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national politics reporter met pinard about the latest on the presidential election and what to expect in the week ahead, the morning meg. -- good morning. >> good morning, how are you? >> were good. and we have received a lot of questions about president trump and how have the indictments, the ones most recently announced, how have they impacted the gop -- gop field in terms of messaging in light of the news? it's been interesting to watch the trump fellow gop rivals reacting to this indictment news and even more interesting considering the fact we kind of have a template for this going back earlier this year to new york state charges on which trump was indicted in watching the gop field react to those. from several candidates including florida governor ron desantis and also former south carolina governor nikki haley, we have heard verbiage around a

weaponization of the department of justice. fellow republicans are questioning the biden administration's take on not only a former president from the opposing party but also potentially bidens rival for the 2024 presidential race. we are seeing that characterization from some in the field and we are seeing some like former our concert governor asa hutchinson -- former arkansas governor asa hutchinson telling trump to pull out of the race. he says the country doesn't need to be dealing with. there are others like the biotech entrepreneur who has not only joined others in condemning this weaponization of the federal judicial system and prosecutorial system but also saying he would pardon trump if he reelected to the nation's highest office. there is definitely a difference of opinion among the republicans who are competing alongside

trump for the gop nomination. again, when we back earlier this year to alvin bragg's case in manhattan against trump, this is similar to what we heard at that point, a first wave of not only support for trump in terms of standing alongside him and saying this case is not something that should have been brought, but also an overall questioning of the system under which it was being brought. we will continue to see how this statement evolves. it's interesting to point out that we heard from a lot of candidates and fellow republicans across the country as soon as news of the indictment came out but then once the details from the indictment were made public there has been kind of a not as loud perhaps response in terms of ingesting the details and seeing what it is the department of justice is alleging. there is just a little bit of a difference in the reaction from that point. host: you also contributed to

the associate press coverage over the weekend as president trump held events in georgia and north carolina which were his first public events since this recent indictment was announced. what was your impression of how he handled his campaign is handling these developments? guest: i think we heard from donald trump over the weekend pretty much what we would have expected. he announced the charges himself on his social media platform and he has been very loud in his condemnation of them and strong in his defense of himself. we heard his characterization of these charges as baseless and without merit. then he took the opportunity to not only go after the department of justice but also the biden administration at large and questioning why these charges were brought against hillary

clinton back in 2016. i think we are hearing from the former president what we would have expected in terms of his characterization of this case against him. considering we will be seeing him but not seeing him directly but he will be in federal court this week on these charges, i think we can expect we will continue to hear a lot of that same characterization from him. he will address supporters when he returns back to new jersey after that court appearance in miami on tuesday. i would anticipate we will hear a lot of the same sort of messaging. host: do we know yet if the indictment announcement has had any impact on fundraising for the former president? guest: i think we have yet to see officially how much money but i would be sure that once there is a figure, we will be hearing that from trump and his campaign.

in the hours and days subsequent to the manhattan indictment earlier this year, there was more than $10 million flagged by the trump campaign and his associated committees in terms of what they had brought in. the point of fundraising and purportedly show up report -- show of support is something they will want to flag. host: i'm showing the new york times has the photos of all the declared candidates for president. we see the republicans feel -- field has already thinned including former president trump. there were three new entrance last week, former vice president mike pence, former new jersey governor chris christie and north carolina -- and north dakota's governor. have the indictments overshadowed the message of these other candidates taking the air out of the room as they

tried to break through in a trump challenge? guest: it is going to be tricky for anybody is getting into the race the tickly last weekend. two -- into the race, particularly last weekend. we try to see some of the field aiming to campaign as usual while still being asked by reporters like us how you feel about this. they are trying to manage their own campaign getting out in the field and raise money and talk to donors and voters. we saw former vice president mike pence at the same north carolina gop convention as the former president saturday directing delegates earlier in the day. they are hot out on the trail and i will be a tim scott later today in spartanburg, south carolina where he is rolling up more than 100 state officials to endorse him his campaign here. he will travel to iowa this week and nikki haley and tim scott will be in california this week raising money.

also, ron desantis of florida is making steps in the campaign trail as well heading to nevada. these candidates are certainly having to deal with a lot of the attention on the former president. i think they already knew that regardless of the cases against donald trump that he was still going to be occupying a lot of media and attention in the race. this is now complicated further by the pending legal charges against him. from what we see, they are trying to get out on the campaign trail to continue their own messaging and do that the best they can in this current environment. host: all right,meg canar