>> i guess that's how they feel about the united states senator. all right, brian todd, thanks very much for that report. brian todd, here in "the situation room." that's it for me. thanks very much for watching. i'm wolf blitzer in "the situation room." "erin burnett outfront" starts right now. "outfront" next, breaking news. massive earthquake in mexico city. at least 116 dead at this moment. this as a dangerous category 5 hurricane heads straight for puerto rico. we're on top of both of these breaking stories this hour. and paul manafort fighting back after our exclusive report he was wire tapped. trump's former campaign chairman calling on the department of justice to release all of the intercepts. and rocket man. trump's nickname for kim jong-un, giving elton john a whole new following. let's go "outfront." >> good evening, i'm erin burnett. "outfront" tonight, two major breaking stories. a powerful earthquake with a rising death toll.

and that death toll has been rising very quickly over the past hour. this is the scene in mexico city. the magnitude 7.1 quake struck there, tall office buildings shaking. large pieces of debris, sheets of glass all, as you can see, crashing to the ground. the president of mexico saying dozens of structures in mexico city have been completely destroyed, collapsed, as you see on your screen. and the number of dead, as i said, tragically has been rising and very quickly. it was only 42 within the past hour or so. now, 116 known to be dead. an untold number are injured as they're searching in the collapsed buildings right now. across the country, millions are without power. this disaster coming as a monster category 5 hurricane is tearing across the atlantic, about to make landfall again. maria at this moment on a collision course with the virgin islands and puerto rico. officials warning residents to evacuate or die. maria is expected to make landfall in hours, packing

sustained winds of 165 miles per hour. the national weather service predicts catastrophic damage for more than 3 million americans on those islands. the storm right now with a life threatening combination of extremely high winds, storm surge, heavy rainfall, and massive flooding. up to two feet of rain expected. that's a combination of harvey and irma in one. a lot to get to tonight. we want to begin with paulina out front tonight in mexico city. look, this happened on the anniversary of the massive earthquake in mexico city. stunning and jarring, and obviously massive damage and a death toll tonight. >> reporter: good night, erin. it was horrible. just to feel the earth shaking once again, to feel that horrible earthquake hit mexico in september 7th, once more, we got hit by this massive earthquake. the damage, buildings collapsed.

there are at least 30 people dead in mexico city. and eight missing. the eight missing people are inside of a building that collapsed, and this is where i live. and the whole area was evacuations. it's very dangerous now in this minute and in this area of mexico city. >> and of course, they are searching for more survivors right now. paulina, thank you. i want to go straight to ricardo ramos, who joins me on the phone. ricardo, you're also in mexico city. you were actually in a restaurant as this earthquake struck. you took a video of exactly what you saw. what did this feel like? >> hi, good afternoon. it was definitely a crazy experience. i was here for the earthquake that happened two weeks ago. but this one was much stronger due to the proximity right here. basic instinct was just grabbing

everything and heading out to the streets, making sure we were away from trees and electricity cables. and i believe it lasted over a minute. so it was definitely the scariest minute of my life, i will say that. >> i mean, it's stunning when we look at these pictures. you know, what we are seeing, giant pieces of glass fall from buildings and the way that those lights were shaking at the restaurant you were in, that wasn't a sway. that was a very dramatic shake we're seeing. i mean, how did that feel? what went through your mind as all of a sudden, it started? >> absolutely. well, it's funny because they had a drill this morning. there's a drill they have been doing ever since the earthquake of the '80s. so at first, i thought it was a drill. i was like, wait a second, there was shaking. you don't really fear in the moment. instinct of grabbing things and making sure you find safety and everyone else is safe. >> and after, as you ran out, as

you say on instinct, you got out of that room where those lights are shaking. you now obviously, we understand, dozens of buildings have collapsed. the death toll right now, ricardo, is 116. it has gone up very rapidly in the past hour. people could be trapped in some of these buildings. what kind of destruction have you seen as you have walked back from the restaurant, even? >> yeah, starting with the restaurant, the lights and the power went out right away. a lot of parts in the street, glass on the floor from broken windows. i personally did not see any of the demolished buildings. but definitely a lot to see. i had to walk all the way back, and it took me about an hour. i got to see a lot during that hour. >> well, ricardo, thank you very much. i mean, just amazing to look at these pictures. you can just see on the anniversary of that earthquake, and then all of a sudden this

happens. it's stunning, and we're covering the story, and of course, hoping we're going to hear about some big rescues and people saved from some of these collapsed buildings. as i said right now, the death toll, 116 confirmed. a number which has unfortunately risen very quickly in the past few moments. i want to go straight to our other breaking story. hurricane maria, which is a deadly category 5 storm, decimating islands as it churns in the caribbean. it's headed directly for puerto rico. the warning is as serious as it can be. evacuate or die. that's the warning. and this is a new video right now. this is the u.s. virgin islands. winds and waves getting more dangerous by the minute as the storm approaches. tom is out front tonight, and tom, i can't believe we're talking about those islands being struck again, and puerto rico with what they say is an evacuate or die hit. >> yeah, erin, and a lot of people evacuated to san juan from the islands. we have new information now, kind of hard to fathom here because we thought irma was this massive monster, which it was,

and now we have a storm that's getting stronger as the hours progress. we have a pinhole eye. it's not the larger storms that are always the most destructive. sometimes the smaller an eye, the more compact a storm, the more ferocious they can be. irma had an eye about 23 miles in diameter. this is 11 1/2. look at the winds, two hours ago, they were 160. the last hour, 165. that would still make it the strongest hurricane ever to make landfall in puerto rico, and now we have just upped it to 175. this is amazing. you'll notice how compact they are. we call this an annular hurricane. this is going to create a world of problems. 70 miles now from st. croix. don't think they're going to take a landfall, but anything is possible. hoping to get a secondary band on this radar. that would tell us we're undergoing an eyewall replacement. that could lose strength going through the process. that's the only thing that could be helpful to st. croix, the u.s. virgin islands, pounded by

rainfall, and puerto rico. we're going to look at this closer because the track takes it over puerto rico 8:00 or 9:00 in the morning, shoots it up to turks and caicos. southeast bahamas and slides it up the coast, keeping it away from the shoreline. we get in closer and look at the path difference between irma. irma stays off the coast of puerto rico by 50, 55 miles and they still had a million people lose power. in fact, they have been in a recession since 2006. unemployment is like 10.1%. their massive labor force has been leaving, heading to the u.s. they need power and they need more of it. this is a population density map. notice the bright red. that's where you have the higher population numbers. this is san juan. this is in the wrong place to be as the storm will really create a high force of wind there, knocking power out could be to the entire country. >> tom, it's stunning. you talk about a storm that is, as you say, sort of a cannonball. so compact with that eye. and now the winds have gone from 165 to 175. can it get stronger and stronger? the thing about this storm that has been so shocking is how

quickly it has lamborghini. it has taken off. >> we saw this with irma. in a 15-hour time period, this jumped from a 1 to a 5. that's outrageous. since 1851 to last year, the number of category 5s that made landfall in the lesser antilles was zero. we had two this month and we have a monster now bearing down on st. croix and puerto rico. we're next. we'll watch it in the days ahead, but this is going to be a rough overnight period but a real rough day tomorrow because it won't be until late in the day tomorrow evening that the storm may take the tropical force winds away from puerto rico. >> thank you very much. as we're tracking this, i want to go to nick paton walsh because he's in puerto rico where the pinhole eye is expected to slam into the island just hours from now. and what are you feeling right at this moment. >> well, you can see obviously the rain has begun here in the last hour or so. really picked up as the sky has darkened.

we're still 12 hours away from pretty much right behind me on the coast here, the east coast is where i am in puerto rico where we're supposed to see first landfall, potentially 165 miles per hour, the storm, as you were hearing. and potentially will leave all of its energy on puerto rico at this point. it's supposed to go right across the land, through san juan capital and begin potentially to slow as it leaves the island itself. but you mentioned hurricane irma. there is a billion dollars of damage. 46,000 people still now without power two weeks after that hit. that caused a glancing blow. this is going to go straight through the island itself. we have seen water being rationed, queues for gas at this stage. boards on hotels. i'm in a seaside resort cleared out. we have seen people in beach buggies popping down to the coastline to get a final look as the storm begins to loom. people taking the warnings to some degree seriously, but you're never going to know until

the real ferocity of the wind hits, who is carried away from the flood areas. we're talking about possibly 11 feet of storm surge. that's when water is finally ashore by the ferocity of the storm. that's almost twice my height here. and maybe 25 inches of rain at some point, too, so a lot is happening in the next 48 hours, and puerto rico, the question is, are they still in a heightened state of readiness because of hurricane irma. we simply don't know, or has so much damage been done that they're weakened to the point that this enormously direct blow could be devastating? you have to be over 89 years old to have seen anything like this to hit puerto rico before. dangerous day ahead. >> and it's amazing when you're talking about 25 possible inches of rain, storm surge of 11 feet. a storm that is possibly going to end up being stronger as it strikes than of course irma. you're looking at harvey and irma in a sense combined. this is a monster of a storm. the warning where you are, evacuate or die.

are people heeding that? >> reporter: yes, as far as we can tell. i have seen some locals here who are clearly not running for their lives. it's hard to get a broader sense. we heard from the government earlier on today that they were seeing less in numbers in the shelters than they had perhaps expected. maybe people have moved further inland. it's the flood risk areas that are most concerned about. hurricane irma took three lives. one in a traffic accident, one through electrocution, and one somebody being moved to shelter. people are more worried about what the water does with as it moves in. we will expect an area like this to be under water in the days ahead. the broader question, how seriously have the warnings been taken? it's clear people have heard them. the issue is do they really buy the idea this is a once in a century meteorological event that could devastate this island. >> where do you go as it strikes? i presume you'll move from where

you are, or no? >> when we stop talking, yeah, i'll move from here. we have to move into probably the second floor of the buildings nearby. trying to get a gauge between being able to see how the storm moves and keep ourselves further away from it. in the last hour or so, we have seen the rains pick up and we're still a solid 12 hours away from the ferocity of the storm hitting. this is just the beginning. >> please stay safe. thank you. next, breaking news. paul manafort making demands tonight about his intercepted phone calls after cnn reported he was wire tapped. plus, president trump calling kim jong-un rocket man. how the nickname made it into trump's teleprompter. his prepared speech to the world at the u.n. and a hurricane hunter who is actually flying into maria at this hour going to join us from that flight live and tell us what the storm looks like.

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in the mirror everyday. when i look when i look in the mirror everyday. everyday, i think how fortunate i am. i think is today going to be the day, that we find a cure? i think how much i can do to help change people's lives. i may not benefit from those breakthroughs, but i'm sure going to... i'm bringing forward a treatment for alzheimer's disease, yes, in my lifetime, i will make sure. breaking new. president trump's former campaign chairman, paul manafort, at this hour calling on investigators to release any intercepts of his phone calls or other communications. he says put it out there, in a statement, he writes, mr. manafort requests that the department of justice release any intercepts involving him and any nonamericans so interested parties can come to the same conclusion as the doj, there is

nothing there. pamela brown is "outfront" in washington tonight. you first broke the news that manafort was wiretapped, and obviously, his team is angry about that. and so they're saying release the records. >> reporter: that's right. this is the first time that paul manafort is responding to our exclusive reporting that he was being surveilled by the u.s. government under a fisa warrant, under a secret court order. at least two times. and as you pointed out, manafort is now calling for the justice department to release any intercepts. these conversations that he had involving him to the public. he's asking doj to do that, claiming that there is nothing there, and he wants the public to judge. and as i pointed out, this is the first time that he is actually making his voice heard in the wake of this reporting that he was under surveillance by the u.s. government both before and after the election. and during that timeframe, he spoke to president trump. he was his former campaign chairman. he spoke to him on the phone in

the same timeframe he was under surveillance, according to our sources. it's unclear if those conversations were ever picked up as part of the surveillance. and also in this statement, erin, manafort says that the u.s. department of justice's inspector general should conduct an investigation into these leaks and examine the motivations behind a previous administration's efforts to surveil a political opponent. that is also a line we have heard from the current administration, calling for leak investigations. manafort was initially put under surveillance for his ties to a pro-russia regime in ukraine and later for the fbi's investigation into trump campaign associations and russians and any possible collusion. today, we should note, erin, that senator grassley of the judiciary committee told my colleague manu rauchue on camera that manafort has not been cooperating with his committee. he also says manafort may not meet with the judiciary committee because he was told he was facing indictment during a raid on his virginia home in july, erin. >> pamela, thank you very much. i want to go to jeffrey

toobin, our senior legal analyst, and a former fbi director for the criminal investigative division. he served under robert mueller for two years. jeffrey, let me start with you. manafort certainly coming out aggressively here, playing hard ball. does this mean he has nothing to hide, put it all out there? >> it's very clever on the part of him and his spokesman. because there is no way the justice department is going to just throw out these transcripts. it wouldn't be legal for them to do that. there are very strict rules about when and under what circumstances the justice department can release wiretaps or even acknowledge they exist. so nothing is going to happen as a result of this. but i do think it's a good public relations position to look like you have nothing to hide. i think much more significant is what pamela referred to last time, i mean, just a moment ago, is he going to testify under oath without demanding immunity, without taking the fifth? that would be a sign that he really has nothing to hide, and his lawyers would be crazy under these circumstances to let him testify without taking the

fifth. >> so chris, manafort says, okay, put it all out there. but he's very specific here, any communications between himself and nonamericans. now, as pamela points out, we know president trump talked to manafort regular during this time while manafort was someday surveillance, and donald trump is an american citizen. if those records do exist, if manafort talking to trump, he's explicitly saying he doesn't want those released. >> well, i mean, by the nature of fisa, any peripheral or incidental intercepts have to be sealed within a certain amount of time. i think it's 60 days, so nothing in the fisa world is publicized. nothing should be publicized. it's a secret court. and paul manafort and his lawyers know that. i could see him calling for these things. none of this is going to see the light of day. >> right. >> unless he ultimately goes to trial, in which case he would be entitled to obtain any

recordings of himself and presumably in a trial, some of it would be disclosed in open court because it would be evidence. >> you're saying none of this will come out, which leads me to the other point in his spokesman's statement, which is it's a felony to reveal the existence of a fisa warrant, they're saying, so whoever this is should go to jail. this information. >> there is -- i feel very conflicted about discussing this because that's right. it is improper to release information about fisa warrants. it is improper, but i salute our colleagues who get this information. i try to get this information ourselves. i understand why it's upsetting to manafort and his team. but, you know, we're in the journalism business and we want this stuff out there. it's highly relevant and newsworthy that this campaign manager for the incumbent president of the united states was wiretapped by the united states government. >> and so chris, this comes as we're also learning some new details about the tactics used

by mueller. in "the new york times," they say, and i wanted to quote this line, because i think it says so much. it says, chris, manafort was in bed early one morning in july when federal agents bearing a search warrant picked the lock on his front door and raided his virginia home. they took binders stuffed with documents, copying his computer files looking for evidence that he set up secret bank accounts. they even photographed expensive suits in his closet. what does it say where they're looking at his spending versus income, who knows what they're looking at here, that they're actually getting to the level of photographing his suits? >> yeah, i mean, this is what i would expect from former director mueller, a thorough, hard-charging investigation within the boundaries of the law and the constitution. they're not playing patty cake. they went in there without a warrant because they had the probable cause to do that. >> i'm sorry, with a warrant. >> were able to establish through a magistrate -- i'm

sorry, with a warrant, without a knock. sorry. they were able to get a no-knock search warrant. that's an extraordinary kind of warrant. the only time or most of the time when i had experience with those cases, they were drug cases. but obviously, they were able to convince a magistrate that there was a potential for evidence to be destroyed and be destroyed quickly. very fungible evidence. so they're playing hard ball and going at it aggressively. >> very unusual in white-collar cases that you have search warrants in this way. >> still asleep. it's dark out. we have reported that. they picked the lock. >> right. >> the guy things he's being robbed or killed or who knows what he thinks. they think that quickly he could destroy evidence. >> that's right. and. >> and they got a judge to buy in. >> most white-collar investigations involve grand jury subpoenas where there is a certain level of trust that there will be production of actual records. here, the existence of this search warrant tells you they don't trust manafort at all. not only to produce what he's

required to produce, but not to destroy what he doesn't want the government to see. so there is obviously a great deal of bad blood already. >> just to state the obvious, jeffrey, he would go to jail for destroying evidence. >> he would. >> and he obviously could go to jail for any kind of financial crimes or money laundering, never mind collusion with russia if they're able to prove that. >> correct, and the reason they got these warrants, they got the search warrant because they -- though the rule is you can only get a search warrant if you convince a magistrate there is probable cause that evidence of crimes will be disclosed. that's how the warrant system works. so obviously, there is a great deal of focus on manafort in this investigation. doesn't mean he did anything wrong, doesn't mean he's guilty of anything. >> just like he can say release the transcripts because no one is going to release them, although someone could leak them. thank you both. and next, president trump's carefully crafted insult was aimed directly at north korea's kim jong-un and purposefully so.

>> rocket man is on a suicide mission for himself. >> that was not ad-libbed. is trump reckless? >> and the surprising turn of events on capitol hill. republicans are now suddenly there. guess what. obamacare may be going away. their experience is coveted. their leadership is instinctive. they're experts in things you haven't heard of - researchers of technologies that one day, you will.

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new tonight, president trump threatening to destroy north korea in his speech to the world at the united nations. once again, calling kim jong-un rocket man. just days after his controversial tweet. >> the united states has great strength and patience. but if it is forced to defend

itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy north korea. rocket man is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime. >> it turns out this was not an ad-lib. that was in the teleprompter. many people knew about it in advance that are around trump, and jim acosta is "outfront" at trump tower. jim, look, it was a late add to the speech, but nonetheless, it was a formal and planned add. what more can you tell us? >> reporter: that's right, erin. this was something of a tweet storm of a speech aimed at the conservative base. we heard everything but the president referring to raul castro and nicolas maduro as little raul and lying nicolas, but getting back to that one liner from the president describing north korean dictator kim jong-un as rocket man, i'm told by senior administration official that was added as of this morning and the reason why is because it is essentially going back to the president's

use of plain language that everybody can clearly understand, and in the words of the senior administration official, it translates clearly into chinese. that's the comment i heard from one senior official. but expect to hear more of this plain language when it comes to the president and his efforts to curb the rogue wregimes around the world. you heard the president talking about iran. that's the next big challenge they have to deal with on top of everything with north korea. i talked with a senior administration official who said earlier today look for the president to unveil a new iran policy in the coming weeks as in this october, next month. and when i asked this official whether or not the president is ready to crap the obama-era iran nuclear deal that was crafted with the world powers to curb tehran's nuclear weapons program, that official strongly suggested that would happen, saying there's going to be a new comprehensive policy coming from the president. >> thank you very much. significant development there, jim. now, the former white house communications director and

former state department spokesperson for secretary kerry, jen psaki, did a lot with north korea, and jason miller, who is also the communications director for the trump transition team. jen, president trump calls kim jong-un rocket man in front of the whole world. does it on purpose. doesn't give him the respect we have been using his real name, right? as i just used his real name. he didn't do that. does the scare minimize, humiliate kim jong-un? >> it sounded more like a term of endearment to me, but look, i think what was interesting about his use of that term is that it shows and highlights his obsession with the news of the day and what's going to pop on dwiter and what's going to pop in the news. what we did not hear in that speech is a comprehensive strategy on how he would approach north korea, what differently he would do diplomatically, and what exactly these escalating military threats mean. and i think the rest of the world, most of whom were sitting in that room, that's what's unique, were probably scratching their heads. >> jason, what do you say?

rocket man, purposeful? >> absolutely. and i love the line, and i love the speech. i think it will go down on the mt. rushmore of trump speeches as one of the best he's given so far. but look, what i think the president was doing today was continuing to isolate kim and his regime. for all of us who saw the excellent will ripley special, the behind the scenes that he did this last friday on north korea, this is an entire regime that is propped up based on lies and deception and what the president is doing is taking what is a perceived strength for kim and turning it into a weakness. this is something where he might think this is -- kim might think this is a strength, but now it's flipped around and he's being mocked. here's the reality, we have to continue to split off north korea from the chinese and from the russians. we have to take that next step further and cut off their fuel supply. it's going to be up to that if we're truly going to go and finally cut them off from the rest of the world. >> which of course, they haven't moved to do anything on the fuel supply. it's a bigger issue, and maybe

that's what he should have talked about. to your point about him being mocked, the president may be disappointed to hear you compliment a cnn documentary, but also he isn't the one who thought of the nickname, rocket man. that was the economist in 2006 who called rocket man kim's father. kim jong-il. look, if that nickname is so effective, why didn't it work? north korea was kind of close to zero then, and now here they are basically a full nuclear power? >> i think up until this point, we have been coddling north korea. and i think at a certain point, we have to quit putting them in their corner and giving them a blanket and a juice box and telling them they're going to be on time-out. we have to start taking real steps, which we have seen the trump administration start doing. it's good that we have gotten buy-in from the security council so far. we have to continue going, as i said, i think really the fuel shipments are going to be the next step in this. but good for president trump for realizing how serious this problem is, and further moving to isolate kim from the rest of the world. >> jen? >> look, i think the issue here

is that escalating rhetoric is not a sign of strength in terms of how the global community perceives you. it's a sign sometimes of absurdity. i think today that was an example of that. the fact is what he could have done today is actually given a propaganda victory to the leader of north korea by saying he's going to destroy the country that millions of people live in. so let's see what they do and if they use that in the coming days. i think that's a more likely outcome than a change in their strategy or a different approach. >> one thing i will say, jen, is trump has this ability to sort of name somebody something that's absurd and humiliating and it sticks. and nobody else would even think of it or do it, and he does it and it sticks. here he is with a few other people. >> i call him lil marco. lil marco. hello, marco. >> in the case of lying ted cruz, lying ted. lies. oh, he lies. you know ted. he brings the bible, holds it high, puts it down, lies.

and then of course, we have crooked hillary. crooked hillary, folks. she's been crooked from the beginning. >> i mean, jen, there was something about those names that worked. >> you're right. and maybe we should give jason some credit here, too, for his work on that during the campaign. but look, trump, you like him, you don't like him. he's a marketing genius. he says things that stick in people's minds. that is effective on the campaign trail. that's different than what you do in a diplomatic arena and how you use your speech at unga. so really, using your speech here, this is a place where the world is really used to the united states driving the agenda. i mean, president obama used his first speech to talk about climate change. it was purposeful so that that could be a driving global agenda item in the years ahead. i'm not sure what we take away from this speech aside from his ability and willingness to use more heated rhetoric. >> and the fact that, you know jen, i think you bring up a really good point. the fact that we're talking

about north korea tonight out of all the different issues that the president talked about today, i think really puts the focus at the right point. this is the single most critical issue that our country is facing on the foreign affairs stage right now, so good for president trump for elevating it, not just for the country but for the rest of the world. we have to get buy-in, and again, those missiles, they might not just be pointed add the u.s. we have a lot of allies like japan and south korea and others in the theater who could be targets. >> thank you both very much. next, last ditch salvo on health care. guess what. it might actually happen, just when you weren't looking, obamacare could be gone. >> and breaking news, hurricane maria strengthening, aiming for puerto rico. they're saying evacuate or die. right now, category 5 storm. it has just increased in the past few minutes since our show began to 175 sustained winds per hour. someone inside the storm right now, a hurricane hunter, in a plane is going to call us and talk to you in just a moment. ♪ adapt supply chains based on trends, tweets and storms.

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this bill has snuck up stealthfully, nobody was watching and here it is. it is real. can it pass? >> it's just trump care again. it's a zombie trumpcare bill. it does pretty much the same thing. it's going to throw tens of millions of americans, potentially off of their health care. it's going to not give them a guarantee that their pre-existing conditions are covered. it's going to slash medicaid and other funding by $700 billion, which will be used ultimately to give tax breaks for the republican wealthiest supporters in america. and the 2.8 million americans who right now are covered for opioid addiction treatment, well, the funding levels are going to be slashed dramatically, and the care for their families is going to be put in jeopardy all across this country. >> look, your point of view, of course, is what i would expect, but as you know, the reason that the highly public efforts to repeal obamacare failed earlier this year was not democrats like

yourself, it was republicaned, right? they couldn't get republicans on board. and some of those big names who wouldn't vote yes before might vote yes now. conservative senator mike lee says he's impressed by the proposal. john mccain has not ruled out supporting the bill. his voemelt, of course, was thee that doomed the last vote. does this worry you? >> well, what's going to happen now is that the volume of voices across the country that were heard back in july are going to be once again activated. so there are going to be more tweets and facebooks and telephone calls than this congress has seen since all the way back in july when trumpcare one came up. so trumpcare two is no more attractive to the same people. there is a stimulus response quality to congress, and nothing more stimulating that millions of americans registering their opposition to a bill which hurts their families. that's going to be unleashed over the next week. >> the authors of this bill note

something, senator, that's pretty important to you. they say that four states, new york, california, maryland, and your state, massachusetts, get about 40% of obamacare funding. their plan, though, would equalize medicaid funding across the state. instead of having it all go to four states or i'm sorry, that lion's share, it would be equal. isn't that a fair thing to do? >> what they miss is the next sentence where then they say, but we're going to cut the total funding by $700 billion. that's going to hurt everybody. so they're going to give smaller chunks -- >> would you be onboard with equal funding? if all we did was equalize it, you would lose money. >> if all the states that are now not in the system joined, they would get the funding as well. if texas joined, if florida joined, if all those southern states joined, they would get the funding that massachusetts and other states are receiving right now, and they would

receive it in a much larger measure. right now, they're just sitting on the sidelines. and their own citizens are being harmed. their health care is not as well protected. so let's not miss this central point, though, that they want to cut it by $700 billion. a vision without funding is a hallucination. they're going to hurt the health care of people in all 50 states if that amount of money is taken out of the health care system. >> senator, thank you for your time tonight. senator markey from massachusetts. >> next, the breaking news. hurricane maria just really now beginning its assault, approaching puerto rico in the final stages. residents there are preparing for literally the worst. they are saying evacuate or die. is this what's headed their way? an expert is flying through the eye of the storm. the heart of that storm right now, his first flight in to figure out what's happening, calling us from the airplane. >> on a much lighter note, what

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breaking news, millions in the path of a catastrophic hurricane. maria right now gone up 10 miles per hour since the program began. this new video out of st. croix. a first direct hit to a major land body is going to be puerto rico today. officials on the island of dominica says the damage is mind bl biologying. we haven't been able to get images of that damage and how bad it is right now. i want to go now to the air, joining me on the phone is richard henning, flight director, and atmospheric administration. he's now in a plane flying over maria. right now that plane is on top of maria. richard, this storm, category 5, and you see it from space, it is

powerful to see, it is huge and it is strong. where are you exactly right now? >> hello erin, thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak with your audience. we are flying over puerto rico tip, we're about to head off the south coast in the island. we're getting in closer towards the center of the storm, we're at 45,000 feet. what we've done throughout the day is lay a pattern of what we call drops on throughout the bahamas and north of puerto rico to sample the atmosphere out in front of the storm, which is going to be very critical for where it goes after it hits puerto rico. unfortunately for residence in puerto rico it's pretty much a sewer thing, it's going to strike puerto rico.

the question is where is it going to go after that. but everything was -- from the air crafts and the other air crafts in the storm right now. this is a catastrophic storm. we're talking about a storm more intense than irma. >> so, let me ask you about that on this intensity point. this storm went from a category 1 to a category 5 in about 12 hours. i know that's incredibly rare, and you're now inside the storm. what are you seeing richard, that explain such a massive and fast power or intensity surge? >> well, sometimes what happens is all of the conditions that intensify a hurricane come together all at once perfectly. and unfortunately for the citizens of dominica that happened just east of the island

yesterday afternoon and through the evening. and it was a worse case scenario you could have imaged for that island, where the storm dropped an incredible amount of pressure in the eye, the win increased dramatically. it made landfall across that island. it actually weakened slightly as it went over dominica because it is such a mountainous island, and small with very tall mountains. now after it emerged last night over the caribbean and gotten back over open water, there's absolutely nothing to -- it's intense right now and again it is a 909 millibar hurricane which is historically low for this portion of the caribbean. you're talking about a storm that's approaching the intensity

of katrina. it's already more intense than hurricane ivan, back in 2004, that was a major category 5 storm in the gulf of mexico. this is a storm that really can't -- really can't over height it. it's not as bad as it's going to get. they just need to -- they just need to be ready for it as best they can. heed all the warnings from the local emergency management people. because again, all the science we're gathering today in the case that there's nothing right now that's going to spare puerto rico from a direct hit from this storm. >> all right. well, richard i appreciate your time. thank you so much for your work. it's the work of richard that helps us understand the storms and where they are headed. next rocket man. fore /* live-stream your favorite sport

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awesome, tweeted one critic. >> tell other countries respect this mags again, tweeted another, i would bet you kim jong-un likes being called rock man. >> what's your favorite kind of music, what do you listen to? >> i think elton john is great. >> no word on whether elton john thanks its great that the president is using his song. google says searches for rock man has skyrocketed. the president first tweeted the insult sunday. >> kim jong-un after an elton john song, i would have gone with tiny dancer but you know, i'm not the president. >> one fan tweeted of president trump, he's a master troll and brander. for those who say president

trump is trolling north korea's leader, look, a president trump troll doll exactly exists. the president of the united states is trolling and elton john-un is live in concert. anderson starts now. good evening, two natural disasters beginning tonight. a death toll rising. hurricane category 5 maria is being to strike mexico. first, we go to the quake, it struck this afternoon, manned to 7.1. here's what it looked like at the mexico city airport. across the capital more than a dozen buildings collapsed, many more damages. death toll topped 100 earlier this evening and that is climbing. moments ago i spoke