we caught up with the champs after the game. >> what's the win mean to you, j.j.? >> everything, everything for our teammates and more importantly michigan nation. it's been too long. finally brought it back home. >> tremendous performance by our team. we're the last ones standing. that's a tremendous feeling. >> national champion, how's that sound? >> it's going to last forever, no one can ever take that away. >> reporter: now, coach jim harbaugh 38 seasons as an nfl and college player or coach, no championship titles until now. finally winning one as a head coach for his alma mater. i wanted you to take a look at the scenes back at campus, there were thousands of fans taking to the streets of ann arbor, celebrating the national title. some couch fires had to be

exti extinguished. i got you a hat, to make up for all of the michigan hate you've been spewing, i feel that you need to wear this and poppy and i and our viewers have notice add bit of bias. you wear this for a while to make up for it, okay, ohio state boy? >> there's a no percent chance that will ever happen. i will grant them the same level of humility and grace that they granted us when we won multiple national championships, none. absolutely none. >> reporter: point taken. >> he would never let that hat touch his precious locks. there is no chance. i'm telling you that. thank you, friend. >> thanks, buddy. "cnn this morning" continues right now. new cnn polling shows nikki haley is closing the gap on donald trump in new hampshire. >> he's out in iowa to remind voters, look, if you don't come out nikki haley is not that far behind. >> i appreciate all the attention president trump is giving me.

it is quite sweet and thoughtful of him. >> the former president pushed to make any criminal charges against him disappear. >> a u.s. federal appeals court will hold a hearing today on whether donald trump has immunity in the federal election subversion case. >> it is a question about does donald trump have to stand trial. >> the problem for donald trump, though, is the facts. >> united airlines discovered loose bolts on an undisclosed number of their boeing 737 max-9 planes. >> there's no fundamental design flaw here. it appears they might have miss add step. >> the cockpit door is designed to open during rapid decompression. >> no one of the flight crew was aware of that. >> we have a lot of questions for boeing. how in the heck did this happen. good morning, everyone. it's the top of the hour. i'm phil mattingly with poppy harlow in new york. it is a day of enormous consequence. donald trump will be in court as three judges in d.c. consider a

profound question for the nation. is he immune from prosecution? this morning trump's lawyers will be arguing that the former president has absolutely immunity as they fight to throw out felony charges against him for january 6th and the alleged plot to overturn the 2020 election. >> we should note trump does not need to be there. he has chosen to do so just six days until the iowa caucuses. this week he is juggling court appearances with campaign events and rallies. it is a monumental day for history. the implications could change the way we understand what presidents are actually allowed to do. let's dive into this. cnn's senior legal analyst elie honig is with us. joining us from atlanta, trump's defense lawyer during his second impeachment trial. it's great to have you. david, let me begin with you, if you were in front of the d.c. circuit, the appellate court and you were arguing this case today for trump, what is the argument you would make?

>> there are two primary arguments. the first is under a long-standing case from 1982, nixon versus -- that a president is immune, that's in a civil context. president's immune for actions taken as official actions. he would argue that the actions at issue in the case in d.c. would take in his official capacity as president, based on information he had, he had an obligation to make sure laws are faithfully executed. beca nixon versus fitzgerald says that covers even the outer perimeters of a president's task and, therefore, we don't enter into factual inquiries as to whether it was appropriate judgment or not. the second argument is different. that's his argument that because he was acquitted in the impeachment trial he cannot be tried again. this is based on the impeachment judgment clause, article 1, section 3 clause 7 that says if

a person is convicted in an impeachment trial that person can be tried criminally and have other consequences. by implication they read into that that if a person is acquitted that person can't be retried, and then they also pile on double jeopardy principles in addition to the impeachment judgment clause. there is a year 2000 opinion, very thorough opinion from the office of legal counsel, justice department's binding division that gives legal opinions to the attorney general, very thoughtful by randolph moss, now a district judge in d.c. in which he analyzed the question, said it 's a very close questio. had arguments on both sides that ultimately the justice department decided that the acquittal in an impeachment trial would not bar a former president from being prosecuted. >> elie, i have long found the power of the presidency in those debates, the executive versus kind of where people land on that completely fascinating and yet largely theoretical. this is for real. and the precedent here, it will completely change depending --

could completely change how the presidency operates. i was struck in terms of what jack smith's team, they argument, quote, rather than vindicating our constitutional framework, the defendant's immunity claim threatens -- donald trump is running to be president. he could license himself. >> exactly. that's why this is sort of an extra level of concern and controversiality here. i think what's important to note is we don't know whether there's such thing as criminal immunity. that's never been firmly established by the supreme court. i think david does a good job of laying out what the arguments trump's team have made have been. the problem, though, is was donald trump's conduct actually in the scope of what the president's supposed to be. i understand the argument would be he has broad powers. it's hard to look at the actual facts as if donald trump was sort of neutrally trying to oversee the elections. any reasonable reading is he's

trying to tilt it his own way. the other problem i think trump's going to face and i think this is a hypothetical that his lawyers ought to be ready for, what if a president's doing something within the scope of the office, within those outer boundary, but it's criminal. i guess i would pose this to david. what if a president, hypothetically took a cash bribe in exchange for issues a veto of legislation, right? that would be within the scope of the office, you issue vetoes. >> or a pardon. >> or a pardon, right? what if there was an exchange of a cash bribe for that. it will be within the scope, would a president be immune for that exact conduct? >> i think two answers. one is if he were still in office, he wouldn't be prosecuted under the justice department policy. if he were out of office, i think that he could be because i don't think it would be an official act. while taken within the scope of office, i don't think it would be an official act covered by this concept of immunity in any event. i got to say one more thing because i know you're going to be short on time. keep your eye on the additional argument, the amicus as provided

in this case that the court said they want to ask questions about. that is whether jack smith's appointment was constitutional under the appointments clause, article 2, section 2, clause 2 of the constitution. that's a big question. there's a law review article that two of the who filed the brief, it was rejected when raised in the context of muller, but it's a very interesting and complicated argument. >> cit would be a stretch, it ws 2019 it was rejected there, but it would essentially say looking at that that it's a supremacy clause argument, right? that it's an inferior officer and you can't do that. do you think that argument would work, david. it's getting the least amount of attention. it's a novel legal con cement. concept. if it didn't work in 2019, would it have a chance here?

>> what calobrisi and lawson have said, the court in 2019 never really analyzed it. they see it as an open and shut question. clearly there's no authority of the attorney general to appoint this kind of role. the president had to appoint him, he's not an inferior officer. i think they happen to be right on the argument. politically is it a palatable argument at this point? i don't know. this is not an easy panel either for the president. on paper you would say it looks like 2 to 1 against, but i don't think those are very fair or good judgments to make. i've seen commentators make that. i assume all judges are going to be fair and look at it on the facts and law. >> thank you, gentlemen, really helpful. appreciate it. this morning nikki haley has cut donald trump's lead in the republican primary race in new hampshire to single-digits. that's at least according to a new cnn poll conducted by the university of new hampshire. the former president still holding a meaningful lead in that poll. 39% of likely gop primary voters

in the stay compared to haley's 32%. the rest of the field lagging far behind. chris christie at 12%, vivek ramaswamy at 8%, ron desantis at 5%. >> new hampshire's primary two weeks from today, the iowa caucus is six days away only. that will be the first time voters get their say on the 2024 election. last night in des moines, iowa, haley refuted trump's claim that she, quote, betrayed him by running for president. listen. >> i will tell you when i said that i would never run against him, we hadn't had the debacle in afghanistan. we hadn't had inflation go through the roof, and we didn't lose the midterms by ridiculous numbers. when i decided to run, i called him. i wanted him to know i was in it to win it and i told him then we needed a new generational leader. i told him then we needed to leave the negativity and the b baggage behind. >> as haley was speaking, trump's campaign was blasting out press releases, used to be directed by ron desantis.

now attacking haley on immigration. >> we don't need to talk about them as criminals. they're not. >> illegals are criminals, nicki, that's what illegal means. >> nikki haley, too weak, too liberal to fix the border. >> clearly the campaign seeing something. joining us from des moines, cnn political director david chalian. top line us to start here. what stands out to you as you kind of dig through these new poll numbers? >> well, you showed the horse race there. this is our brand new cnn university of new hampshire poll. trump at 39%, haley at 32%. i think that explains everything you need to know as to why those ads are running that you just played, fphil. the trump universe, the trump campaign, the trump super pac unleashing a torrent of criticism and critique of nikki haley as they try to deal with keeping her at bay specifically

in new hampshire. look at the growth over time in our poll as well, and you see that nikki haley's momentum that we've been talking about for weeks in this campaign is apparent here as well. she's increased her share of the vote by 12 points. she was at 20% in our november poll. she's at 32% now. you see trump has moved very little. in fact, he's been remarkably stable throughout this entire campaign in new hampshire. so that movement is exactly what the trump team is trying to blunt as they try to get away with two early state victories and actually hasten their path to the nomination. >> how does she fare in this poll with undecided voters in new hampshire versus trump? >> so not undecided but undeclared is what they call independents, poppy. i think this is such an important point. take a look at the breakdown between registered republicans and registered undeclareds. among republican's trump's at 58%, haley's at 21%. among the independents who in

new hampshire can participate in the republican primary, she's at 43% support among those independents. he's at 17% support. you also see chris christie doing quite well among independents. trump's in third place there. this is critical because when you think about the battle for the nomination, you have to look for places if you're nikki haley where independents can actually participate in the process because where it's just a closed primary to republicans only, trump is still dominating that universe. >> david, i think to underscore one of your earlier points, trump supporters locked in in terms of people that have decided when you look through this poll. haley's less so, but the growth has been real. what does that tell you about things? >> yeah, so according to our brand new survey, phil, 80% of trump supporters say they are fully committed to donald trump. they're not moving. their mind is made up. that is true of 54% of haley's supporters and 45% of everyone else. that shows me there is still movement to be had here.

people are stg willing in new hampshire to change their mind. some of those folks may change their mind to donald trump, so it's not necessarily a bad thing for him, but it shows potential for haley to continue to grow, and especially we dug in -- i know you'll like this one -- to chris christie voters, he's at 12% in the poll. and we said who's your second choice if christie were not there. 65% of christie voters say their second choice is nikki haley, and this is the argument about whether or not there's going to be this mounting pressure over the next week or so to somehow get christie out of the race if you're a haley supporter and have him endorse haley. i think that's unlikely, folks, but you can see why republicans look at these numbers and say that may be a way for haley to stop trump in new hampshire. >> it was only about 30% to trump, right, from christie voters, david? >> reporter: yeah, among christie voters, it was an asterisk. trump was not the second choice

of basically any christie voter, which shouldn't surprise anyone. his campaign has been totally based on going against donald trump, right? >> yeah, david, thank you very much. >> and obviously don't forget tomorrow at 9:00 p.m. eastern, i say obviously because you've got to be watching this, jake tapper and dana bash moderating cnn's republican presidential debate live from iowa. united airlines finding loose bolts on a number of their boeing 737 max-9 planes, the same model plane that had that door plug blow open mid-flight on friday. >> donald trump says he thinks the stock market is headed for a crash, and he hopes it's convenient for him. >> we have an economy that's so fragile, and the only reason it's running now is it's running off the fumes of what we did. when there's a crash, i hope it's going to be during this next 12 months because i don't want to be herbert hoover. the one president i just don't want to be herbert hoover. > the cnn rerepublican

presidenential debatate live fr iowa t tomorrow atat 9:00 p.m.m easterern.

today boeing is scheduled to hold an all employee meeting that is focused on safety at the

737 max factory that is in renton, washington, and this comes as we're learning many new details about that alaska airlines flight on friday where a blowout left a giant hole in the plane mid-flight. >> flight attendants mentioned that the communications were so poor that they felt like they really needed guidance and information. we found today that the cockpit door is designed to open during rapid decompression. it is designed to open during rapid decompression. however, no one among the flight crew knew that. the auto pressurization light that illuminated that we have gotten a lot of questions on, at this time we have no indications whatsoever that this correlated in any way to the expulsion of the door plug. >> that was jennifer hominy, the

head of the ntsb. alaska airlines says initial reports indicated loose hardware was visible on some of their planes. united airlines looking at their max planes and found some loose bolts on those 737 max-9 door plugs. pete muntean following all of this. it leaves me speechless that they're looking at all these planes where this hasn't happened and, yet, there are loose bolts that indicate that it could have happened there as well. >> yeah, and it's a big smoking gun here, poppy. these major developments overnight about this door plug, which is where this investigation is focus focusing, that's a door on the boeing 737 max-9 visible from the outside, normal window, wall, and seats on the inside. alaska airlines has been prepping its planes to comply with the checks that have been ordered by the faa, and alaska now says its mechanics have found hardware that was loose. the other airline that operates these planes as you mentioned is united airlines, and united announced yesterday that it

found loose door plug bolts on some of its max-9s. this is huge, these two announcements combined are a significant data point for investigators, and the bolts are really critical to the design of the max 9 door plug. four bolts, 12 stops, and without the bolts the door can essentially wiggle free of the stops. now, the ntsb has recovered the door in question. they've now investmespected it, they can now tell that the door shot off and up like a rocket, but investigators say they are now looking for the bolts that would have held the door in place. listen. >> the exam to date has shown that the door, in fact, did translate upward. all 12 stops became disengaged allowing it to blow out of the fuselage. we have not yet recovered the four bolts that restrain it from its vertical movement, and we have not yet determined if they

existed there. that will be determined when we take the plug to our lab in washington, d.c. >> remember, max 9's still grounded in the u.s. overnight, indonesia grounded its max-9s. there are 215 max-9s in service globally, two-thirds in the u.s. obviously a huge hit for boeing, and today it's holding that com company-wide safety meeting hosted from the 737 max factory in renton, washington. >> and pete, we've also now heard from a teacher named bob who found that door in his backyard, which is just stunning, but also it's crucial, right, for them to figure out what went wrong and how do you prevent it again. >> a lot of clues here. backyard bob, bob sauer teaches physics, really the hero of this latest chapter of this investigation. maybe the best physics lesson ever. the biggest discovery, though, along with the phones and other parts that have been found in portland streets, and he says it's maybe the most exciting

thing to ever happen on his street. >> i saw in the flashlight that there was something gleaming back there, which shouldn't have been there. oh, that's curious. so i went back to look at it, and it turned out to be the door. this is the most exciting thing that's ever happened on this street. >> i spoke to ntsb jennifer homendy about this discovery and says she wants to go to the school where bob teaches physics. one interesting physics lesson, the reason why this door was separated from the phones and headset and other things that got sucked out of the hole is that it has some curvature to it. it sailed a bit like a wing which is why it was a few blocks away. >> pete muntean, thank you for your excellent reporting. joining us now is ed peerson, a senior manager at the po boeing 737 factory and warned about problems before two fatal

crashes, one in indonesia and one in ethiopia in 2019. ed shared a story with congress in 2019. he's now the executive director for the foundation for safety. are you surprised since the issues that you raised by the companies by the industry to see this happening with tliehis linf 737s? >> good morning, and absolutely not. we are absolutely not surprised. we actually have been expecting far worse so this is actually in many ways an awesome wake-up call because it could have been so much more tragic. there's so many other issues that the planes have that we've been monitoring for a while now. so yeah, it wasn't a surprise at all, and maybe that's the most shocking part. some of us who have been watching this have been reporting on many, many production quality defects. they've had over 20 serious production quality defects just since the plane rolled out, you know, and went back into

service. so this is very concerning. yeah. >> were the specific issues -- when you talk about the issues that you have seen and concerns that you have raised, were the issues that appear to have happened in this case issues that you had raised, seen, or been aware of before this happened? >> yes. i mean, this -- when you talk about loose bolts on an airplane, that's obviously not a good thing. we had many, many problems with -- when we put a plane through the assembly line, there's a lot of people that are working on that plane, and if those employees are rushed, if they're fatigued, if they don't have proper quality control, those kind of things can occur, and as you've seen, it's -- you know, when it happens on one plane, there's a very good chance it's happening on other planes. so we have seen issues in electronic and electrical issues involving the airplanes in service, and you know, we've had improper electrical bonding and grounding in the factory. we've seen issues with gaps and

shimming issues. these are very important quality type measures that we have to take advantage of. what's happening is there's this urge to get the airplanes out the door. all the variables that were in place in 2018, 2019 for those crashes are still there, and they're rearing their ugly head again. we've seen this in safety reports. we've seen this in just a whole bunch of situations. so it's very discouraging. >> you know, and you raised these issues publicly in your testimony to congress. we reached out to boeing about this. they responded as operators conduct the required inspections, we are staying in close contact with them and will help address any and all findings. we're c we regret the impact this has had on our customers and their passengers. in terms of the path forward, do you feel like investigators will have access, time, bandwidth to

get all the information they need and to take action if necessary? >> those words that you just read there, those are typical, you know, the kind of typical safety statements that you hear from the boeing company, and unfortunately, you know, the proof is in the pudding. so we had a united flight just within like a month or so ago that had 37,000 feet. they lost an engine. they had an engine failure. that plane had 40 hours on it. we had a southwest airlines plane that took off out of phoenix last year and that plane lost electrical power as soon as it took off. that plane was delivered the night before by boeing. so you know, there's a lot of nice safety statements that can be made, but when it gets down to it, if you have employees that are pressured to get the jobs done and you have issues, i mean, the company removed quality control inspection, if you can believe that. the company has been removing quality control inspections which have been around for many years to ensure safety. this is just a pattern here that we've seen.

they had engineering kpeexempti. we just found out recently that just in the last few months we've had the company request special exemptions from flight-related safety systems including engine anti-icing system, the stall management yaw dampener, so we have seen -- here we have after two fatal crashes, 346 people died, $20 billion loss to the company, criminal conduct, and the company is requesting special treatment right now to comply with legally required engineering design standards. it's astonishing what's happening. so i'm sorry i just don't have a lot of confidence right now in the leadership at the boeing company. >> you certainly have a history of ragz ising these concerns. we will keep in touch with boeing, we'd love to talk to them. ed pierson, we appreciate your time. thank you. >> thank you. right now secretary of state antony blinken is in israel, he is meeting with top officials there. what israel is telling him about the plan to try to push hamas to

release more hostages. that's ahead. and jimmy kimmel firing back at aaron rodgers last night after the jets' quarterback claimed the late night host's name might show up in the jeffrey epstein logs. >> aaron rodgers is too arrogant to know how ignorant he is. ththey let himim host jeoparard two weeks,s, now he knknows evererything.

get over here kids. time for today's lesson. wow. -whoa. what are those? these are humans. they rely on something called the internet to survive. huh, powers out. [ gasp ] are they gonna to die? worse, they are gonna get bored. [ gasp ] wait look! they figured out a way to keep the internet on. yeah! -nature finds a way. [ grunt ] stay connected when the power goes out, with storm ready wifi from xfinity. and see migration in theaters now.

jimmy kimmel in his opening monologue last night blasted aaron rodgers, the new york jets quarterback who came under fire when he claimed without evidence that kimmel could be revealed as a jeffrey epstein associate. kimmel threatened to sue rodgers saying the claim is baseless. >> you know, when you hear a guy who won a super bowl and did all the state farm commercials say something like this, a lot of people believe it. a lot of delusional people honestly believe i am meeting up with tom hanks and oprah at shaky's once a week to eat pizza and drink the blood of children. [ laughter ] and i know this because i hear from these people often. my wife hears from them. my kids hear from them. my poor mailman hears from these people. he genuinely thinks that because god gave him the ability to throw a ball he's smarter than everyone else. the idea that his brain is just average is unfathomable to him. aaron got two a's on his report card. they were both in the word

aaron. okay? aaron rodgers is too arrogant to know how ignorant he is. they let him host "jeopardy!" for two weeks, now he knows everything. and by the way, congratulations to aaron rodgers who has done the impossible. he made the new york jets look even worse. >> there were some laughs there, but this is really serious. joining us now sarah fisher, senior media reporter for "axios" as well. the content of it is very, very serious. give people the back story and then what's going to happen when aaron rodgers goes back on air to address this. >> it's a huge deal, poppy, this has been sort of a far right trope for a long time, accusing people, particularly people in the media of beingllinked to pedophilia. aaron rodgers insinuating this drawings back to people who have right wing viewpoints alleging without evidence that folks in media are tied to pedophilia. you heard jimmy kimmel blasting

aaron rodgers on his show yesterday. aaron rodgers is expected to go back on espn today. he's expected to address whatever kimmel said in his monologue. i would not expect an apology, though, poppy, from aaron rodgers. aaron rodgers has been pretty vocal about his political viewpoints for a long time. he tends to say pretty outlandish things whether it's about not supporting vaccines, et cetera. so i think this feud is just going to continue to boil over. >> sarah, the business elements of this are completely fascinating to me because mcafee's show was a new introduction to espn. he's kind of been the new hot thing, huge viewership and listenership. espn obviously is abc, espn, part of disney, bob iger, like all of this connects together in a way that i would think bob iger would not really enjoy right now. how is this all playing out internally? >> yeah, well, it causes major tensions, especially with the pat mccalf fi show. this isn't the only controversy

they're experiencing internally. i think what you're seeing is there is a certain type of internet culture where voices like aaron rodgers, the joe rogan types, the elon musk types, they gain so much popularity. if you're a traditional media company, you want to tap into the zeitgeist of what's happening on the internet. of course what we're seeing is it comes with some brand safety risks. you don't want infighting between two different voices in two different shows within your company. for disney and every media company watching this unfolding, you have to figure out wla hat r boundaries are going to be. >> aaron rodgers is paid for these appearances, right? so jimmy kimmel is paid by disney, aaron rodgers is paid by these appearances. that makes it even more different than having a guest on, like our guests are often not paid unless they're official contributors. how tdoes that complicate thing? >> it complicates things enormously. two different networks with two different editorial standards. that parent company is going to have to decide do we want to have some sort of uniformity in how we bring guests on to our

different shows. now, the key difference, though, poppy, we're not talking about necessarily new shows, but they're all kind of news and commentary adjacent. that's what makes it difficult. you mentioned cnn's standards. cnn is a news network. what's happening in late night versus what's happening on a talk show on espn, they're going to have different expectations for how guests show up, whether or not they pay or get paid and what they say. >> fascinating, thank you as always for your reporting. >> good to see you. also news this morning that an american citizen has been arrested in moscow. details still coming in. we'll tell you what we know ahead. a review is underway at the defense secretary's office after lloyd austin was hospitalized and didn't tell his deputy or the e president.t. mark esper, a man who previousuy held ausustin's poposition, isig toto join us n next.

welcome back. there's new fallout this morning over defense secretary lloyd austin's decision to keep his initial hospitalization a secret. his chief of staff has now directed a 30-day review of the process and the procedures around notifying national security leaders and the white house. austin is still at walter reed eight days after being admitted for complications from an elective procedure. he is out of the icu. so that's good news. again, it took three days, though, before the white house was notified. president biden says he has complete confidence in austin. joining us now, someone with a lot of perspective on the importance of that job, mark esper. he served as defense secretary in the trump administration. secretary, good to have you. appreciate it very much. primary importance is his health, how he's doing. he appears to be getting better. he's out of the icu. but you've got a republican congressman who is calling for the defense secretary to now be impeached over this. you've got concerns from

democrats as well including senator jack reed who's chair of the senate armed services committee who said he's still concerned that sort of the vital chain of command here and procedure were not followed. what do you think needs to change having sat in that seat? >> yeah, good morning, poppy, and first and foremost, you're right. glad to hear that secretary austin is doing much better. i think a big part of the problem at this point is not just that it wasn't revealed early on, but each and every day it seems like there's an additional piece of information that trickles out, right? when i was first on cnn over the weekend, it was the press corps wasn't informed. and then on sunday we learned the white house wasn't informed, and then we learned that deputy secretary hicks was given authorities but not told, and then we heard that he was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance. every day there's been a new detail coming out, which is i think causing this concern on capitol hill by members who are talking about things that you mentioned, impeachment and

inquiry. i think it's been a big communications failure as well. built around something that is a very serious matter, and that is the president, the national security community knowing where a cabinet member is and how he's doing. >> just in the simplest terms, secretary, what should this process look like? they're obviously reviewing it. they'll probably change some things. but what should the process look like to ensure that everyone knows who is in command when the defense secretary is not? >> look, it's fine if they do a review, maybe they'll turn up something they didn't know before, but i'll just tell you from personal experience, there is a process, and that is the chief of staff or whoever she or he designates is responsible for notifying the white house, national security council, other key players whenever something like this happens. you know, every single day when i was in office as secretary austin is as well, your location is tracked. the pentagon knows it. the white house knows it. all the people who have to get

in touch with you connected to the president know it. these are known things. so the problem is -- and this is the unknown -- is why weren't they told? why weren't procedures followed. was it incompetence, or were they told not to do it? i think that's the key question right no that really needs to be discovered. >> that's an important -- >> is why did the process break down. >> it's a very important question. let's turn to israel because the secretary of state antony blinken is in israel. we saw him shaking hands with prime minister netanyahu, meeting with high level officials, this as the defense minister gallant in israel just did this long interview with "the wall street journal" this weekend, talked about the next phase of the war that he says will be different, but it's going to last longer. do you expect that that will also include significantly fewer civilian casualties in gaza? >> well, there will be a transition. i don't know that it will happen by the end of the month as he promised. they still have a big task ahead of them in the south sorting

their way through the cities and of course the underground network of tunnels, which is a really big challenge. so will we see a significant drop in casualties? i don't know. i mean, it's one of the terrible aspects of war that innocent people die, and you have to be very discriminate in how you do it. so hopefully they'll improve the procedures. look, i think the other important news coming out of secretary blinken's trip is that he seems to have gotten some type of agreement from turkey, saudi arabia, israel, qatar -- i'm sorry, qatar and the uae that they will participate or consider participating in some type of post-conflict governance and reconstruction. to me that's news because the unanswered question is who will step in after the conflict ends and the israeli military pulls out. >> and you're speaking of the conflict between israel and hamas. the huge question mark, secretary, is the north and what happens between israel and hezbollah, especially after the developments in the last couple of weeks. we just heard netanyahu speaking to troops there saying, look,

hezbollah is completely underestimating us, and we will, you know, we have the capability to destroy them. does israel right now have that capability should it escalate on both of these fronts? >> i think it does have the capability. i wouldn't recommend a two-front war, but maybe they feel they've made sufficient progress in southern gaza that they can pull back some and be prepared to deal with hezbollah in the north. you know, we had that major attack that killed a hamas commander in southern lebanon. we had a strike yesterday, and then there was breaking news this morning that another vehicle was in southern lebanon was targeted by a drone strike. no news yet on who was in the car. but the israelis have clearly ramped up the game here in terms of targeting individuals, and that of course is what could provoke the escalation. you know, i assume that israel -- i don't think hezbollah wants it because of what happened last time they had

a major conflict with israel, and then of course we don't know what iran is doing, what they're providing, provoking, inspiring in the background. but those are key factors here as this unfolds. >> certainly. former defense secretary mark esper, thanks so much. >> thanks, poppy. moscow announcing the detention of an american citizen on drug-related charges. russia says 32-year-old robert woodland was taken into custody on friday and is being charged with attempted large scale production and sale of illegal drugs. a pro-kremlin tabloid reported that woodland was born in russia and brought to the u.s. when he was 2 years old. woodland could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted. 2023 has officially been confirmed as the hottest year ever. is this year set to be even hotter? our chieief climate e correspon billll weir herere with the e n next.

this morning more than 40 million people are under the threat of severe weather after monday's whiteout conditions shut down some major roads. and new data confirm 20s23 was hottest year on record. and our correspondent bill weir is joining us now. i come home yesterday, pick up the kids from school, luka who is five says the planet is dying. >> really?

>> he's only five. >> five-year-old. >> and it is. >> well, the planet we knew is and we're not really sure what comes next. back in 2015, almost 200 countries got together and agreed miraculously that we should try to ld who the temperature to 1.5 degrees above what pre-industrial levels. well, we this year not only topped that, but annihilated the record over the year. as you look back at the daily surface temperatures for the first time ever, we had a couple days in november that was two degrees warmer. not just 1.5, but 2. and we shot past it. if you average up the total global surface average temperature, night and day around the world, all together, look at where we are in 2023, shattering previous records before. and this is of course the limit where we think that we can adapt to these changes. we don't want to go to 2 degrees because kcoral reefs begin to de

and tipping points that are unstoppable. but not the same everywhere. right now parts of canada three degrees warmer than average. only place that really escaped it was australia qua. b but the rest of the globe, usually you break records by hundredths of a degree and this time almost two degrees. and he el nino is just cranking. so the 12 months that end in january or february could be well past 1.5. >> there was a "new york times" alert. drill down on this for people. actual tangible costs. >> that's right, we set a record for billion dollar disasters. everything from the flooding in california, they go from the drought to the atmosphere rivers.

and then the heat in the deserts. so more water when you don't want it, not enough when you really want it. it affects everything from snow pack and cover, which we don't have any in the east. all of this is connected. overnight, we had a funnel cloud come ashore in the florida panhandle. you see a thin sort of tie between tornado activity, we don't understand that as well, but predictable weather, what we grew up with, the seasons that we knew, you are seeing them slip away from us. but this is not permanent. we haven't hit 1.5 and we'll stay here. scientists want to see where we go from here, could this year be even hotter, could it slide back down as el nino goes away? important conversations to be having. >> and of the optimist at the end. so i can go home with that we can do things. >> and humanity is on the cusp with the energy transformation, so many things exploding that we're not talking about.

>> well, you are showing us. thank you. and brand new cnn polling showing nikki haley closing the gap on donald trump. and if you are looking at the live pictures now, that is trump's golf course in sterling, virginia on the right of the screen. and the courthouse in washington, d.c. on the left where he will soon be attending an appeals hearing in his federal election subversion case. a lot of those details on a monumental day straight ahead.

good morning. so glad you're with us. i'm poppy harlow with phil mattingly. take a look at live pictures, you are looking at donald trump