day with news and policy issues that impact here. coming up tuesday morning, a discussion about the national debt with the founder of open the box. and we will talk about campaign 2020 with iowa democratic party chair. and later with a reporter from that the more -- des moines register. watch live at 7:00 eastern on tuesday morning. join the discussion. when it comes to potential for gun legislation passing through the senate and house and being signed by the president, joining us on the phone to talk about what has to go into play to make that happen is scott wong. he covers the hell. -- the hill. good morning to you. a story you posted on the five factors that will determine the

gun control debate going forward. of that list, which is the strongest? >> the strongest is president trump and mitch mcconnell. without those two men, without the support from those two men, no gun control measure will move through the congress and get to the president's desk and be signed into law. this has to do with how serious president trump is when he says he supports and endorses background checks. we have heard in the past after the parkland shooting in florida the president say exactly that. that he supports back projects. as we know, that was not backed up by any sort of action on capitol hill. it was uttered but never followed up on. lobbying oner behalf of the nra, president

trump and his administration shifted toward what they said was a hardening of schools. boosting and ramping up security of the public school system. that became the focus rather than back projects. -- background checks. is the most comfortable approach that senator mcconnell is taking? are there other avenues the senator could become for with? >> a few reporters and i were pretty surprised that mitch mcconnell, who has been a and is up forly reelection in 2020 and needs the support of his conservative base to turn out to push him over the top for another six years in office, we were surprised on friday when he said

we were surprised when he said he thinks the idf background checks. that was encouraging to some, although as i mentioned before, and we really start to see process kick into motion and start to see activity on capitol hill, there is a lot of skepticism on the part of democrats who feel like they have seen this before. we heard about the president talking about these issues. why talk to those? what are they endorsing when it comes to legislation? they are known in the past for the background check legislation. this would be to close gun show loophole, close loopholes regarding internet and firearm sales. right now you can purchase guns

at those two venues without going through a background check. if you go to a gun store, you need to go through a federal background check. two, in the wake of the in 2012,k shooting these senators came awfully close to pushing something through the u.s. senate. they fell six votes shy. and we have not seen real years,t in the remaining even as we have seen a number of high-profile shootings ranging from orlando to las vegas, where the most lives were lost. this is seen as a critical

ament because it seems like number of americans are simply frustrated at the sheer volume of lives that have been lost and they are looking to our leaders for help to stop the bloodshed. , you the top of the list put public sentiment as a major driver as to if something is done or not. >> exactly. the washington post had quite a jarring image of the faces of the victims, more than 1100 victims of mass shootings in the course of our nation's history. when you have that many people that have been lost to mass shootings, it seems like everybody has some kind of connection. those are all communities and

families that were broken apart, even thinking about my own family, i am thinking back to an uncle who survived a mass shooting in the 80's. everybody has a connection now to something that has happened, regarding these mass shootings. that is really driving a lot of this frustration and anger. in the past, a lot of americans turned to grief and sadness. people have grown so frustrated and are looking to the u.s. congress and to the president to do something. heard at chant that we the mic the wine event last week. nra ally and he quickly, the next day he heard that message from his

constituents and he endorsed morgan reforms that he had never endorsed in the past. it seems like that frustration is boiling over and having an effect on some politicians. theere is the story from washington post, pictures of the . congress just started their summer break. inthe time it concluded september, what will the issues that >> and center with much time passing? -- that much time pressing? differenthrough 10 news cycles in the course of a week. we have four weeks remaining of this recess, and that is a long time before congress reconvenes in washington and we started to

had a real, genuine debate about gun reforms. 40 lawmakers are on a weeklong trip to israel. members are on vacation. theyone is dispersed across country during this recess. the real test will be what happens and whether there is any sort of momentum that is able to ,e preserved after this long four week recess. media andms like the the american public has been distracted in this trump administration by controversy after controversy. see if be a real test to the american public and stay focused on the issue of gun reform by the time the congress reconvenes on september 7. >> the story appears at the

hill.com. it will determine the future of new gun legislation. thank you for your time this morning. announcer: nbc news correspondent andrea mitchell and robin wright talk about the challenges to democracy. this hour and 10 minute event is on the future of future representative democracy. >> some of the challenges facing democratic movements around the world. migration, populist movements. these are the new developments. itself faces new forms of attack through the manipulation of social media. while collaboration among free nations is more important than