>> hillary clinton is talking to the traveling press corps on their campaign plane. they're at midway airport in chicago. giving you a taste of what she has to say. that is going to wrap it up for this hour. i'm steve kornacki. "mtp daily" with chuck todd starts right now. if it's thursday, the trump campaign is spinning itself dizzy trying to turn trump's weak debate performance into a big win. tonight the trump campaign spin cycle. trying to turn a disastrous debate performance into total victory. plus -- >> are you ready to go to the polls? well, luckily in iowa, you can start today. >> why early voting may be more important to the democrats this year than ever. and from cyber attacks to syria. has russia once again become america's number one adversary? this is "mtp daily" and it starts right now.

good evening from new york. plenty to get to in the world of politics but first we'll follow breaking news just across the river in hoboken, new jersey. one person has died and more than 100 injured after a new jersey transit commuter train crashed into a barrier and onto the pedestrian walkway at the hoboken train terminal at the height of the morning rush. for the latest on the investigation, let's go to my colleague tom costello who is in hoboken. so, tom, what do we know at this hour, particularly about the cause and that part of the investigation? >> reporter: i think that's going to take a couple of days, but we do have some developments in just the last few minutes. nbc news has confirmed from multiple sources that the engineer's name is tommy gallagher and that he survived this crash but is significantly injured and is in the hospital right now.

investigators clearly lwill wan to talk to him. he is cooperating, we're told, with law enforcement authorities. the question right now is did he suffer some sort of medical emergency, or did something happen that prevented him from slowing that train down. because witnesses say it never slowed. it came barrelling into hoboken station on this morning rush hour run, and when it did, it came in with such force that it literally jumped the end of the track. you know, those bumper guards at the end of the track where the train literally would com to a stop, it jumped that and literally went flying right into the train station terminal. we've got, right now, one person, a woman in her 30s, a local mother who was killed. she was standing on the platform at the time. more than 100 people injured. many of them were able to walk into the er, but others had significant injuries, broken bones and the like. so sat this hour, the ntsb is on the scene, federal railroad authorities on the scene in coordination with the new jersey state police, if you will. so all of this now focused on was there a problem with the train, with the tracks?

they'll be looking at the actual black box on the train to get the data. but the questions also will be surrounding this engineer to find out what he actually witnessed. back to you, chuck. >> very quickly, i know that some transit systems, the engineer is there as a failsafe, and some of it is semi-automated or controlled from other places. what is this system? >>s not an auto mated system. this is literally the engineer running the show, if you will. the locomotive is at the end of the train, the engineers at the front. it is up to him or her to slow that engine down and abide by the speed trains. i used to take this train into hoboken regularly, and as you know, it is a major commuter that a thoroughfare, if you will. it carries a lot of people every morning, but they do not have positive train control on new jersey transit, believe it or not. we've had so many crashes around the country where they said positive train control would have prevented these deaths.

today another crash, and the question is would positive train control have made a difference here? it does not exist on this system. >> an infrastructure question that could make its way into a policy debate as well. tom costello on the scene there. tom, thanks very much. now let's turn to the 2016 race, and one simple question right now. what is going on inside the trump campaign? trump himself says it's hard to be unhappy when we are doing well. and a number of trump aides and supporters are hitting the airways saying everything is fine. but then the headlines tell a very different story. as trump might say, there is something going on. everywhere you look, trump ai s aides, anonymously, are in distress. they are concerned, frustrated. and it's ballooned from there. aides are telling nbc news trump needs to change. this is a wake-up call. they're telling abc news, trump failed his own.

he wants reporters to continue to is he serecede in saying he nail it. he once again showed himself to be the leader america needs going forward. then there's the campaign denials on all these stories. the cnn report, quote, completely false and anybody saying otherwise is just making it up. abc news, a fabricated lie. nbc news, your source has no knowledge of what's happening in the campaign. it also refers to trump's controversial comments earlier in the week about former miss universe's machado's weight. they invoke names like paula jones, gennifer flowers and monica lewinsky. trump's supporters are repeating that message.

>> gennifer flowers, paula jones, monica lewinsky, my goodness. >> it's fair game to talk about how hillary clinton treated those women after the fact. >> what about how he treats women. >> every time a woman would come along and say bill clinton did something to her, who was the biggest attacker of that woman? and she's a feminist? >> and moments ago at a rally in new hampshire, trump went right after bill clinton's impeachment, mentioning it three times. there's one more thing you might have questions about, trump's evolving view of the debate moderator. right after the debate monday night, trump was glowing. i thought lester holt did a great job. on tuesday night, not as glowing. i would give him a c, c-plus. i thought he was okay. by wednesday night, a lot of people thought he was terrible. and now the campaign is labeling him, quote, an activist moderator, and at a new hampshire rally moments ago, trump called the debate rigged, which brings us tonight's big

question, what is going on inside the trump campaign? for answers to his credit, i am joined by the senior communications director jason miller. jason, you're on the record here. you're a face, no anonymous quotes. is there really -- is everything perfectly hunky dory, or is there something to all these anonymous blind quotes? >> chuck, thanks for having me on, and first off i'd like to offer my thoughts and prayers to everybody hurt in new jersey today. that's devastating news for everybody involved. with regard to the campaign, we're in great shape, chuck. i'm not sure who some of these sources are talking to these news outlets. they found their own person only they can see, but it's ridiculous. we have a unified campaign, unified candidate. we feel very good. there are always people who are going to be outside the room, outside the campaign and look to attack mr. trump. that's just the way it is. but we're in good shape and is we're feeling pretty confident. >> talk to me about debate prep. is it going to be different this time? >> of course we're going to have debate prep. mr. trump will be ready again.

going into this last debate, there were three debates we'll go through in the presidential debate process. i think it's probably safe to say that most of the media thought that mr. trump would stumble and wouldn't do well in this first debate. he did very well. in fact, he exceeded expectations. >> what made him exceed expectations? bragging about not paying taxes? how is that doing well? >> it's very clear he is the agent of change coming into this campaign. he's the one that's going to turn the country around, he's the one that's going to keep us safe. there are really two main goals coming into this and i think we're able to accomplish it. >> why do you think multiple polls, scientific polls have said hillary clinton won that debate by a 2-1 margin. it's not even been close. >> i have to set you straight on that one. the polls that happened the night of the debate, the snap polls, the ones that happen on line, those all showed mr. trump win ning in a huge way. >> what scientific poll had donald trump winning? those are fan polls.

those are what computer programmers can mess this. those aren't real. >> those are a snapshot of people actually watching. nbc, i figure you'll go to that one next, both monday and tuesday, so tuesday is influenced by all the debate coverage the next day which, of course, the media is going to try to hype up hillary clinton to make it seem like she won. not the case at all. everyone watching thought mr. trump won that debate. >> where is the evidence? >> there was -- hillary got support from the insiders and the media, mr. trump got support from the people. >> jason, you've been doing this a while. you know those are bogus. you know these are bogus. there is nothing -- they're beyond non-scientific. in fact, you have evidence, there is some evidence that there are computer programs that help refresh. all you have to do is empty your

history and you get to vote again. they're not real, jason. >> chuck, the energy, the enthusiasm in this race is all mr. trump. mr. trump in new hampshire, several thousand people in attendance. hillary clinton in iowa, what did she get, a little over a thousand? every time mr. trump, 12,000 in melbourne, last night and the night before? the energy and excitement is all with our campaign. we're going to continue to show that over and over. >> i want to talk about some of these -- what part of the debate was rigged? why does he think the debate was rigged? >> take a look at the second half of the debate. the operative thing here is the fact that hillary wasn't asked a number of questions. especially that second half of the debate with the follow-ups coming to mr. trump was ridiculo ridiculous. first half of the debate, i think lester did a more fair job. the second half of the debate is pretty clearly stacked to hillary clinton. >> so nobody is telling donald trump what to say at a debate, correct? he can say whatever he wants to say. >> but, again, his focus, to talk about his message and his vision. he did just that. >> if he did that, how come he

didn't win these debate polls. >> he did win the debate polls. >> no, he didn't. >> yes, he did, chuck. over and over. >> there are two scientifically conducted polls that have asked questions about the debate. it's not even been close. >> the nbc one monday and then tuesday are all influenced by the post-debate coverage which is going to be stacked against him in the first place. >> and you explain away cnn's snap poll how? >> cnn gets a lot of things wrong. i can speak more specifically to the nbc one which is over the two days. i'll take the 7-plus polls that all showed mr. trump winning big time. that's what we think is a more accurate reflection of what happened monday night. >> do you have any concern -- he also has been talking about google being rigged as well? there is a constant theme here that when things don't go well, something is rigged, something is rigged. that is not the best way to instill confidence in our democracy. why does he do that?

>> let me take a step back real quick. one of the biggest things we're talking about is the questions on mr. trump. this is part of the clinton spin machine game. they don't want to talk about hillary. shade pretty rough debate. took it on the chin on the tpp question. the 30 years hit was a big one. that's something that's been resonating. her challenges are millennials, her challenges with african-american voters. hillary is at best trailing or tied in some of these states. that's where i think the race invite now. >> is there any concern you have now that you're painting? if you don't accept the fact the debate wasn't a good one, then you cannot convince him to perform better in the second one. >> he's going to do great in the second one. i think he'll win the second one, he'll win the third one -- >> do you think the debate prep was adequate in the first debate? >> i think mr. trump was ready. he'll be ready again. >> do you believe it was accurate going into the first debate? >> i believe he was fully prepared and he'll be fully

prepared again. i feel very good about that. >> are you going to have mock debates this time? we have talked to his supporters at a rally in melbourne who all thought he did poorly. i don't understand why you guys can't accept -- by the way, people -- there's plenty of evidence where people lose a debate. i just don't understand why we're, like, creating a reality that doesn't exist. >> chuck, i think we're seeing things completely differently. look at hillary and the problems she has with her own base right now. >> we covered that story, but we're not talking about hillary clinton, we're talking about donald trump. he had an opportunity at the debate and there was plenty of people that i've talked to anonymously in your world that said there were missed opportunities. do you agree there were missed opportunities by donald trump? >> no. he came out of that debate -- >> he didn't miss a single opportunity? it was a perfect debate? >> he did excellent. he drew a perfect contrast. he's the outsider, she's the one

that wants the status quo. he was a win. >> do you remember what happened over the summer? >> there was an article. >> an article from a russian news agency that started this. >> there was an article from brig breitbart. >> do you have evidence of this? >> there was an article in breitbart. >> is it true? >> there's evidence, yes. >> do you have a report that claims this? did you guys do your own study on this? >> didn't do our own study but it's a report out in the public. >> just because something is out there doesn't mean it's truthful. >> it raised the issue. it makes you wonder. >> i have a feeling we should let it go here. jason miller, i appreciate you coming on. it's always interesting to spar with you. >> thank you. coming up, with the election closer than anybody imagined, why early voting may be closer than ever. stay tuned.

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coming up, early voting is under way in iowa. we'll tell you why that's more important than it sounds. we'll be right back. y dollar co. that's why i have the spark cash card from capital one. with it, i earn unlimited 2% cash back on

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polls? well, luckily in iowa, youan start today. lots of folks don't have that opportunity across the country. >> that was hillary clinton this afternoon in des moines, iowa, the first battleground state to begin in-person early voting. voters in other battleground states will get a similar chance to vote early in the next few weeks. all of these states have either in-person early voting or what's called no excuse absentee voting, which means you can apply for an absentee vote at any time. go to the booth or just like you would on election day. ohio, georgia, all those states can vote before the date even happens and the battleground states start the morning after that third debate. democrats have had an edge in early voting and the clinton campaign, the advantage could be bigger than ever. the turnout efforts required are all about the turnout

application. as early as last month, trump said he wasn't worried about turnout, so it's been up to the rnc to fill in the gaps. they're the ones sending staffers and volunteers door to door in these battleground states. according to the associated press, as much as 40% of all votes this year could be cast early. that's up 5% since 2012. i'm going to bring in my panel, steve kornacki, host of the 14th hour, and susan, republican strategist who served in former mayor rudy giuliani's campaign. iowa has been a trouble spot in particular for hillary clinton. frankly, it was a trouble spot in '08. i think it's been a trouble spot for the clintons in general. early voting here is her one shot at pulling off iowa because of the organizational event. >> it exposes the organizational

gap between the two parties, but when you look at iowa in particular, the other reason i think it's such a struggle for her, we talk about that divide between non-college and college voters. here's the status on iowa. 30% of the voters nationally in 2012 were non-college white, the number in iowa was 54%. obviously a very low non-white population where he struggles. >> early voting may help hillary clinton with this. she is well documented with young voters. it gives her multiple opportunities to badger these unenthusiastic voters that if you get them to the polls, they'll likely pull your lever. >> not only that, but it gives the clinton campaign to take advantage of moments. if she has a strong debate performance, they can take advantage of it immediately and try to cash in on that burst of enthusiasm that happens. and tastates like ohio, which i think another big tough state

for them will be ohio, it's also a state that has same day voter registration. so they'll be taking bites out of this apple to try to get to the polls. whereas on the trump side, he's not going to have help doing the same thing. >> susan, the rnc over the last four years, have been obsessed on trying to keep up with this particular issue. there is a lot of evidence they have improved a lot of things, but if you don't have sort of an equal apparatus in the presidential campaign itself, it does hold back. explain. >> it does because they can only do so much on the ground. they're not supposed to be the ones who are getting the grassroots organizers out there. in a state like, for example, ohio with john kasich, he's more worried about portman being elected and we know governor kasich is not a big donald trump fan, so his out reach is going to be for portman supporters. that really leaves the rnc holding the bag, and it's really

not fair -- this doesn't all fall on them. the trump campaign really dropped the ball on this, and that's their problem, and it may be -- lead to some really bad results. >> one of the cooler things i think we'll be able to do this year, steve, is we're going to track this early vote in more detail than ever before and at least keep track to see who is returning more ballots. something i know you'll be using on the board and we'll be able to -- >> absolutely. >> i want to move, though, to the trump campaign. susan, why is it important to them to suddenly put up this facade that everything is fine. pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. >> well, of course when things are tough for hillary clinton, their team put up a facade. that's what they're supposed to do. what they aren't supposed to do is give all the back stories credibility to journalists. because as it's been reported many times, this is the way the campaign apparatus communicates to donald trump, is through the media. so we have competing interests

going on here. and it is proving to be a horrible way to run a campaign. because the surrogates are getting mixed messages. they don't know what they're supposed to be saying. some of the messages they're getting talking about gennifer flowers, i think, is so disruptive to the conversation and doing them absolutely no good. so the trump campaign needs to really regroup quickly and lay down the rules. >> steve, i saw a quote from matthew dowd who said in '04, it was important to admit, yeah, bush lost the first debate. because you build credibility with voters. >> but the campaign is a reflection of the candidate, and this is the candidate who never admits he's wrong, never admits he's screwed up, never admits everything didn't work out. >> is this like the last days of neil kohn instilled upon him when he was young? >> donald trump, where did he go, he went straight to the spin room. they said, we've never seen this before. we have seen this before. every primary debate, he walked off the stage and the first

person to put a microphone in his face, he started talking. i saw him interviewed within two minutes after those debates ending. no matter what happens, you declare victory, you receive all the support you receive from everybody, and somehow you think you can sell it to people. i don't know how in this case, but that's his m.o. >> at a certain point, you have to be able to manage your candidate. donald trump is unmanageable if the people around him are going to be pessimistic or negative. he needs them to tell him he's doing great because that's how he operates sort of emotionally. there is no one around donald trump who is not essentially a hanger-on of donald trump. there is nobody who can say to him that even the obama campaign was able to say to the sitting president, you lost that first debate. >> remember some of the criticisms that was met at president bush, does anybody tell him bad news during the heat like when the iraq war was going south in the public? or when obamacare was not playing very well for president obama? it would be the same -- who

tells -- who has the ability? this is actually an important attribute that we want in our presidents, to know that someone, that they will listen to somebody that tells them, you're wrong. >> the only hurt people in the trump organization and the trump campaign who have ever been able to talk to donald trump that way are his children. he's the one -- don't forget, he had a professional relationship with them, too, in the trump organization. they know how to read him. they know how to speak to him. and that's why it's always been a key part to make sure that kid are on board, if you will, with the campaign strategy. now, i don't know -- you can't really use that when you're running a country, but at least when you're running a campaign. >> they changed their minds. first they didn't like the first campaign structure, then they brought in manafort and they didn't like that structure. >> but they don't know anything about campaigns, so that's their problem. >> i think they can read their father and they can tell when he's not happy. >> the role of the family in these campaigns is they end up

emerging as the protector of the spouse, the father, whoever it is. >> michelle obama, it was widely reported in that first campaign, she wanted valerie jarrett in the circle because she wanted somebody she knew and trusted. >> but at least valerie jarrett could give the president advice he listened to and trusted. >> donald trump only listens to what's in the scientific polls because that's what makes him happy. >> you and i have been fighting these battles for years about these polls and now we have one of the major party nominees making it seem as if they're believable, and 40% of the country may believe this. >> from a strategic standpoint, if you legitimately believe that and you have two more debates, and your read on the first debate is everything went well, then the scientific polls will read the same way in the next two debates. still ahead, are we headed to a new cold war?

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if you feel like the cold war with russia is heating back up again, you're not alone. the cease fire of discussions have basically collapsed as russia-backed forces continue bombing aleppo. >> we're on the verge of suspending the discussion because, you know, it's irrational in the context of the kind of bombing taking place to be sitting there trying to take

things seriously. >> and john kerry was basically the last man in washington that believed a deal could be worked out with russia, so if he's given up hope, watch out. now you have a new dutch investigation of the passenger plane downed in the ukraine two years ago. that conclusion is it was shot down by a russian-made missile. remember those breaches in russia and illinois? the problem is much bigger than originally publicized. a total of ten states had their systems probed or breached by hackers, all of whom appear to be russian hackers. abc news said 20 states were targeted and four systems were successfully breached. and senator feinstein, the democrats in the house and senate, say they've reached the conclusion that russian intelligence agencies are making a concerted effort to influence the election. by the way, no counterpart

signed onto that statement. the department of homeland security says they haven't concluded that one specific country is behind cyber attacks in the country, but listen to what john brennan said when he was asked if he believes russians have hacked our system. >> russians have had an influence globally in a variety of countries, including in engaging in russian politics and manipulation in countries overseas. what we do at the cia is look at the country's capabilities, look at their intent, look at things they've done in the past and determine whether something that certainly looks like a duck, smells like a duck and flies like a duck, whether it's a duck or not. so we're duck hunting. >> we're duck hunting. the question is, how does the u.s. respond in this duck hunt? former ambassador russian and news contributor michael fall joins me one day before the big

game in stanford, but that's tomorrow. let's focus on the issue at hand here. is russia the duck when it comes to this election hacking issue? >> well, let's go through a bit of it. do they have the capability? i think the answer is absolutely yes. have we discovered that they're using that capability? the answer is absolutely yes. will they seek to do something on election day? i don't know. in other words, there is capability there. whether they actually act on that capability is a question to be for the future, but do they have the capability? the question is overwhelmingly yes. >> in baseball, there are the unwritten rules and there are different ways the teams decide to remind teams of the unwritten rules. whether it's a phantom tag or this and that, and you throw a high, hard one sometimes, maybe right behind the batter. the question is, why hasn't the

united states done a high, hard one to putin or a high, hard one to russia that's plausibly deniable, but a warning shot nonetheless? >> so it's a good question, chuck, and it's the right analogy. and most certainly in the world of spy versus spy, not the virtual world, we do that all the time. there's informal rules. when i was in the government, we used them and we knew who to call and how to deal with that. there is a couple things that are different here. one, i want to just underscore, maybe they've thrown that hardball and you and i don't know it. let's always remember we're dealing with a little bit of in visibility in this world. >> fair enough. >> and number two, it's the escalation that worries the government, at least my former colleagues in the uls u.s. government. they don't know where it stops. and number three, they're worried about the political intervention 40 days out from an election if it looks like we, the u.s. government, the obama

administration is taking action, you can rest assured that the trump campaign is going to say they are now intervening in an unfair way in our elections as well. >> it's funny you bring this up, and this is what i wanted to hint at before, because this seems to be the trap that everybody is in right now. the fact that the two -- you talk to republicans privately that are privy to these intelligence briefings and they know this russian issue. and paul ryan has said it certainly appears they're trying to do something. but i thought it was not a good sign when it was the two democrats in the intelligence committee that put up that statement, and the two republicans did not join them. or they didn't seek to have them because it created this idea that only democrats think this is not the government thinks this. >> exactly. and let's not forget that mr. trump himself said in the debate, we don't know who is

hacking. in the debate, their side can can certainly argue this is being politicized, we have to have further investigation. it is a very difficult issue for the government to deal with right now. >> we are almost, i think, on the four-year anniversary of mitt romney saying that russia was america's, you know, geopolitical adversary, number one geopolitical adversary. the obama administration at the time mocked him for it. was he pretty right on this now? hindsight? >> well, he had a point in that there was a big pivot in russia in 2012. and, you know, as i was listening to your lead on when did the cold war start again, in my mind, it was 2012. that's when the reset ended. and it ended because putin came back to power, he became president, and second, he made us the enemy. because remember, there were popular demonstrations against putin at that time, and he pivoted in a very anti-western,

anti-american -- >> he attacked you drebtirectlyn you were over there, didn't he? >> personally and politically. i was supposed to form the argument against him. we were slow as a country, and i would say we were slow as an administration to realize how fast things had changed back in 2012. now we're seeing the results. >> will russia essentially be the biggest foreign policy challenge for the next president at this point? one of the biggest? you could look at isis and china, but is russia more front and center than ever? >> it is definitely in the top three that you mentioned, and i think it's speciespecially challenging for a couple reasons. one is they're playing hardball. as we're seeing with this hacking, they're not afraid to use new instruments to fight us, and we're not ready to do all those things yet. we're still not ready to deal

with that, putin just doesn't care about us. that's how he's different than the president of china and the many complicated relationships we have, he sees a fight with us and therefore he's less constrained than some of these leaders around the world. >> china needs our markets, russia doesn't think so. mcfaul, always a pleasure. even i'm rooting for stanford tomorrow. we'll see you take on the huski huskies. >> that's a big one for us, i agree. how gary johnson's aleppo moment is playing on the trail. . >> who is your favorite foreign leader? >> i like a lot of the leaders. one of my favorites is angela merkel. happy anniversary dinner, darlin'

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time now for my obsession and it's something not happening and that's the fight of obamacare. neither trump nor clinton seems interested in having the argument. trump has some piecebout replacing obamacare, but other than that it's virtually crickets on the trump trail. in our last on-line wall street

journal poll we asked, terror came in fourth behind job creation and spending. people prioritize health care slightly more than they prioritize climate change, which is to say not much right now. or maybe it's that trump is not the right messenger for the obamacare fight. before he became a candidate, he praised obamacare. he said one of the government's top functions is to provide a health care safety net for those in the poverty -- below the poverty line. while now he says he wants to replace obamacare with, quote, something terrific, it isn't very clear what that would look like. so for now, even though the next president is going to have a gigantic impact on the future of the affordable care act and who they appoint at hhs in order to put it into place, it's not making waves on the trail. it's showing up in some senate races but not at the presidential level. we'll be right back now with gary johnson who appears to be in a world of hurt.

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welcome back. if hillary clinton needed more ammunition to try to disqualify gary johnson, she got it last night. the libertarian presidential nominee is starting to develop an unfortunate pattern for him. my host chris matthews host aid town hall last night with a libertarian ticket. and gary johnson was hyped up on foreign policy. >> who is your favorite foreign leader? name one foreign leader you look up to and respect. anybody. >> mine was shamon paris. >> i'm talking about living. any continent. canada, mexico, europe, asia, south america, africa. name a foreign leader that you respect. >> i guess i'm having an aleppo moment. the former president of mexico. >> anybody in the world you like. anybody. pick any leader. >> the former president of mexico. >> which one?

>> i'm having a brain -- i'm having a brain freeze. >> who is your favorite foreign leader? get him off the okay, fine. save yourself. can't argue with that. >> okay. let's -- it's time for "the lid." panel is back. joy, steven, susan, wow. >> poor bill weld. it's starting to set in here. he's traveling with this guy who's not ready for prime-time. chris matthews, i have to give him credit, he will come up with that one question that will just break you. and he brought up aleppo -- >> to chris' credit here, he's also -- look, this is a guy who just loves politics and thinks, come on! why don't you study. why don't you try. it does -- it is offensive to those of us that do for if a living. wait a minute, you get to do this and you're not studying? we have to study for the exam. >> that's right. >> you know, because we're giving the test. why aren't you studying? >> you mentioned bill weld, because weld clearly had some answers there, and this is a

pattern where a lot of people look at it and say, the libertarian ticket would be so much stronger now if bill weld were on the top of the ticket. the problem is, if you look at how the libertarian ticket is formed, it's this convention and just to get bill weld in that number two spot, it took gary johnson begging and by about six votes, they got weld on there. he was never going to get the top spot. but probably more marketable if he's there. >> trump did a local interview today and was asked a similar question. here's trump's answer. >> i think merkel is a really great world leader, but i was very disappointed that -- when she -- this move with the whole thing on immigration. i think it's a big problem and really, you know, to look at what she's done in the last year and a half, i was always a merkel person. i thought really fantastic. but i think she made a very tragic mistake a year and a half ago. >> that may be the most disciplined donald trump once -- he didn't say -- >> i was just about to -- wow! he couldn't have answered it better for him.

>> look at that! >> but then he called it immigration, instead of migration, but whatever. >> but he named basically the most important world leader right now in europe and he was able to pivot to a message that matters to him. >> i would have liked to have the follow up question be, what's her first name? i think that would have been interesting. >> was to go back to this gary johnson thing, democrats are worried about it. i thought it was surprising that hillary clinton really took a shot, almost, we saw that earlier. but there's actually an ad, tom steyer, the climate change advocate, may run for governor in 2014, he's running a super pac ad about gary johnson. here it is. >> thinking about voting for garris johnson? in case you missed it, climate change will cost millennials over $8 trillion if no one does anything about it. so gary, you got this, right? >> we should be building new coal-fired plants. in billions of years, the sun is

going to actually grow and encompass the earth, right? >> well, i tell you, though -- >> probably an effective message. but to the extent to which this is a problem for the clinton campaign, think of new hampshire yesterday. new hampshire looks -- she's doing fairly well in new hampshire, but it's potentially competitive. among under-30 voters in new hampshire, our own nbc news/marist poll, gary johnson ahead of hillary clinton. it's the millennials. they don't want to vote for dru donald trump, but they don't want to vote for hillary clinton, either. and if they think there's another viable option there. >> and it's sort of ironic the libertarian candidate seems to be more of a threat to hillary clinton than he is to donald trump. and the super pac is specifically focused on trying to get voters under 30 moved in the clinton direction. >> you know what's interesting, the way our gary johnson voters in the nbc news/wllgs journal poll, they split evenly between the two candidates. but by a ten-point advantage,

wanted a republican-controlled congress. so it was interesting, our republican after the pollster said, hey, gary johnson may be the best thing for republican senate candidates. >> well, and it's interesting, my guess is they probably think hillary clinton's going to win. the millennials believe in, oh, we'll have a democrat, we'll have a republican. but to joy's point, the fact that millennials are now out-pacing or i should say, out-pacing hillary clinton in new hampshire -- versus johnson -- johnson outpacing hillary clinton in new hampshire, that is extremely doub troubling. not only if they show up to voice, but more importantly, her voice is not getting through to them in any shape or form. and vermont is some place where sanders has spent some time trying to help her out. >> one thing, a, you don't put your fate in the hands of voters under 30, quite frankly. and number two, they're not down-ballot voters. i think the big risk in overamplifying this message, if these voters show up, they vote

at the top of the ticket. >> and it also depends on the share of the vote that voters under 30 may -- it was more than voters over 65 in 2012. in 2014, voters over 65 outpaced voters in their 30. >> but share in margin, too. the obama coalition has relied on young voters in a way democrats haven't before. he won by 36 and then by 23. they do count on margin there, with as well. >> but the only person who has the obama coalition is obama. >> that's what we're going to find out in november. >> steve, susan, joy, always a pleasure. thanks very much. we'll be back in a moment with an in case you missed it, because we certainly did. (announcer vo) when you have type 2 diabetes,

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finally tonight, in case you missed it, we missed something yesterday. our anniversary. it was one year ago yesterday that "mtp daily" hit the air, the first time "meet the press" went every day. that's right, september 28th was our one-year anniversary and we forgot to bring ourselves flowers or a box of chocolate or even bring in breakfast for the staff or crew, send ourselves a card. at the pace things are going, it's easy the to understand how we missed it. believe it or not, it's already been 69 days since the democratic national convention began. 72 days since the republican national convention. 241 days since the iowa caucuses. and in that time, those of us who cover politics have forgotten actual birthdays, actual anniversaries, and other important dates in our life. personally, i blame both hillary clinton and donald trump, you can too.

so if you made your spouse or loved one mad for missing something, blame the campaign. but a little more than a year from now will be the 70th anniversary of the original "meet the press," and that's one day we won't forget, i promise you, all day long. that's all for tonight. we'll be back tomorrow with more "mtp daily," be "with all due respect" starts right now. previously on game shows with gary johnson. >> geography, 16. >> this city had been its nation's business capital and was once the end of the silk road. gary? >> what is aleppo? >> you're kidding. [ echoing: no ] >> it's time for celebrity family feud. >> name one foreign leader that you respect and look up. anybody. >> mine was shimon peres. >> no, no, no. i'm talking about living. pick any leader -- >> the former president of mexico. >> which one? >> i'm having a brain -- >> well, neighbor