president biden welcomes world leaders as he fends off critics at home.

we have team coverage on the president's race to rally nato around ukraine and unit his own political party behind his candidacy. southeast texas bruised and battered by beryl. the death toll climbing to six overnight after the category 1 storm blasted the houston area with heavy rain and catastrophic wind. over 2 million people still in the dark this morning. when power could be restored and where the remnants of the storm are heading next. alec baldwin on trial manslaughter. jury selection set to begin in just hours over the accidental killing of the cinematographer on the set of "rust". how much jail time the actor could face. fed chair jerome powell set to testify before congress as more americans reach their boiling point over prices. and they're kind of a big dill. a pickle sandwich that's driving the internet wild and drawing huge crowds at the store.

it's tuesday, july 9. "early today" starts right now. gra glad you're up early with me. big stakes in d.c. this morning, as the latest nato summit is about to kick off. in addition to member states, partner nations from the asia pacific will also attend, as will ukraine. a topic for the summit will be ukraine's bridge to membership in the alliance, something fiercely opposed by russian president putin. for the latest, let's go to claudio lavanga. what's wh what's on the agenda for the summit this week? >> reporter: atop of the agenda will be ukraine. as you mentioned, president biden and the rest of the nato leaders will be talking about a new series of measures that will help to repel the attacks by russia. among those, according to white house officials who spoke before the meeting is possibly the

announcement of a new air defense system that will allow ukraine to shoot down russian missiles and drones. another topic of discussion as you mentioned, will probably be the possibility of ukraine to join nato in the future. now, all of this is happening as russia is stepping up its war against ukraine. a new wave of attacks in the last 24 hours. at least 41 people dead. and one of the targets, it turns out, was a children's hospital, an attack that president zelenskyy of ukraine called savagery. now right now, all the leaders in nato agree and are united in their support to ukraine, but perhaps the meeting will be overshadowed by the possibility, the real possibility that by this time next year, the president of the united states could be donald trump. and, as we all know, because he said it before many times, he's no support of neither nato nor ukraine. >> claudio, thank you.

as president biden prepares to host those world leaders today, his health is still under intense scrutiny. overnight, the white house releasing a letter from the president's doctor. the letter says the president has not seen a neurologist outside his routine physicals. nbc's brie jackson joins us now from d.c. and brie, this letter directly addresses questions about a specialist that had visited the white house multiple times. >> reporter: that's right, frances. good morning. nbc news confirmed reporting from "the new york post" that visitor logs showed a parkinson's expert visited the white house at least eight times over eight months. in the new letter, president biden's doctor explained that this specialist has been a consultant for the white house for more than a decade and that he only examined mr. biden only during his annual physicals. the last one was in february, and the president showed no signs of any nur hoeurological disorder. nine democrats have called on mr. biden to bow out of this election.

the president called into "morning joe" and had this message for his doubters. >> i'm getting so frustrated by the elites. now i'm not talking about you guys, but by the elites in the party, who they know so much more. any of these guys don't think i should run, run against me. go, announce for president. challenge me at the convention. >> reporter: and former president trump spoke last night in his first tv interview since the debate, calling in to fox news and saying that he expects president biden to stay in the race. >> it looks to me like he may very well stay in. he's got an ego. and he doesn't want to quit. he doesn't want to do that. it just looks to me like that's what he wants. >> reporter: and the republican convention is just one week away, and mr. trump said he'd like to announce his running mate there, but said that news will probably come a little before. frances? >> brie jackson, thank you.

chuck schumer says he is considering a new bill to counter last week's sweeping supreme court immunity ruling for former president trump. the top democrat said the six conservative justices have placed, quote, a crown on donald trump's head with the ruling. the outline of the bill is unclear, and it would face an uphill battle in the senate. democrats have a narrow majority and would need unlikely republican votes to pass the bill. actor jay johnston has pleaded guilty for his part in the january 6 attack. the fbi alleged that he was seen on video handing a stolen police shield to other rioters. johnson will be sentenced in october and faces up to five years in prison. the alec baldwin trial begins today in santa fe, new mexico nearly three years after the actor shot and killed hed ha

muchance. t halyna hutchins. baldwin denies pulling the trigger, saying the gun malfunctioned and went off in his hand. >> the trigger, i didn't pull the trigger. i feel that, that someone is responsible for what happenedle ahappened, and i can't say who that is, but it's not me. >> he is charged with involuntary manslaughter and could face 18 months in prison. now to texas where hurricane beryl slammed into the gulf coast of texas early monday as a category 1 storm with maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour. at least six people with killed there, raising the death toll to 15. >> do not take your safety for granted. we still have power lines down. there are over 50 roads that are covered with water. some of them are impassable.

>> more than 2.3 million remain in the dark this morning. down from nearly 3 million right after the storm. houston's primary electricity provider, centerpoint energy hopes to restore power to 1 million customers by the end of the day wednesday. our dfw station has more. >> reporter: the howling wind and blinding downpours kept those near the northeast texas coast wide awake throughout the early hours. >> the house is arockin'. sure, you're going, oh, god, please. >> reporter: beach side homeowners like jody purdue decided to stay put. >> there's a lot more damage this time. >> reporter: some homes withstood the power of hurricane beryl. others were nearly wiped out. >> we've seen those things forever. >> reporter: no one was home at the time as the majority, like austin campbell, heeded the red

flags and headed inland. >> we went to lake jackson. once you've ridden out enough you know when to leave. >> reporter: folks near the city of lake jackson still trying to grasp the severity. >> it was a scary thing, you know. it was really scary. >> reporter: gary thompson was just feet away from being crushed by a tree and downed power lines. >> then all of a sudden it's like this big boom and scrape and, it's like, i looked out, and i seen all kinds of wind blowing and whipping. >> reporter: beryl's strength lifting this gas station's canopy as if it was a tissue, blowing it across the parking lot and tossing it aside. >> it just blew everything my way. >> reporter: now they're left working in the heat and humidity, as there's no estimate for when power will be restored. neighbors are leading the way, as they say it's just part of the coastal life. in surfside beach, texas. the remnants of beryl are still causing trouble.

angie lassman is tracking that storm for us. >> it's been nearly two weeks that we have been watching beryl from birth to now we've seen it make three landfalls, and we're finally going to get rid of this system into tomorrow. but we've still got to deal with what's left over and impacting folks specifically where we have plenty of flood alerts. these were just expanded. from detroit to little rock. it lifts to the north. we will see the threat of flooding through the day, and eventually as we get into tomorrow, much of the rain works still across parts of the great lakes and new england will get into the action too. we have a chance for severe storms, including the threat for tornados for 5 million people, including paducah. that's something we'll watch through this evening. we've also got the heat to talk about. 138 million people under these alerts. heat and humidity across parts of the gulf coast, feeling like triple digits in a lot of spots,

but the actual temperatures headed to the triple digits out west. no relief in sight at this time. tomorrow, las vegas is expected to hit 118. that would beat th wichita. low 90s in dallas with full sunshine. atlanta ends up at 93 degrees. thunderstorms in the forecast from tampa to orlando. back to you. >> thank you, angie. 13 young hikers who went missing in the tahoe national forest are safe this morning after narrowly escaping a fast-moving wufrildfire. the placer county helicopter spotted them yesterday, and a rescue team was able to lead the group to safety. up next, big change and

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with non-habit forming zzzquil. ♪ ♪ markets are flat this morning after a record day on wall street. the s&p and nasdaq both closed at new highs yesterday. investors optimisticthat new data out this week could point to a rate cut on the horizon. later today, fed chair powell will testify before congress. let's turn to arabile gumede who joins us with a preview. good morning, arabile. >> good morning, frances. you're quite right. it just becomes a more difficult road path for jerome powell. he's said he needs more information, more data, need to collect more items to kind of give a clear sense that they're comfortable, as the fed, that

indeed inflation is dropping off towards that 2% target. the anticipation is it would hit 3.1% later on. and the estimation coming in for thursday as release. that's what we will really be looking for when it comes to the market. that's what we are anticipating to hear out of jerome powell later today then as he begins his testimony to congress. but the clear wording will certainly be around more data, more information and ensuring that inflation comes down so they can begin cutting interest rates. the market is anticipating that it would then start in september with two interest rate cuts anticipated this year. also just wanted to make note of another story very quickly. some of the other retail stores, particularly restaurants, are looking at cutting prices significantly and putting forth a few discounts. that's all because of inflation's high surge and how prices have actually been increasing over the last couple of months. in fact, a few years. some even videoing restaurant

chains to make sure they're not cheating them up when it comes to chicken wraps. it's very interesting how the inflation story is working out for consumers. united airlines is investigating why the wheel from one of its planes fell off. it landed safely in denver, and there were no reported injuries. the faa stepped up yoversight o maintenance when a wheel fell off on a flight heading from san francisco to japan. the diabetes and weight loss drugs have been compared. those taking ozempic and wegovy lost 8.3% of their body weight, while those taking mounjaro lost 15%. the results do not mean one is better than the other.

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up with demand after a social media post went viral. people are lining up out the door for a chance to try the pickle bun sandwich. a adam kuperstein tells us about their new bread and butter. >> reporter: for 50 years, this family-owned italian deli has served a steady stream of customers, but they never saw this coming. >> the line starts around the corner here and goes all the way out the door. >> yes, all day long. >> everybody please just step to the left if you're on the pickle sandwich line? >> reporter: all of a sudden, the owner has found himself in a bit of a pickle. this is constant lines of curious customers, desperate to try their pickle sandwich. >> we've been seeing it all over tiktok. and we knew we had to get our hands on it. >> reporter: seven brothers first created their breadless

sandwich in january, but it wasn't until four months later that it blew up. this tiktok video made by a cashier's sister went viral. >> that is so good. look at the juice dripping. >> reporter: it quickly wracked up more than 4 billion views. >> we made 20. we made 30. then it was like, we made 70. t then i'm calling the boar's head guy directly, i need more pails of pickles. >> reporter: he used to order one pail of pickles a week. now he's going through ten per day. at the peak, how many of these are you selling per day? >> 500. >> the pickle sandwich, we saw it on tiktok. >> my teenaged daughter sent me here today to get this sandwich. >> people have been waiting a half hour. >> reporter: some people are driving from hours atoway to tr the pickle sandwich. can you order it in any of the 200 combinations on the menu,

and they cost about 10 bucks. the original is turkey, bacon, lettuce, provolone and a side of honey mustard for dipping. >> the crunch. >> it's so nice to see that people worldwide are seeing them and getting the recognition they deserve. >> she's definitely getting free lunch for life, i tell you that. >> reporter: does this seem normal to you or weird? >> no, it's super, super weird. it feels like a dream. >> reporter: anthony's dad started the business in 1972 and certainly never could have predicted pickle mania. >> he passed away a couple years ago. i wish he could be here to see this, because we eat it up. it's incredible, overwhelming, but it's incredible. >> if ocean side, new york is too far fo nice to meet ya. my name is david. i've been a pharmacist for 44 years. when i have customers come in and ask for something for memory, i recommend prevagen. number one, because it's effective. does not require a prescription.

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