The meeting was appropriate. The white house now trying to take the focus off the russia investigation again. Declaring, are you sitting down for this one, made in america week. Despite many trump products still being made overseas. Here he is checking out the front seat of a fire truck. And this is President Trump trying on an americanmade cowboy hat. Youre going to see things announced that you wont even believe for our country. Youll be seeing that happening really quickly. Were tonightly set up. Were going to stand up for companies, and maybe most importantly, for our workers. Is this enough to give a muchneeded jumpstart to an administration that is under water pollingwise . Were almost six months into the trump presidency, and a new abc Washington Post poll showing the president s Approval Rating dipped to 26 , the lowest mark for a president in the last 70 years, just 25 strongly approve of the job that he is doing so far. Then theres this. A new Monmouth University poll showing 41 support for impeachment of President Trump. Compare that to 26 supporting impeachment for president nixon six months into his second term, as the watergate scandal was breaking. With me is howard fineman, the global editorial director for the huffington post, and jennifer epstein, White House Reporter for bloomberg. Good to see you all. Jennifer, let me start with you. Theres been a failure over the last six months of Donald Trumps presidency to capitalize on this coalition that propelled him to the nomination of the republican party. He has now fallen back to strong support only among that base, roughly about 25 of voters who, i think were on his side back when he was a birther. Yeah, were seeing here that the president is struggling, that he came in saying he would do a lot for these people economically. While there have been some steps, you know, the job creation level has been consistent in that its continued from where it was in the Obama Presidency at the end, about 200,000 jobs a month, there are a lot of things that really just seem to be going smoothly, but not a real spike in the kind of things that the president promised from an economic standpoint which gets you to the made america event today and the whole week that hes trying to hammer home what hes attempted to do so far and what he says is coming soon. Jake, im going to talk to Jared Bernstein about the made in america stuff. But the bottom line is, once again, the president presents he makes a speech in which he implies that there are some very obvious things standing in the way of everything we buy being made in america. And at any moment now hes going to clear the decks of all of that kind of stuff and suddenly this American Made manufacturing boom is going to be before us. Yeah, thats what hes saying. Theres no evidence here on capitol hill that thats the case. The thing thats actually quite stunning to me is that theres very little coordination from the white house on message weeks and house and senate republicans. There could be a huge walltowall effort to hammer home this message. The house and senate could pass bills this week that trump wants done on this topic, but theyre not. So its actually its really a missed opportunity many republicans tell me to hammer home a message that like you said at the top could be very useful and popular with his base. A perfect example, howard, infrastructure week. He did one of those. Got off to a slightly better start than this one. But this is a real topic, that voters probably on both sides of the aisle would be interested in seeing, improved infrastructure and a real project to do that. Again, infrastructure week came and went, and i think stephanie and i were the only two suckers talking about it that week. Well, pittsburgh, my hometown, im in favor of new infrastructure. There are a couple of problems here. First of all, donald trump doesnt get the fact that congress does the actual legislating and the deciding of how much money is to be spent. And that it works better, usually, when a president is involved. As jake said when the president is out making the case, when theres coordination, where theres a bill thats been drafted, with the agreement of the white house staff, and the key leaders on the hill of the party of the president , all that kind of detailed stuff about how you actually pass a law and spend money is something that donald trump doesnt know anything about, and doesnt appear to be very interested in. The other thing thats going on is that the sort of mesmerizing force of both the russia story, and the travail of the Health Care Bill, have kind of frozen the attention of members of congress and they cant seem to focus on anything else. Thats an interesting point, jennifer. The fact is that this Health Care Bill is hanging by a thread. Its kind of ironic that Mitch Mcconnell put a hold on this, because john mccain is unwell. There are a lot of people who didnt think john mccain was fully onboard with this Health Care Bill to start with. There are two senators who said theyre not voting for it. There are probably 13 more who have serious reservations about the whole thing. As much as we wish john mccain well and you cant keep that guy down, its kind of a comedic excuse for Mitch Mcconnell. You need the president to help when you have legislation that big hanging by a thread. You know, his approval on health care in the bloomberg poll was 23 , 28 , somewhere in there. Those kind of numbers are really pretty difficult. Because in part, he really has not said what he wants other than a great plan, a really good plan, the best plan. He hasnt set out markers for which you would like to see lawmakers reach. He does have about half a dozen, or maybe even more senators coming this hour to the white house, all republicans, and this is yet another chance for were not sure, is this turning the arms of some moderates, is it trying to keep some more conservative republicans on board, or trying to keep momentum while senator mccains out . It remains to be seen. But it seems like the president ial involvement seems to be in fits and starts and without a real clear idea behind it. So, jake, when youre talking about health care, its not going to get any easier when we get past health care and tax reform, but they need to cut spending so much, and so much of that spending is in the Health Care Bill. At what point does do these numbers and the influence of this president become something to help get something done . The sixmonth point, whats the reset that has to happen to make the president useful to getting any kind of legislation passed in this country . Ill tell you whats not useful. We had a story on politico this morning, that the president s aides are considering supporting a primary challenge to jeff blake, the popular republican senator from arizona. Im not sure in what world the president or his aides thinks this is a good idea. I met up here on capitol hill with complete amusement and complete this is like political malpractice. If you talk to republicans in the senate, theyll say that. Im not sure. This is going to be Mitch Mcconnells deal to bring home. And republicans put it the other day, if he cant do it in the senate, theres no one who can do it. To your other point, the idea that the white house thinks theyll be able to kind of move smoothly to tax reform, thats a nice thought. I also want to be a 66 swing man for the washington wizards. Thats also not going to happen. You know, they need to pass a fiscal year 2018 budget. There are huge gaps between within republicans on spending priorities, entitlement priorities. So this is not smooth sailing. This is real hard ball politics, and legislating. As howard said, hes right, the president has not shown the kind of interest in learning what the what it takes to get this stuff done. Ali, the only interest hes shown is to issue threats. Right. As jake said, you know, theyre going after flake. Theyve been trying to twist other senators arms. For context, flake was very critical of donald trump during the campaign. Thats true. But a lot of president s let bygones be bygones. This is not the campaign anymore, this is legislating. Having covered donald trump for a couple years in politics and many years before that in new york, theres never a bygone with donald trump. And he creates new fights all over the place. And when you go after dean heller of nevada, go after flake in arizona, and you arent doing anything else, and you have a 36 Approval Rating, youre not doing yourself any good, and youre stepping on Mitch Mcconnells turf. Donald trump has said, i want mitch has got to do this. Mitch has to get it done. If you want mitch to get it done, dont get in mitchs business. So, jennifer, what is the reset, if there was one . Lets give everybody the benefit of the doubt that at six months in, the white house gets the poll numbers like everybody else does. If donald trump is not surrounded, not in an auditorium or stadium with loving admirers all around him, he might say theres an opportunity for a reset, do you believe theres any discussion going on like that . Or is the white house full of factions fighting each other . Since the start of june, we started to have these weeks, infrastructure week, and so on, which has been mocked and maligned a lot of times because they all end up being russia week, donald trump jr. Week. And this week seems to be a bit of a don trump jr. Week as well. You at least see the white house trying to do some of the things you would see the Obama White House do, or the Bush White House do, which is to have these things each week. They have not yet figured out they should be coordinating with the hill on it, and that maybe every week should be Health Care Week for the president until this bill passes. But the idea of doing something around, you know, made in america, or, you know, american heroes is next week, these kind of things, if they are done right, can at least drive the message a bit and be a bit newsworthy. But i think here you have the challenge where its so disconnected from legislation, so disconnected from Everything Else happening in washington, and around the country in a lot of ways, that it doesnt necessarily work the way that this white house ali, theyre also selling it the wrong way. They put the package together in secret. But theyre making the compromises, theyre trying to buy off people in public. It should be the other way around. We should know whats in the package first and then make the deals, yeah. Good to see all three of you. Thank you for your time this evening. Still ahead, was trump juniors meeting with the russians the only one of its kind . Who else might have been involved in the setup . And the followup . Im going to hear from the former ambassador to russia. As weve been talking about, some people think its made in america week for the Trump Administration. Sounds good. But what about all the trump brand merchandise thats not made in america. Well have a closer look. Plus, the president speaking out about senator mccain and the surgery thats delaying maybe even derailing the gop Health Care Bill. More kinds of crab than ever, new dishes, and all your favorites. Only while crabfest lasts. Red lobster. Now this is seafood. Dad flash drives . Yup. Thats dad taking care of business. Laptop setup . Yup. But who takes care of dad . Office depot, office max. This week, all hp ink, buy one get one 30 off. Taking care of business if you have moderate to severe Rheumatoid Arthritis like me, buy and youre talkingf. 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Yeah, and i can watch thee bgame with directv now. . Oh, sorry, most broadcast and sports channels arent included. And you can only stream on two devices at once. This is fun, were having fun. Yeah, we are. No, youre not jimmy. Dont let directv now limit your entertainment. Xfinity gives you more to stream to more screens. More than a week later we still dont really know what happened in the meeting with donald trump junior. Nbc news confirmed at least six people in the room, but there could have been more. And what was the point of the meeting in the first place. White House Press Secretary sean spicer said this. There was nothing as far as we know that would lead anyone to believe that there was anything except for a discussion about adoption and the magnitsky act. Would refer you back to counsel on that. Named after the man beaten to death by russian authorities. These two on your screen, the New York Times reporting that this man, the lobbyist is, quote, a skilled practitioner in Opposition Research. With a reputation for obtaining email records, information from spyware and other data that appear to be drawn from russian hackers, though he denies that. An opponent of the russian lawyer at the center of the meeting described her to the atlantic as, quote, vindictive and ruthless and unrelenting. Steven served as u. S. Ambassador at large for the former soviet union and is now a counsel on foreign relations. Ned brice is with the National Security council and served as special assistant to president obama. Steven, good to see you. What do you think this means . They call this guy a master of the dark arts, and said that hes a real practitioner of this research. What do you read from that . This is a guy who made his career in washington, d. C. So theyre alive and well in our capital, too. He has a lot of russian clients. And what the russians call black pr is a very rough game. It involves blackmail, and sometimes violence. Its not usually about elections. It tends to revolve around lawsuits, getting people out of businesses, taking property away. And so forth. But he has also made a career in legitimate washington pr, and we dont know exactly which area he was operating in here. Ned, theres this adoption thing, its a remarkable red herring. Because the magnitsky act, sean spicer should learn how to say it, because it was about a man who was killed, but its about the specific sanctions on human rights abusers close to Vladimir Putin about which the russians imposed a prohibition on adopting russian children. You wouldnt be discussing adoption, you would be discussing the whole context of lifting the magnitsky act. Thats exactly right. The issues are intertwined in the russian mind. And a meeting about adoption in our parlance is about magnitsky. At the center of this, hes spent the last few years really pitching in washington and around the world, frankly. For moscow, this meeting was never about adoptions, or even the magnitsky act for that matter. It was about getting documentary evidence that the trump team was ready and willing to take part in what could be called collusion. As soon as donald trump jr. Sent back that email saying i love it, especially later in the summer, that was what moscow was going for the whole time. That was the intelligence jackpot that they sought. So, in other words, steven, they reel you in that way. They offer something up and you say, hey, im into it. Now youre in some fashion or other into it. Well, thats what they do if theyre trying to recruit an agent. What we dont know here is whether these people were actually engaged in that kind of enterprise. Or whether they were pursuing the interests of their clients. You know, a lot of the people who were under sanctions in the magnitsky act wanted to get out from under, related to other issues, who wanted to get out from under. What we dont know is what kinds of instructions these people had, if any, from the kremlin about the meeting they were undertaking. Is it likely to you, steven, that nothing came of this . After they got the documentary evidence that ned was talking about . They know the Trump Campaign or the trump family is interested in a scoop that they could potentially get, because theyve been doing it like americans have been doing it for decades. We know how to get onpo research. Is it conceivable nothing came of this afterwards . Its certainly conceivable, and not an issue in which we should just jump to clonclusion. Its clear that the Trump Campaign was frustrated by the lack of information. Theyve come to that meeting, after all, expecting to get really hot dirt. And they didnt get it. Now, whether there was a followup, we dont know yet. Surely their frustration would have suggested that they get back on the horn and say, wait a second, where was all the stuff you were promising . But we dont have that email trail yet. Ned, what do you make of that . Steven is exactly right, we dont have that email yet, we dont know if that meeting was about setting up other forms of communication, or that everybody just walked away and said, no deal here. Thats exactly right. What the ambassador was saying. I would point out a couple of things. In the initial email chain, there was a reference to a phone call. I think its a red herring to say this email chain encapsulated what went on in the runup to the j