vaccinated. >> cardinal burke now served in rome. he was hospitalized here in wisconsin where he was supposed to be celebrating a series of masses here at a shrine that he helped stab. we reached out to the shrine in an effort to get an update on cardinal burke's condition. still waiting to hear back. >> thank you very much for your reporting and thanks very much to all of you. "ac 360" starts now. >> good evening. today, president biden seeks to defend his attempt to close the book obhis country's involvement on afghanistan. tonight we'll look at what happens to those still struggling to get out and if the u.s. will live up to the promises to them. we begin with the final fiasko. the images all day have told the chaotic story. afghans desperate for a way out of the country, trying to get in any way they can. from all the talk from the administration there would be no images like from the fall of saigon in 1975, well, these pictures are certainly bad

enough. crowds mobbing the tarmac, climbing onto jetways trying desperately to board outgoing flights. clinging on to the outsides of planes. that's an air force c-17. people are grabbing on to it as it taxis off. there are people holding on to the aircraft as it takes off. and as it flies away. at least two people were seen falling several hundred feet from one of the planes. sickening. haunting as well, this photo posted on the website, defense one, about 640 people, according to defense one, on an aircraft designed to carry 102 troops. afghans desperate to leave. right now, according to the pentagon, there are about 2500 u.s. troops securing the airport. late today, the president said their number will rise to as many as 6,000, but only to secure the evacuation.

before that, in words laying blame squarely on our former ally, the president justified his decision to end all military involvement. >> so i'm left again to ask of those who argue that we should stay, how many more generations of america's daughters and sons would you have me send to fight afghanistan's civil war? when afghan troops will not. how many more lives, american lives, is it worth? how many endless rows of headstones at arlington national cemetery? >> the president also spoke to the mess we're seeing now, saying the buck stops with him. he had less to say, though, about precisely how the administration got things so wrong. just six weeks ago, you'll recall president biden called a taliban takeover of the country highly unlikely. i'll talk more on how unlikely became inevitable. first, clarissa ward with the

latest from kabul. where do things stand with the evacuation of u.s. and ally personnel? >> reporter: so basically, what we're hearing is that hundreds of u.s. personnel from the embassy have been moved via helicopter to the airport. evacuations have been going on pretty much nonstop, at least 700 afghan siv card holders or visa holders have also been evacuated. there's lot more work to be done. the americans have also reportedly now secured the perimeter of the airport. of course, those harrowing, devastating scenes that i think none of us will ever forget, anderson, of people spilling onto the runway, indeed, flooding onto the runway, climbing onto the fuse lodge, desperate to get out of afghanistan. everyone desperate to avoid that happening again. but they do say they have now secured the perimeter. it's a very different story y should say, in the center of

kabul than it is at the airport. those chaotic scenes are not being replicated here. we went out on the streets for a day, keen to see what life felt like in this new islamic emirate of afghanistan. and we found a mixture of emotions. there was heartache, desperation, fear, and also some jubilation. take a look. as soon as we leave our compound, it's clear who is now in charge. taliban fighters have flooded the capital, smiling and victorious, they took the city of 6 million people in a matter of hours. barely firing a shot. this is a sight i honestly thought i would never see. scores of taliban fighters and just behind us, the u.s. embassy compound. some carry american weapons. they tell us they're here to maintain law and order. everything is under control, everything will be fine, the commander says.

nobody should worry. what's your message to america right now? america already spent enough time in afghanistan. they need to leave, he tells us. they already lost lots of lives and lots of money. people come up to them to pose for photographs. they're just chanting death to america, but they seem friendly at the same time. it's utterly bizarre. almost everywhere we go, it seems the taliban want to talk. a lot of people are very frightened that you might engage in revenge attacks against security forces. since yesterday, we have proved that nothing will happen, and we give assurance to everyone that they will be safe, he tells us, and we follow our leaders. once we make a promise, we stick to it. maintaining law and order is top

of that list of promises. at the presidential palace, the taliban are now guarding the gate. they say they're here to fill the vacuum left when the government fled. but the welcoming spirit only extends so far. and my presence soon creates tension. they have just told me to stand to the side because i'm a woman. the taliban have yet to implement their draconian version of islamic law, but many are already preparing for it. you can see this beauty salon and many others have actually painted over images on their store fronts of uncovered women. taliban commander says islamic rule will be implemented gradually. how will you protect women? because many women are afraid they will not be allowed to go to school, they will not be allowed to work. >> the female, the woman can continue their life and we will

not say anything. they can go to the school, they can continue their education. with an islamic hijab. >> like i'm wearing? >> not like you, but covering their faces. >> cover the face. >> yeah. >> why do they have to cover their face? >> because this is in islam. >> is it in islam that you have to wear that? >> of course. it is in islam. >> most ordinary afghans we meet are in a state of shock. struggling to process the last 24 hours. this man tells us his father in the afghan army and was killed this summer. now he doesn't know what to do. >> i have lost everything. >> you're afraid. you're afraid. >> yeah, i'm afraid. i lost my dad. i lost my mom. like two months ago. >> i'm sorry to hear that. >> just i'm with my little

sister. we're living at home. i'm afraid for everything. big problem. big problem for us. >> it's a feeling shared by so many. walking along, one has a sense that the real story may be the people who are not on the streets. those too afraid to leave their homes, waiting to see what tomorrow will bring. >> clarissa, we heard in your reporting, first, fascinating to hear the taliban say when we make a promise, we stick to it. obviously, things were said, and as you know better than anybody, it's pretty horrific in afghanistan when they were in power before. you know, the taliban making statement about women being able to continue their education, is there really any reason to believe them? because it's one thing to, okay, allow a girl to go to school. it's another thing, what they

actually are allowed to learn. >> yeah, and i think there's also an important distinction between what they say and then their ability to implement it. so on the topic of women's education, for example, every taliban commander i have spoken to over the course of the last couple weeks, and there's been a lot of them, has said the same resoundingly, the taliban has changed. we learned from our mistakes. women will be educated through high school, through university, and even beyond if they want that. however, when you start to talk about the logistics of what that actually looks like, you run into problems because then suddenly they say, once women hit puberty, they can't actually be educated in the same building as men, as boys, because they need to be segregated. so then there need to be girls' schools, which haven't actually been built yet. ergo, these women don't end up getting educated. the other thing you see a lot, anderson, particularly not in a place like kabul, but in rural

areas, is that there's just a different mentality. so people think they're just supposed to send their daughters, their little girls, to a religious school for a few years, maybe shul rr learn the numbers, a few letters of the alphabet and learn how to recite koran, but beyond that, there isn't really an appetite to educate girls. so even if the taliban did say it was permissible, will they actively promote it in the way that the afghan government and the u.s. here to the extent of its presence has been actively trying to do for the last two decades? or will we, as the fear is, the very real fear, and probably the more likely scenario, see a huge decline in women's education once again? >> the fear in that young man's voice talking to you staying at home with his sister, his parents dead, it's so sad. clarissa ward, thank you for being there. please be careful. let's get perspective from thomas friedman, "new york times" foreign affairs

columnist, best selling author of many books. so tom, i mean, we see clarissa's reporting, you see the images. president biden's speech today. what do you make of how things are unfolding? >> you have so many cross currents right now, anderson. i think i would be really humble about making any predictions. the thing that really strikes me is the taliban clearly initially are being very careful what they say, what they try to impose. i think that's partly because they want first the americans to leave and get that process over. but secondly, i think they don't know. they're taking over a country that is very different from the one they left 20 years ago or left power from, i should say. millions of women have been educated. people have been working with the west. universities have opened. and i think they have got to really figure that out. i'm not particularly optimistic, but i think they also realize they broke it. they now own it. and if the sun doesn't shine, if

the rains don't come, if the plumbing doesn't work, if the sewers back up, they're going to be responsible now. for that, they're going to need a lot of foreign aid and investment to replace the money the americans put in. i think they're just feeling their way, trying to figure out exactly where they land. >> in terms of their basic ideology, though, i mean, they haven't changed their interpretation of the c koran. they haven't changed the medieval mindset they ruled under some 20 years ago. >> no, there's certainly no sign of that, and i wouldn't expect it. this is a really isolated country. if you have been there. you know, really always struck in the times i have been to afghanistan, just how isolated it is. and that's kabul. when you really get into the outside the big cities, it's even more isolated. this is a medieval country. it's going to find its own course. >> you write tonight about the biden administration in "the new york times." you say in part its failure to

create a transition process in which afghans could be assured of a safely removal to america, not to mention an orderly exit for diplomats and aid workers is appalling and inexplicable. do you think the president fully owned that today? because, you know, they're still claiming that they're going to be able to get out the tens of thousands of afghans and their families who have sacrificed themselves and helped the americans over these last 20 years. that seems hard to imagine. >> well, they certainly made clear they had made mistakes and they weren't prepared. it's interesting to read some of the stories that the taliban were prepared. they clearly were bribing, intimidating, inducing officials in the central government and in the provincial government to take this thing down much faster than we realized. that's an intelligence failure. why and how it happened, i don't really know. but i do get the sense from what

the president said today, anderson, that they're going to put whatever troops they need in there. i think there is an understanding with the taliban, you lay a finger on anyone at the everairport and you'll pay heavy price. i don't think the taliban want to do that, so i hope that we have seen the worst of it. again, the worst was not expected. it was not tolerable. it was embarrassing. but i hope we won't see any more pictures like we saw at the start of your show today. >> it is interesting whether the taliban would allow this group of people who have helped the u.s. to leave. there's arguments really arguing for that, that they want them to leave, but also at the same time, that if there's a lot of educated people leaving and people with management experience, et cetera, they might at some point decide they don't want those people leaving. but you brought up a really central and fraught question in a column you wrote tonight. you write, was the u.s. mission there a total failure? you go on to say, when big

events happen, distinguish between the morning after and the morning after the morning after. everything really happens the morning after the morning after when the full weight of history and the merciless balances of power assert themselves. it's interesting idea, the morning after the morning after. to that end, we have seen the morning after and it hasn't been pretty. do we know what the following metaphoric morning looks like? >> we don't. that's why people should be really careful about either praising or damning joe biden. you know, a friend wrote me this evening. he said, you know, if you could talk to lyndon johnson today, and he watched joe biden's speech, would lyndon johnson be saying today, boy, i wish i had given that speech in 1967 about vietnam? i wish i had cut the cord. so this is going to play out over a long period of time. and i think when i talk about the weight of sort of geopolitics, i'm talking about the taliban regime now in afghanistan. it's surrounded by iran. a shiite country hostile.

it's got pakistan in the north very worried because pakistan is worried about the pakistani taliban now. the chinese are worried that this will energize their uighur muslim population. they're going to have to navigate a balance of power. i wouldn't be surprised, in fact, i would encourage them to keep joe biden's phone number on their speed dial because going forward, they may need american help, american balancing, not to mention american aid. a million things could happen. and i think always respecting the morning after the morning after, when everything settles in, the power, the weight of responsibility, that's when you'll really see the real story, and so i'm keeping my powder dry. afghanistan has been the graveyard of empires in and a lot of commentators. >> we were watching a really historic moment. tom friedman, appreciate you being with us. >> we're going to look ahead to the political price to be pay for the president as well as the potential reward for doing what none of the past three

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talking tonight about two stories as troops continue flowing into kabul airport to secure the american and allied evacuation, one is how the administration could have misjudged or mishandled the end game badly. the other is the justification, both domestically and geostrukeejicily for ending our 20-year commitment there and what happens now. the president so far has done little to explain the first, but a lot on the second. the question of pulling the plug. >> some very brave and capable afghan special forces units and soldiers. but if afghanistan is unable to mount any real resistance to the taliban now, there is no chance that one year, one more year, five more years, or 20 more years of u.s. military boots on the ground would have make any

difference. >> in a moment of senior adviser to three presidents who decided to stay in afghanistan. first, kaitlan collins at the white house. what is the sense in the white house of where things stand. they were concerned enough that president biden came back to make this speech today. do they think it went well? >> well, i think they realized that there was no option, anderson, besides making some kind of address, given that on replay over the last 72 hours, it's been the president's comments from six weeks ago where he said it was, quote, highly unlikely the taliban would take over, and given they have not only taken over but the former afghan predhas fled, they really believed that he needed to come back and make a statement. i was told they wanted to wait until they believed the situation had stabilized some. my colleague jeff zeleny was told they did want it to be at nightfall so there weren't images playing out to the president speaking about this. today, when he did come, the

focus of his speech was advocating for the withdrawal overall, something we have long known was going to be his position, though he did acknowledge their expectations were not what actually happened. listen to what he said. >> we planned for every contingency, but i always promised the american people that i will be straight with you. the truth is, this did unfold more quickly than we had anticipated. >> what was missing from following that, anderson, is why it changed, why it was different. why it unfolded differently than they expected, because that's been a big question facing the white house, was this an intelligence failure, was this a strategy failure? was it a combination of the two? because it's put a lot of scrutiny on his foreign policy and the way they withdrew, not the fact they withdrew, which is what he spent a majority of the speech defending. >> if in fact it was an intelligence failure, if the u.s. did not know that the afghan national army wouldn't fight, that things would fall as

quickly as they did, i guess supporters of the policy and of the white house would say, well, that shows that the difficulties operating there, and one more reason why the u.s. shouldn't be involved there. if we don't know who it is, you know, the capabilities of the people we have been funding for the last 20 years, that's certainly a sign of something. >> well, and i think that raises the question then, why did the president say it was highly unlikely the taliban would take over. he did talk about their competency, he talked about how equipped and trained the afghan security forces were. though we know and we have heard from colleagues like barbara starr at the pentagon when you talk to u.s. soldiers, they knew there were a lot of complaints actually within the afghan security forces. over whether or not they were even actually on the pay roll, whether they got time off, whether they were properly supplied, properly fed. complaints like that that were real complaints they had. i think that's part of the question that's facing the white house over this decision, is given that they say they have prepared for every possibility, every contingency, clearly not

given we saw the airport overrun overnight. there was a scramble to evacuate u.s. personnel who were still at the embassy in kabul. a really expensive embassy that the united states had built there that now the state department says is not being guarded. those are the questions facing them, is what exactly, how was this planned, why was this not done sooner? to where it wasn't where you saw a helicopter hovering over the u.s. embassy trying to get u.s. personnel to the airport. >> just briefly, do you know what the plan is now? does the white house still claim that they are going to be able to get out the tens of thousands of afghans who have helped the u.s. over the years? >> president biden said today that they are going to work to do so. they sound confident about it, but if you look at the situation on the ground and the deterioration there, the question is whether or not people who are -- who do want to leave are going to come forward and are going to be able to get out of there given look what's happening at the airport. imagine the people who aren't actually at the airport yet. how do they get there? of course, it's not really

popular right now to make known that you were someone who helped the u.s. for the better part of ten decades given it's now been run by the taliban, people who are targeting those very people. so that's really the big question, and that really is going to be a big point for the white house going forward. >> kaitlan collins, appreciate it. david axelrod joins us now. he served as senior adviser to president obama. what do you make of president biden's speech today. did he do enough to take responsibility? how do you think it played? >> i thought the part of the speech, the bulk of the speech in which he made the case for why we had to leave afghanistan was very powerful and very compelling, and it was familiar to me because i heard biden make similar arguments 12 years ago when president obama was formulating his policy. but i do think, anderson, he could have done more to take responsibility for what was manifestly a failure. everyone is watching these horrific images on the screen.

and everyone remembers the assurances he gave the country back in april. and i think there is nothing wrong with saying, we got that wrong, and i own it. you know, john f. kennedy after the bay of pigs said victory has 1,000 fathers and defeat is an orphan, and i am the responsible officer of government. so he took full responsibility. actually benefitted from that. but clearly, things went wrong. and he kind of glossed over that today. and i think he made a mistake doing that. i think people would have accepted if he had said, yeah, we got this wrong. we got to find out why, but mostly what we have to do now is make up time that we lost here. >> you know, you worked obviously in the obama administration. president obama with iraq sent troops back in, which was not very popular among, certainly among a lot of the president's

supporters at the time. joe biden was vice president, and do you see any potential for a similar repeat? because i mean, as you said, jojoe biden was then as vice president, i assume he wasn't for sending troops back in. >> well, look, the policy drifted for seven years because the attention had shifted to iraq. so president obama was trying to formulate a strategy for afghanistan that was missing. the pentagon felt strongly that to stabilize afghanistan, we need today have a surge, and this was a huge debate within the administration, and joe biden was concerned that the mission was shifting away from its intention, which is what he talked about today, which was to disable al qaeda and go after the people who had attacked the u.s. and he felt that we should limit our mission there because we would get bogged down endlessly. he turned out to be right about that. and i think most americans accept that argument. you look at polling, and by

something like a 2 to 1 margin, americans supported the idea of getting out of afghanistan. but you know, i do think that these images today are going to have some impact on that. in the long poll, i think biden was right about that 12 years ago. and he clearly feels strongly today. he is not going to send troops back, and i don't think the american people are of a mind to send troops back. >> from your experience in the white house, i mean, how does a president get information? biden, a month ago, was saying he doesn't think the country is going to fall so quickly, that they're going to take over. clearly, i guess it was based on information he had been given on the capabilities of the army from intelligence sources or the military. how does a president get information that just turned out to be wrong? >> well, look, i think first of all we're going to get the answer to that question because it seems clear both republicans and democrats in congress are eager to find out the answer to that question, and they should,

because if the intelligence was really deficient, that's a big concern. you make life and death decisions based on that intelligence. so what went wrong? the other thing, anderson, is the president said today, we're going to continue to fight terrorism where we find it in afghanistan and elsewhere, and we're going to keep eyes on what's going on there. well, if they kept eyes on what was going on in the last year, and got it completely wrong, so this is a big -- there's a big reason to want to know this. and i think some acknowledgment that there was -- that mistakes were made on the part of the president today would have been appropriate. >> david axelrod, appreciate it. coming up, as we digest chaotic scenes like that, we'll discuss the question of what is next, specifically what one top juice general thinks it could mean for troops in the region. l. there's strength in every family story. learn more about yours. at ancestry.

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thousands in kabul, afghanistan, desperate to get out, still many at the airport. many in their homes afraid to try to make it to the airport. the images opthe ground in kabul bear repeating, and certainly raise the question of what exactly comes next for those people and for the country. our areas once secured by u.s. forces like this one outside the evacuated u.s. embassy in kabul now patrolled by taliban forces celebrating their decades long return to control the country. perhaps more concern is what it

means for the u.s. counterterrorism efforts. general mark milley told senators in a briefing sunday that because of the takeover, terror groups like al qaeda could reconstitute in afghanistan faster than they estimated to congress, according to a senate aide briefed on the comments. wants want to get perspective from peter bergen who spent decades chronicling afghanistan. peter and i have traveled in afghanistan together. also retired general mark kimmitt, who served as assistant secretary of state during the second bush administration. you wreet today, the route of the afghan defense and security forces will go down in history as one of the greatest military defeats of the past century. in the end, despite the billions of dollars, the 20 years of training by u.s. special forces and others, what happened? >> well, i think what we couldn't calculate, what we couldn't measure is the fact

that the average afghan soldier was surrounded by corruption, didn't really have a cause that bound him to either his unit or his country, and candidly, the taliban had a tremendous strategic communications campaign that kept their people together and the cy-ops executed on the average unit inside the afghan military caused them to either give up or melt away into the sunset. >> peter, the way the u.s., you know, botched the evacuation of american allied citizens, clearly didn't expect this to happen so fast, is there any good reason why intelligence agencies would have missed signs the taliban was poised for a rapid control of kabul. >> i think the taliban is probably surprised by how well they have done. i'm not excusing the intelligence community, but whenever there's a significant event, think of the earab sprin,

the cia tends to miss it. the people involved in a revolution often don't understand how successful they're going to be. as soon as when we started seeing cities falling and also ghazni on the crucial highway, it was clear the game was up, and the intelligence assessment of 30 to 90 days should immediately have been adjusted to several days. as general kimmitt says, the collapse of the afghan army is also i think one other element here is the country has been at war since 1978. even before the soviets invaded, and most afghans want to retain their heads on their bodies. and they will switch sides. not because they're bad people, but because they have seen so many people -- so many forces come and go, and they want -- there's a strong desire for survival. >> peter, do you share the concern that al qaeda could reconstitute in afghanistan quickly? >> yeah, general milley, he's in a pretty good position to make that assessment. and you know, every jihadi group in the world, not just al qaeda

but isis and the 20 other foreign terrorist groups already in afghanistan, they're all going to be pouring in to celebrate this great victory. >> general kimmitt, just in terms of the fulfilling any obligation that the u.s. feels to afghans who have helped them and to their families and people who are understandable, having understandable fear tonight about what may happen to them, just logistically, the u.s. has the airport. they're sending in up to 6,000 troops which seems like an awful lot to be able, you know, enough probably, i assume, to secure an airport, at least from direct attack. i don't know about, you know, mortars or shells coming in from distances. but what do you make of the ability? is the u.s. able to given all that's going on actually fulfill promises made to people who have helped us? >> well, i would ask the taliban. the simple fact is that the taliban will now have to let

those potential u.s. citizens come in to the airport. while we have control of the airport, we don't have control outside. and while it will be a very simple logistics effort to bring those people that are inside the airport perimeter now into a series of air lifts, what about the tens of thousands that aren't at the airport? and the only way they're going to get there is if the taliban open the doors and let them come in. i think that's going to be problematic. >> yeah, i mean, peter, i guess some might, i guess you could argue the taliban, you know, would not want to antagonize, if they want foreign aid from a lot of countries, they might let foreign citizens and other afghans leave. the flipside is they may not want an educated class of afghans who are civil servants or whomever leaving and taking with them the ability to actually help run the country. do you, peter, when you hear the taliban on the streets of kabul

telling clarissa ward girls can still go to school, things like that, we have changed, do you by the way any of that? >> i don't. i have a great deal of skepticism. i spent a fair amount of time in taliban controlled afghanistan when they were in power, and you know, you know exactly what they did. i don't think there's a great deal of countervailing evidence and claims they simply make that we have changed, let's see -- they're going to declare their emi emirate. they're going to wait us out until we leave, and then they have a free hand. i anticipate ethnic cleansing. i anticipate reprisals against anybody who have had any help with the americans or their allies. and a pretty bleak future. >> general kimmitt, these are thugs with a very medieval ideology. >> absolutely right. i think both peter and i would agree that we would expect this country to be in a pre-9/11 state within the next year. they have a wonderful strategic communications campaign, as i

said, bringing flowers to the negotiators in doha, using social media very, very well. the taliban spokesman was over all the channels, you would have thought these were the sundays, he was on so many channels today, trying to tell everybody how things would be safe, things would be better. but behind all this, their ideology hassa an't changed. >> peter bergen and mark kimmitt, thank you so much. >> just ahead, a tragedy unfolding with long ties to the u.s. we'ller liberty mutual customizes car insurance so you only pay for what you need. how much money can liberty mutual save you? one! two! three! four! five! 72,807!

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more breaking news tonight. the death toll from the massive 7.2 magnitude earthquake in haiti has risen in the last few hours, haitian officials now report at least 1,419 people have died. thousands more are injured. with tens of thousands of homes damaged or destroyed. haiti tonight is also facing the prospect of flash flooding and mudslides as a tropical depression threatens the country still reeling from the chaos caused by the assassination of its president. matt rivers is in haiti with the

details. >> getting to the hardest hit area of this earthquake means a helicopter ride. 100 miles away from port-au-prince. land and the reality of haiti's latest trauma greets us on the tarmac. a waiting truck filled with people injured over the weekend still waiting to be evacuated. first to come out, a young child held by a relative carrying into a waiting plane. next up, an elderly woman in a wheelchair, unable to walk. lifted out of her chair, she's carried up step by cautious step on her way to the help that still alludes so many. things are out of control at the hospital, he says, not enough doctors, not enough medicine, serious injuries. we need urgent help before things get worse. at least 1400 have been killed and thousands more injured in the worst earthquake to strike here since 2010. not far from the airport, this is what remains of a multi-story hotel.

officials say there could still be bodies in this rubble. some here digging, trying to help. others digging for scrap metal and air conditioners. >> what you don't see here are haitian authorities. there is no police presence. there's no firefighters, no search and rescue crews here. just people from the community, and this lone excavator that is not currently in operation. it's very indicative of what we're seeing as we drive through this area near the epicenter. aid simply isn't arriving quickly. part of the reason -- blocked roads like this one impassable for some convoys. >> the response effort is taking time to actually get there. i mean, we should have been there already. we're getting started but we're not satisfied. >> back at the airport, first responders desperately look for a way to get this young girl out. she's stoic. but her leg is gravely injured and she's clearly in pain. this plane is full. another helicopter takes off without her. and so after walking around the tarmac, she's placed in another

truck, a painful wait for help goes on. >> matt joins us now from port-au-prince. matt, there's concerns now about the tropical depression grace's impact on the search and recovery efforts. thousands without homes tonight. what's the weather situation there right now? >> reporter: yeah, the fact is, anderson, there could be some parts of these communities that were hardest hit that could receive 5, 10, maybe even 15 inches of rain overnight tonight into tomorrow. that, of course, raises the risk of flash flooding, of mudslides, makes it harder for search and rescue teams to do their work, and you're also talking about thousands and thousands of people who have been displaced from their homes who are spending the night outside, anderson. during a tropical depression. >> it's just awful. matt rivers, appreciate you being there. thank you. up next, what pfizer told the fda today about its covid booster shot and what it could mean for how quickly they're available.

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tonight as covid cases surge in 40 states, pfizer submitted initial data to the fda from a clinical trial shows that a booster of their vaccine works well against the original coronavirus and the beta and delta variants. this is part of their application seeking authorization of a vaccine booster for everyone 16 and older. joining us is leana wen, author of the new book "lifelines." how significant is the news from pfizer? initial data is one thing, getting the data authorized is another. do you think they will? >> well, i don't know. but here's what i think based on

the data, that it's good news, but actually it's not really surprising because what they found is that a third dose increases your antibody levels and the antibodies appear to be effective against the delta variant. all of that is commonsense. we know that the two doses of the pfizer vaccine are effective against delta, why wouldn't a third dose be better? that's not answering the key questioning we have right now. the key question is, how quickly does immunity wane after the first two doses? how soon to the rates of hospitalizations begin to increase and i think not only that, even if you don't have severe illness, is it more likely that immunity to symptomatic disease also begins to wane? that's the question that i think will really determine when a booster is going to be needed. >> how do you square this data with the fact that the cdc and nih have not yet seen proof that a booster is needed for the general public? >> there are two different

questions being asked right now, one is a question of is a booster going to be effective. i think we can say, yes, a booster is going to be effective. but do we need a booster is a separate question. for example, right now, we don't know, there are data coming out of israel that say maybe you need a booster because the protection against symptomatic illness may be decreasing from 90 something percent to 40 or 50%. but i think the cdc and fda are saying that the vaccines protect very well against hospitalization and death. we haven't seen that decline yet and maybe we'll wait until then. i think the data from pfizer are promising, even if they're not surprising. >> we don't know the length of time at which a booster might be necessary, there's not enough data you're saying, or conflicting data? >> right, i think there are conflicting data and conflicting values. some people might say, i don't want to get a vaccine unless it turns out that i'm more likely to be hospitalized or die. but other people will say, i don't want to get sick at all.

if the likelihood of symptomatic illness begins to increase, i want to get a booster at that time. it's not just the science, but also the values. >> interesting. dr. wen, appreciate it. tropical storm fred strikes part of the gulf coastline with two other storms in the atlantic. latest forecast ahead. try the cooling, soothing relief or preparation h. because your derriere deserves expert care. preparation h. get comfortable with it. when you get back out there, however you get back out there—go green. 'cause everybody's green when you ride with uber green. yep, even you guys. (upbeat pop music in background throughout) now we're giving you even more reasons

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injection site pain, headache, eyebrow, eyelid drooping, and eyelid swelling. tell your doctor about your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, and medications including botulinum toxins as these may increase the risk of serious side effects. see for yourself at botoxcosmetic.com tonight tropical storm fred is moving inland after making land fall along the florida panhandle. they could see flooding, dangerous storm surge and possible tornados. the storm is heading north into alabama and western georgia with rapid weakening expected by tomorrow morning. fred is one of three atlantic storms that's being watched. tropical storm henry is threatening the bahamas. and tropical depression grace is off the coast of haiti. this saturday on cnn, don't miss we love nyc, the homecoming concert.

bruce springsteen, paul simon, patty smith to name a few. you'll see it here on cnn saturday night, 5:00 p.m. eastern time. news continue right now. let's hand things over to chris for "cuomo primetime." chris? >> about my brother's situation and i have a note on that. first tonight, i want us to deal with the crisis that is coming at all of us. this is afghanistan. and it is a nightmare. innocent masses begging america not to leave them to vicious extremism. but that is what has happened. this picture is also making the rounds. proof of america saving hundreds on a cargo plane. but be clear, 640 men, women and