♪ welcome to "kasie dc." i'm kasie hunt. tonight if you thought 2018 was wild, just wait until 2019. we'll look back at a crazy year in politics and preview what next year has in store. plus, i'll talk to a republican congressman who won't be back next year. the lessons they learned and the

lessons for their colleagues as they try to restore regular order. and i'll be joined by my capitol hill producer team to determine how democrats are going to govern when they get the gavel next week. the president began by saying he was fit to serve, battling back allegations from michael wolff's book. yes, that happened this year. what followed was all about cause and effect. voters headed to the polls and set record numbers of women and people of color to congress. students organized marches and took to the streets to protest gun violence. historic national disasters ravaged communities on both coasts and president trump continued to make his mark both here at home and on the world stage. we saw the country split in two as now justice brett kavanaugh and dr. christine blasey ford testified on capitol hill in one of the seminal moments of the me too movement. we also saw families separated at the bortder as the fight over immigration policy reached a fever pitch. and we saw the death of a president and with it a changing of the guard in republican

politics. and, of course, very little of this man. but the impact of robert mueller's investigation was ever present in every corner of american politics. and with that, i'd like to welcome in my panel for this evening. with me here on set, senior adviser for moveon.org, karine jean-pierre, eli stokols, communications director for the nrcc, matt gourman and leighann caldwell. thank you for being here to look at the year that was and the year that's to come. eli, how does president trump start off 2019? is he in a position of strength, of weakness? what is he going to have to tackle with democrats taking back the house? >> he seems to be in a much weaker position. you think of kavanaugh being the biggest success for him in the past year. but the elections delivered the verdict in november and it was an obvious setback for republicans. a referendum on this president at a very controversial administration. a lot of these policies. and democrats picked up 40 seats in the house.

and the president as a result of that is going to have to deal with a whole lot of investigations, not just into the russia matters that we've heard about for two years but into personal financial issues in terms of decisions that he made or didn't make. relaxing of sanctions. the khashoggi stuff. democrats have already indicated they plan to subpoena a whole bunch of white house documents. that's going to be uncomfortable. obviously, the mueller investigation. that seems to be reaching an end game. there's darkening clouds hovering over this white house as a result of that. and there's been an exodus of the people hanging on in this administration trying to rein in this president to direct him in a more positive focused direction. a lot of those people are leaving. i talked to someone in the last week or two who said high-ranking official said i don't know who is going to be here at the end of january. we saw in recent weeks they had two people, two top choices for chief of staff turn them down. people don't generally turn down that job when it's offered.

and it just tells you about what people close to the president, republicans, are anticipating heading into next year. they're not anticipating it being a whole lot of fun. >> in a relatively bad spot. >> matt gourman, you were heavily involved in the republican effort to try to hang on to the house. obviously, you had a very difficult year. >> yeah. >> what lessons did you take away from what happened, and what would you say the republican party needs to do to regroup in the new year? >> we have to focus on the suburbs where we lost a lot of seats. in the closing weeks, the focus on immigration affected us in a lot of ways. >> you think the president going out and talking about immigration, talking about the caravan was a net negative? >> yes. i think certainly congressman carbello. polls showed him doing well. the focus on immigration started to take over the dialogue. those poll numbers slipped.

you could say that in pete sessions and others. both sides, democrats and republicans pulled out thinking it was a lost cause. i think that focus affected races breaking late. when it comes to suburbs, again, it was a referendum on trump as you said, but 2020 will be a choice like it was in 2016. so, however the democratic nominee is going to be defined for better or worse is going to tell us a lot where congress goes. >> leighann, one trend we saw in 2018 that i'm interested to see how it's going to play out in the course of this presidential race that matt mentions, women, right? overwhelmingly winning on the democratic side but just getting decimated on the republican side. 13 republican women in the house of representatives coming up in 2019. it's just stunning. several of them are looking at their largely white male leaders and saying, guys, hello, this is a huge problem. sometimes it seems republican leaders have their heads in the sand about it. >> they do. they are pushing back against

these 13 republican women who are trying to have a bigger voice, trying to recruit more women into the problem and some of them saying there's not really a problem. getting to matt's point, they have to recognize there's a problem. if there's going to do anything about it. >> careen, let's pick up on what leigh ann was talking about with this record number of women winning. especially as we head into what is inevitably going to be a 2020 primary season. already some democrats are looking at the early polling and wondering, hey, why are there white men at the much to our polls. joe biden, bernie sanders, beto o'rourke. what do you think they need to do to keep excitement among people they'll need. >> it's still very early. the people you just named are folks who have name i.d. beto o'rourke just came off of a very national race and became like the -- one of the stars of the democratic party. it's not surprising that his name is trending out there. biden clearly popular.

former vice president. and bernie sanders who almost became the nominee and very competitive in 2016. so i think it will come. i think that it is important. one of the things i am excited about this 2020 democratic presidential primary is that it's going to be big, yes, but it's going to be diverse. you're going to have the kamala harris, elizabeth warren and so forth in that primary. and once it gets started and once people start hearing from them, i think those numbers will shift a bit. >> who do you think president trump wants to run against in 2020? if he could pick his democratic opponent? >> i think elizabeth warren. we've seen him relish attacking elizabeth warren. >> it was pretty damaging. >> so i think she's up there on the list. the president, though, as we all know, he needs to have a foil. he did better when -- as matt said. it's a binary choice. trump or clinton.

he did better when it was, do you want hillary or me? it was one or the other. i think he enjoys having the foil of the media right now. that's really all he has. with democrats taking over the house and congress, he'll be able to run against them and say you're in charge, too, now. and if he is smart politically, i think he'll start to do that and he'll also, as we know, just sort of be consuming the democratic primary like the rest of the country is on television. >> changing the channel. >> you'll be able to tell from his tweets who he'd like to run against, by the nicknames and who he is having the most fun attacking. i think he's nervous about someone like biden or if this gets further along, someone in the biden mold, a sherrod brown, someone who would challenge him in the states key to his electoral college victory where republicans did poorly in november. >> matt, do you think the republican party would benefit from a primary challenge to

donald trump or would it be incredibly damaging? >> i don't think it's ever benefited a sitting party. you've seen the rnc and other folks come together and say this is not in the best interest of the party. south carolina is talking about canceling their primary. for the most part, with president, you have him for eight years on the ballot and the primary would just divide the party in an unnecessary way and for folks down ballot, that would be a terrible, terrible thing to have a distraction. >> so who is going to campaign with the president in 2020? >> that's a great question. >> we had him travel to duluth, minnesota, down to the rochester, minnesota, across the midwest. let's also not forget he's going to come into the states whether you like it or not. be in florida and maine. michigan, wisconsin and others are going to be battleground states. it's not a matter of wanting to campaign. he's going to be there.

>> before we go, i want to also back up to something we mentioned at the top and that is brett kavanaugh. and how divisive that fight was. what kind of moment was that for the me too movement. a lot of people considered it to be a failure because ultimately he did land on the bench. are those scars going to heal? >> it was absolutely a devastating blow to many women across the country. i was one of those folks who spoke almost every day in front of the scotus building and during those protests, and it was hard. it was tough for the women i met out there. but it also energized. we were -- the democratic base had been energized since the 2016 election, certainly since the women's march. so the energy had been there. but there was something that really ignited that the base even more after that. i think folks, while they were torn and they were hurt by it, they realized that the fight needed to continue and they needed to show up. >> it energized the republican

base as well. >> it energized them before the actual vote, right? i think before the vote, folks, i think, folks in that base were like, okay, we've got to get kavanaugh. that's our guy. we've got to fight for him. once he was on, it lasted for a little bit but because of the loss, it energized more, i would argue the democratic base because now you have a loss. nuyou have something to really fight against. something to talk about and to really say, hey, we've got to take back the house. we have to do better in these states. we have to make sure people get elected. diverse people get elected and democrats get elected. >> leigh ann, what's your takeaway on what that moment meant to the country? >> yeah, that's a good question, kasie. so i think it gets back into what we were just discussing about women and the enormous amount of women that's going to serve in congress and how the republican party is suffering

with women. i think it's very symbolic of where this country is. this country is quite divided. i think that the kavanaugh hearings continue to divide the country but i also think it was a really seminal moment in the sense that you had this woman come before the committee, tell her story. and that republicans tried, the republican men tried to not bash her. that didn't last completely 100%. but there was more of an awareness then in the anita hill hearings. there's more awareness now than there was back then. i think that's a little baste bit of a progress. >> leigh ann caldwell and karine jean-pierre and eli stokol. inside the movie "vice" which profiles dick cheney and leads the golden globes in nominations. first, political theater of a different kind. i talk to retiring congressmen. what they hope their colleagues learn from the midterms before 2020 comes. we're back in a moment. amazon prime video is now on xfinity x1.

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>> how magnanimous. that was president trump just a day after the midterm elections rubbing salt in the wounds of republicans who didn't fully embrace his agenda. it's left many rank and file trying to figure ot the answer to a basic question. how can they be true to themselves and their districts without becoming a target for the head of their party. joining me are two republican congressmen set to leave washington. congressman ryan costello and carlos curbelo. >> i'm not italian but he's not the first one to make that mistake. >> congressman curbelo, thank you for being here. you two are friends in congress which many of you may not know that that does happen in the congress. but you are both leaving. congressman, you elected to retire and congressman curbelo, you decided to run. so my first question to you, are you glad you did that instead of retiring considering that ultimately it didn't work out? >> i'm glad i ran because i ran on my record and even though the

president doesn't realize this, i was the top performing republican in my district. a narrow race. the most democratic leaning district in the country held by a republican so i feel good about things. the political pendulum swings back and forth. this time i was on the wrong end of that, but that's okay. >> what is the congress going to lose with all of the mostly moderate republicans in suburbs who lost their seats. the republican party that's left behind in washington is more conservative. what impact is that going to have in washington? >> because we're now a minority in the house, i don't think it will have as much relevance on a day-to-day basis simply because with the democrats controlling the floor, you are likely to see democratic priorities take shape. but i think more broadly, being a republican in an era where free trade isn't really free trade anymore and some of the costic rhetoric, not embracing what is a suburban agenda of focusing on environmental issues and middle of the road issues which i don't think democrats have exclusive jurisdiction on having under their tent are going to be lost.

and i fear moving forward if we don't have a suburban agenda and aren't a party that embraces centrists, a lot of folks in the middle of the country, in the middle of the electorate aren't going to look at the republican party as the solutions party. >> do you think that there's still room in the republican party for people like the two of you, congressman? >> there is. and i think there will be more once the president is out of the picture either in 2020 or in 2024. i certainly do think that he is such a unique political figure that there's very little room for anything else. >> would you vote for him to be re-elected? >> i didn't in 2016, and i think it's too early to say but he hasn't done very much up to now to change the decision i made in 2016. >> why are you still in the republican party?

>> i believe this country deserves, needs a small government, free enterprise party. >> do you think the republican party still stands for those principles? >> every day less so but i think soon, whether it's in 2020 or 2024, a young generation of republicans and new generation is going to have the opportunity to recast that party and not to make it what it was. we don't have to make the republican party great again but certainly build a free market, small government party that can appeal to younger generations. i think it will be sprinkled with some libertarianism for sure and there are a lot of wonderful members we're leaving behind that i think are well suited to do that and we'll be able to help them from the outside. >> if you look back at 2010 and what happened to a lot of blue dog democrats who didn't vote for obamacare at the time, the

pendulum tends to kick out those that are in -- towards the center of their party, be it republican or democrat. and whether this was a wave election or realignment if you're a republican in the suburbs in a swing district, the electorate had your number. i don't think it was personal. it was frankly -- >> you think it was about the president? >> no question it was about the president. >> i can't get kevin mccarthy to say that out loud. >> you had state reps that had favorability ratings of 55 or 60% getting 45% of the vote with voters coming out of the booth saying, i can't do it this time. i have to send a message that i don't like how the president conducts himself. >> would you vote for president trump in 2020? >> i would echo the sentiments of senator flake and corker that we should have a battle of ideas. i do not -- >> so you think there should be a primary? >> yeah, i do. i think it's healthy.

and let it play out. but i do think having someone speak on the free trade issue, speak about civility, speak about the issues that i think we've kind of given to the democrats. climate is an issue that i think we need to address and our party is not leaning in on that issue. we're giving the democrats an issue even though we may not agree with their solutions. i'd like to see some of the ideas and solutions the president is unwilling to embrace be brought up. >> who do you think should primary the president? >> i don't know. it won't be -- >> would it be you? >> i'll support you. >> there we go. our first endorsement. so i'm kind of curious for both of you what you liked and hated about being a member of congress. what will you miss and what will you not miss for a single second? >> i'll miss the relationships i

made. i'll miss, obviously, having not just a voice which i'll keep but a vote on some of the biggest issues in the country. what i won't miss is this all or none approach which i think is only going to be more accentuated in the next congress with so many moderates leaving the congress. i think you'll see this tension grow even worse. the conflict. i hope i'm wrong but i just see it going that way. and those days where that kind of ruled the day was frustrating. it made me feel like it wasn't worth being away from my wife and daughters. i won't miss that but i'll miss the camaraderie. the ability to have not just again a voice but also a vote. have an impact on some of these big issues. however, as a private citizen i'm going to stay active on the issues i care about, the environment, immigration, the national debt. these are important to me but as a 38-year-old still, you know, with a lot of runway i'd like to think in this country. >> certainly younger than most of your colleagues. >> it's true. how about you? >> the days are action packed. deal with the weightiest issues of our time and the most interesting and historically significant legislative body in the history of civilization. what i won't miss, you know,

hitting your quarterly fund-raising numbers. i won't miss the identity politics permeating the us versus them mentality. and if you vote yes instead noef then you voted to do all these terrible things and people try to personalize things in a way that's not healthy. it's not going to incent vise good people to want to get into government and that's more important than either of us. you want your teens and 20-somethings, whether they are democrat or republican to want to do these jobs. you don't want the people that just want to do it. you want to encourage people to do it. >> and one important thing i'll not miss are the constant questions from reporters like you about the latest tweet. >> i bet. congressman costello and curbelo, thank you both so much. thanks for being such great friends of ours over the last year. just ahead, the nbc news capitol hill producer team joins me on set. this is the a-team.

we'll get their predictions for the year to come.

behind the art of the deal, may be about to get his first taste of truly hostile negotiations on capitol hill. the president's frequent democratic foil, nancy pelosi, will claim the speaker's gavel when she returns to the house in january. and the president is also likely to face a series of investigations in the new year planned by house democrats. joining me, nbc news capitol hill producer and reporter alex, frank thorpe and producer mariana sotomayor. this is the great team that brings you all the news from the hill every day. thanks, guys, for coming in. i really appreciate it. alex, you cover the house. so let's start there. what is the landscape going to look like for the president, quite frankly. he hasn't necessarily won his recent fights with nancy pelosi.

>> something really interesting and a very busy year. we'll see how nancy pelosi and donald trump are going to interact. obviously, there's going to be a lot of investigations on the hill and nancy pelosi will be the one that overseas all of them. i think we'll wait and see what happens with his tax returns. that's going to be one of the big things that a lot of democrats want to see. will the ways and means committee be able to uncover donald trump's tax returns? i don't think we'll see that in 2019. i think that process is going to start. but i think the oversight committee is going to be another place to really watch. there's going to be a ton of investigations. elijah cummings, the incoming chairman just in december, you

know, sent of 51 letters to the administration encouraging them to comply with all their requests. >> encouraging? >> yes. >> now he's going to have a little more power. >> the subpoena power that democrats are going to get is one of the biggest things that from them winning the house, they'll be able to be that check and balance on the administration that, you know, a lot of people say republicans did not do these first two years. >> frank thorpe, you cover the senate. let's talk for a second about the flip side of this which is while as more democrats have come into the -- onto the hill who are going to be critical of the president, we're lose something key voices in his party that have been willing to stand up and fight back against the president. >> senator bob corker and senator jeff flake, both of those senators are leaving. those are two of the most vocal critics of the president from the republican party. and so the question is, for a lot of us, who is going to fill that void? who is going to be that critical republican voice? and actually talked to both of them and both of them actually named mitt romney as one of those choices. so it's mitt. it's going to be -- mitt is definitely a possibility here. they are looking to him to kind of be a critical voice. he just got elected. he has nothing to lose. >> he's got six years before he's got to worry about it. >> on the flip side, somebody

who is now not going to be running for election, lamar alexander, from tennessee, is one both of them named as possible critics. there's one-third -- >> i hadn't thought about that. he's someone that's been in politics a long, long time. education secretary. very serious policy mind. >> he's been pretty moderate on the health care issue. he's been critical of the idea of just ripping the -- ripping off the aca. he's been wanting to get some kind of compromise on that. his last two years could be very interesting. the third also is martha mcsally. she's coming in and she needs to run for re-election in a moderate state in two years. she's going to have to thread a needle. jeff flake was telling me, this is a situation where she'll have to thread a needle. be comfortable of trump and win a primary but stiff arm him and win a general. it's going to be a really interesting question to see who is going to fill that void. >> marianne alet's talk for a second here about another dynamic that's going to be super fun in my opinion which is half

the u.s. senate seems to be running for president on the democratic side. there's like a new one every day, i think. michael bennett from colorado, not somebody who appears in these lovely graphics with thankful various faces but one, two, three, four, five, six of the people in that political graphic are all sitting members of congress. how do we expect this dynamic to affect policy and what's going on, on capitol hill? >> all of these people have big personalities. and they're going to try to define themselves in different ways. in the last year you saw them voting together against any trump -- any type of trump nominee. and now you can probably see that going forward that they're going to do the same thing. try to fight him on that. in terms of the caucus itself, because they are going to try and differentiate themselves, they're going to try and win over the same base moror less. they'll be fight with each other. there may be a lack of unity on some key votes.

we don't know what they'll be voting on, but it could be hard for chuck schumer especially to try to get his base together. it will be definitely interesting to see how that's going to play out. especially on the senate floor where they're just going to be giving every speech they can. >> and, frank, i'm interested to see if they are all tripping over each other to come out first and strongest on the president and whatever he's tweeted that day. >> i was talking about republicans critical of the president. democrats are going to be basically running to the cameras. we've seen recently elizabeth warren has been talking to cameras all of a sudden. she would never talk to us before. >> how many years? >> it only took an upcoming potential presidential run for her to start talking to us. they are going to be tripping over themselves to talk to us. it's the key for them is trying to differentiate themselves. that's going to be really hard. >> alex, my question for you, are they going to actually be able to get anything major done in the next year in congress?

there has been some conversation for basically since the president took office about a major infrastructure bill. do you knng of that is going to move? >> i would say probably unlikely especially when you think about how many investigations house democrats are going to be launching into president trump. it's hard to see that they are going to come to the table and agree on something like infrastructure and work in a bipartisan way. but they also were able to just get criminal justice reform done at the end of december, so i think anything is possible. but i'm going with probably unlikely. >> i think senators are -- members of congress are looking at that criminal justice reform passage and how bipartisan that was and how much president trump backed that bill and it passed so overwhelmingly in the senate and passed in the house. it's a situation where i think they are looking at this and, like, okay, maybe we can actually get something done if we throw down our arms and agree on some policies. >> right. i guess we'll take potentially

the president embracing something that members from both parties have been working on. we'll see if any of that can happen with divided government and the first year of what's likely to be a two-year presidential race. thank you all so much for being here. it is going to be quite a year, i think, for all of us. when we come back, the planet in crisis. concerning climate reports were often overshadowed by the political sport of the day. we'll dig into that next. (client's voice) oww, it hurts...

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does seeing this devastation at all change your opinion on climate change, mr. president? >> that was president trump back in november as wildfires ravaged the state of california. the record-setting blazes left nearly 100 people dead and the camp fire alone burned more than 150,000 acres of land. nearly 100 people also died from violent hurricanes that battered the atlantic and gulf coasts in 2018. and a report published in november by the federal government warned climate change would cost the u.s. billions by the end of the century. joining me is climate and energy reporter for "the new york times," coral davenport. you cover climate year round and you've covered these issues for

many, many years. how dire is the problem right now? and did we get anywhere in trying to solve it in 2018 or just one big back slide? >> you mentioned the report that was put out by the federal government by 13 federal agencies published the day after thanksgiving by the white house. that report, the national climate assessment, comes out once every four years and it represents the best science that the u.s. government has on the state of climate change right now. it tells us unequivocally, not only that, you know, what scientists have been telling us clearly for a long time that greenhouse gas emissions are warming the planet. they're caused by fossil fuels. there's not really any scientific debate about that. but it also tells us that we're seeing the impacts of that right now in the united states. the climate change can now -- we can directly attribute some of these things we're seeing,

stronger hurricanes, stronger droughts, stronger wildfires, we can clearly, scientists can clearly draw the links between those events and climate change. and one of the new things in that report is we're able to put price tags on the impact of climate change. that report found that climate change could knock off as much as 10% of the gdp, the nation gdp by the end of the century. this isn't something that is this future existential threat that may affect plants and animals of the future. >> this is hurting -- and it's not even your children. this is hurting us, our livelihoods, taxpayer dollars, property values right now. >> so why when we have all of the evidence in front of us and we can all see just how dire the situation is, what is it about the politics of this issue that make it so difficult for us to take action? >> so in the same way that there is very clear scientific consensus about the cause of climate change and what it's doing, there's also pretty clear consensus in the world of policy about what to do about it.

there's been a survey done among economists, about sort of what is the best economic policy for addressing climate change. and it's pretty much the thing that everyone hates the most. if climate change is caused by fossil fuel emissions and that means burning gasoline, burning coal and burning natural gas, policy experts say the number one sure shot solution is taxing. put a tax on those, missions. >> make it more expensive. >> make gasoline more expense pitch coal-fired electricity more expensive. make our energy more expensive. send that market signal in place. that will drive the market to cleaner sources of energy. but that is probably the most politically toxic proposal that you could put forward. >> and this is a global problem, right? because for many countries that are not as far long on the development index like countries in the west, this may have a greater economic impact. is there a way to make that

ecquitable? >> you're right. climate change is a global problem. the world is warming and it hits the poorest the hardest. globally, people and communities with the fewest resources. bangladesh comes to mind. it's a low-lying island nation where a lot of people have limited resources. when they start flooding, they lose their homes, their -- this is tens of millions of people losing their homes and livelihoods. don't really have anywhere to go. in africa and in latin america and in australia, you start to see the impacts of drought. again, subsistence farmers are losing their livelihoods as a result of climate change. so it really is very unequally balanced.

>> coral davenport, thank you for your reporting. your warnings. quite frankly, hopefully some of our politicians will heed them in the year to come. when we return, back to the bush administration. actress lisa gay hamilton took on the role of condoleezza rice in the movie "vice." she joins me just ahead.

what do you say? >> i want you to be my vp. i want you. you're my vice. >> george, i -- i'm a ceo. of a large company. and i have been secretary of defense, and i have been white house chief of staff. the vice presidency is a mostly symbolic job. >> uh-huh. >> however, if we came to a different understanding. >> welcome back to "kasie dc." believe it or not, that's christian bale playing dick cheney, arguably the most powerful vice president in history in the movie "vice."

you'll also find sam rockwell playing george w. bush, steve carell as rums feld. and lisagay hamilton as condoleezza rice. lisagay, thank you for being here. i really appreciate it. >> thank you for having me. >> so what was it like to try to inhabit somebody that the public knows pretty well. condoleezza rice was obviously a figure during the bush administration, somebody who had a very strong image, quite frankly. i remember her wearing tall boots walking across a tarmac in europe getting a lot of attention. what was your thought process as you started working on this such as adam says come join me, you have to say yes. when there is sam rock well and amy adams, you say, great, great, great i'll do it and knowing i would be portraying condoleezza was actually a treat to be able to portray someone who had so much influence and power during actually both of the bush administrations was tantalizing and interesting and just to be able to learn her cadence, her, the rhythm of her

speaking voice but if you have an incredible makeup artist like i did with kate besco you don't have to work that hard because the makeup does a lot for you already. all of those things put together really was an extraordinary experience for me. >> we were just seeing pictures of you as condoleezza rice. >> doesn't it look good? i love it. >> there it is right there. >> exactly. exactly. >> amazing. >> for sure. >> what did you learn about condoleezza rice and the person and career and herself before you started filming? >> that's a really great question. you know, i think given that she was the first african american female secretary of state after the first african american male

secretary of state colin powell. i knew a lot about her already just by the nature of her being and wanting to know who this black woman was. i can't say i was necessarily surprised as much as what i refamiliarized myself with who she was. it just confirmed how smart she really is and how strong she really is and how much she believes in her own convictions about the world and how we operate and should operate in particular as a country. so i'm not sure that i learned new things about her as much as things were reaffirmed for me. >> did you or other members of the cast talk to any of the people you were playing to their

real life persona. did they participate in the making of the movie? >> i couldn't speak on that but i would be really surprised. i'm sure privately they are watching it but i don't think they will openly say yes, we support this film. i don't think given the portrayals they would. >> is this oriented toward liberal or conservative audiences in particular or a sympathetic portrayal? how would you describe it? >> i can't certainly speak for adam mckay. i think what he would say is that it's a truthful depiction of how he perceives these actual live historical beings, the part they played in the making of the nation during that period of time. i think some of it is sympathetic. i think most of it is truthful and there is playing around with what who george bush was during that time.

i think they, the film makes it seem as though george had nothing to do with it and we know he did although he didn't support the war, and i'm not sure that it caters to or that adam wanted to cater to one particular group or another. i think what is extraordinary about the film is that someone of his nature and stature was able to make a film that is very much who he is as a director. >> well, i'm excited to see the film. "vice" is in theaters everywhere now. lisa gay hamilton, thank you so much. >> it's great to have you. when we come back, what to watch for in the week ahead.

before we go, let's talk about what you're watching in the year ahead. leeann caldwell, what do you think 2019 has in store? >> i'm looking to see if donald trump and nancy pelosi become b.f.f.s or how much that relationship breaks down, that everything is completely stalemated. >> i love the dynamic of donald trump and a woman with a lot of power. >> yeah. >> i'm looking how the moved up california primary leaves democrats campaigning on the left. >> great point. >> early bouts will go out in iowa. it's a massive state and eric garcetti. see how it turns out. >> aside from the president's twitter feed and developments

from the mueller investigation, i'll be watching the larger economy. this is a big reason heading into the big election. you head back to 2016 and a lot of people with the clinton, trump face, i can forgive the personal things. if the economy takes a dip, it doesn't do as well by the end of 2019, that's a big problem for donald trump. >> 2018 is the quiet before the storm even though -- >> i sadly agree with you. >> for me, being you know a democrat, i will be looking at the primary at the presidential primary. i'm really excited about it. it's going to be diverse and i think it's a wide open field. i don't think anyone has this and as we go along the first three months will be interesting. the first six months will be interesting once people start announcing and it will be surprised by who comes out of that. >> i of course, am looking to see what it is house democrats can find out about this president that we don't know because it will be a huge new

frontier, i think, as well as elih, you mentioned the findings of the mueller investigation. thank you-all so much for being here. that will do it for us this year on "kasie d.c." we'll be back next week but for now, good night from washington. this sunday, the climate crisis. >> brace yourselves for dangerous heat and the drought we're in is disastrous. everyone ought to be worried about it. >> rainfall amounts are staggering. >> everything we own was destroyed. >> this is the eyewall hitting right now. the strongest winds. >> and will average temperatures in the u.s. could increase anywhere from 2 to 11 degrees. >> two fast-moving firestorms within miles of each other. >> can you see how intense the flames are right now. >> garden of eden turned into the gates of hell. >> the evidence is everywhere. >> that's my place, so you can answer yourself. >> the science is settled. >> it's wouldn't it be bet first