convention. do you think he did enough? >> so we're going to see. what i think is very smart and what everybody has been asking for, everyone who is asking in good faith has been asking for him to get out there and so he has a number of interviews scheduled, a number of press -- you know, did he this press conference, he showed command of what he needed to show, i thought. you know, the gaffes have always been his issue and so -- but what he did was he was solid on the policy stuff. i mean, you could never imagine trump being able to answer those questions. >> certainly not. and president biden on the road to michigan today and then sits down with our colleague lester holt for an interview with nbc news on monday. that does it for us this morning. we will see you on monday as well. have a good weekend, everybody. katy tur picks up the coverage right now. right now on msnbc reports, return to the trail. president biden heading to michigan after last night's news conference, acknowledging he's still trying to defend his candidacy, while insisting he is

in this race for the long haul. >> i'm not in this for my legacy. i'm in this to complete the job i started. >> that as three more house democrats called for him to step aside. what will we hear today from capitol hill? plus, a top biden campaign official will join us. what they say about nbc news reporting that some in the reelect think joe biden is doomed. and later the rnc's next week, what team trump is saying about a running mate and what they are not saying about president biden. ♪♪ good morning, it's 10:00 a.m. eastern, i'm katy tur in for ana cabrera. president biden heads back out on the campaign trail today trying to prove himself to voters and armor himself against growing calls for him to step aside. his trip to michigan follows a rare -- for him at least -- solo news conference where the

president spoke with deep knowledge about foreign policy, touted an objectively extensive record of accomplishment and told reporters that he was still the best candidate in this race. >> if your team came back and showed you data that she would fair better against former president donald trump, would you reconsider your decision to stay in the race? >> no, unless they came back and said there's no way you can win, me. no one is saying that. >> well, before that press conference 16 congressional democrats were saying that. the list is now up to 19 and it includes the top democrat on the powerful intelligence committee in the house, congressman jim himes. joining us now from -- >> joe biden, his legacy is top ten presidential material. it is absolutely a remarkable legacy, but if you don't look at this in a cold, hard way, you

will be complicit in donald trump's second presidency. >> let's try this again. joining us now from the white house is nbc's peter alexander, from capitol hill ali vitali and also with us is nbc's senior national politics reporter jonathan allen. so, peter, the white house i'm sure feels pretty good about the news conference last night. did they feel good exactly one minute after it happened when jim himes came out and said that he could no longer support joe biden? >> reporter: i think broadly speaking the white house and perhaps more importantly the president's allies and campaign advisers do feel like they have sort of tied the tourniquet on one more time. they felt that way early in the week and then in the middle of the week it looked like the defections started to grow again, they think in the words of one biden aide, campaign aide that i spoke to a short time ago that in effect this gave them another oxygen tank so they can spend the next several days beginning to fight back again. this has been a challenging time. a separate aide saying as the

performance last night that news conference was winding down that if this joe biden had showed up despite that one gaffe that got a lot of attention, that he and the democrats would not be in this mess right now, but similarly i was speaking to a democratic leadership aide shortly after the events of last night wrapped up and i asked them if this changed anything and they said to me, no. they said in simple terms that they did not believe the president was able to do enough to sort of snuff out the rebellion, to stop those who were already leaning toward calling for him to get out of the race. the president said he recognizes his real challenge right now, the way to sort of convince those voters and critics is to get out on the road again to help allay their fears by getting the chance to see him and that's what he is doing again today, going to a campaign event that will take place in detroit in the key battleground state of michigan. he heads to texas in the next several days for the 60th anniversary of the civil rights act, nevada as well, an exclusive interview with our colleague lester holt. so notably, katy, one biden

adviser or biden aide i should say here at the white house said to me they didn't view last night as any singularly important night but part of what has to be a consistent effort. i do think in simplest of terms right now that this president is in effect in a purgatory, he is in between there being enough calls for him to get out and the definitive performance that would say, hey, he is our guy again. it is a tough challenge for democrats in this moment. >> peter, you've covered this white house for a long time, you have important relationships. bring us behind the curtains. what are we learning about what are the conversations like internally, who has the most influence and what about this news and he was asked about it last night that the campaign team is polling kamala harris. >> reporter: a couple questions in there. pulling back the curtain a little bit i think obviously you can see a little bit of the color has drained out of the faces of some of the president's closest advisers. i will tell you that one moment where the president yesterday -- and he has done this for years, i remember in 2008 when he

referred to barack obama introducing him in iowa as barack america, so he's prone to gaffes in the past, but last night right out of the gates when he mistakenly said vice president trump instead of vice president harris i heard a deep sigh and saw one of the president's advisers in the front row sort of bow his head and take a deep breath. they recognize in this highly scrutinized moment that he really has so little room for error here. that's why they are pointing, i think, to the way he handled those questions on foreign policy and demonstrated the breadth of his knowledge, his detailed understanding about the complexities of foreign policy challenges, but, you know, in many ways as one biden supporter said to me, you know, he has demonstrated he has the ability to do the job, perhaps just not the ability to win the job again, and that really does, i think, prove to be one of the fundamental challenges they're facing right now. the question is how much time do they have to play with?

perhaps just five to seven more days as ali can attest jim himes noted before they have to come up with some sort of real conclusion with this and not live, again, in this extended state of purgatory. >> ali, let's talk about what it's like to be a democrat on capitol hill right now. jim himes coming out, he is the ranking member on the house intelligence committee, he is a gang of eight member, he is, i guess, the most, i guess, powerful democrat that has so far come out among the lawmakers to say that president biden should step aside. >> reporter: and it's notable of course that he did it with the timing that he did it with, but i also think that the point peter is referencing that himes made, this idea that the back and forth and debate over biden as the nominee can't go on forever. it continues to hamstring a party that is already in a bit of a posture of being in a circular firing squad around their nominee. there are a lot of people yet who have not come forward, who have told me and told members of our team that they are outright concerned, potentially drafting statements. i think this is sort of the spectre or the cloud that's

looming over capitol hill, even though lawmakers are physically gone, kany, the panic goes somewhere else with them physically, but it's definitely still palpable here in the halls. we had a roller coasty of a week here where i think on tuesday when democrats first came back to the hill and huddled together there was a sense of resignation around biden as the nominee. then when former speaker nancy pelosi went on "morning joe" on wednesday morning and made the remarks that she made, really leaving the door open for biden to make a different decision than the decision he had already clearly made to remain the nominee, that sort of opened up the panic again. then you saw one senator, peter welsh a freshman member come out as the first and only senator to say biden should drop out. we have seen house democrats put out statements, including congressman himes, but the question is is there a dam-breaking moment and how much longer can this go on? >> what are they waiting for.

ali? there's new sound from jim clyburn, one of the closest allies of president biden, i want to get to that, but what are the lawmakers waiting for before they send out that statement that either says that they can't support him or will stay on his side? >> reporter: this is the emotional aspect, i think, because of course the political conversation is one that we've been having, it's the polling, it's front line members concerned about what the drag is on their own ballot as they get further down the ballot because of course the president -- the role of a president is to bring party members along with him. so the political concerns are palpable but there's also the emotional stuff. i have not heard from one member, one strategist, one operative who says anything other than i love joe biden, but. they want him to reassure them. they want to go into these meetings with biden campaign aides and feel like the plan is going to work, but at the same time the question is how long it can go on and that's where i think congressman clyburn comes in as you mentioned because listen to what he said this morning on "today." >> is this the same joe biden that we saw two years ago?

>> well, look -- >> is it? is it the same joe biden? >> no. i'm not the same jim clyburn that i was four years ago and given a few -- what, ten more days -- >> you will be 84. >> i will be 84 years old. >> in terms of mental acute n terms of his physical ability, is he still the same man? >> physically? >> yeah. >> i don't think so. and mentally, i do think so. he is still grasping what this country is all about. he knows what a democracy is all about. >> reporter: and we have to point out two things, one, for as many members that are starting to come out and say biden should drop out, you do have clyburn saying he's our nominee and he is strong enough to do it. clyburn has been unequivocal that says the debate period has to end now, biden is the nominee. >> yeah, i mean, the

conversation is vibrant and healthy for a democracy up to a point. then it just becomes damaging for the candidate that is being spoken about. john allen, you've talked to a lot of folks within the effort to get him reelected. what are they telling you? >> some of the people who are trying to get him reelected believe that he has no path, i did some reporting with our colleagues carol lee around this. there is a sense within some of the upper echelons of the campaign, democratic party, that basically he's not in a place where he can turn this around. recently heard david plouffe the former obama campaign manager from 2008 saying that -- and i think this is important -- that before the debate joe biden was on a trajectory to lose to donald trump, but i think what you're seeing here basically is paralysis, katy and it has been that way for a couple weeks. you have a lot of democrats hoping they don't have to come out and call on biden to leave because that's divisive within

their own constituencies, but they hope that he will come to that conclusion on his own. they have you have biden trying to prove to them and there's an easy proof point here that he doesn't have to go anywhere. that he can hold on to this nomination as long as he would like. i think there is an effort by congressman clyburn there to close this down. i think there are a lot of members that would like to make a decision about one way to go, but the democratic party in congress, the democratic party, you know, sort of elders, the deletes, the folks that are involved in campaigns are legitimately divided over this. and it's not just biden needs to leave versus biden has to stay. even individual members of congress, individual operatives aren't entirely sure what the best option is for the party and kind of waiver back and forth. >> we've heard a lot of talk about the closed inner circle and all of them are advising

president biden to stay in. we've also heard that nancy pelosi plans on talking to him at some point and hakeem jeffries plans on presenting the concerns of his caucus to president biden. do we have any reason to believe that either one of them can be a difference maker for biden in terms of how he goes about this? john? >> yeah, you know, there's no reason to believe that joe biden is going to easily give up an office that he sought for his entire adult life, that he believes he's doing well in and that he believes he should have for another four years. that being said, there are few people with more will or political capacity than nancy pelosi. she has not called on him to leave, but she has, again, questioned his decision to stay in, right? he keeps saying i'm in and she keeps saying, when you make a decision, let us know. i don't think that's particularly subtle and i think that if she believes that for the good of the party, for the good of the country that she

needs to step in more forcefully she will do that. >> she's the speaker emeritus, she still has a lot of muscle within the democratic party. >> katy, can i just add, not just muscle, katy, i don't think we've ever seen anybody as politically gifted at least in my lifetime as nancy pelosi, sort of understanding where the high political ground s getting there first and waiting for others to kind of understand that they are about to get steam rolled. so if she decides at some point to come out it's not just, you know, the power, the muscle, it's also that she's just -- she's just so good at understanding politics. >> she's crunched the numbers. she's good at counting votes and if she comes out and says that president biden you don't have a path, it's because she has seen that there is no path or she believes she sees no path. jonathan allen, thank you so much. ali vitali and peter baker appreciate it. along with public calls from allies, donors and lawmakers for him to step aside, there is a lot of source reporting about

what's happening among the influential few who can speak honestly with the president. for more on that let's go to "the new york times" and it reports that a small group of biden's long-time advisers are convinced he will lose in november and they're figuring out how to convince the president to bow out gracefully. "new york times" investigative reporter michael schmidt helped break that story, he joins us now. michael, walk us through what you've been told. >> well, basically people that have worked for the president and alongside him for a long time, and people that have influence with him, have seen what many democrats have seen and that is that biden -- they've come to the conclusion that biden -- the pathway to victory is not really there for him and that their biggest obstacle now is convincing him that he cannot win and that they have to do that. he acknowledged as much last night at the press conference saying that, you know, he would need to be convinced that he cannot win, but they realize what many other democrats certainly on the hill, some that

have said it publicly and some that have not, that there is -- there is -- the chances of him winning are increasingly low, and that they need to do something. and this really speaks to the crisis and standoff that we face. you have a president of the united states who is increasingly entrenched in his position of wanting to stay in. i think, you know, we knew -- we knew he was entrenched behind closed doors, we certainly saw that last night, and the aides realized the political reality and there is a big gap between those two. there is the same gap between the congressional democrats and the president. some of the congressional democrats coming out and saying, you know, he has to go, others willing to say it on background, not willing to stay it on the record yet, and that's the standoff. that's the crisis. that's where we are as we come into this third week, you know, we're entering the third week after the debate.

>> do they have an idea of what they can say to convince him? is that presenting somebody who has a better path to winning the white house, perhaps his vice president? because he was asked about that last night and he said he's not getting out of the race so long as he has a path to win the presidency. >> look, he told people before the debate that he thought he had a far better chance than -- than harris at beating trump. he's convinced of his own singularity and his own power. people counted him out time and time again throughout his political career and he was able to overcome it all and win the presidency. he sees himself as an underdog, he does have deep resentment for what has gone on, for the way that these democrats have come out against him and the fact that they haven't rallied around him, say, in the way that clyburn did today. i think, you know, for the president that's a really

positive sign, but, you know, i talked to one of the 17 who have come out, the congressional democrats who have come out, and he said to me -- this congressman said to me, look, i was really worried about this. i didn't know what the reaction was going to be. i didn't have polling on what my constituents were going to say but i needed to come out and do this and since i've done that i haven't faced a lot of backlash from my constituents. about 80% of them think that i did the right thing based on my interactions with them. and to me that was sort of telling, that here was one of these members who took the risk of going out there against the president and the reaction to it wasn't -- wasn't an extreme backlash, it was actually people that agreed with what this congressman had done. >> do they believe that president biden has a base of voters or is the base of voters anti-trump? >> look, there is an enormous amount of anti-trump folks out

there. i think that one of the biggest problems that democrats see here is that, you know, the media, joe biden, joe biden's surrogates, are not talking about donald trump as much as they are, you know, talking about his performance last night. how many words did he stumble on? how many names did he forget? was his performance a b plus, an a minus or c plus and what does that mean? i think that the deeply frustrating thing to democrats is the fact that it distracts from two things, one, trump, project 2025, all of the anti-trump sentiment that they are running on and trying to raise the issue of, and the accomplishments of the past few years. you even saw that in what congressman jim himes said last night when he came out asking for biden to step down. democrats think they have accomplished more under biden than they probably have under any modern president and they think that something that they are not obviously just proud of but that they believe can help them win the presidency and, you

know, and maintain seats in the house and the senate. so if you're talking about the age and if we're sitting here saying, oh, well, he said this, he didn't say that, he was good on this issue, he wasn't -- whatever. you are not talking about trump, you are not talking about the accomplishments of the past few years. >> michael schmidt, good to have you. thank you so much. coming up, we're going to talk to a biden campaign official about what is next as more democrats call for a change on the ticket. and did we just get a big clue about who donald trump's vice presidential pick could be? we're back in 90 seconds. presi? we're back in 90 seconds ah, these bills are crazy. she has no idea she's sitting on a goldmine. well she doesn't know that if she owns a life insurance policy of $100,000 or more she can sell all or part of it to coventry for cash. even a term policy. even a term policy? even a term policy! find out if you're sitting on a goldmine. call

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how do you assure the american people that you won't have more bad nights, whether on a debate stage or it's a matter of foreign policy? >> i tell you what, the best way to assure them is the way i assure myself and that is am i getting the job done? am i getting the job done? can you name me somebody who has gotten more major pieces of legislation passed in three and a half years? i created 2,000 jobs this last week. so if i slow down i can't get the job done. that's a sign that i shouldn't be doing it. but there's no indication of that yet. president biden saying he can still get the job done. joining us now principal deputy campaign manager for the biden/harris campaign quinton folks. good to have you. thank you for being here.

has the president met with speaker hakeem jeffries? i know there was talk that he was going to relay the concerns of his caucus to the president. do you know if they've met? >> they did. they did meet last night. the president and the leader had a very good conversation, a substantive conversation as the president has been having with members on the hill and governors and mayors and elected officials across this country for the past week. >> can you tell us a little bit about what was relayed and whether it swayed the president? i'm sorry, i said speaker before, i meant leader. >> well, i don't have insight into those conversations, but i know that it was important for the president to connect with leader jefferies so i will just have to leave that at that. >> what is the conversation like within the campaign right now? at the top we just showed the president talk being all the jobs he has created, his record in the white house and it is an impressive and extensive record, objectively he's gotten so much done, but he has had a problem communicating to the american public about it and he's having a problem right now because so

much of the conversation is surrounding the debate performance and whether he is really still up for the job. what is the conversation internally about how to change course and whether it's possible to change course? >> well, look, the conversation inside of our campaign is one that it has been for months, which is we believe that campaigns matter, we believe we have to build an infrastructure and a campaign apparatus to communicate to american voters, that is how they're going to get the information. the president knows that he has to be out there communicating. we saw him last night for an hour give a press conference and answer questions about some of the most complex issues facing this country and the work that is being done as he said in the clip you played a second ago there is no indication that the work isn't getting done. 2,000 jobs last week, 15,500 jobs total. inflation going down. the conversation inside of the campaign is one of how we continue to tout those accomplishments that the president laid out and also how

we make sure we're drawing the contest of things like project 2025, trump and republicans are going to convene in milwaukee this week or next week to talk about project 2025, which is trump's agenda for a second term in america, one that's going to gut things like the department of education, gut checks and balances across this country, monitor women's pregnancies, ban abortions. those are the things that matter and trump doesn't have a plan for anything other than himself, an extremist. he wants to tax the middle class so that the wealthy can continue to get ahead and that is where his focus is. and so our conversation is continuing to make sure that we are drawing that contrast every waking moment and that is what our campaign has been built to do, what we're going to continue to do. >> the president and leader jefferies met last night. leader jefferies just a moment ago released a letter to house democrats saying that he expressed the full breadth of insight, heart felt perspectives

and conclusions that the caucus has fared. we will wait for more on what those conversations were like for our hill team. i wonder how does the campaign feel with so many democratic lawmakers now saying that they just don't think that he can do this? how do they feel about the ranking member of the house intelligence committee, a member of the gang of eight, jim himes, pressing send, pressing post on his statement asking the president to step aside the second the president finished his news conference last night? >> look, katy, obviously we disagree. the president disagrees. joe biden is the democratic nominee and he is the democratic nominee because he wants to be, because he has earned that right. 87% of 14 million votes and because he feels that he is the best candidate for this job and as he said there's no indication that the job isn't being done. i want to take a step back here. the reason all of this anxiety is coming from is coming from a place of wanting to defeat

donald trump. these lawmakers, everyone around the country, we are united in the fact that this we want to beat donald trump. our campaign is on a path to do that. as i mentioned to you, it is paramount that we continue to draw the contrast of things like trump's project 2025 versus our own accomplishments and that of our vision. as i said, republicans are going to convene to talk about this and the extremism that we are going to see and we have to do that. we're not going to get into a fight with these members. we are the democratic party and we are stronger when we are united. the president laid that out within he talked about all the accomplishments that those members on the hill have helped him do and we are strong because voters are feeling that. voters know what the president has helped them accomplish and democrats know that, that under his leadership record amounts of accomplishments have been done, the economy is coming back from the brink that trump left it in and president biden immediately got to work leading our country through a pandemic, creating jobs, continuing to bring inflation down. that is what's at stake. voters at home right now, women

unfortunately are thinking about their reproductive freedom, how they're going to put food on the table, corporate greed, rent prices, their mortgages and that is what president biden is fighting to do and as the numbers state and as the president again last night in his comments noted, there is no indication that those things aren't being handled under his leadership and that is how he judges it. he is not in this about his legacy, he is in this to continue to do the work for the american people and that is a stark contrast to donald trump who is a felon who only cares about himself. >> quinton, thank you for joining us. i appreciate it. >> thank you, katy. and let's bring back ali vitali from capitol hill with a little bit more on that meeting between leader jefferies and president biden which last night after that news conference. what can you tell us? >> reporter: we knew from our sources, lawmakers and other sources on capitol hill who said that leader jefferies promised them he would take the concerns he was hearing to the president directly. we're learning in a dear colleague letter from jefferies

that he did that. i will read a piece where he says i requested on behalf of the house democratic talk can you say and was graciously granted a private meeting with president biden. that meeting occurred yesterday evening. jefferies says in that conversation he directly expressed the full breadth of insight, heart-felt perspectives and conclusions about the path forward that the caucus has shared in our recent time together. he goes on to say that house democrats will continue to work in the best interests of every day americans. look, every time i and others have asked jefferies about these conversations that we know have ranged from supportive of the president to outright panic conversations, especially among front-line democrats about the role of the president at the top of the ticket, jefferies has continued to use what we've termed here on the hill the three c's describing the conversations as candid, clear-i had and comprehensive, like thing them to a family discussion. jefferies now bringing those concerns and conversations to the patriarch of the democratic family clearly telling him in

the aftermath of that press conference the range of opinions from within this house democratic caucus. katy, i can tell you in just the last minute or so, in the same time that we were confirming that jefferies met and relayed concerns, we have also seen another house democrat come out, brittany peterson of colorado saying with deep appreciation and love, joe biden, please pass the torch. so you can add another one in the column of house democrats calling on the president to step down, even as their leader, hakeem jeffries, went to him, met with him and relayed both support and concerns. >> i will add a fourth c to that, conclusions. >> i didn't hear those. >> he said he expressed conclusions, what are the conclusions? we will wait and see. thank you vooch. new speculation about donald trump's vice presidential pick based on the rnc's speaker schedule. with upwards of 50,000 people expected at the convention, which milwaukee is doing to get ready for it all. l.

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it is already here, the republican national convention begins on monday in milwaukee and we're getting more news on the schedule. this morning we learned melania trump will be at the convention after being all but invisible the last few years. notably absent from her husband's hush money trial. there's also no word -- there's also new word that don jr. former president trump's eldest son will be speaking on wednesday night ahead of the vp pick. so what could that tell us about who the vp pick might be? joining us now nbc news correspondent vaughn hillyard and nbc news correspondent shaq brewster who is in milwaukee for us. vaughan, vp pick. there was this news yesterday that don jr. would be speaking on wednesday night ahead of the potential -- or ahead of the vice president, whoever that vice president may be. why do we think that that might give us a clue about who it is? >> he and one particular individual have struck up a strong relationship over the past couple years, that

individual ohio senator j.d. vance, they share advisers. they are both very much on the same page with what the vision of a second trump administration could look like and what type of figures they want in congress serving alongside of donald trump in 2025. and so for don jr. to be the one introducing potentially the vp speaker, they think it potentially could be notable at the same time as the eldest son this is not a role that should be unexpected at the same time. we do not know if ivanka trump will be speaking at this convention or not. it is not clear whether melania trump is speaking. ivanka and melania both spoke at the 2016 convention here. for donald trump there is still a lot to be sorted out. >> tiffany as well. >> i believe tiffany. i would go to go back. baron had his first campaign appearance at doral on tuesday night. he is newly turned 18 and his father introduced him to the crowd that started chanting his name for the first time. >> what are we going to learn about the vp? usually with donald trump he starts teasing it.

for pence it was a big event and there was talk about it for days in the lead up. we haven't seen that here. is this because they're just letting the democrats have the moment with the questions about joe biden? what's going on? >> there is one more rally outside of pittsburgh in butler, pennsylvania, on saturday. so potentially could make that pick, but none of the three finalists that we believe to be finalists have so far to our understanding been invited to that rally on saturday. so there are outstanding questions. yesterday at mar-a-lago donald trump was meeting with hungarian prime minister viktor orban, there is doug burgum is actually here in manhattan, he was on fox earlier today, there's kind of silence from marco rubio and j.d. vance. so everybody is laying a little low here waiting to see how this develops, but there is the potential that donald trump could very well make this announcement at the convention in milwaukee to add a little extra flare to the festivities. >> talking about milwaukee, shaq, you are out there. how is the city preparing for

this? >> reporter: well, katy, you often hear law enforcement explain this as there are preparations that are seen and unseen and outside of the pfizer forum where donald trump will accept that nomination you see some of the physical barriers and physical infrastructure here, but we also know that there are more than 100 departments from around the country that are sending officers to milwaukee to help the city secure its first traditional convention that we've seen in eight years. a major security challenge for the city of milwaukee, now just hours away. large metal fencing blanketing downtown, former a massive protective zone around the arena where donald trump -- >> i love milwaukee -- >> reporter: -- is set to accept the republican presidential nomination for the third time. we join jeffrey norman as he makes rounds. >> how long have you been preparing for the rnc? >> approximately a year and a half, two years. >> reporter: planning that included at least 16 federal,

state and local agencies. 50,000 people are expected to flock to milwaukee, including delegates and media, law enforcement and protesters who this week lost an extended legal battle to protest within sight and sound of the arena. the biggest organized protest is set to begin outside of the secure area, but the protest organizer tells me the group will march into the so-called soft perimeter up to the main barrier where credentials and a security screening would then be required. >> exercise your first amendment right, don't destroy anything, don't touch anybody in violence, that's not going to be accepted in our city. absolutely not. >> reporter: the secret service taking the lead inside the perimeter with the milwaukee police department responsible for everything else. >> we can't plan for everything but we do have a lot of plans and a lot of resources. >> reporter: the department is leaning on tens of millions in federal grants to bring in additional officers and pay for new equipment, including a $1.3 million mobile command center and riot gear like gas masks.

>> the amount of protests that we have had this year has given us a lot of practice. >> reporter: from recent protests over the war in gaza, to nba championship celebrations, when crowd control is needed in milwaukee, the major incident response unit is called in. >> milwaukee has been here before. we have a large juneteenth celebration where we have tens of thousands of people in a very small area, so we've absolutely been here before. our officers are well-trained, they're professional. >> reporter: the first traditional convention in eight years, giving this host city a high profile test. >> are you ready for this convention? >> absolutely. >> no doubt about it? >> no doubt about it. >> reporter: and, katy, the department tells me that one of the biggest things that they've learned from the protests that we've seen this year is the importance of communicating and to that point they've been in constant communication with any major group that says they're planning to protest the rnc. >> shaq brewster, thank you very

much. and coming up, we are going to talk about donald trump and his hush money case, what he's trying to do to get the conviction thrown out. own out. looking for a smarter way to mop? try the swiffer powermop. ♪♪ an all-in-one cleaning tool, with a 360-degree swivel head that goes places a regular mop just can't. ♪♪ mop smarter with the swiffer powermop. switch to shopify so you can build it better, scale it faster and sell more. much more. take your business to the next stage when you switch to shopify. have you ever considered getting a walk-in tub? well, look no further! safe step's best offer, just got better! now, when you purchase your brand new safe step walk-in tub, you'll receive a free shower package. yes, a free shower package! and if you call today,

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donald trump was supposed to be sentenced yesterday for his felony conviction in the hush money/election interference trial, but the supreme court threw a wrench in that with the immunity ruling, forcing the judge to delay an order to review the supreme court's opinion to see whether it applies to any part of the trump case here in manhattan. and now trump's legal team is taking it a step further, asking judge juan merchan to throw the kate out entirely including the conviction. joining us state attorney for palm beach county florida, dave arrenburg. can they throw this whole thing out based on the immunity ruling? >> it's not going to happen. the judge is not going to let it

happen. what is an official act in paying off an adult film star to help you get elected president? but the supreme court did say that you cannot even go into the official acts as far as getting evidence, you can't even go into a core constitutional duty and get testimony as evidence and hope hicks is -- or was an aide to then president trump and her testimony came into the trial. so now they're saying, ah-ha, you should never have admitted her testimony into the trial. case dismissed. doesn't work like that. if anything it's harmless error, but also his conversations with hope hicks were not crucial to the case. >> but there's also the tweets and stuff. if i'm playing devil's advocate and i'm looking at the trump side of things, can they say there's enough evidence that was used in this case that would have never been able to be used had the supreme court ruling come before it to make the conviction not legally viable any longer? i'm sure there's more correct terminology for that, but that's how i will put it. >> tweets were public, the financial disclosure forms were

public, and the court said you can use public documents against the president. so i think the bigger issue is the testimony of hope hicks, of madeleine westerhout because they were white house aides and there may be a level of immunity, but as i was saying the key testimony in the case or the testimony of michael cohen and david pecker, not of hope hicks or anyone else. the jury discussions, remember, they came out with their questions during deliberations, they involved david pecker, michael cohen not hope hicks. if anything even if you couldn't admit the hope hicks testimony i would say that would be harmless error, no chance of dis mging this case unless the supreme court decides to go their own way again. >> can i take you down to south florida and ask about the latest with judge aileen cannon and what she's doing, she wants to review the immunity case as well in regards to the classified documents. >> yeah, well, judge canon's middle name is delay and she's going to continue to delay these matters and deliberate, but eventually -- look, what he's

being charged with are acts after he left the white house, right? it's not the possession of the documents while he was president, it's the retention of those documents and refusal to give them back after he left the white house. >> yeah. >> there is a difference. it's not an official act as a private citizen taking the documents and refusing to give them back. if he had taken air force one and refused to give it back he would be prosecuted for that, too. >> dave, really good to have you. thank you so much. coming up next, the big witness who could take the stand today in alec baldwin's involuntary manslaughter trial. don't go anywhere. hter trial don't agonywhere.

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any moment now witness testimony is set to resume in day three of alec baldwin's involuntary manslaughter trial. new mexico prosecutors are expected to call "rust" armorer hannah gutierrez-reed to the stand today. reed is currently serving an 18-month sentence for her role in the shooting death of halyna hutchins. joining us now chloe malis. is hannah gutierrez-reed going to be testifying today? >> i just spoke to her attorney moments ago and melas. so, is hannah gutierrez reed going to be testifying today? >> her attorney said he got a call from new mexico special prosecutor carrie morrissey who says they're running behind and they may not be calling hannah gutierrez reed today. we could see her potentially take the stand later in the afternoon, but it might be

monday now. and what is interesting is that she was already transferred earlier this week, from her prison, when is outside of santa fe to a local jail in santa fe, where she is awaiting to be called. the question is what is she going to say when she takes the stand. she has not wanted to cooperate n a pretrial hearing in may, she said she didn't want to take the stand and she was forced to by the judge to show up. she could plead the fifth. we have been talking to some former prosecutors in santa fe who say she could plead the fifth on some of the questions, but not all. and so, remember, she was already charged -- convicted on the same charge that baldwin is charged with, that involuntary manslaughter count. and she is facing -- she's already behind bars serving an 18-month prison sentence. >> this all comes down to the gun itself being fired, the trigger was pulled. the prosecution and the defense are arguing two different things about that. >> so the defense says this was make believe, alec baldwin is an

actor, he had been acting for generations, you heard that with alec spiro in his opening statements this week, it shouldn't have mattered whether or not he pulled the trigger. alec baldwin always maintained he didn't pull the trigger. when you listen to the new mexico special prosecutors, they say when you're on a set, you're not on a set, you should always assume that a firearm could be loaded and you should never point that firearm at anyone. now this is the first shooting death on a movie set since 1993. and, you know, obviously hollywood has gone to great lengths to keep sets safe. but at the end of the day, the big question i'm hearing constantly is how did live rounds get to set that was something that was not answered in hannah gutierrez reed's trial. and they believe she brought that ammunition to set, but it is a question coming up now. >> i imagine that would be a question she would be asked by alec baldwin's defense team. what was live ammunition doing

there? this was not a set that was supposed to have it, period. >> she maintains she did not bring the live rounds to set, but it is a similar box that the live ammunition that matches ammunition that was at her father's home, her stepfather is also a famous armorer in hollywood. but her team has always said it was brought by somebody else. >> maybe they start making the fake rounds, the blanks look very different from the real rounds in order to make this not a confusing situation. >> i want to also tell you yesterday on the stand we heard from mr. pietta and he talked about creating that replica gun and said that gun was in perfect working condition, afar as he was concerned, and it could not have accidentally gone off, which was in line of what the fbi said as well when testing the gun. >> you've been looking at live pictures of the trial as it has gone under way this morning in santa fe. chloe, thank you very much. jury selections are expected to begin today in the bribery trial of new jersey democratic senator bob menendez.

attorneys wrapped up four days of closing arguments yesterday after a nearly two-month trial with 37 witnesses along with hundreds of exhibits that piece together a tale of gold bars, stacks of $100 bills and egyptian and qatari investors. menendez pleaded not guilty to 18 bribery charges, and faces decades in prison if he is convicted. and coming up next, would an at&t breach is doing to the text messages and the logs and phone logs of millions of at&t customers and what the company is saying about it. don't go anywhere. ers and what y is saying about it don't go anywhere. nes. (aaron) so whatever's next... we're cooking with fire. (vo) switch to the partner businesses rely on.

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if you were an at&t customer, you got to listen to this. the company just revealed that nearly all of its customers, more than 100 million people, have been hit by hackers in a massive data breach exposing their text messages and their phone logs. joining us now, nbc news business and data correspondent brian cheung. this is awful. >> yeah. it is a big deal. and basically what at&t disclosed this morning is that during a period between may and roughly the end of october in b and text messages were accessed illegal by some bad actor. at&t says the contents of phone calls and text messages were not included in the breach, but nearly the text numbers you reached out to or basically whoever you were calling or texting, those numbers were identifiable and even though there is no --

>> why are they confident of that? >> that's what they say. we're looking into this and law enforcement officials are working with at&t to figure out the nature of what happened here. they say one person was apprehended, at least one person was apprehended, but law enforcement officials are continuing to work with not just at&t, but the fcc, the federal communications commission, in investigating exactly what happened. >> what are they telling customers about what to do in the face of this in. >> they're telling customers to be aware of any sort of unusual activity, spam or phishing messages by email that could be linked to this information that was illegally accessed. they say they're working quickly to resolve the vulnerability related in this instance. >> they got text messages and phone logs and any indication they got emails or any info like that? >> so it is just -- it seems to be limited to phone calls and text messages and the contents were according to at&t not allegedly part of that. let's say there are text messages between me and my mom.

there are phone numbers involved in that exchange, but we don't know what has been done with this information, we don't know if this is being released or sold somewhere, regardless, someone accessed this illegally and they're trying to look into it. >> brian cheung, thank you very much. that's going to do it for me this hour. i'll be back here at 3:00 p.m. eastern. please join me. also, ana cabrera will be back on monday. first up, jose diaz-balart. i need a new picture. that has very long hair on me. jose diaz-balart picks up our coverage right now. good morning. 11:00 a.m. eastern, 8:00 a.m. pacific. i'm jose diaz-balart. in just a few hours, president biden will get on the campaign trade in battleground, michigan. in the last few minutes, we learned president biden met with the top democrat in the house, hakeem jeffries, in a letter to house democrats, jeffries says he expreed