Democratic party. Where were you in 2017 when we had the worst president in the history of the United States . But the partys growing progressive wing is not happy. Ill talk to tom perez about healing a divided party, and our brand new nbc news wall street journal poll. The bad news for President Trump, an Approval Rating at a historic low. The good news, his supporters are as enthusiastic as ever. Joining me for insight and analysis are Jerry Gerry Saa ebb of the wall street journal, Helene Cooper of the New York Times, and Eliana Johnson of politico. Welcome to sunday. Its meet the press qwest qwest. From nbc news in washington, the longestrunning show in television history, celebrating its 70th year this is meet the press press with chuck todd. Good sunday morning. Stands at 44 with 48 disapproving. That is the lowest rating ever recorded in our poll at this early stage of a presidency. It took president obama 32 months to fall into negative territory and george bush 42 months to fall under rocky water. Mr. Trumps Approval Rating suggests a durable floor of support for him. That support comes almost entirely from republicans who approve of the president by 86 and democrats disapprove by exactly 86 to 9. It is independences that put him under water. They disapprove by a ninepoint margin, 38 to 47. One issue that doesnt seem to hurt the president right now at least in the eyes of his supporters are the reported ties he and his aides may or may not have with russia. Whenever storiesre subject, press bashing which is always part of the president s arsenal seems to escalate. Im against the people that make up stories and make up sources. Its a tactic with a pattern. The president s attacks on the media repeatedly have directly followed reporting on russia. On january 5th, nbc news reported on the intel jeligence report. On january 6th, President Trump tweeted i am asking the chairs of the house and Senate Committees to investigate top talent prior to me seeing it. On january 13th, 14th and 15th, news outlets reported on President Trumps ties to russia. President trump spent much of a 77minute News Conference attacking t the news is fake. Media outlets reported that Reince Priebus asked the fbi to publicly discredit a New York Times story on russia after the fbis dp director reportedly told him it was overblown. On friday, the president went after the press. I want you all to know that we are fighting the fake news. Its fake. Phony. Fake. Trump Administration Officials acknowledge on friday that white house chief of staff Reince Priebus did ask Deputy DirectorAndrew Mccabe to push back on news stories about contacts between trump aides and russians during the campaign. Days earlier priebus had said this on meet the press. Ive talked to the top levels of the Intelligence Community, and theyve assured me that that New York Times story was grossly overstated and inaccurate and totally wrong. Later on friday the Washington Post quoted both house and Senate IntelligenceCommittee Chairman saying that enlisted them in conversations with reporters. Conversations that priebus also mentioned on meet the press qwest qwepress. And in fact, devin nunez who is on the house Intelligence Committee went on the record after he was informed by the fbi as to that story, and what did he say . He said it was total garbage. The drip, drip, drip is making even some republicans in congress wary. On friday republican congressman darryl issa who was narrowly reelected said he was open to a special prosecutor to investigate russia interference in an election. You cant have someone, a friend of mine, Jeff Sessions who was on the campaign and who was an appointee. You will have to use the special prosecutor statute and office. Senator tom kontinof arkansas is a member of the select committee on intelligence and would be involved on any earful from arkansans o russia. Who called for repealing and replacing obamacare. [ crowd chants do your job ] quite a week for you, senator contin. Great week. Nothing wrong to be a part of democracy in action. Any time you can get 2200 of your constituents is a good thing. Are you concerned with the white house contact, in particular the fbi and the chairman of the Senate Intelligence committee since your committee announced its investigating all of these allegations of russian int interference in the election. Lets step back. Russia is not our always been. Theyve been examining russias attempt to undermine our interest around the world. We have said that we will undertake in a bipartisan fashion an inquiry into everything that russia tried to do in our election process last year. If that leads to potential contacts between Trump Associates and the russian government, then well explore those, as well. One of the things i did before i left for home was have an hourslong hearing on these matters. I am confident well proceed wherever the facts take us. What youre talking about is what Reince Priebus said last week. This is not something the white house has tried to conceal. It doesnt matter if it concealed. Is it appropriate, though . Lets take the cnn article on face value. Im not going to confirm or deny anything on these stories because these leaks of classified information could do real harm to our National Security, but lets take it at face value. The and Reince Priebus and said that reports of contacts between Trump Associates last year and russian intelligence officials were grossly overstated. Isnt it reasonable for the chief of staff to then say to the fbi director are you going to say anything to correct the record on this since everyone is running around washington making these allegations . I think thats a perfectly reasonable response. The fbi have reasons why they dont call balls and strikes on the stories because we dont want to let our adversaries know what we know and what we dont know and how we know it. Thats alarming. Lets go to the issue of the white house trying to enlist the chairman of the two Intelligence Committees and in particular, senator burr who has already announced an investigation. Was that appropriate . Reince priebus said last weekend devin nunez was saying this on the record. The white house was trying to ensure that the media had more access to information. Thats what the cnn about Reince Priebus. Were you contacted by the white house . I was not. If you had, would you have talked to the media at their request . Chuck, i try to refrain from comment on whats happening on the Arms Services committee because i want to stay on the right side of the line about classified information which frankly, i wish more people in the media and more of the obama holdovers in the administration were doing. Mike warner who is the vice chair. The Intelligence Committee works differently than any other committee. It is truly bipartisanly run. Mike warner had concerns about this idea that the white house contacted senator burr that it could call into question about whether this will be a fair investigation. I think there is no doubt this will be a fair inquiry. We are well under way and its been conducted in a bipartisan fashion and democrats and republicans have been working well on it and there is a limit to what we can discuss publicly and the eight democrats know what we learned and i would encourage them to tell the other 40 saying so they dont get over their skis making false allegations or other allegations. Before you said this to go to the recess to go back home that it was a hearing. Was that a hearing that you had with director comey . Is that how we should describe that . I will want discuss what we may or may not you called it a hearing. Every time we meet i call it a hearing. We had an hours long hearing on these very topics. I want to ask you about the darryl issa being open to a special prosecutor. What point is it in the best interest of the country to sort of take it away from elected partisans at this point whether its a commission. I know a select commission, outside commission or a special prosecutor. Where are you in this . I think thats way, way getting ahead of ourselves here, chuck. There are no allegations of any crime occurring and theres not even indication that th the investigations of the intelligence bureau. If we get down the road thats a decision that attorney general sessions can make at the time. The senators are getting calls on their own. You called during your campaign against mike prior. You called for a special prosecutor for the irs. How does this russia allegation, when does that rise to that level n your mind . I think thats far down the road from what our inquiry might reveal in the Intelligence Committee and thats something that can be decided down the road and right now theres no credible evidence of these contacts beyond Anonymous Sources in the media and Anonymous Sources cant always be trufrted. Anonymous sources is how we find out about a lot of scandal. Anonymous sources said bannon confronted john kelly and is not true, you cannot credit stories that are based onn youre in a position of responsibility, but you cant simply credit them. You got an earful from a town hall. Tell me your big takeaway from that. Does that say youve been one of these advocates saying we cant repeal obamacare until there is a replacement that the public can see. Does that make you more determined than ever to say slow down. Get this replacement right before the exuberance on repeal . We have to get health care right. Our Health Care System has had problems going back decades and obamacare didnt solve them and it didnt because the access to doctors is still strained. What we saw over this past week is anxiety and stress that americans feel about health care. I know families that have been helped by obamacare that feel that anxiety and stress and i know families that have been hurt by it and health care is a stressful thing and when we repeal obamacare we have to get it right and we have to make sure that our sol americans that they have control, choice and freedom over their health care. That promise sounds good. Do you understand why some people think thats an impossible promise to keep . To make it affordable, make it wider. It seems like youre selling something that cant be done realistically. I know a lot of americans are skeptical about their government on a whole host of issues and they should be given the poor performance from recent years from our government, but i think we should trust the American People. We can make our Health Care System more flexible and more personalized and more affordable for everyone and still address the problems that boomcaobamaca the coverage for preexisting conditions and so forth and thats what well do. John boehner in a speech said theyre not going to repeal obamacare. Theyll end up repairing it. Is that how theyll end up looking to people that its basically a repair of obamacare with a conservative vision . Weve had four elections about obamacare. And were not going to have a fifth one, are we . In three of those elections the republicans won big victories because we promised to repeal obamacare and to fix the system once and for all. We would not keep faith from the American People if we did not keep our word from the elections. Senator tom contin. Appreciate it. As republicans have been greeted at town halls, Many Democrats are simply calling for allout resistance to everything that President Trump touches. We are going to dump trump dump trump as long as the president continues down this path, there is nothing democrats can work with him on. Let resistance plus persistence equal progress for our party and our country. So that was the backdrop to yesterdays election of form labor secretary tom perez as chairman of the democrat committee. He defeated in a close race that was closely watched. Many supporters made their displeasure clear when donna brazile, the outgoing chair announced the results. Little did they know that tom perez was about to announce that Keith Ellison was going to be his deputy chair. With the democrats in their weakest position in 100 years, the first job will be to unite the party and try to lead them out of the wilderness. Mr. Perez joins me now from atlanta. Mr. Chairman, congratulations. Thank you, chuck. Its great to be with you. Let me start with the fact that that was a pretty divided room, all intraparty elections can feel personal and feel petty, but the fact supporters frhe primary who were skeptical of the clinton wing of the party and see you as nothingmore as an extension of that, how do you unite this Party Without making it an antitrump party as a way to unite it. I thought we had a great day yesterday, chuck, and deputy chair ellison and i, we were there together. We were united, and our unity is our greatest strength and frankly, our unity is Donald Trumps greatest nightmare. Hes already tweeting this morning about the election being rigged and frankly, he ought to be looking at the u. S. Election last november through special council. What we saw yesterday, chuck, not only in atlanta where the democrats were gathered, but we saw up in delaware great examples of how we are putting our activism into action. We had a special election there for the state senate seat, and the state senate hung in the balan. A lot of money was invested in that race by both sides, and we had 500 volunteers coming in. Our revolution, the dnc, grassroots activists, all coming together and we won that race thats the energy and the most frequent question i get is how do we translate energy into action . Yesterday was a great example not only here in atlanta where congressman ellison and i and the entire family of democrats came out very united, but in delaware, weve got a race right here. Okay. In cobb county, georgia, for district 6, and well do the same thing here. So im very excited about the road ahead. We need to make sure were electing candidates from the school board to the senate and yesterday was the state senate. Let me show the hole that youre in as a party and the hole which is surprising considering you had the white house for the last eight years. Since 2008, heres the financial hole. The Republican National committee has outraised the barack obama as the president of the United States and head of the Democratic Party by over 200 million over that eightyear period. And then look at the results. You know them. A loss of 11 senate seats, 63 house seats and 12 governorships and nearly 1,000 state legislative seats and i know youve been talking about this grassroots approach, grassroots approach, but the fact is this party got gutted while you had a democrat in the white house. Well, we have to rebuild our parties in the 50 states and the territories and thats exactly what were going to do. We also have to redefine our mission. We not only elect the president of the United States, but we elect people from the school board to the senate and everywhere in between, governors, secretaries of state, treasurers and attorneys general, and it started yesterday in delaware, and im very excited about that, and i think theres an acute understanding that where we fell short is that we didnt invest enough in those state parties. When we lead with the strong infrastructure and when we make house calls and live in every zip code and ive traveled ten states over the last five days, chuck, and thats why my voice is scratchy. Right. The Democratic Party hasnt been there for us recently. We have to make sure we have an every zip code strategy. Thats exactly what were going to do. These investments in grassroots organizing because our values are the right values, but weve got to put those values into action. I want to put up a quote that howard dean used in his president ial campaign and some would argue that his tenures is perhaps one of the most successful tenures in the modern history of the party. I still want to be the candidates for guys with confederates flags in the pickup trucks and we cant beat george bush unless we appeal to the broad section of the democrats. That quote could be active today when its rural america. Culturally, economically or both . Think we have to underscore that economic message. In ohio, i went out there, and i talked to voters. What they heard from donald trump is im going to bring your coal jobs back. Thats a lie, but what they heard is that he felt their pain. What they heard from us is that we vote for us because were not him, and we have to make sure were communicating our affirmative message. We stand for good wages. We stand for Social Security. We stand for retirement security. We brought this nation medicare. The republicans are trying to voucherize medicare and privatize