♪ house speaker kevin mccarthy is plotting his next move in his

job is potentially on the line. >> kevin mccarthy does not have the votes. >> if there ends up being a shutdown, republicans would largely be to blame. >> sit down with our team, the jeffries, and negotiate a way forward. ♪ today president biden set to join autoworkers on the picket line against the big three automakers. >> this is what the president wanted to do to stand, to stand with autoworkers. >> we invite you to join us in our fight. ♪ >> surge at the border, shelters fearing they may soon be overwhelmed by migrants. >> more than 100,000 in what we saw crossing all of last year. >> you leave them on the street, provide shelter. leaving them on the street is not an option for us. ♪ a defiant senator bob menendez flatly denying he did anything wrong. >> not only will i be exonerated, i still will be the new jersey senior senator. >> you want to claim selective prosecution, you have to prove that. >> if you're indicted, you should resign. >> it won't help us to have him

hanging around. ♪ good morning, everyone. top of the hour. so glad you're with us here on "cnn this morning." a lot to get to. did they figure out the government? >> i love your optimism. it doesn't track with any reality of the last decade, but you know what you have to hold on to it with four days, 16 hours and 58 minutes. >> so the president -- >> until the government shuts down. >> maybe the president has had it. leaving washington and going to detroit to deal with another significant issue. president biden joining autoworkers right on the picket line in michigan for their strike against the big three. this is the first time a sitting u.s. president has ever done that. and it comes just one day before donald trump will also visit detroit and also speak with union members there. >> now, these back-to-back visits to a crucial battleground state could be our clearest view of rematch of 2024. biden wanting the union

endorsement. the united union president will be joining biden on the picket line today. but the union is not involved with trump's visit. cnn business and politics correspondent vanessa yurkevich is live outside the stellantis plant in warren, michigan. this is huge 48 hours, politically and optically. what's happening with the negotiations as all of this comes together, vanessa? >> reporter: yeah. it's going to be a historic day. president biden a matter of hours coming to wayne county, michigan, to take to the picket line. the first time we have seen a sitting president do that in what has already been a historic strike against the big three automakers by the union. today, i'm in front of the stellantis facility in warren, michigan. this is one of the 38 facilities that were authorized to strike just on friday. so these folks have been on the picket line for just a few days now. i want to bring in james snow to the conversation. he has been with the company for

about 25 years. your thoughts on president biden coming to town today, taking to the picket line? >> i think it's good to have any exposure signed on what we're fighting for. i don't think it's the most important thing to be talking about right now. i think we have other more important things -- d reason why we're out here, the strike that we're really fighting for. like you said, i have 25 years. we're not out here for me or all the other guys out here with about the same amount of time or more. we're out here with the younger guys just hired. been with the company four, five, six years, paid about $15 an hour, not eligible for vacation days, not eligible for the profit sharing the company likes to keep talking. they have no dental. they have no vision. and the most important thing, they have no clear path to full time employment. that needs to stop. >> reporter: you've heard that ford has made some progress at the table with the uaw. stellantis we haven't heard the

same level of negotiating with the union. you are with stellantis. you work for stellantis. your concerns about that? >> i think we will be out here a while. the company is definitely not trying to do what's right and return the concessions that we gave up in good faith, we opened a contract back in 2008 or '9, agreed to the temporary concessions and they do not want to return those for us. i guess they have a funny way of defining temporary. >> reporter: thank you so much. thank you for your time this morning, james. listen, negotiations are on going, constantly. we know that ford put an offer on the table that the union is happier about, rather than what they have seen from stellantis and general motors. today, president biden coming to town. tomorrow, president trump will be here in the detroit area holding his own event, but until then, these men and women will be on the picket lines 24/7. phil? >> vanessa, that was so helpful

to hear directly from him what they're fighting for, for other workers, not necessarily ones like him who have been there a long time. thank you for being on the ground. phil? poppy, vanessa does a great job of that interview of laying out the stakes for the workers here. this is labor dispute and sit a significant one with broad macro economic repercussions, obviously repercussions for the labor union and the big three automakers as well. but the politics is something you simply can't avoid. that's going to become very acute over the course of the next 48 hours. and here is why. president biden, of course, won in 2020. in large part because he rebuilt the blue wall. we're talking about pennsylvania. we're talking about michigan. we're talking about wisconsin. why does that matter in this case in particular? well, i'll tell you. i think the important thing to note is when you actually move into michigan here, biden -- winning the state by 154,000 votes. that's obviously a very big deal, right? well, something to keep in mind is track back to 2016. we'll explain to you why this all matters and why these two

visits over the course of the next two days are so significant. look at this blue wall here. pennsylvania is red. michigan is red. wisconsin is red. in these three states, in particular, the union vote is larger of a share than it is in most states throughout the country. those are the voters, particularly white working class voters. particularly those without a college degree that shifted heavily towards trump in 2016. biden working very hard to pull them back in 2020. so let's take a look at michigan. look at how close this race was. it was a stunning, stunning result for hillary clinton and her campaign. trump winning the state by 10,704 votes. so let's actually pull up the exit polls on what the union vote was in 2016. union households clinton had 51%, trump had 42%. that's significant, a nine-point victory in union households for hillary clinton. no, it wasn't. it was a significant drop off from where president obama had been in 2012. it was a focus that the biden campaign had trying to rebuild that blue wall in 2020.

so what happened in 2020? let's pull back out and go into 2020 and pull that back up. biden winning michigan by 154,000 votes. much larger margin of victory than trump had in 2016. where do the union vote land? well, biden enlarging it significantly, 62 to 37%. this right here, this is critical in a state where 1 in 4 households for voters are likely aligned with unions. that's why bide season there. he is aligned with the uaw leadership. he wants that endorsement. shawn fain will be with president biden on the picket line. doesn't have the endorsement yet. poppy? >> thank you, phil. let's bring in deputy chief of staff, former deputy chief of staff for former congressman adam kinzinger, max rose and bloomberg senior washington correspondent zalaeh. i want to start with you, congressman, democrat but you

represented a very purple part of new york. so, biden is going to a battleground state. then trump follows him. you think that biden needs to be careful and in your words wake up the campaign on this. why? >> well, absolutely. look at what happened. okay. donald trump initially ate his lunch. right, when he announced that he was going to this site that is traditionally the democratic base. >> stronghold. >> now what's interesting, though, is that what everyone thought, the press and myself included, is what biden was going to do was stay away from michigan as a consequence there. you don't want to look like you're going there just in response to trump being there. but instead, the administration and his campaign has decided to do something that no president, no sitting president has ever done and in the process has completely shifted the narrative away from donald trump to this truly unprecedented act in support and in solidarity of working people and unions. and in that sense, it's a political win.

but you mentioned that this is a preview of the general election. this is the initiation of the general election. >> you think mara, it's risky. on one hand he has to go there as president trump. on the other hand he has to go there as candidate trump and you got to belief he'll be asked by specifics, you support our four day workweek? you support x, y and z? what does he need to bring as president? >> president trump? or president biden? >> biden. >> right. so that's the issue here is that going as a candidate makes sense, right? you want to show your support for the unions because largely they have been -- he is the most pro union president as he has said countl lless times. going as president, you have to show up with something. you can't go there and be happy to throw your support and do nothing else. they want to know what you'll do tangibly as president to help them. so i think it is an issue for the president to go there and not have anything but walking with them and being candidate

joe as opposed to president joe biden. but i would also say the bigger issue is we're dancing around it and ignoring the fact that policies that the president put forward are going to hurt the unions and hurt these autoworkers because introducing ev, while it's great and is going to be the future, it does impact them at the end of the day. so i think ignoring that issue donald trump will hit on that. donald trump is going to point out these issues that biden will have with autoworkers and will compel to them an emotional level and try to relate to them despite obviously contradictory aspect the fact that the former president has his own issues as a businessman and with workers and not paying them or not paying them enough. so, it will be an interesting sort of next few days here. >> it's fascinating. you look at what trump did with the national labor board, where i'm from in ohio, never came to pass. the question i think you're getting at this is the ability

to have that kind of political knock down drag out fight when you're technically the president, there's a reason presidents don't go to picket lines. right? they're not part of this negotiation. they're not a party. they try to stay in the background and hope to facilitate. you've covered this team's economic policy and efforts closer than anybody. how do they operate in this space given the politics? >> to me it's a sign of desperation. if the president is making this huge move to show up and outshine the last president, who was a candidate, who is a big opponent, it is showing how hard he is fighting because what donald trump is doing is trying to recreate that 2016-like attraction, that pull to blue collar workers that got him to the white house. and biden grabbed those votes in 2020 and they're uncertain now about him. that constituency is not shared because he's backed electric vehicle production. trump is talking about how that's going to wipe out your jobs because they need less union workers to produce those kinds of cars. they're shipping those jobs to

china. that's how he won in 2016. he's recreating that. so biden is rushing in to do the counter narrative, but he's showing up a little bit empty handed when it comes to policy fixes on making sure union jobs are protected. >> i mean, what power -- you make this good point that the president needs to tell these workers he won't allow the ev transition, that this administration backs so fervently to chip away at good-paying jobs. but he doesn't really actually have any power to make those promises, does he? >> he has signaling power to show up and to make it clear to the big automakers that i'm the president and i support this. unless he's willing to go back on those promises on ev production, which he's not, that's going to upset a lot of people in the climate change sector, he can't do anything here. >> the balance here, right? biden has tried every single time he talks about this to say, when i talk about climate, i'm talking about jobs. i'm talking about union jobs.

that's his message. doesn't necessarily track with autoworkers. how does he navigate this? what laura is pointing out is 100% true. >> there's of course the opposite point, the biden administration successfully negotiated the dock workers and the railroad workers union deliberations. they did so very quietly, diplomatically and i don't think they got credit for it despite the fact that those were also historic agreements. so, politics is, yes, about nuance and pros, but it's also about poetry and it's also about large, symbolic acts. certainly when this negotiation does end and i do believe that these workers have a very strong position and significant momentum, there's an argument to be made that the mieden administration will receive more credit this time and the uaw's endorsement. although the uaw said they will not be endorsing donald trump, they're still very open to endorsing joe biden.

>> does that endorsement matter? >> it does. they have largely had this kind of strangle hold on this group of voters, this block of voters. but again, republicans are looking at michigan and this could be a real opportunity to make some headway there. >> i think fain is aligned with his rank and file than uaw presidents have been in the past. >> thank you, guys. appreciate it very much. all right, this is ahead. the house back in session today. no spending deal in sight. speaker kevin mccarthy running out of time. we have the latest on these negotiations. >> these interest days max misses the house. >> don't you, max? >> also in just moments, alexei navalny is expected to virtually attend. >> this coming as ukraine claims they have killed a prominent russian commander in their attack on moscow's black sea fleet. our chief international correspondent clarissa ward joins us live.

♪ well this hour alexei navalny is expected to virtually the end a hearing where he'll appeal. a russian court handed down a new 19-year punishment to

navalny last month on top of 11.5 year sentence he was already serving. in 2020 navalny was the victim of a suspected poisoning. a cnn investigation found evidence that before navalny fell ill he was being followed by agents from russia's security service. >> you don't recognize them? >> i don't recognize any of them. >> would it surprise you to learn that some of these men went on more than 30 trips with you over the course of three years? >> this is absolutely terrifying. i don't know if terrifying is a good word. >> that was our own clarissa ward interviewing navalny. here she is confronting one of the members involved in navalny's poisoning, trying to get answers. and he just shuts the door. navalny spent months recovering in germany before he returned to russia early in 2021 where he was immediately arrested. he is russia's most prominent

opposition leader. he says the charges against him are all politically motivated. here with us at the table this morning, happy to have our chief international correspondent clarissa ward. good morning. >> so good be with you. >> such a treat to have you in person. today, this hearing, why does it matter and what happens? >> in terms of the ramifications of it, i wouldn't expect much. basically it's an opportunity, though, for people who are close to navalny, people watching in terms of human rights abuses what kind of condition he is. previously when we have seen him by video link, he has been incredibly emaciated, not in a good way. he posted he has been in solitary confinement for the last four days. he's been held in deplorable conditions. he has all sorts of health issues. he said he was being put on very strong antibiotics at one stage that were giving him real stomach problems. he is now being served with 19 years, various different charges, extremism. but i think the reality is --

and i think this is something that he probably always understood, that there is no prospect for this appeal to be successful. that there is no prospect for alexei navalny to be a free man as long as president vladimir putin remains in power. >> and just to be clear the charges themselves, what are they based on? and are any of them valid? >> none of them are valid. they are a series of trumped up charges ranging from extremism to fraud. you have to understand that president vladimir putin has effectively eviscerated now civil society inside russia. and alexei navalny posed legitimate threat, not because of the number of people supporting him but because where he was really probing the hardest was on the corruption of the kremlin, not trying to appeal to russians who might be interested in liberalism or want to live a more western life. he understood that doesn't really play with the russian base. but corruption and the idea that people are stealing from the

ordinary russians, that the elites are stealing, that is an effective tool and made him a very dangerous man as far as putin was concerned. >> you also have been on the front lines, many times since the war, russia's war in ukraine began. we got news yesterday that zelenskyy says the first abrams tanks from the u.s. have come and there's -- according to the white house, many more to come. what actual difference does that make in this counteroffensive, which has been very slow? >> well, i think the key is the number. right? we're talking about a few dozen abrams tanks. >> 30. >> so they may be very helpful on the battlefield. but if you're talking about 30 tanks, it's not realistically going to make a widespread difference. my guess is that they will use them together to make a real push in one area. but the broader issue on the ground is that this counteroffensive is moving slowly. and that is what president putin is counting on. he can keep grinding and keep the russian people suffering for as long as he wants to. president zelenskyy has to keep

his allies on board. and we are heading into the season that means it gets very rainy, gets very muddy and very cold. the ground freezes over. it becomes that much harder to push through those fortifications. and the russians at this stage, it's important to remember, they're playing defense. >> they're getting a little better, too, right? >> they're not playing offense and they're improving. they made terrible mistakes in the beginning. they suffered humiliating defeats. they are absolutely beginning to learn from their mistakes. so this is going to be a very tough battle for the ukrainians going ahead. >> we have seen an uptick in the tempo of ukrainian efforts to hit crimea, to hit specific strategic critical points in crimea in particular, which is illegally annexed by russia in 2014. there had been reports that high ranking official had been killed. just moments russian ministry of defense appear to show the commander of russia's black sea fleet suggesting he's alive

despite the claims from ukraine that he was killed. this back and forth i guess what do you make of it? but more broadly, this strategy that you have seen from the ukrainians? >> what i do make of it? we have a very tough job as journalists because this is an information war. so yesterday you had the ukrainians coming out saying they had killed this commander. this would be a very big deal. the biggest really since they sunk the ship last year. 30 or more than 30 officers killed alongside. now you have the russians saying, well, here he is. he's still alive. how do we know what to believe? but most importantly coming to your question about the sort of tactic, this is a very effective tactic for the ukrainians, right? it may be incredibly difficult to push through those fortifications, but to keep the pressure up in crimea, to keep up this idea that you are safe at no place on the battlefield, whether you are commander or whether you are rank and file soldier, you are constantly at risk of this very specific targeting. that is a very effective tool

both in terms of, you know, the impact it has on the battlefield but also psychologically. so i think you're going to see a lot more of these gorilla-like tactics going forward. >> we're just waiting for those images to come in so we can show our viewers that russia is saying here is the proof that the commander of the black sea fleet is alive. as we wait for those, the increasing drone attacks inside russia on moscow, that president zelenskyy publicly denies are coming from ukraine, but then also talks about the effectiveness of doing that. should we expect those to increase? >> i think you should expect that to increase both on the ukrainian side and on the russian side. technology has been at the forefront of this war from the get-go, right? the ukrainians understood that this was kind of their super power and you have this strange juxtaposition of a war that is being played out in the trenches, reminiscent of world war i but at the same time is implementing some of the most sophisticated technology we have ever seen on the battlefield. again, though, the russians are starting to play catch up.

the russians are buying lots of drones from the iranians. they're stockpiling them. as we head into this season where you might see fewer or less movement on the actual, physical battlefield, i think you're going to see a lot more drone attacks coming from both sides in ukraine and also beyond. >> can i pull back for a minute? i think we get so -- i'm as guilty as anybody getting so caught up in the weeds on these congressional funding fights and kind of absurdity we do this every single fiscal year and ukraine, emergency ukraine funding, $24 billion, a piece of this larger battle. but there's been a shift, particularly among house republicans and some shift in terms of how the american people feel about the funding. when -- if you're the international community f you're the ukrainians who you mentioned zelenskyy needs his allies desperately at this moment, talk about what this battle on capitol hill means more broadly? >> i think this is an

existential battle for the ukrainians. they understand that if the republicans decide to really pull back on this funding, if the american people are really starting to tire of this war, it is going to be next to impossible for ukraine to win it. they desperately need this funding. not just in terms of the weaponry, not just in terms of defense spending. i'm talking simple things like paying government salaries. ukraine's economy is effectively being underwritten at the moment by the u.s. and by the europeans as well. and if there's any sense that that support is starting to wane and there's kind of malaise kicking in, that is going to be setting off alarm bells. i think it already is setting off alarm bells in kyiv and that is exactly coming back to my original point. look, president vladimir putin has been betting on from the beginning, we can keep grinding. we were born for this moment. whether it's two years, five years or a decade. but the west does not have the same appetite for suffering and

the west, of course, in general has to answer to its voters. >> yeah. absolutely. clarissa, thank you. treat to have you here. we appreciate it. >> thank you. just take a look at this we just got this in, i believe. this is russia saying this is proof that the commander of their black sea fleet was not killed, as ukraine claimed yesterday. that he is alive. but as clarissa rightly put it, it makes the job for journalists very tough with all of this information from both sides. we'll keep following that. >> absolutely. well, to get a better grasp of the biden crisis facing the u.s., cnn traveled to border with guatemala. his report coming up next. >> reporter: that's guatemala over there. that if you look here are folks crossing, waving at us. migrants who made the journey from various countries. ♪

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this morning, a new report says the u.s. immigration court has a backlog of nearly 3 million cases, even a it has migrant crisis continues to escalate. thousands more migrants arrive each day to cities like el paso and eagle pass, stretching resources thin. meantime, u.s. officials have a

new agreement with mexico to deport migrants from border cities back to their home countries. because this unprecedented surge is also overwhelming mexico's southern border with guatemala. that's where we find cnn's david culliver. >> reporter: to get a better sense of the migrant crisis impacting the u.s., we wanted to come to the border. not the border you might be thinking of. rather we're at mexico's southern border with guatemala. that's guatemala over there. and that, if you look here, are folks crossing. waving at us. migrants who have made the journey from various countries. we met folks from haiti, from cuba, from honduras, ultimately, though, many of them tell us, if not all, they want to go north. by the way, that's the official crossing. that bridge. not many people using that. instead they come to this side, the mexico side, and this is into a city call where they set up little encampments. you can see you have folks with tents set up, clothes hanging, they're cooking food. you see a lot of families a lot

of young children in particular. and the plan for many of them is to be here until they can find a way, usually by bus or by car, to get to the largest city in this area in southern mexico. and many of them plan then to go meet with officials. and they hope to then claim asylum here in mexico or at the very least try to get transit documents and that buys them time to stay in mexico as they plan their way into the u.s. most of them will tell you, and they told me this directly, they want to enter the u.s. legally. but what you noticed here and we have seen this in the past several months in mexico in particular is the influx in the surge is a real strain on the resources for mexican cities. and you notice it as you see a lot of these folks are really trying to, on their own, figure out how to find food, how to find clothes and they're filling up cities. 15 to 17,000 right now the

number of migrant ace loan. huge numbers that plan to wait and stay. if you look at the u.s. border as a river and you have cut it off in one part, at least that's the intention from u.s. border officials, well, upstream it's still flowing. it's flowing rapidly. and this is the impact. it's coming on over the banks. you have migrants here who ultimately, yes, want to go to the u.s. but frankly most of them don't know how or where they'll end up. it really has become a humanitarian crisis. and most everyone you speak with here acknowledges that. david culliver, cnn, mexico. >> again, david culliver with remarkable perspective and view of what is driving this. >> yeah. senator bob menendez is digging in as calls for him to resign grow louder following his indictment on bribery charges. three senators from his own party now say he should step down. well, some house republicans are threatening their

colleagues. should they work with democrats to keep the government running? some senators say there should be bipartisan solutions to avoid a shutdown now and in the future. one of those senators is republican james lankford of oklahoma. he is here next.

corruption charges again. >> the charges are formidable. probably be a good idea if he did resign. >> reporter: three democratic senators are now calling for his resignation. including vermont's peter welsh, writing, quote, the shocking and specific allegations against senator menendez have wholly compromised his capacity to be that effective senator. i encourage senator menendez to resign. in his first on-camera statement since the charges were filed friday, menendez remained defiant, vowing not to step down. >> i firmly believe that when all the facts are presented not only will i be exonerated but i still will be the new jersey's senior senator. >> reporter: federal prosecutors allege menendez received hundreds of thousands in dollars in bribes in the form of cash,

gold, and luxury vehicle in exchange for the senator's influence. the conspiracy counts also charge his wife and three people described as new jersey associates and businessmen. prosecutors say some of that evidence included dna and fingerprints of one of the business contacts menendez allegedly accepted bribes from. >> for 30 years i have withdrawn thousands of dollars in cash from my personal savings account. which i have kept for emergencies and because of the history of my family facing confiscation in cuba. now this may seem old fashioned, but these were moneys drawn from my personal savings account based on the income that i have lawfully derived over those 30 years. >> reporter: one democratic congressman says this explanation is not good enough. >> he didn't disclose having that cash. all senators have to disclose their income. and of course, he didn't address

the gold bars. he didn't address the mercedes. he only addressed the cash. so, no, i don't think that's a very good explanation. >> reporter: senator menendez is due in court on wednesday, but when he returns to the capitol, we expect that he will no longer wield the powerful gavel of the senate foreign relations committee, instead, he will temporarily step aside. senator ben cardin, another democrat on that committee, will rise to become the top democrat in his absence. menendez will continue serving on the committee, just not in that top slot. phil, poppy? >> lauren fox, keep us posted. thank you. all right. so this just in to cnn a warning from the white house about a shutdown and potential damage to the united states as white house puts the blame squarely on house republicans. according to a new statement from the white house, quote, a government shutdown would have damaging impacts across the country, including undermining our national security and forcing service members across the country and around the world to work without pay.

so at the center of these negotiations is new military assistance, funding for ukraine, according to the "times," also in the senate, a bipartisan idea gaining traction to take the threat of a government shutdown off the table, not just now but for good. senators and house members circulating a letter pushing legislation that would automatically fund the government past spending deadlines. that addressed to top party leaders. here is part of it, quote, it is a simple bill that offers an eminently reasonable solution to one form of occurring congressional gridlock. our next guest cosponsored that bipartisan bill has been pushing it for five years. republican senator james lankford of oklahoma. senator, thank you very joining us. the question is would leaders give up the leverage that they get from spending deadlines and shutdowns to forever end the possibility of a shutdown? >> we do need to take the

shutdown issue off the table entirely. at the end of the day, this is not good for the united states of america as a world leader. it doesn't typically solve the problem at any point. in fact, i don't know of a shutdown that solved the issue oint. we do need to have hard, grown-up conversations about debt and deficit, but during a shutdown is the wrong time to do it. quite frankly, the way the bill is shaped the leaders still have leverage. the way that we shaped the bill, this is senator maggie hassan from new hampshire, members of congress and our staff we stay in session seven days a week, can only work on appropriations bill, forces congress to do its job but holds federal workers and their families and the american people harmless in the process while we work through the issues that we have to get done. >> senator schumer and mcconnell are working towards a short-term agreement in the senate. to basically force this on the house if they can't figure it out. according to politico, it would be about four to six weeks of funding with minimal ukraine funding.

would you get behind that? would you support it? >> yeah. as with everything, we have to be able to see the details on it. we need to keep the government open and operating while we get a chance to talk through the hard issues that we have to be able to resolve. they're going to file that we understand later on today and all of us will get a chance to read it. >> on its face it sounds reasonable? >> on its face it's reasonable. we do have to be able to keep basic government operations going. >> when it comes to ukraine funding, i thought this was notable from john kirby at the white house, here is what he said, listen. >> without the supplemental requests we asked for, it will absolutely have an effect on our ability to support ukraine well into the fall and into the winter months. >> i wonder if you have a message to some of your fellow republicans who not only are pushing to exclude more ukraine funding from continuing resolution but from the budget entirely. >> yeah. so a lot of folks are saying, hey, we have to take care of our problems here in america so we

can't take care of ukraine. we have to be able to do both. we are the united states of america. now, this is not an endless war that can just go on forever, but we cannot allow the thug, putin, to be able to go next door and slaughter his neighbors. that cannot be allowed. that's why japan and south korea, europe, the united states, so many others even countries in africa have chipped in to be able to help ukraine. that's why there's a lot of oversight that's actually happening on those weapon systems. but it is a bad thing for the world for putin to be able to go slaughter his neighbors and the world just to be able to turn away from that. that would be a signal to iran and signal to north korea and china and so many others. so we need to stay engaged and we need to allow ukraine to be able to win this war. >> senator, you make a good point that there are a number of americans who say what about us at home. and i just want to point to one thing in your state, right, oklahoma city, home to the faa's training academy for air traffic controllers. critically important position. we remember the shutdown end of 2018 into 2019. they had to cancel contracts,

cancel training for those folks. talk about what the impact would be at home if your state that would actually affect all americans. >> yeah. a lot of folks say that shutdowns are just a slow down of government. it doesn't really affect people. it absolutely does affect us not only on the international stage but all the contractors are not paid. they're actually cut out and then they're not paid. so areas like you mentioned, the air traffic control training, that's a lot of contractors that actually do that. they're put out. they're not paid at all. if it's their long enough, they have to restart the program as they did last time. that puts us behind in air traffic control where we already have a slow down. that's true on our southern border right now as well. the border control and cbp are dependent for contractors to work with them. if those contractors go away a really horrible chaotic situation at the border gets even worse when they folks have at that time no pay and also no help. >> right. let's talk about the border.

you have been welcome a dozen times as a ranking member. there was a congressional report in 2019 and it looked at what that shut down meant. yes, although border patrol agents continued to, wo, they didn't get paid. there was a delay in maintenance, delay in repairs and, quote, had a serious impact on how law enforcement officers operate and their safety including those responsible for border security. do you have a message for republican hardliners that care a lot about the border, a lot of people do, but whether or not are standing against a deal here given what this shows us happened last time at the border. >> yeah. my biggest message is let's have the argument about debt and deficit. they're not wrong on those issues. to be able to say to a chaotic border it will get worse why we're trying to negotiate what's happening on debt and deficit is the wrong method to do it. not only those members of law enforcement down there, now suddenly you're not paid, it's already incredibly difficult on them day to day and what they're actually facing.

but then also to have no pay during that time period is really difficult and to lose access to all those contractors. we have got to, as congress, focus on redefining and clarifying what the word asilo means so we don't have 10,000 people a day crossing our border being waved into, no details, we can't have that as a country. that's a national security problem but we also can't make it worse in the process. >> 2.6 million backed up in the immigration courts right now for the asylum claims. >> up to ten years waiting. >> i know. rosa flores was reporting that this morning. it's stunning. senator bob menendez defiant after this indictment on multiple bribery counts. i want you to listen to some of his response yesterday. here it is. >> for 30 years i have withdrawn thousands of dollars in cash from my personal savings account. which i have kept for emergencies and because of the history of my family facing

confiscation in cuba. now, this may seem old fashioned. but these were moneys drawn from my personal savings account, based on the income that i have lawfully derived over those 30 years. >> he believes he will be exonerated. he believes he will stay the senior senator from new jersey. you're on the ethics committee. will you guys investigate this? >> so i can't talk about anything on ethics. that has been a standard rule that all of us that are on ethics, myself and chris coons never talk about any part of ethics. >> do you think something like this would be worthy of investigation then? >> certainly would be. when individuals from outside or people inside actually make accusations or they file a request to be able to inspect that the ethics committee always follows up on those things. it is a unique challenge to be able to walk through the process where we have to be able to do it in silence. obviously the department of justice, they have continued to be able to do their

investigation. that investigation will move on the >> it is difficult to think through a members of the united states senate who doesn't trust their government enough they have to be able to maintain that much cash at home that. a challenging, obviously, issue to be able to try to explain. we will work through it and the department of justice will do their work as well. >> senator james langford, nice to have you with us this morning. thank you. >> good to see you again. the warm temperatures in the pacific ocean could be having a major impact on how bad this winter will be. what you can expect. that's next. >> and we promise no song title puns here to phil'sdy play. new financial evidence that swifties and football fans are all in on this rumored relationship between taylor swift and travis kelce.

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♪ if you needed any more proof that taylor swift's appearance at the chiefs game is resonating, people appear to be putting their money on the couple. travis kelce was in the top five of jersey sales this weekend, surging more than 400%. likely driven almost exclusively by swift fans. >> this is the best part of this entire story, including the future of their relationship. one surprising swift fan weighed in yesterday. >> where do you fall on that? travis kelce, taylor swift, power couple in the nfl. >> travis kelce had a lot of big catches in his career. this would be the biggest. >> that was patriots coach bill belichick. he went to taylor swift's concert at gillette stadium earlier this year. he called swift tough, impressive. i love that. to get bill belichick to laugh

and smile at a reporter, big deal. a few days into the fall. with winter not far behind, this year could bring drastic changes. experts say this winter will be the first in a few years to feel the effects of el nino because of warmer than normal ocean temperatures. here to explain, meteorologist derek van dam. does it mean more blizzards or what? >> i think a lot of people on the east coast will be quite happy, actually, because last year they were robbed of a proper winter. >> true. >> maybe their year of retribution, right? so, yes, you can expect more winter storms on the east coast. in fact, this is the typical weather pattern that an el nino drives during the winter months, december to february. take note of an amplified storm track that. is the southern polar jet stream. that is basically just running across the southern tier of our u.s. and making its way into the eastern sea breeze as well. to conjure up my favorite hbo

max show, yes, winter is coming. expect that. that's the trend. in fact, according to the climate prediction center, they are calling for above normal precipitation favoring the eastern seaboard during the core of the winter season. that means that the weather patterns are going to favor that area for more snow. what about temperatures? climatologists look towards other winter seasons with long el ninos, and they compare december, january, february of previous years. this is what they predict. the above-average temperatures will be located across the northern tier of our country with the cooler weather the southern portions of the u.s. if you are looking for snowy and cold weather, he anticipate that on the eastern seaboard. >> "game of thrones," the crossover we never knew we needed. thank you. this just in to cnn. hunter biden now suing rudy

giuliani. we will explain why next. and cassidy hutchison releasing her book. some shocking revelations and the allegations she is making. that's next.