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only 63 cents a day, we'll send you this adorable blanket as your reminder of the journey you helped me make, and the journey you're helping other kids make too. - it's amazing to know that there's someone looking out for me and my family. - and it isn't just the doctors and nurses who have been looking out for me. it was you. pick up your phone or go to loveshriners.org, and you'll be a part of something special too. right now, members of the uvalde texas community are digesting the stunning findings of a long awaited justice review in response to the 2022 shooting at robb elementary

school. 19 children and two teachers killed of course in that shooting and the doj in this 575 page report explains how the law enforcement response was plagued by mistakes. just about every level. here is one example of how the confusion and chaos of the scene had deadly consequences. >> victims who had already passed away were taken to the hospital in ambulances. children with bullet wounds were put on school buses without any medical attention. in the commotion, one adult victim was place on a walkway. on the ground, outside, to be attended to. she died there. >> in just moments we are going to get reaction from a father who lost his son in the uvalde shooting but first we want to go to cnn's evan perez. evan, you sat down with the attorney general merrick garland who is visiting uvalde. what did he share with you

about his trip there? >> reporter: one of the things that emerges from this report and from the attorney general's visit, he understands that everything that could go wrong went wrong that day. you had hundreds of officers standing outside for 77 minutes as these children and their teachers were trapped inside these classrooms with the shooter. i asked him about whether he understands the frustration from the families. the victims. you know. for what happened here. listen to what he had to say. >> one of the things when you talk to the members of, the family members of the victims here, you hear a lot of frustration from what they see as a lack of accountability. and you know, you have come in here, you have met with them, do you understand that frustration and what do you tell them when they ask for that? >> of course i understand that.

and of course, i understand. it is almost unimaginable pain that they went through. to think of the idea. >> and that they continue to go through. >> of course. >> you think of child. shot? and left in a classroom, a small classroom with the shooter who is still shooting? for more than an hour when law enforcement could have come in and rescued and conducted a rescue? it is just not a pain that is ever going to go away. the question of accountability. what we did here and what we have to try to make absolutely clear in an independent and honest investigation and report that sets out what everybody did. this is the basis for accountability. the community now has the kind of report necessary to make sure accountability occurs. >> this shooter was 18 years old. he waited until he was 18 to

buy this firearm. he bought it legally. in your view, is that too long to be able to buy a firearm like this? ar-15 style firearm? >> look, there is so much we still need to do and that congress needs to do. 18-year-olds should not have a military grade weapon that belongs on the battlefield. not in a classroom. one thing that this tragedy actually did was lead to the first really important gun control legislation in decades. the bipartisan safer communities act that had allowed us to stop more than 500 purchasers since the passage of the act by young people who were trying to get guns to which they were not entitled and to which were prohibited. >> is this your sense that changes like that could stop something like this? >> i think the appropriate sets

of changes could and there is much more congress should be doing. >> reporter: and one of the things that we know because this is america and these things keep happening is the lessons from this report possibly could be used by police departments around the country to respond to the next shooting. >> yeah. that is the hope certainly. and there is a local probe in uvalde that should be wrapping up soon. what's the interplay here? could this doj provide that local probe with any new angles to examine? >> reporter: talking to justice department officials they hope these findings help the district attorney doing the investigation. it is still something that is ongoing. the families are extremely frustrated because they have gotten so little information from the da and that is one of the big open questions that

remains to this day. >> we heard from family members and they welcome the report but were understandably frustrated. do we know what the outlook is for their next steps? >> reporter: it is all about the da. you talk about the local probe. the district attorney dealing with this case since it happened. she was there on the day of the shooting. she has been investigating this from the day this happened and the big question for them is what is taking so long? and they really feel she has been hanging this. really terrorizing them over the fact that she has not released any information. she has been fighting the release of information that media has requested. there's a court battle going on that she has resisted. and so they sort of feel like we are not going to get any

kind of accountability. having the attorney general here stand before them and announce to the world that what happened here was so wrong and should have never happened and kids perhaps could have survived if police would have done what they were supposed to do was very significant. because it justifies their feelings. it is hard to believe they would need justification to feel the way they feel mistreated by the community. by law enforcement. but the attorney general did that. thanking you for coming here. maybe the world now will know how we feel. and that we are justified for feeling this way in that we have been mistreated. there is no justice for us. people are telling us forget about this. just move on. we are almost two years and they haven't moved on. but they are fighting for justice. for that transparency. there is a long road ahead for them.

we have the da investigation. there are other police departments that are conducting their own probes. and many of the officers involved in this, the rank and file, are still on the streets here. the first officers that ran into the school, didn't take action, they are still patrolling the streeting here. they want them fired and perhaps with this report now, maybe that will happen. they will keep fighting. this is an unbelievable group of parents that despite every obstacle from the community and other people, they keep fighting. and they are doing it for their kids. >> one of the most emotional portions of the press conference, one of the grandparents of victims, some of them have gotten promotions, raises after what happened in uvalde. thanks so much for the update. we want to have a conversation now with brett cross. his beloved son, ten-year-old

yusui garcia was among the people killed. thank you for sharing your thoughts with us. i just want to ask you about something you said when you were at the podium speaking to the press earlier today. you said now the doj has stamped this report and given credence to the findings this was a failure of law enforcement. you said quote maybe they will take us seriously instead of telling us to move on. i'm curious about who is telling you to move on and also, how you feel this report helps to validate the experience and frustration that you have had. >> yes, sir. so, i mean that was directed to pretty much our community in and of itself. it is very divided. we have had people vote in officers who were there into elected positions because they just are not listening to us. a lot of these findings in the

doj, we have known. since the doj put it out there, put their seal on it, maybe these people start taking us seriously. because we do get told to move on and uvalde doesn't want to be known as the place with the mass shooting. well too bad. it is. it's the place where my son took his last breath. >> you also mentioned that there is some hesitation in the community to address the law enforcement officers that were involved directly. you said quote they don't want to believe that the people that are supposed to protect us failed our children and you specifically mentioned seeing some of these officers at the grocery store. i'm wondering what your interactions with them have been like. if they approached you, recognized you. and try today offer you some kind of explanation. >> so one of the officers is a

county commissioner. and we go to the county commissioner meetings. we have to sit there and look at him in his face and all he tells us wait until the reports are out. when we see that he just stood there, he got the phone call from the little, you know, from the dispatch, from the little girl saying that i'm still alive. there's a shooter in here. and he did absolutely nothing with it and these people are elected into these positions. >> i'm wondering how that makes you feel. >> angry. if it happened to the rest of the community, they ought to know these officers would have done the same thing. and it doesn't matter whose children it was. it was because they weren't going to do what was right. they didn't do what was right. they haven't done what is right since. they show boat and boast and walk around town with their

head held high like they did nothing wrong. when the fact of the matter they did do wrong. they sat outside while our children were screaming and bleeding out. >> you have pushed for kristina mitchell, the local district attorney to follow up and prosecute those responsible for this failure. you believe that she has failed and refused to do her job. first, what exactly do you want her to do and why do you think she hasn't filed any charges or taken steps to be more transparent with you to this point? >> it all boils down to once she doesn't care. she kicked me out of our autopsy meeting. she just doesn't care. my son is murdered. i'm not going to be quiet. you know? i feel like she also is under the thumb of governor abbott.

as we all know, he said it could have been worse. allowing texas dps to interview texas dps in their investigation, she has given no updates. every time she said we will have something done at this time, when that happens it is another four or five months. i believe she is dragging it out and if she ever does anything with this, it will be right before she is up for reelection. >> bret, you heard the attorney general who met with victim's families last night say that it is now up to local officials to potentially prosecute folks because the federal government can't really pursue federal charges. what is your message to the attorney general and more broadly, even to the white house on this? >> why are you not able to send

somebody down here to make sure they are doing it right? as we have seen, nothing has been done right. from our city to our county. to our state. nothing has been done right. people just want us to move on and that is not going to happen and if our da is not going to do anything like she has, you know, not been doing, we need help. >> you have been outspoken on the need of changes you want to see. walk us through what you think it will take to prevent another tragedy like this one. >> first if we could either ban these assault weapons, it was brought up earlier that the officers were not scared of that 18-year-old. they weren't afraid of him. they were afraid of the gun that he had. and so, that is an issue.

if our own officers won't go in and serve and protect like they are supposed to, we shouldn't have these military grade weapons on the streets. so that would be one thing. also, texas removed $211 million from our mental health situations. and why. and they want to blame it on mental health. like we need help here. and our state isn't giving it to us. >> i don't want to leave the conversation without talking about yuzi and his legacy. we are almost 20 months out. from the shooting. how do you feel in retro spect about how people should remember your son? >> he need to be remembered as the huge hearted loving amazing kid that he was. he wanted to be a cop so that

he could help people. and that just goes to show you like, he wanted to help people and he was failed by the same officers that he wanted to be like. remember his smile. remember that sparkle in his eyes because if anyone was having a bad day, he did everything in his power to make sure that you smiled. >> bret cross, obviously, our hearts are with you. we are so sorry about your son and we are grateful that you decided to share your story with us. thanks for joining us. stay with cnn. we're back in just moments.

now to the federal civil trial against donald trump.

she wrapped up her testimony, e. jean carroll said her status had been lowered since suing trump after he denied raping her. a jury found trump had sexually abused and defamed carroll when he refuted the attack. now they are trying to figure out how much he should pay. and trump's attorneys questioned her motives. through cross-examination, she testified her salary was much lower in the year she decided to write the book detailing trump's attack, compared to her peak days working for elle in the 1990s . we are outside of the federal courthouse in new york. carroll's attorneys had a dollar figure on the damage she suffered. >> reporter: yeah, so her team has called their reputational expert. this is the person who is testifying about the harm that was done to carroll from donald trump's statement that the previous jury had already found to be defamatory and how much

it would take to repair her reputation. so her calculation is the impact of his statements that it would cost between $7.2 million and $12.1 million to repair her defamation. she said that does not include any potential punitive damages that the jury could consider or any emotional harm to carroll. so setting out a baseline for what carroll's team is hoping to recover, as part of this lawsuit, they were seeking more than 10 million. now they have a topside of at least $12 million. the lawsuit brought by the plaintiffs against rudy giuliani. the reward of $250 million.

she is in cross-examination. and trying to suggest the understood lying data in her report did not take into account the impact of carroll's own allegations against trump. this questioning is going underway. there is about an hour left in the courtroom today. she wrote her ask e. jean carroll nearly three decades in elle magazine. it is possible they will play the access hollywood tape where trump is caught on a hot mic talking about his views toward women. he believed the jury could hear back because it could impact their views of trump's mindset when he is accused of doing something to a woman. so he is a allowed that to come in. we don't know when that is going to be played. the big question will be does donald trump himself testify in this case? he says he wants to. he is not here today.

he is attending his mother-in- law's funeral in florida. since there is no court friday, he would allow trump to come in monday and give his testimony then if he chooses to testify. >> we'll have to see if he makes good on that. thanks for the report. let's expand the conversation now with cnn legal analyst and civil rights attorney ariva martin. thank you so much for being with us this afternoon. i'm curious to get your thoughts on the defense focus here on the idea that carroll once had this lucrative career that fizzled out. that is when she decided to write a book that included the trump allegations. and that she has actually profited off of trump denying the accusations she has made about him. how does that play in court? >> the real issue here is the

reputational damage, she has counted more than 26 times donald trump called her a liar. and not only donald trump the civilian, but donald trump the president of the united states. one of the most powerful men in the world basically attacked her. and she has testified and there is evidence that after that attack, she received death threats. she had serious reputational damage by the expert. the overwhelming evidence in this case is in favor of e. jean carroll. >> her attorneys have played videos multiple times of the former president not only disparaging her, but also, they are potentially in line to play portions of that infamous access hollywood recording in which trump is heard saying vulgar comments about grabbing women. walk us through the strategy by e. jean carroll's team in that

record. >> yes. that will be very consequential. it is going to i think have a tremendous impact on this jury. what his lawyers want the jurors to know is that donald trump has the mind set of making these kinds of disparaging very inflammatory defamatory remarks about women. and that he knows that he is doing. and that he does it purposely. and he does it with malice. a big part of this is not just the compensatory damages but the punitive damages. that send a message to a defendant that your conduct will not be tolerated and that you will pay a large monetary award if you continue in this conduct so i think if jurors hear that tape, we know how inflammatory that tape is. it could cause this jury to rule in favor of e. jean carroll and award her substantial damage. >> we have to leave the

conversation there. appreciate the perspective as always. >> thank you boris. still ahead on cnn news central, how nikki haley is responding to the recent attacks by donald trump ahead of tonight's cnn town hall. and, two nations now attacking each other across their shared border. and how aggression between pakistan and iran is drumming up concerns here in washington. to duckduckgo on all your devie

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we are looking at new video from inside iran. this comes just one day after pakistan says an iranian missile strike killed two children in its territory. we have jim here to break down all of what is happening between these two neighboring countries and beyond. talk to us how it came to this for iran. >> last thing you need is something like this. iran and pakistan shooting in opposite directions here. pakistan hitting separatist fighter ins iran. it has been contending with these. a region of pakistan, they have been dealing with this some number of years and they have

been striking some number of years. iran responding to some degree by striking an isis tied group inside pakistani territory. the iranian foreign minister said today that its strike was, that pakistan's strike was seeming to say this is not really a strike on us. perhaps a path to tamping things down. when you look at the region, you have a hot spot here. the ongoing open war between israel and hamas. increasing attacks between hezbula. you have all these flash points. already heating up. the concern is one of them

expands into something bigger. >> and there have been all of these attacks in this key shipping lane. >> what is happening now, the first strikes we saw last thursday were more significant. some 30 targets. the u.s. and the u.k. striking them in a number of places around yemen in the first attack. since then, we have had four and it seems what they are doing now when they see, satellites. the number of ships here. they strike before they are able to shoot. trouble is this is still a dangerous area. the u.s. is warning flag ships to stay away. you have multiple times where the houthis are attacking u.s. ships in particular. that is real economic

consequences. to date, the u.s. strikes, u.k. strikes have not solved the problem. they hope over time it will. >> do you want to take your chances? just go around africa? jim, thank you so much for taking us through that. we appreciate it. national security adviser jake sullivan will be meeting with families of americans taken hostage by hamas. the u.s. believes six americans are still in captivity and gaza. four others have been released. sharon and her daughters were among those set free by hamas. she and her little girls are haunted by the horrific ordeal and she fears for her husband who is still being held. here is some of what she shared with anderson cooper. >> i cry all day. i try to be strong for the

girls. they look up to me currently because i'm both a mother and a father. when they don't see me, i cry. i watch video of them. sound voices of them. just to feel connected. every minute in captivity lasts like a lifetime. in captivity with the husband and the 135 people are in. >> sharon is vowing to fight for her husband's freedom until he is released. nikki haley is now ramping up her rhetoric on donald trump who has targeted her as she is

looking to build momentum in new hampshire's primary next week. plus, the economy. always shaping up to be a major voting issue. with new numbers out today on jobless claims and mortgage rates can tell us about the state of the economy headed into 2024's presidential election.

in the final push, nikki haley is directly attacking the front runner for the nomination calling out former president trump by name in the attack ad saying the majority of americans want a new generational leader. preparations for the town hall are understood way for tonight. so omar, this sharpened criticism, she does seem to be amping it up. is this sort of a new phase for her? >> reporter: it really does seem like it. the criticisms we have seen have either focused on policy or lumping together former president trump and current president joe biden. but today was really a shift in tone targeting specifically donald trump. and even saying at one point, the reason we republicans lost the house, the senate, and the white house was because of donald trump, donald trump, donald trump. and that was in response of being asked about some of the many attacks that trump has

waged against haley. even more so over the last couple of weeks clearly indicating he sees her as a real threat here. take a listen to some of how haley responded when asked about the attacks trump has lobbed her way. >> trump says things americans are not stupid to just believe what he says. the reality is who lost the house for us? who lost the senate? who lost the white house? donald trump, donald trump, donald trump. nikki haley will win every single one of those back for us. the second he says he is going to get on the stage, i'm ready. he threw a temper tantrum last night. >> now look, she was the only one out on the campaign trail today essentially trying to capitalize on what has been a more toned down ron desantis campaign at least here in new hampshire as of late. that said, one of the interesting things about this shift in tone is when chris christie got out of the race, we talked to a lot of the people supporting him at the time. what was holding back some of them from jumping over to her

side was they believed she wasn't going hard enough after trump. so it will be interesting to see five days out from the primary, it will be interesting to see if this is the beginning of the targeted attacks toward trump. or, if she is really just testing the waters, but bottom line, it is a steep hill to climb. but she knows she has an opportunity here. even better than most candidates we have seen to this point. all the candidates we have seen to this point to give trump not only serious challenge, but also potentially to win the state in the best case scenario as well. even though her campaign is saying that they are looking for a strong second place finish here. we will are to see. >> is that tone something she can dial back and will the former president let her? we shall see. omar, thank you for that report from new hampshire. and be sure to watch the cnn town hall with nikki haley moderated by our jake tapper airing at 9:00 p.m. tonight. jobless claims and mortgage rates both down according to the latest figures.

ahead, how the mortgage rate dip could be both good and bad news if you are shopping for a home.

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shake up the senate - with democrat katie porter. i'm katie porter and i approve this message. (vo) with fargo, the new virtual assistant from wells fargo, you can instantly know what you spend on things like food. (dad) fargo, what did i spend on groceries this month? (son) hey dad, can the guys stay for dinner? (dad) no. (vo) want faster, easier banking? you can, with wells fargo. just in, the house debating a stopgap spending bill that could help congress avoid a partial shutdown this weekend. earlier the senate passed the bill, now it is the house's turn. in their tradition, this does kick the can down the road and sets up new deadlines of march

1st and march 8th, but gives lawmakers more breathing room to negotiate a deal on spending. we will keep a close eye on this. a double dose of good news, about two things americans care about, jobs and the housing market. first-time jobless claims fell to the lowest level since september of 2022, far below projections. also falling was mortgage rate, the lowest since may. but these trends don't necessarily mean that americans feel at ease. let's go to matt egan with a closer look at the numbers and what they mean. should we be encouraged by these numbers? >> reporter: i think so, especially on the jobs front, initial claims, a proxy for layoffs, falling to 187,000. that is not just a 16 month low , this is historically low. back in 2020, during the peak of the covid crisis, this

metric spite to above 6 million. crazy high. anything above 300,000 would be flashing a recession warning. clearly, we are nowhere near that level. for a simple reason, bosses cannot let go of the workers they have because they needed to keep up with the strong demand. very robust retail sales in december. bosses are worried, if they let go of workers, they cannot find new ones. the jobs market is in a good place with unemployment below 4% and steady hiring. paychecks are finally starting to rise faster than prices. as you know, this economy does not have a jobs problem, it is a cost-of-living problem. white house officials even say there are affordability challenge, cars, childcare, housing. there is nothing about the numbers today that will solve any of those issues. >> let's talk about mortgage

rates which went up over the last few weeks but now lower. >> reporter: this is good news, another step in the right direction. the average 30 year fixed-rate mortgage down to 6.6%. that is the lowest level since last may. starting to go lower. obviously, not at all low. we are talking about rates that are twice as high as two years ago. homebuyers have been hit by the double whammy. record high home prices and punishing borrowing costs. that is why this housing market is historically unaffordable i recently spoke to a woman in georgia who told me, at these prices and these rates, she does not know if she can ever purchase a home. a lot of people have those same frustrations. no coincidence that president biden mentioned mortgage rates today. talking about how they

are falling and predicting they will go lower. that is not up to the white house, that is up to the market and the federal reserve. federal officials are signaling that rate cuts are probably coming. but there is a lot of debate over when the fed will be able to start cutting rates and by how much. a lot is at stake, especially for homebuyers. >> the question of inflation and affordability likely central to the presidential campaign. thank you for the analysis. long time executive of meta sheryl sandberg is leaving, she used to be second in command to mark zuckerberg. he credits her for teaching her -- him to run a company when the social network was first started. she saw massive growth in the popularity of facebook, she and other executives faced criticism for a range of issues including harming teenage users

and undermining democracy allegedly. she says she will focus more on philanthropy after she leaves in may. she will serve as a company advisor. 1 million people in upstate new york are under lake effect snow warnings, including buffalo. local officials say travel could be very difficult to nearly impossible after the airport got a foot of snow yesterday. some areas of the city could face wind gusts up to 40 mile-per-hour and windchills of 10 below zero before they host the kansas city chiefs on sunday night. two senior members of the royal family are resting comfortably, one in the hospital and the other will go under the knife soon. that is next.

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prince william has visited his wife at a london area hospital where she is recovering from abdominal surgery. the princess of wales is expected to be there for two weeks and not expected to resume public duties until april >> an update on king charles, queen camilla says her husband is okay as he prepares for a hospital visit. buckingham palace says he will undergo a procedure or make a benign enlarged prostate next week. the queen said he was looking forward to getting back to work. >> all the best to them and their health issues. the lead with jake tapper starts in a few seconds.