joni ernst of iowa, republican senator. the state is the first in the nation for the republicans nominating process. nearly all the party s candidates campaigned at the event which just wrapped up. donald trump was a prominent no-show. jeff zeleny joins us from des moines. for candidates this was a prime opportunity to mingle with a crowd of politically plugged in caucus-goers. what was the reaction, though, to trump not being there? was that a an oversight on his part, did he miss an opportunity there? what did you hear from folks? reporter: we ll see. i mean, certainly republican voters here, some 900 or so, were sitting for several hours watching all the speeches at the roast and ride. we talked to joni ernst and she said she did extend an invitation to donald trump a few months ago. she said it was her sense he does not like to attend multicandidate events. translation, he does not like to be in the same room at the same time as his rivals. that s why he decided not
by. everybody has a right to their own opinion. on history, i would want to be here with this bill today. this hour, chris christie ready for another white house run, moving his blistering public feud with former president trump to primary states and debate stages. it comes as ron desantis is barnstorming across iowa, making four more stops today in his push to win over those iowa trump voters. now he is attacking me over some of these disagreements. i think he is doing it in a way that voters will side with me. i will counterpunch, fight back on it. i will focus my fire on biden. he should do the same. coming up, steve kornacki will break it all down. i will be joined by a congressman to talk about a frightening new warning from science and tech experts on the threats to humanity s future presented by artificial intelligence. good day to you. i m peter alexander in for andrea mitchell. she s on assignment. in washington, there s a critical numbers game playing out on
ballot and why are democrats again helping another trump-backed candidate there? but, first, breaking tonight, president biden is trying to have it both ways when it comes to gasoline be prices. the president blaming russia when costs skyrocketed. now, he is claiming credit for some modest drops. but the president is still putting foreign oil ahead of domestic as he tries to ease the crisis and at the same time is considering a climate emergency executive order. white house correspondent jacqui heinrich starts us off live from the north lawn. good evening, jacqui. good evening, bret. gas prices haven t just crushing americans waltz but polling. a cnbc poll giving president biden economic approval rating below the worst mark his predecessors obama and trump ever got just 30%. now the white house sees a silver lining if they can strike a nuclear deal with iran. the white house is framing a return to the iran nuclear deal as a way to bolster global oil supply. deputy secret
Ptsd or traumatic brain injury. those of us in serious combat, explosive situations, many of us have suffered. we have to be comfortable talking about it. i do think there s a bevy of programs out there to deal with it and really what seth and i are doing is getting in the weeds and trying to measure the effectiveness of those programs, whether the resource and whether they re doing what they ve been chartered to do. can i ask you, congressman molton, but a separate issue that deals with the military? it s been in the news in the last couple of days. several u.s. military facilities are getting name changes. fort bragg is fort liberty. since i have two veterans with me on this program, i have to ask you about this. congressman molton, let me go to you first. do you welcome this? do you think it s finally good for the country to move on from having military bases named after confederate civil war figures? yes, absolutely.
Awareness and i certainly support that, we also can t give the impression that anybody who joins is going to come out forever mentally damaged. and so we have to be very balanced in how we take this on going forward. congressman molton, what do you make of that, and i know you ve shared your personal story in all this. you ve talked about how much you were struck about attitudes changing about mental health issues. you received a lot of support when you talked about your experience. you didn t think that would happen. what are your thoughts? first of all, let me just say that it s a really big deal when the first green beret in congress is willing to share his story. so mike, cheers to you for showing america that special forces, some of our elite troops, can deal with post traumatic stress and come out on the other side. you re not only a great example of sharing your mental health story, but of showing what you can do in spite of that