we'll continue to talk about the situation in ukraine and the peace talks throughout the day on cnn. thank you so much for joining me today. i'm carol costello. another hour of "newsroom" straight ahead. at last a call to vote for war against isis. the president seeks new authority. why some democrats, members of his own party, are now standing in his way. >> funny man jon stewart, newsman brian williams tv giants whose careers are changing course for very different reasons. could it change tv viewing habits as well? high drama at the murder trial of aaron hernandez. the ex-nfl star's fiance granted immunity and will testify for the prosecution. is this the bombshell that could sink him? you might be surprised.

hello, everyone. great to see you. i'm john berman. >> i'm kate bolduan. this morning after much anticipation president obama is asking congress for formal authority to take on isis. the white house has now sent the authorization for use of military force, a lot of words on capitol hill they sum up as umaf sent to lawmakers on capitol hill. >> that's coming six months after the mission against isis actually began and there are critics who say it's long overdue. it's the details within that are sure to stoke controversy. it would limit the operation to three years. it limits the use of ground troops saying there will be no enduring offensive ground combat operations. what does that mean? it would not restrict the battlefield to iraq and syria but it would repeal the 2002 military authorization for the war in iraq. >> let's get to it and bring in white house correspondent michelle kosinski and chief congressional correspondent dana bash who are working both ends

of pennsylvania avenue on this one. michelle let's start with you. this was anticipated, but what are you learning from the white house today? >> reporter: it has been a long time in coming. you can see the balance that the president was trying to strike here. tailor something to fit the isis fit specifically but still leave flexibility because you don't know how the mission will change going forward. first place you see that balance repealing the 2002 authorization pertaining to the war in iraq but leaving in place the one from someone related to al qaeda and its associates. that's the one the white house has been operating under to fight isis. it's interesting that they left that one stand. however, we all know that al qaeda and its associates remain a threat. aqap being the main one. other areas of balance allowing the president and pentagon to fight isis wherever it is. doesn't put geographic limits on the fight and also includes isis associates groups fighting

alongside isis. where this aumf does set the limit is the ground troops. that language in the actual request enduring offensive ground combat operations does not authorize the president to use that. in his letter to congress he said it wouldn't authorize long-term large-scale ground combat like those our nation conducted in iraq and afghanistan. there's a limit that not everybody agrees with but you can see that it does leave a window open for shorter term smaller scale ground combat operations. all of these things are open to interpretation and you can say that's why we've been using a 2001 authorization in the first place. back to you guys. >> the president will make his case to the public today at 3:30. he'll give a little bit of an announcement in his speech about this plan at the white house. meanwhile, let's go to capitol hill. dana bash, those words, no enduring offensive ground combat operations. i see a battle brewing from both

sides of the aisle over this. >> reporter: remember goldilocks? they are trying to find one that's just right. it's not easy. it's for reasons you wouldn't think along traditional party lines because the democrats are saying that they believe that it is too broad. they want to narrow the president's authority. the republicans are saying that it is too narrow. the president himself has to tie his own hands too much. let's listen to what house speaker john boehner said on that note this morning. >> i'm not sure that it's a strategy that's been outlined will accomplish the mission the president says he wants to accomplish. the president's point is he wants to dismantle and destroy isis. i haven't seen a strategy yet that i think will accomplish that. >> reporter: basically the gist of what we're hearing from a lot of republicans is that what the authority that the president asked for limits the president's ability as a commander in chief. they don't care that it is a

democratic president. they think it's a bad precedent. the flip side you hear from democrats that they're very worried. they've been down this road before they say, about giving the president too broad of authority. listen to what the democratic leader in the house, nancy pelosi said about that issue. >> we hope to have bipartisan support for something that would limit the power of the president but nonetheless protect the american people in a very strong way. >> reporter: just to sum this all up what does this mean? even though members of congress on both sides of the aisle have been demanding that congress debate this and they believe many illegal or unconstitutional for the person to have been waging this action already against isis without congress acting is definitely no sure thing that congress will be able to find a compromise to actually act and thread that needle on the difference between how much power or how little power the

president should have. >> it's an important debate to have. thanks so much for this. some of the greatest skepticism here is coming from democrats and members of the president's own party. later we'll speak to senator chris murphy who has indicated he would vote against this measure as it's currently written and we'll ask him to explain his view on that. >> likely one of the toughest votes that many members of congress will take. one of the toughest votes tail take in more than a decade at this point. the u.k. u.s. and france will pull workers out of france. rebels seized u.s. embassy vehicles parked at the airport and even stopped u.s. marines leaving the country from taking their weapons with them. >> yemen has been a nation in chaos for weeks and months since rebels placed the president there under house arrest. the state department warns now of ongoing risk of kidnapping to foreigners including americans. let's bring in chief national security correspondent jim

sciutto. jim, shutting down the embassy. american vehicles seized. this seems like a dangerous and volatile situation to say the least. >> it's dangerous. a difficult departure from this very key diplomatic post in a very key region in a very key and difficult time. we're told that because the houthies rebels who have taken over the central part of the country and capital control the airport, it is they who require the marines to give up their weapons at the airport and take over now the vehicles at the embassy and we're told by officials that they prepare houthies to go into the complex so prepare yourself for difficult images of people taking over what is u.s. property abroad. we're told that u.s. embassy personnel took all necessary steps destroying documents and computer disks and disabling any weapons they left behind but also keep in mind it's not just visas that an embassy puts out.

this is about political contacts on the ground. intel gathering. military cooperation with the yemenis which is key because they're a partner in fighting aqap al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. this is a real loss. you understand why they did it. it's a volatile situation but you do lose something not having that diplomatic post on the ground. >> exactly to that point, this seems like it could be seen as a blow to the obama administration. it's definitely going to be used by republicans to criticize his foreign policy stance because yemen and cooperation with yemeni government is something the president held up as successful partnership in taking on terror. >> that's exactly right. this is regionwide now. you have no diplomatic presence. no embassy in yemen. none in syria for a number of years. post-benghazi, nothing in libya and nothing in somalia for a number of years. all of these places hotbeds of terrorism. you have al shabab here.

you have isis in libya as well. isis in syria. aqap in yemen. talk of isis fighters there. no diplomatic presence. i'm told by u.s. military officials that counterterror operations will continue. that's drone strikes, et cetera down here in the south. you do lose something when you don't have those key diplomatic relation ships relationships and not sharing information with the local government and now we see that in four failed states that are real threats to u.s. security. it's a problem. a real loss. >> important context you are putting it in. thank you so much. surprising consequences from last week's deadly plane crash in taiwan. more than half of the pilots trained to fly that same model of aircraft for transasia have been suspended. several of them failed to pass tests on how to handle plane during engine failure and others were not able to take the test because they were out of the country or apparently sick. the pilots will be able to take the test again after retraining.

investigators looking into last week's crash say pilots may have cut off the wrong engine when they sensed troubles. new developments in the shooting deaths of three muslim students in north carolina. police now say an ongoing dispute among neighbors over parking may have pushed the alleged gunman to carry out the attack. three people were killed here. 46-year-old craig steven hicks has been charged with three counts of first-degree murder now. he's being held without bond and is said to be cooperating with investigators. authorities do say they're going to continue to investigate whether the victims' religion had any part in this attack. >> a lot of questions about this case. moving words from a 6-year-old in the fight against measles. california school district last night voted to support a proposed state law that would stop letting parents cite personal beliefs to stop their children from getting vaccines before entering school. he's been in remission from

leukemia for a year and a half but his immune system is to weak for him to get shots. his father says he relies on immunity of other kids to protect him. >> thank you for teaching science and making everybody get vaccinated unless they are doing chemo like i did. soon we will say good with the measles. i give a damn. >> that's a damn cute kid right there. >> are you kidding me. he's so cute. >> nearly 8% of the kids in his county are not vaccinated. that's among the highest number in the state of california. >> i'm going to watch that over again later. new information, important information to tell you about kayla mueller, the american aid worker and isis hostage whose death was just confirmed. intelligence officials telling

cnn that mueller might have been given to an isis fighter during her 18-month captivity as some kind of bribe. it's not clear at this point if she was forced or sold into this pairing. the circumstances around mueller's death are still very much unclear. isis claimed she died last week in a jordanian air strike. that's been disputed in the u.s. and beyond. that's clearly part of the investigation now. >> troubling. coming up for us two big names on tv are going off the air. jon stewart leaving "the daily show" on a very high note. >> and then a bombshell moment in the news business. the highest rated evening news anchor suspended. the controversy surrounding brian williams. we have new information about his future next.

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the world of fake news is losing a pioneer. >> you're leaving? >> most of what i do is real here. >> kidding. >> jon stewart says he'll step down as host of "the daily show" later this year. >> stewart has been at the helm of the comedy central program. this surprised me. for the last 16 years. his announcement hit the airwaves last night and shocked everyone but also offered only a bit of a hint about why he may be leaving. >> i'm not going to be here and try and sum up what this place has meant to me over the years. i couldn't do that. we have plenty of time and i've got a myriad of people to thank and we'll get to that over time. i'm not going anywhere tomorrow. but this show doesn't deserve an even slightly restless host and neither do you. >> want to bring in robert

thompson, director of the center for media studies at syracuse university. professor, thank you so much for being with us. you know we joked about jon stewart being a fake news anchor. he does this comedy show on comedy central. but he's become much more than that. >> he has. i mean he starts in january of '99. takes over from craig and is doing fraternity jokes. the elections come along and he finds his own voice and that show since then has been an important part not only of american television but of our civic conversation when most of the news operations have dropped the ball on stories like weapons of mass destruction and the rest of it that comedy show has been plugging away sometimes in ways that are much more insightful than we see in the more legitimate news operations.

>> on one point did he also downplay the anthony weiner scandal at one point. he's not infallible. >> absolutely. he always kind of hides behind -- his old line used to be why does anybody take me seriously? my lead-in is a puppet show. his lead-in isn't puppets anymore but he had that downplayed the fact that it was just a comedy show. he knew and we knew that what was going on in that program was considerably more important. now, i never thought it was good that people only get their news from jon stewart. that's not a good thing. people who have jon stewart as part of their diversified portfolio of information is a fine thing to put in there. >> how much of a void is there and how do you suspect it will be filled? he's not just a hero to some millennials but also to liberals. it's not like he's right down the middle here in terms of his

criticism. >> unlike colbert which they scrapped the show and put a new show in there, "the daily show" will continue its format. i think it will continue its title. i think if they're smart, they'll recruit from within. they have a faithful fan base. whoever is part of that family they love. they love john oliver when he took over and he did a perfectly good job doing that. they loved colbert when he went to his show. if i were on comedy central running the place, i would immediately right now offer the job to one of their internal candidates. jessica williams. she's funny. she's smart. she's a great actor. she's prettier than jon stewart and i think she would give a little different voice to that show which is maybe what we need now. john oliver in many ways when he took over while stewart was making his movie was almost doing a jon stewart impersonation in a british dialect. that was fine as a place holder.

after all these years, maybe we need a slightly different stick than what jon stewart did so brilliantly. i'm going to miss him terribly. i think someone like jessica williams who has been on that show a lot, who is part of the family could do some really fascinating things. >> john oliver did nail the british accent when he was doing it. >> he really did. >> professor, thank you so much. appreciate you being with us. all right. the crisis in ukraine. there's a war raging in eastern ukraine right now. hundreds of people dying every month there. there is a potential peace meeting happening right now. leaders from key nations meeting. what will be the outcome? we'll take you there next.

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a crucial moment in the deepening war in eastern ukraine. leaders from ukraine, russia france and germany are set to meet in belarus moments from now to try to work out a peace deal between kiev and russian-backed separatists. the situation is described as dire by u.s. officials with dozens of people being killed every day. nic robertson is live in minsk. we hear the stakes couldn't be higher for the people of ukraine. >> reporter: they couldn't be. they're witnessing that every day in the south and east of ukraine at the moment. the president of ukraine petro poroshenko the first to arrive here at the independence palace

in minsk just a few moments ago. petro poroshenko had been today to one of the areas in ukraine where civilians are being killed. some were killed in shelling just yesterday. he comes with moral authority to say my people are suffering. we have to put an end to this. he's also said that if there isn't a political agreement here he will implement martial law across the whole country and implications there are military confrontation and conflict would ratchet up. just in the last two or three minutes we've seen the german chancellor angela merkel and the french president francois hollande arrive here. we understand the russian president en route from the airport to these talks. that's when they can really get under way. some contentious issues there at the moment. one of them for one of those contentious issues for the russians is who would control the border between russia and separatist region of ukraine.

the ukrainian government wants it to be done by international monitors. that and many other thorny issues here to be debated late into the night here. john? kate? >> nic robertson, thank you so much. all eyes on that especially as the last one as we were talking about -- the last peace proposal out of minsk fell away and fell away quickly. president obama lays out his war proposal to congress. what does congress think about the plan? that's clearly the most important question. some in the president's own party may be his biggest challenge on this one. we'll ask a member of congress to weigh in. sound good? great. because you're not you you're a whole airline... and it's not a ticket you're upgrading it's your entire operations, from domestic to international... which means you need help from a whole team of advisors. from workforce strategies to tech solutions and a thousand other things. so you call pwc. the right people to get the extraordinary done.

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it may end up being the most important vote in over a decade for members of congress. president obama has sent his plan to congress that would give the u.s. permission to wage a much bigger battle against isis. >> we're joined now by democratic senator chris murphy from connecticut. senator, thank you so much for being with us. >> sure. thanks for having me. >> senator, we have read what you have to say about this measure over the last several days. you have concerns as do several other democratic senators about what some call a loophole. the president is calling for weapons only to enduring offensive ground combat operations and i know you and others have concerns that leaves an in if they want to use ground troops. do you not trust the president here with that kind of authority? >> no. i completely trust the president because i think he knows what can significantly degrade and

defeat isil. that's limited military power in conjunction with partners arab partners in the region that give the space for real political and economic reform to stamp out isil. he's made it very clear to congress and to the american public that he is not going to use major combat troops in this conflict. i have no doubt that the president is sincere about that. the problem is that this authorization goes for three years. not a year and a half. so it will extend a year and a half at least into the next president's term and a lot of my republican colleagues here have made it clear that they want to put boots on the ground and so i want to make sure that we have an authorization that takes the fight to isil but as the american public has cleared told us sets a line and says combat troops are not ultimately going to defeat isil so we should keep them back here at home. >> to that point, some of your republican colleagues say that to defeat isil is impossible to do without american troops.

listen to senator lindsey graham who was on the show yesterday. >> to my colleagues if you think you can win this fight without any american troops on the ground your evaluation of the capabilities in the region are far different than mine. i want to win for the sake of this young lady and for the sake of all who have suffered under the hands of this brutal regime who burned a man alive. let's get on with degrading and destroying. >> you guys are in very different places on this. where is the compromise because the fight against isil is happening right now. >> i'm not sure what about the last ten years as advertisement for massive deployment of ground troops in the middle east. the reality is that as good a job as our soldiers do the very presence of major american troops in iraq over the last ten years brought terrorists and extremists from all around the world to iraq and to syria. and so i'm not sure what you can

read into our experience in that region that would suggest that we should open this up. i'm furious about what happened to this young lady to the public executions of americans and of europeans. anger is not a strategy. we've got to be smart about this fight. smart strategy recognizes that combat troops in the end are going to become bulletin board material for terrorists to bring even more forces to the fight in the middle east and across the globe. >> by limiting combat troops as much as you seem to want to sir, does that not tie the hands of the president? i understand you say you trust this president but not the next one. shouldn't any executive argument goes have the authority to wage the war they think they should? >> that's not how the constitution envisions foreign policy happening. congress is authorized by article 1. the president is authorized by article 2. we frankly advocated our responsibility to try to help the president set strategy and

there's a long precedent of congress enacting war authorizations with limitations. and so here where we know that the president is committed to fighting this war without ground troops i think we should simply take him at his word. congress has effectively allowed too much discretion to the president and the results have been disastrous. a war in iraq that never should have been fought in the first place. a war in afghanistan badly mismanaged. congress needs to get back in the game here and there's nothing wrong with us having something to say about the right strategy moving forward. >> senator, you have said that this proposal is going to have to change dramatically to get your support. timing here it seems to be kind of a priority of an urgent nature because the united states and coalition forces are committing air strikes right now against isis and the goal is to defeat and degrade isis. what's the timing do you think? when do you think congress will be able to come to some kind of

a compromise and agreement? >> reporter: we're in a curious place because the president still says that he has the authority to conduct these operations with or without this authorization so let's be honest he's not going to stop fighting isil while we debate this authorization. i think that -- >> do you think he doesn't need this authorization? >> i think he does. i disagree with the president. i think that right now this is an extra constitutional conflict. i think he does. just for practical purpose, the fight is not stopping. i think we should have a prohibition against ground troops with exceptions. there are places in which you're going to want to put special operations forces in to go after particular leadership within isil. you certainly have to have the room to do rescue operations. i think we can build an authorization that has a general prohibition on ground troops but then allows for some flexibility for the executive. i think ultimately that's a place where republicans and democrats can get together and i'm hopeful that will be the process coming up. >> senator chris murphy always great to have you with us.

appreciate your passion and your eloquence on this issue. hope to see you again soon. today at 3:30 eastern time the president will issue a statement on this authorization he has sent to congress. he'll make the case why he says he needs it. we'll bring you that statement when it happens here live on cnn. brian williams is off the air and off the payroll for the next six months after his iraq war story morphed into quite a huge scandal. could there be more bad news coming for him? plus a big moment in the aaron hernandez trial. his fiance granted immunity. does this spell bad news for the former nfl star? you might be surprised.

stunning news for millions of americans who depend on the

news. brian williams suspended for six months without pay stemming for comments he made about riding in a helicopter he said was shot at during the iraq war. it was of course not. >> the question at this hour what happens later this month after the six-month suspension is up? really what do folks think of the six-month suspension in the first place? joining us professor of broadcast journalism at the university of maryland and our senior media correspondent brian stelter. mark good to see you. you said to "the new york times," i don't know how he can ever read the news with a straight face or how the public will respond if he does. what the do you make of this? >> well credibility is a fragile thing. he lost it. by his own admission, he lied. from nbc's statement, it appears he may have lied multiple times and multiple exaggerations.

it will be hard to turn the clock back to the traditional credibility he had. >> if it was just this instance six months without pay seems like a pretty harsh penalty there. is there a sense that there is more out there? there's another shoe to drop? >> there is a sense. i don't know if it's an entire shoe but there's a sense there is more coming that nbc found that deserves further scrutiny and requires more fact checking. they've been fact checking for several days. a whole team at nbc has been doing it. they've been talking to soldiers on that iraq war mission but also people involved in hurricane katrina aftermath that brian williams covered and other stories. i'm not sure which other ones yet. nbc does know. that's why they hinted at that yesterday. let me play brian williams -- let me go into his mind for a moment. he's not at work today. he's suspended. my sense is he believes he can

win people back still. he had a chance to resign. he could have resigned yesterday. he didn't. instead he accepted the suspension. he believes he can apologize and he believes he can win people back. i think that's significant. a lot of folks at nbc are writing him off saying there's no way we can come back. there's a widespread point of view but williams believes he has a chance to win people back and apologize and earn a second chance. >> to be contrarian some people think six months without pay is a harsh penalty but others would say if you're of that level, if you're the face of nbc "nightly news," managing editor of "nightly news" or any other organization and if this is multiple instances which they are investigating, folks would be canned. >> yeah. frankly all three of you would be canned and rightly so as i would i if you engaged in what he's admitted to and nbc is

investigating. truth matters. trust matters. i realize that's an old fashioned view in the era of truthiness and celebrity values matter in television. when it comes right down to it people watch the news to get information as well as entertainment. if you can't trust the person who is delivering the news there's a price to be paid for it. as bad of a scandal as telling lies about the iraq war to get us into it as the bush administration did, no but telling lies is a cardinal sin. >> if you're interviewing politicians and you're brian williams how can you ask about misstatements given this situation? maybe time heals all wounds. maybe six months is a long enough period of time that people will in their own way have memory lapse like brian williams says he had and move on. by then i have a feeling nbc may be happy with lester holt or other people filling in.

the ratings came in for tuesday and holt beat abc's world news and that's something that was notable for nbc and preliminary numbers could change but it's another indication that viewers are not rejecting brian williams' fill in. >> mark is writing a book about media scandals. obviously a chapter added to that book. mark great to see you. get writing. on a personal note we discussed this. i struggled with covering this story from the very beginning. i was hesitant. i resisted myself because i would think someone with the stature of brian williams deserved the benefit of the doubt. we're in a different place at this moment obviously as he's been suspended. i was also surprised at how many people did not share the view that i had in our industry and that folks were really quick to jump on the bandwagon. >> it's a tight knit industry but a cutthroat industry. there's sadness in the industry but also disappointment. >> looks bad for the business when someone at the top of the business suffers a scandal like

this. brian, thanks for being with us. coming up foreign fighters heading to join isis at an alarming rate. we'll break down the frightening numbers and discuss why so many are heading overseas to take on the fight. having a perfectly nice day, when out of nowhere a pick-up truck slams into your brand new car. one second it wasn't there and the next second... boom! you've had your first accident. now you have to make your first claim. so you talk to your insurance company and... boom! you're blindsided for a second time. they won't give you enough money to replace your brand new car. don't those people know you're already shaken up? liberty mutual's new car replacement will pay for the entire value of your car plus depreciation. call and for drivers with accident forgiveness, liberty mutual won't raise your rates due to your first accident. switch to liberty mutual insurance and you could save up to $423 dollars. call liberty mutual for a free quote today at see car insurance in a whole

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happening now, an alarming warning to congress about the rapidly increasing ranks of isis growing in numbers and most worrisome the growing ranks of foreign fighters. a top u.s. counterterrorism

expert says more than 20,000 fighters have joined isis from 90 different countries. about 3,400 are from western countries and about 150 from the united states. >> officials say they need stronger counterterrorism laws to stop the flow of those terrorists across borders but how and also this. the chair of the house homeland security committee says he's alarmed that the united states doesn't have a lead agency currently in charge of countering radicalization at home. let's discuss all of these especially these new numbers. with us now is the co-author of "isis inside the army of terror." michael, what do you make of these numbers that are out? 20,000 they believe is the latest estimate. 3,400 coming from western countries. >> it's totally plausible. the important thing to keep in mind is that the minority are coming from western countries. most foreign fighters have been tracked to join isis come from other countries in the middle east to north africa. tunisia is a huge feeder.

just because, a, look they are reading about isis or seeing the broadcasts in it's easier to get to syria or iraq from saudi arabia kuwait and these countries. >> here's what it says to me it says they're still growing. it says despite the u.s.-led coalition, the bombing going on in syria and iraq despite the worldwide media, propaganda effort, i don't use that word por jor -- perhaps increasing the level of their recruits. >> this is not a new group, isis. it was al qaeda in iraq. by 2010 the upper echelons of the organizations were all but destroyed, captured or killed on the battlefield in iraq. they've replenished their ranks and then some. so the resiliency of this group

to pull in foreign fighters is extraordinary. and you have to understand their propaganda is that the united states and iran are in league with each other to either kill ethnically cleanse or dispose of sunni muslims in the area. that's what this is designed to sort of hammer home. so indeed people are watching this stuff and saying i want to go off and do jihad or at the very at least join the vanguard group in the region. >> do you agree -- mike mechanicalmccaulll is the largest -- >> when we talk numbers, this is a difficult game because you're not just looking at the isis -- the people who have signed up to be the rank-and-file soldiers or

the clerics, you're looking at fellow travelers and people who pledge allegiance or who operate more as affiliates. >> the sympathizers. >> yes. look at the expansive terrain these guys are lording over. from syria to iraq all the tribal areas, the populations under their sway have given some kind of pledge of allegiance to them. if you take in these numbers, you're looking at probably over 100,000. >> and not shrinking. >> and not shrinking. >> great to have you. coming up for us a major moment in the trial of aaron hernandez. the star's fiancee has now been given immunity to testify. she will testify for the prosecution. but is this necessarily an awful thing for aaron hernandez? you might be surprised.

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right now, the murder trial of former patriots player aaron hernandez has resumed with a very big change in the courtroom. the defendant's fiancee, shaniya shayanna jenkins could testify. >> prosecutors suspect she told aaron hernandez to get rid of the murder weapon. let me bring in mel robbins. people think now this is over. that's not necessarily the case is it? >> that's right. not so fast, everybody. the prosecutor has given her immunity for a particular

reason. they want to back her into a corner, you guys. keep in mind she has pending perjury charges. the prosecutors alleging she lied not once but 29 times to the grand jury. why grant her immunity? first of all, immunity means if she were to go on stand and say, yeah, i lied yeah i got rid of the gun, she would not be prosecuted for that. she's been given immunity. however, why the prosecution is giving her immunity is because when she gets on that stand, she cannot claim the fifth amendment right to self-protection against incrimination. she either has to testify and answer the questions directly that she's being asked or she will be held in contempt and she will be thrown in jail. she's not testifying for the prosecution, guys. she will be a hostile witness. this lady has been sitting with aaron hernandez's family. she mouths "i love you" when he

comes into the courtroom. she is on his side. she will be hostile. they will treat her as a hostile witness and she will now be compelled to testify. >> but it will still be just a dramatic moment here to see her on the stand because we're talking about the family dynamic. her sister was the girlfriend of odin lloyd and has an entirely different take. >> yeah. this is a serious case. but i think we're all thinking in the back of our minds, how long until the lifetime movie version of this comes out because the drama and the family plot line underneath this all is fascinating. but she's either going to get on the stand and sing, which she's likely not going to do because she's still in aaron hernandez's camp or she'll get on the stand and refuse to testify, in which case she'll get thrown in jail. or she's going to get on the stand and do what she did with the grand jury and that is tell stories that aren't truthful and believable.

for example, she's accused of lying about the fact that aaron hernandez called her from his attorney's office last june and asked her, instructed her to remove objects from the house. she denied that happened. another thing that she denies remembering is those things she removed from the house, she's not quite sure what she did with them. so if she testifies like that in front of a jury a jury might be like, i don't believe this chick. something's weird between these two which goes to her credibility. >> the prosecution banking this is a win-win for them. if she squirms on the witness stand, they're betting it looks good for them anyway. mel, thank you. >> thank you, mel. thank you all for joining us today. >> "legal view" with ashleigh banfield starts just about now.

six months after u.s. fighter jets started blasting isis in syria and iraq the obama administration is formally asking congress for the authorization of military force. a measure sent to capitol hill this morning would expire three years after passage. it specifically would not authorize, quote, enduring offensive ground combat. it would not authorize that. and it would repeal the iraq war authorization of 2002. president obama will talk about all of this live at 3:30 eastern time. cnn will carry that live. so