news political analyst matthew dowd, vice and the washington bureau chief shawna thompson, rick klein, and we have jenniferviewed the president just this week, and we're going to get to that in just a minute, but i have to start with you with the new poll numbers from the abc news/ "washington post" poll. president trump has the lowest approval rating heading into his first midterm election of any president since 1954. how much will he loom over those elections? >> this election is all about donald trump, but neither party disputes that. in fact, the president boasts of that a couple of times a week on the campaign tra, approval rating, that is 10 points below where presidents obama or clinton were at this point in the election, and 12 points below reagan, and all three of these men suffered devastating losses. i have been talking to republican strategists the last couple of days and they are making the case that a lot of their candidates can isolate themselves from the president, but they look at that 36% number and a couple of them made the same point to me. i can see why that could get worse between now