AMNA NAWAZ: The nation mourns a trailblazing first lady, and a Band-Aid budget won't heal the nation's divides or congressional dysfunction in the election year to come.

We will break that down in today's Politics Monday with USA Today's Susan Page and Tamara Keith of NPR.

Amy Walter is away.

And good to see you both here.

Susan, before we move deeper into politics, you have covered Rosalynn Carter before.

You were with her on a 1979 trip to Thailand when she was meeting with refugees?

As we're remembering her life and legacy, what stays with you?

SUSAN PAGE, Washington Bureau Chief, USA Today: She was a serious person.

She took and defined a more serious role for the first lady than most of her predecessors.

And on that trip to Thailand, she went to these desperate -- these desperate refugee camps with Cambodians.

I remember she picked up a child, cradled the child, talked to the mother.

That picture went around the globe.

It shone a spotlight on the plight of these refugees.

And she said to this -- to the refugees: "I'm going to go home and tell my husband about you."

And I guarantee you that she did that because she weighed in on the most serious policy matters with her husband.

They had not only the longest White House marriage in our history.

They had one of the closest partnerships in the White House that we have ever seen.

AMNA NAWAZ: Such a remarkable life.

Well, in the meantime, back here on Washington, on the front here, it's a good time to do kind of a temperature check, Tam, so, on both the presidential race and Capitol Hill.

Congress did avoid a government shutdown, but there's another potential one looming in mid-January.

Will that grace period that the far right Republicans extended to Speaker Mike Johnson be extended much further?

TAMARA KEITH, National Public Radio: Yes, Congress has found a way to do the bare minimum and make it look really hard.

(LAUGHTER) TAMARA KEITH: And Mike Johnson did get a grace period.

Now, some of the far right Republicans are already saying he has one or two strikes because of this legislation that did the bare minimum, which is fund the government for a little while.

The question is whether that grace period will continue.

But the reality is that there's not a great alternative.

He got the job after a three-week back-and-forth with everybody looking around trying to find someone to do it.

And so it's likely he gets a little bit more of a grace period because also it's going to be the height of primaries and caucuses and primaries for all of these members of Congress who are also going to be on the ballot.

And it's -- once the funding runs out again in January and February, it's an election year.

We're going to be in an election year.

And so it's most likely that they are going to find some sort of a way, probably with some drama to get there, to just keep the government funded a bit.

AMNA NAWAZ: What's your take on this, Susan?

SUSAN PAGE: That's really optimistic.

(LAUGHTER) SUSAN PAGE: Because there's been no demonstration of a willingness to put we need to govern, it's an election year ahead of, let's blow things up.

I mean, it's not a lot of members of Congress, but when you have the kind of narrow margin that Speaker Johnson has, it only takes a couple people, as we have seen, to upend everything.

If he manages to do that, if we get through the January and February deadlines for funding the government and he has put together a plan, then he deserves some real credit for doing something that his Republican predecessors have had a lot of trouble doing.

TAMARA KEITH: Well, and the thing is, there isn't as much personal animus towards him, in part because they don't know him that well.

But that -- the honeymoon could eventually run out, or they could just decide, all right, fine, every single government funding bill requires Democratic votes because it's divided government.

He gives the far right Republicans the permission to slip to vote no, as they have always wanted to, and then you just sort of limp along.

We will see.

AMNA NAWAZ: Let's take a look, meanwhile, at the presidential race.

As you mentioned, the calendar does start to get busy and crowded in the new year.

There is some recent polling I wanted to put to you, this from Harvard/Harris poll conducted just last week.

It shows Americans aren't really happy with President Biden on some of the issues they say are most important to them.

Here's his -- some of his lowest approval ratings are on those same issues, 39 percent for immigration, 40 percent for inflation, 42 percent on crime and violence, and 44 percent approval on the economy.

Tam, what's the White House saying about this?

TAMARA KEITH: The White House view, generally, on all of these polls, all of these issue polls is simply that this reflects his broader approval rating, that voters are not talking to pollster and carefully considering their feelings about him on immigration or the economy or any of these things.

Voters are in a sour mood.

And, essentially, all of these issues are basically matching up with his broader approval rating, which isn't great.

But they also take sort of a long view, which is that often presidents at this point in the reelection cycle have really low approval ratings.

AMNA NAWAZ: Yes.

TAMARA KEITH: And they sort of feel that Joe Biden is always taken for granted.

He's always counted out.

He's always left for dead politically, and then they end up passing the bill or he ends up consolidating support in the Democratic primary.

And so they, at least for now -- this is like people actually employed by the president -- are keeping their powder dry, his inner circle.

AMNA NAWAZ: There is a year to go, Susan.

SUSAN PAGE: People may say these are the issues they care most about, but it doesn't -- there are two issues that have been more powerful than those issues.

One is the issues of abortion ever since Roe v. Wade was overturned.

We have seen that deliver for Democrats in two elections.

The other is the issue of Donald Trump.

And antipathy to Donald Trump has been the best thing that Joe Biden has had going from concern about the future of democracy, about what Donald Trump might do if he got back in office.

So we should be modest about what we learn from polls.

And that includes issue polls, as well as horse race polls.

AMNA NAWAZ: And are you saying, when it becomes a binary choice and the choices become clear, voters see things very differently?

SUSAN PAGE: Is it going to be a binary choice, though?

How big would the ballot be?

How many credible, credible, in that they will have some money and they will have some -- get some attention?

Other candidates will be on the ballot.

That could make the math of the election entirely different.

AMNA NAWAZ: Well, in the meantime, we have a couple minutes left, and I never get to talk to you guys about these kinds of things, but it is Thanksgiving week, and we are so grateful for you both and your insights.

So I'd love to give you a moment just to share what you're grateful for, when a lot of what we report on is not necessarily celebratory.

Susan, why don't you kick us off?

SUSAN PAGE: I'm, of course, grateful for my family.

But what I'd like to say I'm grateful for tonight are the journalists who put themselves in harm's way to cover the news that they bring to them.

I'm thinking of the Israel-Hamas battle.

The war there has already killed 48 journalists.

The Ukraine war has killed 15 journalists.

This is a time when trust in the news media has eroded, when people in this town jeer at journalists all the time.

These are reporters doing their jobs, and we are all the better off because of that.

AMNA NAWAZ: Thank you for that.

Tam, what about you?

TAMARA KEITH: Well, I am thankful for "PBS NewsHour" viewers like you.

(LAUGHTER) TAMARA KEITH: And what I will say is that, over the past year, I have heard from so many people who love Politics Monday, people who sought me out in places I was not expecting to find them.

And I am just grateful.

I am grateful for all of those conversations that I got to have over e-mail and over social media and in person, even with people who do not like my hair.

(LAUGHTER) TAMARA KEITH: Even those conversations, I am grateful for them too.

AMNA NAWAZ: Let me just reiterate how grateful we are for both of you, for the insights you always bring, Susan, you as a guest, you as a regular on Politics Monday.

And we will look forward to talking again soon.

Susan Page and Tamara Keith, thank you to you both.

TAMARA KEITH: Thank you.