President. I may very well do it, but im being as honest as i can. Where do you stand . Likely to run . This is not what im doing. How Many Democrats will jump in . And will any republican primary President Trump . And the ways the president has influenced culture from the words we use to race. Very fine people, on both sides. Welcome to new years eve sunday, its meet the press. From nbc news in washington, the longest running show in television history, this is meet the press with chuck todd. Good sunday morning and a happy new years eve to everyone. Almost from the left hand on the bible, President Trump signalled to the country that his presidency would be different. Different in ways that would thrill millions, and different in ways that would appall millions more. It began with a jarring comment about the state of the country. This american carna right here and stops right now. Within a day, press Secretary Sean Spicer lectured white house reporters arguing implausibly that more people witnessed Donald Trumps inauguration than president obamas and a day later here on meet the press, the president s counsellor, Kellyanne Conway offered this explanation. Sean spicer, our press secretary gave alternative facts. That inauguration weekend kicked off a year of friction between the white house and the press, between the president s supporters and detractors, liberals and conservatives which has helped feed a sense that we as a country are more divided than we have been for decades, if not longer. Over the next hour, were going to look back at the past year and ahead to the next. Our panel this new years eve morning, charlie cook, kristen welker, bbc anchor patty kay who showed beyond 100 days will begin appearing on s tuesday and rich lauer, editor of the National Review. Were going to look at the promises made by candidate trump and whether hes been able to make good on them or not. Lets watch. Donald j. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of muslims entering the United States. 1 trillion in infrastructure investment. Tax relief will be concentrated on the working and middle class. I will be the greatest jobs president that god has ever created. Repealing and replacing obamacare. Save medicare, medicaid, and Social Security without cuts. Have to do it. I pledge to every citizen of our land that i will be president for all americans. We will build a great, great wall, and mexico, mexico, mexico, mexico will pay for t whats been the single most important promise he made and the single most important promise hes kept . Rich lauer, im going to start with you, i think the wall is probably the single most important promise connected to him as candidate. Yeah, that was a signature promise and was probably the most flagrantly unrealizable promise in all of american president ial politics. The idea that mexico would pay for this wall. Let alone build the wall. Right but the other country pay for it. Immigration is a Success Story for him. He doesnt have a wall, but reestablishing a certain baseline of enforcement and set an Important Message and you have illegal border crossings down to the lowest level since 1971. Im kind of surprised he doesnt boast about that more. Whats been the most important one that hes kept . The most important one i think that hes kept is that he would be the president for the people that voted for h their favor. That he would carry on talking in ways that White Working Class voters who felt theyve been neglected before, they feel they have somebody who is their president that they dont have to be pc anymore. That they can say things that they might have wanted to say for years and President Trump has emboldened them to do that. Whats the biggest one hes missed . I think a couple, chuck, one, he said he was going to repeal and replace obamacare. That didnt happen. Hes tinkered around the edges, but wheres the replacement . He also said he was going to prevent north korea from advancing its nuclear program. That hasnt happened. And that has proven to be one of the biggest Foreign Policy crisis. And to pick up on what shes saying, i think he has been a president for his base, but hes failed to be a president for all people. I think in many ways the countrys more divided. You have the nfl, you have charlottesville, and i think thats been a pr topic that is sort of interesting here, and thats the economy. In that its been a great year. And that has not translated or as john says, maybe it has and hed be at 25 if it wasnt for the economy. You know, its funny that so many people dislike him, disapprove of him, think hes a bull in a china closet on Foreign Policy, all of these things, and yet, the economys doing really well. And either, a, something hes done is right or hes just really, really lucky. And i just kind of wonder whether the fact that maybe its the absence of president obama or just sort of the idea of a president thats less adversarial towards business, whether its released animal spirits in the economy, or maybe hes just lucky. Lets debate this. Luck or has he done something . Lets g can see there is a disconnect between political dysfunction around the world, not just here in the United States, but certainly in europe too and there are National Security issues that are looming and crisis in ways we have not seen for a very long time, and yet every single investor will tell you this is a great time to economically. And at what point does that disconnect come back to haunt us or doesnt it . Can we carry on operating where stock markets keep rising, unemployment keeps falling, growth is ticking up, wages are ticking up, and still have this political insecurity, theres not just american political insecurity, but global insecurity. I remember youd hear the frustration in the last two years of the obama, like everythings there, its poised to take off, but it wouldnt, trumps election and then to quote charlie, whatever the animal spirit is, boom, it finally is here. So its luck in that he inherited an economy that was in pretty good shape. Its not like obama and after a financial crisis, its more than luck and the policy matters. And the expectation of the market and the Business Community is that at least youd see no new regulations, no new taxes, not any additional burdens on the economy. And weve seen even better than that from the business perspective because weve seen a major deregulation rollback, and now a tax bill that is a generational change on the corporate side. And will, all things being equal be progrowth . I think the white house would argue, the fact that they have cut so many regulations is what has spurned this economy. Look at health care versus taxes. He got read in on all the of the details, he ran as the jobs president , and i think that you have investors who feel good about that, the market obviously reflecting it, and were starting to see that in his policies. All right. Lets pivot a little bit to Foreign Policy. Yearend, do we know doctrine is, patty . In some ways its a continuity of the past. It was a key campaign speculation, nafta is still in place for the moment. We still have american troops in afghanistan. We still have them in iraq, we still have them in syria. So in some ways things are the same. Whats different is that in the Foreign Policy, the big Security Strategy review that the president gave at the end of the year, no mention of Climate Change as a National Security threat and no mention of american human rights and values. The single biggest change with the president is that we are not seeing america leading the world through principle. America hasnt always got it right, but it has always relied on some sense of principle and higher moral standing. What we have is a transactional Foreign Policy. Youre nodding a lot. The basic structure, its a central right realism. You see the policy even on north korea where hes been aggressive, its a status quo of middle east, who did a big surge in afghanistan early in his administration. But i agree there needs to be more of an emphasis on ideals. This is a reaction against the crusade that george w. Bush fought for our ideals, theyre an important deals. I dont sense coherence. He does seem, im going to get tough on china, and then say were pals. Then youre going, what . Youre seeing that disconnect around north korea as well. He talked about fire and fury, and that made a lot of people very nervous that he was on the brink of taking some type of action, and he didnt. I think we wont know what the trump doctrine is until we see how north korea plays out. Will he take a limited military action . I mean based on my conversations with senior officials, his military options are very few and very far between. So it doesnt look like thats likely. I do think though, chuck, retreat from multinationalism, he pulled out of least of a shift. Legacy there. The National Security policy report that katy referred to released just before christmas, when i read it, it actually did provide some coherence to what, through the past year, has looked like complete, random, ricochetting around and i couldnt tell whether is this thing actually more coherent than i thought or is there just a heck of a speech writer on board . I tend to think the latter. Let me does you this, i feel like the issue we dont cover enough in Foreign Policy is how close are we to war . A hot war. Whether were involved or not, a hot war that involves iran or saudi arabia . It feels like a tender box. We have in yemen iranian proxies fighting saudi regulars. We have in syria, saudi proxies fighting iranian regula the yemeni rebels firing missiles at riyadh in saudi arabia, thats a hot area of the world. There is one Foreign Policy issue that seems to congeal with our domestic politics, and its russia. Heres the best of russia from this year. I have nothing to do with russia, folks, okay. Why would there be any contacts between the campaign . I dont think of bigger lies. Russia is a ruse. I have nothing to do with russia. There is no connection. Youve got russia. If the president puts russian salad dressing, somehow thats a russian connection. We had no dealings in russia. We have no projects into russia. We have nothing to do with russia. Those conversations never happened. There was no collusion between me and my campaign and the russians. We think going on this russian, trump hoax for the better part of a year now with no evidence of anything. There is absolutely no collusion. That has been rich lowrie, hes not getting the benefit of doubt on all of this is it seems for one big reason. He seems to want nothing more than to cozy up with vladimir putin. If he were willing to be tough on putin, he might get more benefit. Or say the meddling was an outrage and ill never stand for it and it wont happen again on my watch. He wont say that. My theory, which i cant prove is he considers the russian story a personal affront because he thinks it undermines his victory, its kind of a psychological reaction rather than speaking to a deeper conspiracy hes trying to hide. I think thats right. And one of the things that is so striking if you look at his tweets, hes lashed out about just about everyone, including the leader of china who he needs to work with on north korea. Hes never had sharp words like that for russia. Hes never convened a meeting of the National Security team to just address for. He begrudgingly more sanctions that congress imposed. Not just that he wants to cozy up to putin, people around him, time and again, seem to forget meetings that they had with russians. Why the secrecy . Why have the meetings and reveal them later . And its happening too often it seems for this to look like just coincidence. Final word. Nobody wants to think that they won illegitimate matly. That you want to believe, i won on my merits. I think rich is right, why cant he just say, you know, they were meddling. I dont think it had an impact on the outcome of the election, but we need to make sure this never happens again. Thats pretty painless. Whats wrong with that . Youre doing something Donald Trumps never done before. Be humble. All right guys. When we come back, were going to look ahead to the year that sta and you know what that means. Elections. Are we looking at a democratic wave or can republicans somehow maintain their hold on congress and of course that means on all of the power that comes with it . Their experience is coveted. Their leadership is instinctive. Theyre experts in things you havent heard of researchers of technologies that one day, you will. Some call them the best of the best. Some call them veterans. We call them our team. Heare you one sneeze away from being voted out of the carpool . 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The results last night smell exactly the same way our republican friends better look out. We think well produce results. Results that we will certainly be able to talk to the American People about in the fall of 2018 and in 2020 as well. Can you win back the house next year . Doothe door is certainly ope for pus. A wave selection coming your way, that your majority is at risk. What do you make of that . Blah, blah, blah is what i say about that stuff. I think were going to win the senate and the house. I feel optimistic. Were going to do the blah, blah, blah, the panel is back with us, lets talk about the blah, blah, blah in november of 2018, welcome. Got to love speaker ryan. This is my lifes work and hes making fun of it. He blah, blah, blahd over the best part. Lets do it by the numbers here, Senate Makeup after doug jones is essentially 5149. Blah, blah, blah. Cook, this is what you do for a living, you saw the 11point advantage of the nbc wall street journal poll for democrats. It suggests that wave is building the question is just how big and will it crest at the right time and the right moment for the democrats . This is the this is what waves look like when youre standing on beach looking out and weve seen this before see it from afar, wow, look at that. You know, cant tell precisely how tall it is, but you can tell its a big one. Could things change . You know, if we had a couple more quarters of good growth, i dont think it will. Were looking at the senate. Its now plausible that democrats could take the senate back. I think its not likely, but its plausible in the house. If you had to bet today, i think youd bet the house would turn. One of the reason why is rich it doesnt look like this is going to shift. We look at the ballot. Among millennials, its nearly a 50point advantage. Among women, 20 points, independents, 12 points. Even seniors which has become a base vote. Its the democrats that are up four and among all white voters, only down two. Thats why it doesnt look like a couple of good economic quarters change things. Thats the best thing republicans could have going for them is robust growth to take the edge off of this, but my fear is that this isnt a conditions based reaction, its not an agendabased reaction so much. It is a profound personal reaction to trump himself. And there is no way to change that. The white house says the opposite. They say that candidates are knocking down their doors to get an endorsement from President Trump and hes eager to get out by the way, there probably are some candidates knocking on their doors for an endorsement. Their door is not being answered mcconnells. Thats right. They look at ed and say he tried to walk a fine line, and it backfi backfired. The white house saying you should embrace trump. We saw that that doesnt always work. Obviously roy moore deeply flawed candidate in his own right, but he did run base odd an trump playbook. I spoke with the democratic strategist who said were looking at a tidal wave. And i said, wait a minute, dont you run the risk of overplaying your hand . If you go into 2018 with that type of thinking. I think thats the real concern. The economy is a big unknown. That could i think shift the outlook. You know whats interesting is that you look historically and theres this very clear pattern. I mean, all but three midterm elections since the edge of the civil war, but were now seeing a more explosiveness. I mean, the last six midterm elections, either the house or the senate or both have flipped in four thats that hasnt happened in 100 years. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and so its people are voting,t not more parliamentary, but its more by party and were seeing big, big explosive results and thats got or it scary for republicans. Katy, the challenge for the democrats is on the senate side at least is the red state democrats. And you could argue, how they handle red state america in order to win the majority is going to say everything. Let me put up the senate map here. These are just democratic seats that are in states in 2018 up where President Trump carried that state and you can see, montana, theyre not surprised, but florida, ohio, wisconsin, and michigans in there, heres how a few of the red state democrats weve talked to the l