polling that voters , this was done shortly after this began, two thirds of the voters in battleground states Want Congress to work on the things they sent them to work on. Two thirds of those voters think this is nothing more than political theater. 58 percent of them Want Congress to work on reducing the cost of prescription drugs, addressing surprise medical billing, pass the trade agreement, usmca, things like that. Last night, Bernie Sanders said during the debate that democrats are more than capable of chewing bubblegum at the same time as walking. In other words, they can pursue impeachment while pursuing legislative goals you set out. Is that something that they can do . Here is the problem. When you ask me about messaging, the leadership on the other side of the aisle understands how devastating this is in the battlegrounds. That is why the d triple c, our counterpart, they are conducting focus groups to figure out how to message this to independent voters. This, we came up with cant call it quid pro quo, we have to collect bribery or find a new word. This doesnt have to do with, one or the other at the same time. Get thers want you to work done they sent you to do. Democrats have done absolutely nothing except this impeachment process. We are running out of time before the end of the year. We passed one continuing resolution. It will take us to december 20. There arent enough days, and their obsession with the hatred of this president and their desire to undo the peoples will of the 2016 election frankly is stopping them from doing anything else and it will cost them their majority next year. Some democratic polling has shown washington as a battleground. Going to be such a boon to your bid to take back the majority . Theany voters support inquiry as dont support the inquiry in battleground states. It doesnt seem to be moving people either way. Rep. Emmer i disagree. I dont know what you were looking at. National polling will pick up larger concentration of democrat voters and the problem with the polls, if you will use those polls, it matters how you ask the question. The voters in battleground states are not upset with the investigation. They dont have a problem with the investigation. They have a problem when there is nothing there. They have a problem with the process and nothing else is getting done. I would disagree. I would challenge that statement that there is a wash. There is a poll that came out yesterday, a wisconsin poll that shows in the last week since this socalled impeachment process, which i would argue isnt even a process, this is the adam schiff show. He makes up the rules. He decides who is going to get to testify, who will be in public, what they are going to get to release. That is not a fair process. Wisconsin, since this thing supposedly went public last gap with the independent voters, which is where the election will be decided, is growing. Independent voters believe this is nothing more than political theater. When it comes to independent voters, i think we put them in one big category together when that is just not the case. There are two types of independent voters in this country. There are suburban independent voters, folks who may be in the past have supported traditional republicans like mitt romney. And then former barack obama supporters who in 2016 saw donald trump and said this is the guy who represents me. The question is whether those independent voters in those suburban districts, whether those are the kinds who are going to be frustrated by s constant support of the president and not finding places where they disagree with them. Rep. Emmer actually, those are the voters i was talking about. Two thirds of those voters, even Nancy Pelosis outside group, House Majority forward, there is a damning report that house , gettingforward did terrible responses to what they are doing from educated suburban voters. Even if we take the impeachment proceeding and put it to the side, they havent accomplished anything. They are here to reduce the price of prescription drugs, work on surprise medical billing, instead what they are doing is, they are offering, they want socialized medicine. You have 150 of their members are in this medicare for all, it is collett what it is, government medicine. They want to kick people off, which will kick people off private health insurance. Fossilnt to eliminate fuels. They want to sell things like, we are going to stop eating hamburger. We are going to decriminalize illegal immigration. These are not mainstream american thoughts and that is not going to sell in the suburbs. Lets talk about the suburbs. Back over the last month, republicans have had hard losses in virginia, both houses of the state legislature, looking at louisiana, kentucky. The impeachment has been going on while this is happening and governments won these votes on the strength of the suburbs. Does that worry your party . Is is it is interesting because i think the National Narrative and the National Media would like to like us to believe that this was a democrat night. You had an unpopular governor in kentucky was way behind two weeks early, made it close. He lost but it is interesting, that didnt translate down ticket. The republican candidate for secretary of state outperformed the last secretary of state race by 10 points. You want to talk about the suburbs in virginia, take a look at virginia seven. They did not flip one Republican House seat. Go to new jersey. Somebody like Jeff Van Drew has to be conceit concerned. Districtban senate that he used to represent in the new jersey senate, last fall he won that district, his senate seat dessie was running for congress, by 12 points. In the elections last week, that flipped to republican by plus seven. There is great news. We had republican victories for township supervisor in the largest suburban population in america, hempstead, new york. You are starting to see, this is what i am talking about, the frustration is that the new socialist democrat majority has not accomplished anything they were sent here to do. Their obsession with the impeachment process and constantly trying to take out their hatred of this president on the 2016 election, that will cost them the majority this fall. A new jersey democrat elected in 2018, he could theoretically lose reelection. That might not mean republicans every captured the majority. What is a good bellwether district that shows republicans are within striking distance . Rep. Emmer we need 19 seats. We targeted 55 of them. The top 31, donald trump one. Donald trump won. The next 20, Hillary Clinton won by five or less. These are seats like kevin yoder in kansas. Tough losses but republicans have held those and cannot hold and can hold them again. The top 13 seats, donald trump more. Six points or oklahoma five, utah emerald for, these utah four, it is a narrow path but if you look at it, you need 19 seats. Lets assume we dont win all 13 of the ruby red districts, we win 10. Now we need half of the remaining 18 in the top 31, which i would argue our trump districts. These are districts where, this is why the firstterm democrats, people like Jeff Van Drew say, lets pump the brakes on impeachment because he is no he knows what is coming. If we win half of those, we are back to the majority. Depending on what the environment is, we can easily win back 4, 5 or six of these. The path is there to get to 25. That calculus does not take into account democrat offense, especially in places like texas where you see districts that have been trending away from republicans and possibly driving the retirements we have seen. Gaining 19 seats is a bit of an understatement when it is possible that other republicans could lose their seats in 2020. Rep. Emmer i think that is a false narrative. I told my counterpart at the d triple c, i hope you put all your money in texas. The member most at risk in texas, he is getting a wicked primary generated by justice democrats supported by ocasiocortez. If you look at texas, you had half a million trump voters that didnt show up last fall that will be showing up this time around. Great candidates in texas. By the way, we just talked about suburban voters, i wish my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, good luck as they try to sell it eliminating fossil fuels in texas, eliminating people eating hamburger in texas, socialized medicine in privateutlawing your health insurance. These are not going to sell in texas. I hope they put all their money in texas. We will hold texas. We will take back seats in texas. Can you talk about what your party has done to rebrand your brand in the suburbs. The net loss of 40 seats is largely driven in part by the president s unpopularity. What changed them 2018 to 2020 that makes you optimistic. Optimistic . Rep. Emmer i believe the brendan should be with the incumbent. That is where it has to start. This is something we do when we sit down. Right now we have 800, last night it was 799. I will round it up to 800 candidates that have filed and are already running for congress as republicans across this country. We have candidates in 357 races. We have a Record Number of. Omen running, 161 it is over 160, i think the previous high was 133. We have a Record Number of minority candidates. It is close to 150. We have over 150 veterans running. This is a diverse crowd. First, it starts with the candidates. Do they reflect the district they are running in . Second, i think people underestimate the fact there are 8 million trump voters that did not show up last fall. You look at iowa for instance. I have not done this in every state. There are 4 congressional districts in iowa. You can compare the registered republicans and unaffiliated fall, from 2016 to last you will find there are between 164 and 165,000 voters that did not show up last fall. I would suggest to you those are trump voters. That combined with the fact that donald trump will be on the ballot this time, last time, the midterm is a check on executive power. The party that loses the white house is particularly energized because they want to push back and they show up, and they did. This is called a choice election. People will be able to make an make a choice and it will be a simple it is between freedom one. And socialism. You can dislike the personalities, take whatever you want from that, vote against a person if you dont like their behavior or, for whatever reason. In this election, it is, do you want the government to decide what your health care looks like . Do you want the government telling you the healthiest thing you should be eating . Do you want the government telling you how you are going to travel from one point to another . Do you want the freedom to make those choices yourself . When people go to vote next fall, when that is the choice, they are going to make the choice for the republican candidate. Trump can be a double edged sword. If you are looking at the governors races, he energized democrats and affluent voters in as suburbs more, if not just much, then his base. Rep. Emmer you are talking about louisiana and kentucky. You have a problem. You try to compare these. It is your right to have that view of it. In kentucky was very unpopular. The louisiana governor had to have a Value Proposition, and what he did was coming he won the primary saying this is a bad governor. Our Current Governor is doing a bad job. That may be so, but you have to have a message, what is your Value Proposition to voters in the louisiana . He didnt get that out. Instead, he nationalized the race. He got all of the bump he could out of the president. He had to have something of substance to offer himself. I was not there, but talking to louisiana members, they say that is the biggest problem, he didnt have a Value Proposition. Our guest on newsmakers, the chair of the Republican National congressional committee, representative tom emmer. Us toests are joining question him. Please go ahead. Is there room for republican candidates, especially districts that Hillary Clinton carried, that republicans lost in 2018 . Is there room for them to say that they support the impeachment inquiry to separate themselves from the republican president the same way that 2018 democrats separated themselves from nancy pelosi, for example . Rep. Emmer lets separate it from donald trump and the current administration. I dont think voters are telling us they have a problem with investigations that are valid. I think what they have a problem with is, this is a complete hoax. There is nothing here. You have a witness that was cherry picked. We are going to offer him because he is supposedly going to Say Something we wanted to say. In the morning he says one thing, the afternoon, something else. There is no basis for an impeachment. It is not an open process. I would recommend to candidates that that is an issue they stay away from. If you are going to try to give an opinion on what is going on, the only opinion i would give is that it is a flawed process and it should be completely transparent. If you want to do this, put it all out in the public eye, let everyone see everything. Then you would get a more fair result. You might get a better reaction from voters. I think the reason they are not doing that is because the information they want is not there. The word hoax, do you think that will resonate with suburban voters . In places like houston, dallas, omaha, virginia . Rep. Emmer i do not use the word hoax. What i talk about is the fairness of the process. If somebody asks me back at home, i will tell them, this behind closed doors, not allowing every member to have access to all the facts, why not . What do you have to hide . Why dont you have a completely transparent process . Stop telling us this is like the nixon and clinton proceedings because it is not. It is not at all. There was due process, people were allowed to witness this, people had representation. That is what i talk about. Administration can collect whatever they want, but from our perspective, congress does have an obligation to look into things. But if you truly believe this is a credible, valid exercise of congressional oversight, put it all out in the light of day. You mentioned 31 democratic districts that trump won and it looks promising. There are some recruitment holes. Democrats have raised a lot of money. Can you point us toward the places you are still recruiting . Rep. Emmer first off, i told have 357 of the 435 races that are already covered. Several of them have multiple candidates in them. We are recruiting every day. I am not sure where what you want me to go with it. 800 people are running, these are great candidates. We are 12 months out. We are going to have a lot more people that show up. Fill allf we dont 435, certainly 420 races will be covered. There will be a difference between a candidate who raised a lot of money and one trying to get off the ground. Rep. Emmer it depends on what race you are talking about. Different media markets, different environments in play. You dont need, keep in mind, last cycle, the average winning democrat in the house spent 4 million. The average winning republican spent 2 million. It costs less to sell the truth. If you want to focus on fundraising, we are doing extremely well when you focus on fundraising. We are within 200 200,000 300,000 of where this committee was a few years ago. And we had 40 more members. I think everything is trending, we are way ahead of the pace when you look at prior to your cycles. Twoyear cycles. You are going to have to compete in a lot of major markets. Are you going to be able to take out someone like katie porter . She has 2 million in the bank. Their bankok at accounts and the totality of their campaigns, it looks more complicated. Rep. Emmer you can have a lot of money but you have to have a message, you have to have some accomplishments, you have to convince the people you are working with them instead of trying to allow this hatred, this obsession with this president getting in the way of everything you were sent here to do. Every one of those people is at risk. I believe we will take back ourfive seats in california. We have david valid theyll running in california, polling that shows him up by double digits. Granted, we are a year out. Katie porter has put herself at risk. Just because you have 1 million in the bank, americans are smarter than that. You can have the most glitzy Media Campaign and everything but if you dont actually have a message, if you are going to sell the socialist agenda, which, it is interesting. There are those that want to own it and they step out front and say, we are socialist and we want the government to do this and decide that. There are others who want to take a step back and say, that is not everybody. But by your silence, not standing up and speaking out and fighting against this socialist takeover of the democratic party, my grandfather passed democrat party, you are literally part of it. Every one of those people is at risk to some extent. Those new jersey suburban seats, 7, 2, three, these seats could easily flip back. Katie porter, we will see how it plays out. The president ial primary dynamic in california will impact californias, what is it . 24, 21, whatever katie hills seat was. The numbers are getting messed up but you know what i am talking about. The special election called for march 3. We will see how that plays out on march 3. For the longterm, i am incredibly bullish on all of these seats being in play. By the way, you know because you study every day, we have 55 seats targeted. Some will rise up as we move forward and be more likely. Others may drop down because the candidate, the operation, whatever happens. Then there are some that are outside of the 55 that may surprise us. There might be two or three that, because of a charismatic candidate or the lack of getting stuff done here, and electorate that is really frustrated with the new socialist agenda being advocated for and not accomplished, thankfully, it could put other races on the