good evening, and thanks for being with us tonight. i'm rachel maddow here at msnbc headquarters. precisely one fishing pole's length away from my colleagues nicolle wallace and joy reid. that's actually a technical -- brian williams will join us later tonight. we are here, of course, for the final debate of the 2020 presidential campaign which started approximately 4,000 years ago. although, we have learned in this apoch in our nation's history to never predict

anything too far into the future. we think this debate is going to be happening just under one hour from now. debate one, of course, was widly seen as a debacle particularly for the president. his plunging poll numbers immediately thereafter bared that out even before he tested positive for the coronavirus just days later. debate two never happened because the president refused to do that one. tonight ahead of what we expect to be debate three, the president and his campaign have spent the whole week complaining about and, frankly, telling lies about the agreed-upon rules for this debate. they have tried to bully the presidential debate commission into changes the topics for tonight's debate. the president, himself, has repeatedly attacked the moderator of tonight's debate, the one and only estimable nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker. adding to the peculiar drama that attends that kind of performative petulance, the president arrives at tonight's debate having stormed out of

another occasion in which he felt he was being questioned too strongly. the white house today releasing its own recording of a "60 minutes" interview that seemed to undo the president in which he angrily cut short. as of right now, though, tonight's debate is on and we expect it to go 90 minutes. hopefully, with both candidates staying for the whole thing. we'll see. anything could happen. today, republicans on the judiciary committee forwarded amy coney barrett's supreme court nomination to the floor of the senate. there has never been a supreme court nomination advanced anywhere near this close to an election. democrats refused to take part in the committee vote on barrett today, instead putting photos in their chairs of americans who stand to lose health coverage if the supreme court strikes down obamacare. coronavirus cases continue to rise in the nearly every state in the country. midwestern and plains states now facing hospital bed shortages. atop of all that, we have last night's somewhat perplexing statement from the trump-appointed director of national intelligence, saying iran was interfering in the

election by sending threatening emails to democratic voters. telling them to vote for president trump or else. the intelligence director characterized this as an effort to hurt president trump, which seems backwards since those emails were threatening democrats to vote for president trump. today, the fbi and the homeland security department cybersecurity agency followed that up with a warning that high-level russian hackers have successfully breached computer networks in state and local governments and that, quote, there may be some risk to elections information housed on local government networks. all this happening with the election just 12 days away. as of today, over 42 million americans have already cast their ballots in this election by nbc's count which means every single day the number of persuadable voters available to trump or biden is rinki ingshri millions not just because voters are making up their minds but because they've already voted. if americans vote in the same numbers as we did in 2016,

already, we've got somewhere between a quarter and a third of the vote already cast, with 12 days still to go including whatever is going to happen at this final debate tonight. i have a sense of trepidation that i think is now epidemic to everything i do in life. i particularly have a sense of trepidation about tonight because the first debate was a debacle. it was a disaster. not just for one of the two -- one of the two candidates, but i think for our democratic process. >> yeah. >> debate two getting called off. >> right. >> and now this. i just, i feel like i'm halfway under the desk. >> well, look, i think the information eases anxiety, right, and like, here's the information that is available to us right now. as we sit here today, no trump adviser that i was able to reach on the phone, the ones that have recovered from the covid that they got at the white house superspreader event, and you have to look at that debate prep team. most of them were taken out by covid infections. bill stepien, donald trump's

campaign manager, chris christie, his debate coach, hope hicks who was in and out of debate prep, was leveled with an infection, herself. his entire press office staff was out. so those are the kinds of people you want around when you're preparing for your final chance to make a case to the largest tv audience you're going to garner before an election, you were losing in every poll. and what i asked these folks is when was the last day, the last news cycle, lasting longer than 6 to 12 hours, that dronald trup sustained an argument against joe biden. no one could answer the question. now, he sometimes makes attacks against someone with the last name, biden, but he's not running for president. and he sustained a four-day campaign against tony fauci after "60 minutes" appearance and he's now been at war with lesley stahl from "60 minutes" for i think about 22 hours. that's all fine and good. it's his prerogative. that's not how he closed 2016. in 2016 he was running as an anti-war republican which

appealed to republicans, appe appealed appea appealed to a lot of people after the wars in iraq and afghanistan and he was running and pointing and he was looking, he was connecting with the forgotten men and women. he hasn't said a word about any of those things. neither as he promised or explained w eed why he didn't b back manufacturing jobs. this is not the candidate who ran four years aegsz a s ago an trump coalition. now, his job tonight isn't just to -- we should stop talking about the trump voter. he's got them. they're in the bag. there may be some of the vote that's -- he -- his coalition fell apart the day after election day in '16. they showed us that in '18. and he's done nothing to bring one single member of that coalition back and this days-long jihad against tony fauci, i expect we'll have more days against "60 minutes" will do nothing to repair his political damage. >> yeah, it's sort of like to the point you made, right, he's not running to try to talk to the forgotten voter. he's actually running to kind of

deride them. he goes to erie, pennsylvania, he goes to iowa, and says i don't even want to be here. >> he does that all over the place. why does he do that? >> right. he's angry that he can't reproduce the conditions that got him elected and you've seen him try really hard to reproduce those same conditions that existed against hillary clinton. now, we have 13 days out from the election, that weird press conference by john ratcliffe that tries to sort of reproduce the comey moment where like right before the election there's an fbi bombshell that reshuffles the race again but that fizzled because no one's buying that an order that -- unless you want to get hurt, you're going to vote for donald trump, is designed to hurt donald trump. no one is buying what john ratcliffe is selling. he ain't no comey. no one's believing it. then you have this attempt to sort of smear joe biden as this sort of lascivious figure. the thing he faced ed in 2016. people blew it off, he speaks to me, speaks to my soul somehow.

trying to do a weird qanon on him, enlist him in the qanon conspiracy is not going to work. there's lots of tape of him being lascivious toward his own daughter. none of that is working. trump seems to be feeling frustration. i have a republican friend that i've talked to about it who knows the trump world a bit and it's like, basically saying that donald trump is extremely frustrated because he only has that one playbook that he used against hillary clinton and he doesn't understand why it's not working against joe biden. and for one thing, joe biden doesn't have the same sort of negative relationship with the media, let's just be blunt, that hillary clinton had for 40 years. and she doesn't have the same negative relationship -- she had this thing built up against her for more than 40 years by the right that made her into this supervillain. joe biden is just joe. he's a sort of amicable, you know, center-left figure that isn't in any way objectionable to people. so you just can't do the same thing. he's not a woman, also. i think that helps. and so this whole playbook isn't working.

i think he's just angry, think he's just pissed off. >> here's one thing, i don't think we can call it a playbook. he ran an inside straight in '16. no one sat around and made a plan. >> no, he got lucky. >> joe biden is known, too. the reason -- >> that's right. >> -- none of these attacks has landed. someone said to me there's a place in trump's reptilian brain that knew joe biden represented a threat to the trump coalition. that's why he got imp peaeached >> this reminds me of the late seasons of "the apprentice" when it wasn't working anymore, wasn't entertaining anymore. the thing peopleapprentice" ill donald trump wasn't in "the apprentice" that much. i didn't watch. most of the show was omarosa and them doing a task. they did a whole thing, they came in at the end, he came in and said "you're fired." >> he was the charlie angels figure. >> he was the charlie angels guy. for the first time a lot of americans who only knew him from

"the apprentice" are experiencing him full-time 24 hours a day and don't like it. >> i will say, counterpoint, in 2016 at this point in the race, everybody's talking right now about how much more money joe biden has than donald trump has and joe biden is absolutely more than lapping trump in terms of money. trump had no money at this point in the race in 2016. >> yeah. >> he was below $20 million in terms of his campaign war chest at this point in the campaign in 2016. cle completely outgunned financially and still won. i'll also say every incumbent president blows their first debate and does terribly which has the effect of boosting the other candidate and lowering expectations for how the president's going to do in the subsequent debate. now, usually there are two more debates. this year there's only one. i'm expecting a strong performance tonight from donald trump. i thing he's sometimes at his best when his back is against the wall. he doesn't take advice but has good instincts about how to take other people down. i think the biden campaign is maybe more confident than they need to be at this point. i -- >> they're not confident.

they are never -- democrats are never confident. it's not a thing democrats know how to be. >> all right. let's put some numbers on this. for me on where the race stands heading into tonight's final presidential debate, let's turn to somebody who actually knows these things, steve kornacki. steve, where you think -- what should people understand about where the race is at right now? >> let's take two different views. first, a 30,000-foot view. here's your national polling average coming into tonight. biden with a lead basically of eight points on average over trump now. how does that compare to where we were at this same point four years ago? this same point far out from the election. you can see it was october 27th, same number of days to the election, clinton's lead at that point, 5.6. basically 5 1/2 points. now, the key thing to remember i think when you see these numbers side by side, two things, number one, biden is over 50% in the average and been over 50% for a while. number two, this 5.6 number was on its way down at this point. we were two days out in 2016 from the comey letter, the late

development in that race and by the end of the campaign, hillary clinton's average polling lead was about 2 1/2 to 3 points so that's the question here, when you see about 8, is that going to stay at 8 or is that going to start to move down because that was part of the ingredients for trump in 2016, the polling average nationally moved down at the end of that campaign. so let's see what happens there. then there's the question here, let's take a look at the battleground states in three categories. this first category, this is biden's cleanest route to the white house. these are three states that trump flipped there 2016. you can see barely flipped them. trump's margin in wisconsin, pennsylvania, and michigan, less than a point in each state. every one of these states had been democratic since the 1980s until that night in 2016 when trump flipped it. and look at the polling averages in these three states right now. it's biden by seven. biden by about 5 1/2. biden by about 6 1/2. these are the strongest swing states for joe biden and from an electoral college perspective,

if joe biden goes 3 for 3, he's president-elect joe biden. donald trump has to find a way to hang on to one of these three midwest states that he won by a fraction of a point in 2016. otherwise, that electoral vote count goes under 274. next tier of battleground states, these were trump wins by a small margin. florida, arizona, north carolina, in 2016. and what do we see in the polling average now? we see biden leads. they're smaller biden leads. two, three, about two points in north carolina. again, these are biden leads. and the scenario we just talked about where trump pulls out one of those midwest states, he's now going to need all three of these states so you can see, he's running from behind, what amount to must-win states for him then these are the states where trump had solid wins in 2016. mid, high, single digits. georgia, ohio, texas, iowa. these are reach states. were supposed to be reach states for joe biden and actually see

right now on average very slightly biden leads in georgia on average. it's very slight, but that is a democratic lead in the poll average. ohio, razor thin. .2 of a point for trump right now. texas, trump still with a lead of four there. again, iowa, where trump almost won by ten in 2016, very, very slight biden lead in the poll right now. these are the states, though, when you look at the electoral college map, are probably gravy for joe biden. he'd be getting a lot more probably if he picks off one of these. >> steve kornacki, thank you very, very much. that is clarifying and also sort of, like, riveting in its clarity actually. all right. i have a feeling we're going to be back with steve later on before we get to the start of tonight's debate. now i want to bring into the conversation symone sanders, senior adviser to the biden campaign. ms. sanders, it's a pleasure to have you with us on such a busy fight. thanks for taking the time to be here. >> thanks for having me. >> let me ask you about some of the things i've been discussing

with joy and nicolle already. that's our expectations for tonight. i'm going to take the libber tv acharacterizing my colleagues as saying they think the president is all over the map right now and that vice president biden needs to basically stay the course and not change anything that he's doing. does that analysis from us outsiders here looking in comport with how you guys are approaching it from inside the campaign? >> well, we might say it a little differently, you know, tonight joe biden, he's ready. he's prepared. and folks have heard me say this before but tonight on the debate stage, he's going to speak directly to the american people about what's going on with their families. and we're going to put this focus squarely on them. you know, president trump, we expect, is going to come to the debate tonight and talk about everything but his failure to mitigate this virus, and the failures of this administration, but from our perspective, the reality is that every single day across this country americans are waking up and living through and seeing in real time the president's failures. it is dictating their very lives, the fact that i'm wearing

a mask while we're doing this interview. so, yes, joe biden is going to -- you're going to see him turning the camera tonight. going to see him talking about his plans to get this virus under control. what me would do as president, as it relates to the economy, w. it was literally incomprehensible for most of it, almost entirely because of the president just steamrollering the rules. and talking over the vice president constantly and being unable to follow even basic direction in terms of how the debate was supposed to go. for you and your campaign for vice president biden, what was the lesson learned there in terms of how to compete with that, about the right way to comport one's self if the president does that same thing again? we know there will be different circumstances around the microphones and when they are on and off, for example, but aside from that, how do you intend to handle that sort of disruptive, sort of transgressive, debate behavior from the president if he brings that again? >> well, you know, this is

really about presidential temperament, and this isn't really about the mics where they're muted or turned down. this is about if donald trump, the current president of the united states, is going to come to the debate tonight and talk about plans for the future and the american people or if he's going to come with the intent to distract and lie. again, regardless of what he decides to do, though, joe biden will be there to speak directly to the american people and he won't be distracted by the president's antics and i mean, that's just really how we have to handle it. folks who are tuning in tonight who are sitting in their living rooms, who will be at their kitchen tables watching this debate, are really watching to figure out what these candidates have to say about this virus. this pandemic that they're living through. grave economic devastation. i would also think folks that, you know, people are watching to hear what the president really has to say about pre-existing conditions. you know, i saw the news much like everyone else today when the president in his "60 minutes" interview that he leaked said he wants the supreme court to do away with

pre-existing conditions. he hopes they end it. they're in court right now trying to take it away. joe biden, a staunch defender of not only pre-existing conditions but the affordable care act. health care is something that's on the top of mind for folks at home. so, again, we're squarely focused on the american people tonight. the folks in their living room, at their kitchen tables, people who are probably missing a loved one this evening because the virus has stolen their lives. >> symone, i wonder, i aso souse vice president is receiving intelligence briefings as the nominee for his party and senator harris is still on the intel committee. i wonder if it's your campaign's understanding that what the dni said last night is true, that iran is interfering in our election to hurt donald trump, so said dni ratcliffe. >> so, first of all, i want to be clear, i am not receiving any classified briefing, and, obviously, if the vice president and/or senator harris have been in receipt of classified

information, that's not something i'd repeat here. let me tell you what we do know, we do know more than 50 intelligence officials from the obama/biden administration, from the trump administration, have noted that there is election interference happening in this election by russia, chief among them, okay? we do know that there are efforts under way from many foreign actors trying to meddle in this election and undermine the will and the confidence of the voters. we also know that there is domestic interference happening in this election. chief among them is the president of the united states who, in our opinion, is trying to scare people from going to the polls, but we believe that the american people are going to be heard in this election. and that is why with 12 days to go until election day we've seen unprecedented voter turnout. we are not overly confident about that turnout. what that says to me is people are paying attention and tonight what it will be incumbent upon joe biden to do is speak to those folks who are tuning in, who are listening and talk to them about the realities we're facing here in this country. yes, that includes the meddling

of our elections by foreign actors but also includes a message that says go to the polls and vote. make your voices heard. this is our country. as joe biden always says, this is the united states of america, there's nothing we can't do if we come together. >> hey, symone, it's joy. let me ask you, you know, those. who know donald trump, people who know him including his niece, mary trump, and others, have essentially said prepare for donald trump to go as low as possible. this may be his last opportunity to speak to a broad audience and try to make a case that i think his campaign would like him to make about the economy and taxes, but there's a lot of expectations that he'll skip that and he'll go as brutally low and ugly and personal about joe biden's family as he possibly can. what's been the preparation for former vice president biden about that and what is he prepared to do in response? >> so, joy, unfortunately, if the president decides to attack joe biden and his family tonight

on the debate stage, it won't be the first time that that's happened. you know, donald trump tried this. it didn't work. we saw how joe biden responded in the last debate. called it out as smears, ugly smears designed to attack his family for no reason except i guess the president thinks it's politically popular, political aadvantageous for him. but then you saw in the debate that joe biden went to the camera and talked to the american people directly about, you know, about opioid abuse and about how there are many people across this country that have struggled like his family has struggled and that as the president, he will be a president not just for them but for all folks. so if donald trump would like to attack vice president biden's family tonight, i don't know how well that's going to go over with the voters. joe biden, he'll be ready. let's just be clear, if the president decides to amplify these latest smears about the vice president and his surviving son, that is russian misinformation. okay? that is what he is doing. we should call it as such.

>> symone sanders, senior adviser to the joe biden campaign. ms. sanders, thank you so much for making time to talk with us on such a big night. we know you're hotly in demand right now. we appreciate you being here. >> thank you, guys, i'll see you soon. >> all right. we are less than an hour away from the start of the next and final presidential debate. the news is still, of course, at a rolling boil. that never stops. we got lots more to get to tonight. stay with us. i'm looking for my client. i'm his accountant. i'm so sorry. [ sighs ] hey! hey man! you're here. you don't trust me here is vegas, do you? well... i thought we had a breakthrough with the volkswagen. we did. yes. we broke through. that's the volkswagen! that's the cross sport. wow. seatbelts. ♪ please, just tell me where we're going. ♪

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here's a live shot of the auditorium tonight inside belmont university, nashville, tennessee. all set up for tonight's presidential debate. now, you will see there on the stage, if you look closely, the lights are dim but you can still see. the podiums are quite far apart from each other as they should be, no plexiglas barriers

between the podiums on the same. the commission on debates told nbc news they'd initially planned for there to be plexiglas between the two candidates but the commission and their miedical adviser decided they would take down those barriers after each candidate tested negative for covid today. the decision also involved some consultation with dr. anthony fauci who of late has become one of the president's favorite punching bags even though he's one of the most trusted people in the country. one of the primary topics in tonight's debate will be fighting the coronavirus. we're currently losing that battle by basically every imaginable metric. our beloved colleague, the hostz be has been looking at we are on covid heading into the final debate. >> i wish i was coming to you tonight with good news but there's very little to be found. the fact is the coronavirus is raging across the country utterly uncontrolled right now.

experiencing the much feared fall outbreak and arguably as bad a spot as we have been in since march. things could get much, much worse very quickly as many health experts have been warning. according to covid tracking project, there were over 76,000 new cases today. the second most recorded in a single day in this country. seven states posted daily records on thursday. the death toll just today was over 1,100 of our fellow americans. the highest since the middle of september. that is going back up as you can see on that chart. what makes this even worse than april and midsummer is those outbreaks were fairly localized. they were intense brutal o outbreaks but largely concentrated in a few different metro areas. this outbreak we're in right now is broadly distributed throughout the country. it is in many rural areas with little hospital capacity and shows no sign of abating. the worst hotspot in america right now is north dakota which earlier today confirmed over a thousand new cases in the state. for context about how bad things are there, if north dakota was a

country, it would have the worst coronavirus outbreak in the entire world on a per capita basis. want to say that again. north dakota has the worst covid outbreak in the world right now. the outbreak is not just north dakota, it's everywhere. new york state, where the first outbreak was so terrible just reported the most new cases since may. that's not great. the governor of indiana is deploying the national guard to help nursing homes. the university of michigan has ordered students to shelter in place on campus as cases skyrocket. wisconsin just admitted its very first coronavirus patient to a field hospital the state had to set up in a state fair park. and a hospital official in twin falls, idaho, said, quote, this is the worst spot we've ever been in. we're getting to the point where if we're need to transfer patients out, it's not clear where we're going to be sending them. despite all of that, there's still no national strategy from president trump about how we stop the virus from raging out of control and killing thousands and thousands and thousands of americans who do not need to die.

in the video you guys were talking about before, trump released because he thought it would reflect well on him, the president told cbs' lesley stahl he got stuck with covid and it was not his fault. the president got top-line medical care paid for by american taxpayers. most people are not that lucky and until someone steps in to help them, they are stuck with it, too. back to you, rachel. >> thank you, my friend. chris hayes, host of "all in with chris hayes." we'll just say that questions about covid seem to be one of the things that really sets this president off in terms of being unable to handle answering questions. we're watching right now, i believe, i stand corrected if i'm not right, but i believe that is the biden motorcade arriving at the site of tonight's presidential debate. we're going to take another quick break here. we're steaming toward the top of the hour and we expect this debate to start. kristen welker will be out before then addressing the audience talking about tonight's ground rules. we'll be here for all of it. stay with us. n it.

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it's a live shot of the hall where tonight's third and final -- well, second and final -- presidential debate will be held. earlier today, ahead of tonight's debate the president tried to one up the cbs news show, "60 minutes," maybe, by preemptively posting on facebook a white house recording of his 40-minute sit-down interview with veteran reporter lesley stahl. this is the interview that the president apparently ditched and ran out on before it was over because he didn't like stahl's questions. cbs isn't planning to run the interview until sunday. the president said he published his own recording of the interview today to expose what he called the bias, hatred, and rudeness that cbs has toward him. actually, what the president made clear by posting this interview is he doesn't like what he considers to be tough questions. including tough seemingly simple questions like, why don't you

tell people to wear masks? >> i can't believe after what happened in the rose garden here, after the announcement, with all the people getting sick -- >> yeah. >> -- that you are not being more strongly encouraging about wearing masks -- >> i am. >> -- at your rallies. >> i tell people -- >> you don't. >> lesley, we hand out thousands of masks. >> but you look out and they're not wearing them and you don't say, please put on your mask. >> had you been looking yesterday, take a look -- take a look yesterday in arizona. everybody behind me -- >> i'm looking at other places. i'm looking at wisconsin, which is a hotspot right now. >> right. right. a lot of people had masks. >> lot of people -- >> it was outside. >> why aren't you getting up there and saying -- >> i. >> -- i had it, i don't want you to get it. >> lesley -- >> please put your masks on. >> -- we hand out masks to everybody who comes to the rally. we tell them to wear the masks. >> you don't. they love you. >> i don't know, lesley. >> if they heard you say it -- >> i have no problem.

>> they love you. >> next question. go ahead. >> they would pay attention to anything you said. >> i hope you're right. >> next question. he thinks there's another reporter he can go to there. next question. still going to be her. no matter what. along with posting that video on facebook today, the president promised, "tonight's anchor," i think he means tonight's debate moderate e "tonight's anchor kristen welker will ask far worse questions th" than the on he got from "60 minutes" that caused him to get up and walk out on the interview. the president spent the past few days publicly attacking kristen welker at his rallies, on fox news and other members of the press trying to undermine her ahead of the debate, trying to work the refs as he always does. accused miss welker of being dyed in the wool radical left democrat, being terrible and unfair and called her flat-out, quote, no good. actually, in reality, you should know that kristen welker is very good, among the best there is in this business. she is scrupulously fair.

she works incredibly hard. she is always prepared. she always knows what she's talking about. you cannot push her around. and you cannot find an ounce of bias in her if you had a geiger counter, a dousing rod and million-dollar bounty to do it. good luck trying to work that hard enough to get yourself an easy night. i will say, i'm sorry to, like, effuse there a little bit. i feel defensive about our colleague. joy, does the working the ref thing help? i don't thick it's goink it's gk on kristen welker. >> no. >> does it work on creating expectations of the audience that are beneficial to the audience? >> yes, i think it works for his audien audience. it sets him up if he does a poor job, he can blame it on kristen welker. it only works with his audience. i will say among the people who agree with you that kristen welker is literally one of the best in the business, myself, i'm one of the people who agrees with you, nicolle, but also donald trump because donald

trump was praising her. re pl we played it earlier on my show. he was praising her to the high heavens when she first got onto the "today" show, he was like, congratulations, what a good hire, you're going to be great. he agrees kristen welker is one of the best in the business. he's only doing this because he thinks he might not do well, not get good reviews and setting it up to blame kristen. >> they agreed to the commission of presidential debates -- >> nobody is moderating a debate that both campaigns didn't agree to. >> right. >> i think rudy i think represented him, a direct line, from one man's brain to the other. i think something to keep in mind when you watch this is, one, his audience is a lot -- his audience is the country tonight and his audience is not going to like it if he attacks her and if he walks out. i think he's creating a permission structure for himself to do what you said at the beginning, i wrote down your very good words, performative petulance. >> yeah. >> he is creating the conditions

for his own performative petulance tonight. >> yeah. >> so if he storms out or if he gets muted and has a fit, he has to do -- he has told us these attacks are fake. >> he told lesley stahl that these attacks are fake. >> he told the editor of "the new york times," oh, i'm sorry that i endangered journalists in war zones and all -- i got to do what i got to do. he has told us that he gaslights for kicks. he has told us he starts fights with the media so that twitter is titillated all day long. he has told us that this is what he does. we know he doesn't mean these things about kristen welker. i have to say, i was on a zoom with kristen a couple weeks ago, she had papers all over the place and the people who have done the most damage to donald trump, not just among a general public but among his own coalition, again, that 2016 coalition is what he hasn't been able to reassemble, had been the most repaired journalists. savannah guthrie, jonathan swan. and would appear from what we've

seen from the "60 minutes" interview lesley stahl and kristen welker is very much a journalist in that mold. >> can i say, you know, donald trump tonight is supposed to try to change the position that he's in right now with 12 days to go. he only has time. the temptation that he has to be where he always wanted to be, he's always i'm sure wanted to be on "60 minutes" because to him -- >> he live tweets it every sunday no matter what they cover. >> so he walks into really a disaster, but because his pride puts him on "60 minutes," he must be there be, that's a sign of success. just like having a time -- he has to fake one. the think the problem he has is trumpism only works for people who already believe in it. it doesn't recruit new people. >> yeah. >> this isn't a national tv show where you watch "the apprentice" everybody goes, okay, maybe i like donald trump. he's narrowcasted so much. >> totally. >> to the right-wing media that when you see him in the open in the normal world, people are aghast and appalled. >> and i will note that it is an undercurrent what we're talking

about tonight, this prospect that the debate might not happen. even though it's 20 minutes away or the president might walk out in the middle of it. that is an -- it's bizarre in itself that that is part of what we are thinking about. i want to bring into the conversation, though, now, former 2008 obama campaign manager, senior white house advis adviser, david plouffe. mr. plouffe, thank you very much for joining us and helping us out here. i want to put to you the counterproposition, not that donald trump might storm out of the debate tonight, or that he might not make it all the way to the podium when the clock strikes 9:00 eastern, i want to put to you the prospect that maybe joe biden shouldn't have agreed to this debate tonight. after the president broke all the rules of the first one including the rule about wlorpt including the rule about w whether or notlorpt he should have been covid tested and the president bailed on the second deba debate. with joe biden ahead, should he have maybe not said yes to this tonight? >> it's an interesting question rachel, but i don't think so. first of all, the first debate was a disaster for trump. if i was biden, i'd rather have had three debates, not just two.

secondly, i don't think you can take shortcuts to the oval office. i think you have to run through the process. and i think in politics like in sports, it's really dangerous to play it overly safe. and i think the first segment tonight's on covid. i just heard chris hayes' report about cases rising, hospitalizations rising. we know it sets trump off. he wants to be done with covid, but covid's not over, done with us. obviously, also in the "60 minutes" interview, basically cheering on the supreme court to get rid of the affordable care act in the middle of the pandemic. so the debate starts on really great terrain for joe biden. i think that's not just winning the debates on those issues. it could really set the tone for the debate . no, you have to run through the tape in a presidential race. >> david plouffe, i remember in the heat of the mueller investigation you'd come on my show and say democrats have got to get back to health care and the economy. i was like really, this is so riveting. this election seem tos to be closing on the question of now donald trump's now stated --

this isn't investigative reporting that revealed donald trump wants to take away people's health insurance. it's donald trump in his own words, his motive for his latest pick to the supreme court and ending in the middle -- once in a century health crisis for the country. i also noted with keen interest and been waiting to talk to you about it that joe biden has fought to a draw the must be li public's t approval, on the economy, could the conditions be any more favorable in terms of the topics in the news right now for joe biden? >> no. but these are random topics. they're important topics because donald trump failed as our president. we have over 200,000 people dead. we could be facing a third wave which could be worse than the previous two. we've got an economy in tattered. we've got a country that's divided. we have -- i think what you're going to see tonight, we may see a blend particularly in this first section on covid of an incompetent sociopath which is not a healthy combination, and so i just think this really

suits joe biden well. in many respects, there may be other presidential races where joe biden may not have been the ideal candidate. his empathy, his experience, his calmness, his knowledge of how the government operates, i think does fit this moment. and so, right, i think you're right, nicolle, that these are good topics but they're good topics for joe biden because donald trump has so blundered them and doesn't van answer. >> right. >> he gets so uncomfortable talking about covid. can you imagine fdr getting uncomfortable talking about world war ii? >> right. >> it's unbelievable. >> that's bad. how dare you. >> david -- >> it's like it's happening to him. >> right. it already did happen to him. i mean, he did get covid. >> it did. >> so, we all experienced the catharsis of watching president obama just go off, like, for nearly an hour, probably even more than an hour, on donald trump, you know, to the extent that, you know, the rat battle

ether music was being played under it on twitter. joe biden a little bit, is it time for joe biden at this stage in the race, particularly if donald trump goes after his family and gets personal, to just say, you know what, i'm going off. i'm done with this. i'm done with you going after my kid. and just pull an obama. or do you think that he's better off sort of leaving things the way they are because he seems to be winning with sort of mild-mannered joe? >> well, joy, it is clear that president obama had some things to get off his chest. >> for four years, he's been waiting. >> you know, you can't go to philly and not tell it like it is. so he brought some truth bombs. you know, i would be careful. i thing you wak you want to be trump's mismanagement of covid. tough on trump's coddling of billionaires. be tough on trump basically endangering the planet. there's going to be a climate change section tonight. i wouldn't necessarily get in a

tit for tat about the family. to an extent he's going to bring up hunter biden five times, you know, yeah, of course, there's a lot of ammunition there. the trump family is basically pulling off a grift and con on the american people. all the self-dealing, all the money they're charging taxpayers for their properties, plus we now find out he wants to talk about china, he's got a secret chinese bank account. the united states president. so, i think you want to have the ammunition in your pocket but i would try to -- you don't want to get into the mud with trump, necessarily, on personal stuff. >> former obama campaign manager, senior white house adviser, david plouffe. david, always good to have you with us. thanks for your time tonight. >> thanks. >> all right. we are going to squeeze in one last break before the debate gets under way at the top of the hour. lots more still to come. stay with us. water? why?! ahhhh! incoming! ahhhahh! i'm saved! water tastes like, water. so we fixed it. mio

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♪ ♪ ♪ (boy reading) ♪ find the nonpartisan facts behind the real stories at usafacts.org ♪ a live look at the debate stage at belmont university in nashville, tennessee.

in just a few minutes we're expecting nbc's kristen welker to come out, greet the audience, and lay out the ground rules for tonight's debate. i'm such a dork, it's one of my favorite things about a debate, when they say, you're allowed to applaud twice, once now. we expect we'll hear that in just a moment. ly i will go to it even if there's no sound. let's go back to steve kornacki. steve, there's a question as to when we are going to know whether election night will be election week or election month. florida, whether or not their results will be determinative, whether or not we'll find out the results on election night. >> the vast majority of florida

closes at 7:00 p.m. eastern. it's also a state that administratively was kind of doing covid elections before there was a covid. heavy mail-in voting, heavy early voting, processing the ballots early, figuring out how to get results reported out quickly. so the potential exists to get a lot of results pretty quickly from florida and the electoral college implications, 306 for trump in 2016. if trump loses florida, that wouldn't put trump under 270 but it would put him on the cusp of falling under 270. at that point, a north carolina, for instance, would put biden over the top. or a pennsylvania would put biden over the top. or a michigan would put over the top. you get the picture here? anything in the midwest, a georgia, a north carolina, he would effectively be won state

away, biden would, from the presidency, if he could get florida. it's a huge "if." there was a trump win in 2016. republicans were resilient there in 2018. but of course we've seen in the polling in florida, senior citizens, we've seen it in florida and nationally, it's a worrying sign for trump. florida would be an early readout. >> let's drill down on some of that. steve kornacki, thank you very much. one of the potentially dedetermid determinative factors is the latino vote. we want to bring in somebody who knows quite a lot about hispanic outreach, an msnbc contributor and the author of "finding latinx." thank you very much for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> whenever the cameras aren't

on and we're talking amongst ourselves, what we're talking about is the latino vote in arizona and florida in terms of trying to figure out what's about to happen. what do you think a national audience should understand about those dynamics right now? >> first of all, the latino vote is not a monolith, right? both arizona and florida tell you exactly why. in arizona, i was just there last week, you have the young latino vote, a lot of young latino voters will be voting because they saw their parents be criminalized by legislation like sb 1070, and by joe arpaio. in arizona, 40% of young latino men say they might be voting for donald trump. in that same state, suddenly you have latina women inching towards joe biden in a way they haven't before. in just one state, in one county, maricopa county, responsible for 60% of the entire state, those votes are counted in that one county, you see three different dynamics within the latino vote which

explains how hard it is to tell the story of the latino vote. forget about florida, the question is will cuban voters go again for trump or will it be another 2012 dynamic where suddenly the younger cuban americans voted for president obama. >> do you see the candidates and their campaigns appreciating that diversity and tailoring their outreach to different latino communities in ways that show they understand those differences? >> not yet, right? i think we're starting to see, and i think all people need to understand and all people need to see to understand how diverse they are. look at the latinos that are running for congress. if some of these folks win, y'all see the first gay latina in congress, the first afro latina in congress, the first latino-arab. that is the future of the latino vote, that is the latino community. i think they get it more, they're paying more attention.

i still think they're scared to ask basic questions. >> paolo ramos, thank you. let's go to kristen welker talking to the audience in the debate hall. >> so glad you're feeling better. dr. jill biden, thank you all for being here tonight. we are so excited, we're looking forward to a really robust discussion and the only thing i would reiterate are the cpd guidelines that when the candidates are talking, please hold any applause or any other reactions, except of course when they walk out, make sure you cheer loud with applause to make sure everyone can hear you. thank you for having me, this is really the honor of a lifetime. i am going to sit down and just get organized and get settled, and the show will start very soon. thank you for being here. >> nbc news' kristen welker, giving those ground rules to the audience. the key moment is that the audience is not supposed to

react to anything that happens onstage except for the moment when the candidates are invited onto the stage. remarkably, even at the first debate, which was a proverbial car crash, the audience was actually not a factor at all, i think because people were so agog. as we count down the remaining minutes until the start of the debate, let's squeeze in one more of our friends here, someone who is the leader of the national republican party until not that long ago, but boy, does the republican party feel different now. just this week former rnc chairman michael steele made this announcement, he said, i am a republican voting for joe biden over trump because i am an american first. joining us now our friend michael steele, senior adviser to the lincoln project now. michael, it's great to see you tonight, thank you so much. >> it's good to be with you, absolutely. >> do you feel transformed by your public endorsement by putting yourself out there the way that you have? >> i feel free. >> we've been free for a long time. >> although, although, i think i have to comment on the

performance petulance, rachel, awesome, love it. >> thank you, i'm working on my alliteration. >> i think trump may be looking for some viagra supplement on that. but the reality of it is, he's got to come with the "a" game tonight. and he's got to work hard to convince the american people to give him four more years which is something he has not done yet. so this is his last opportunity, because after tonight, with 40 million americans already having voted, where do you go, if you don't close that deal? >> michael, do you think that the biden campaign should have learned anything from debate one in terms of dealing with the steamroller effect of trump just running through all the rules, all the talking over? maybe that will be fixed tonight with this thing they're going to do with turning off one of the mics when the other is talking. should biden adjust to the way trump behaved in debate one? >> yes, absolutely. the one thing i would do if i

were in the vice president's shoes is pace myself. let trump get it out of his system. the more he shows his behind, the better it is for you to come in over the top as reasonable, solid, speaking to the american people. don't try to do the engage thing, don't take the bait on hunter. i know it's your son. don't take the bait. hit it one time and move on because everything after that is gratuitous. so the reality for trump is, he's going to try, instead of doing what i said before, convince americans to reelect him, he's going to try to draw biden into the murky quagmire of his soup. the reality for biden is, i'm not doing that, america, this is what i need you to know in the last two weeks of this campaign, and why you need to voteor