'What happens if Trump says screw you to NRA?' Morning Joe panel wonders if GOP would choose president over guns

President Donald Trump has signaled a willingness to support new gun safety measures following a pair of mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton -- and MSNBC's Willie Geist wondered what would happen if he effectively told off the NRA.

Trump and the NRA's embattled CEO Wayne LaPierre have spoken by phone since the massacres, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell appears to be hoping public sentiment cools on gun control before Congress returns from its summer recess.

"Let me ask you a question that I asked a lot this week and I haven't heard a good answer," Geist asked Axios reporter Jonathan Swan. "What happens if Donald Trump gets the phone call from Wayne LaPierre and says, 'Screw you, I'm doing universal background checks. By the way, it's supported by your membership -- a majority of your membership in the NRA.'"

"What's the cost in that to the president of the United States, the most powerful man in the world?" Geist added.

Swan, who speaks regularly with White House insiders, said the president appears to be taking the temperature of making such a move.

"What Donald Trump has been doing this week is what he does every time, which is poll -- effectively his way of testing a message is to sort of bite at it, nibble at it," Swan said. "It's him testing the waters. What's the reaction going to be, am I getting torn up on Fox News? What's the blowback?"

"His instinct is, he wants universal background check," Swan added. "He's a New Yorker, he's not -- Donald Trump doesn't come from a culture of wanting to, you know, own guns and be sort of hyper Second Amendment. He developed this as a political tactic."

Trump seems uniquely positioned to change the gun debate because of his intense popularity within the GOP, Swan said.

"He's probably the only politician in America that could actually shift this issue in the Republican Party, because he has such a cult following in the Republican Party," Swan said. "Such a hold over that party that if Donald Trump did come out in favor of a background check position, look, there would be a lot of Republicans that would defy him, but it would be quite hard for a number of others."

The NRA is weaker than ever, after a series of scandals have drained its leadership and donation base.

"The only interesting new factor here is that the NRA is in complete disarray," Swan said. "It is an organization roiled by financial malfeasance. It is basically LaPierre and a phone at this point, in terms of their internal organization. Now, they still have a huge grassroots donor base, money, but boy they have some problems. I wonder if that does add a new little conversation."