can save. >> there are auctions going on right now, so what are you waiting for? >> cnn this morning with kasie hunt next it's tuesday, december 17th right now on cnn this morning i'm scared.

>> why did they do that another deadly school shooting this time. >> it's a 15 year old girl opening fire at a christian school in wisconsin before taking her own life. >> plus, breaking overnight, a top russian general killed in the streets of moscow. the new details just in to cnn, claiming ukraine may be behind it and he's going to be much less radical than you would think. president elect donald trump trying to calm fears about rfk jr., his controversial pick to head the health and human services department. all right. 5 a.m. on the east coast, a live look at the washington monument white house there in the shadows in front on this. boy, what day is today on this holiday week, anyway? it's tuesday. good morning everyone. i'm kasie hunt. it's wonderful to have you with us. just days before the

start of the holiday break, tragedy strikes a madison, wisconsin school and another community is left in turmoil in the wake of a mass shooting, this time at abundant life christian school. police say the shooting started monday morning, leaving a teacher and a student dead and six others injured. the 15 year old attacker then turned the gun on herself. first responders were at the school within three minutes. after a second grader called 911. >> let that soak in for a minute. a second grade student called 911 at 10:57 a.m. to report a shooting at school the suspect has been identified as natalie rupnow. >> police say her parents are cooperating with the investigation and are not suspected of committing a crime. at this time, the school has about 420 students from kindergarten to high school.

students as young as eight years old are telling their stories of coming face to face with gun violence at school. >> we heard them, and then some people started crying, and then we just waited until the police came, and then they escorted us out to the church. i was scared, and why did they do that? why? >> i just heard sobbing and there was a teacher and she was screaming like, ah, my leg! >> help, help! >> i was i was really scared and i was really sad. >> it is so heartbreaking to watch those students have to talk about going through this. joining us now to talk about it is jennifer mattea, senior news writer at the trace. jennifer good morning. thank you so much, jessica. excuse me for being here this morning. this obviously an incredibly difficult situation that we have seen unfold all too frequently here in the united states. of course, in this case, it's a 15 year old girl

who is apparently the person who brought this gun to the school. what do we know about why at this point? and how can this community try to grapple with this tragedy? there's very little we know about why at this point. of course, investigators are going to be looking into her background. >> was there any bullying? >> was there any leakage? >> were there any written plans that she left around to find? >> was there anything on social media? >> i assume investigators are going to be scouring that. when i saw that this was yet another young teenager, i was shocked. you know, we've had several shootings in recent years. appalachia high school, just in june that the shooter was 14 years old, oxford high school a few years ago, the shooter was 15 years old. here we see yet again, another trend of young teenagers getting ahold of weapons somehow. and i'm sure investigators are going to look at where this minor got ahold

of this weapon. if an adult gave this minor a weapon, we could see charges just like we did in the appalachian high school shooting and oxford, where parents were charged. and in the case of the oxford high school shooting, actually convicted. >> yeah. you know, i was going to ask you about that as well, because it does sound like in this case, as we've reported here, that the parents are cooperating, are trying to help investigators. how much can that does that matter in the context of potentially holding them accountable? >> i assume that, you know, they're going to want cooperation above all else in the early stages of this investigation, charges would probably come later. investigators really need to piece together what happened and which adults along the way. it may not be the parents. we actually have no idea where this person got the gun, which adults along the way have allowed a child to access this gun, which we really don't know at this point.

>> jennifer, how unusual is it to have a girl be a female shooter in a situation like this? >> a female mass shooters are quite unusual. we've only seen this about a dozen times in the last 50 years. and in terms of school shooters, though, we've seen it a couple of times in the last several years, the covenant school shooting was somebody who was assigned female at birth. and now this shooting, we also saw last year we had a church shooting in texas, the lakewood church shooting that was a female shooter. the stem highlands ranch shooting. that was a high school shooting five years ago. one of the perpetrators there was female. what this is showing me is that these gun attacks, which usually used to be the province of white males of a certain age, is now diversifying. we're seeing different races, different genders, we're seeing america's gun virus really extend to other groups. and

this is this is troubling to me. it means that there's no corner of this country that could really be untouched by america's gun violence epidemic. >> all right. jennifer mattea for us this morning. jennifer, very grateful to have you on the show. thank you very much for being here. >> thanks for having me. >> all right. coming up here on cnn this morning, breaking overnight, a top russian general killed in an electric scooter bombing this morning, a source telling cnn ukraine may have been behind the assassination. plus, arrested again that stowaway who tried to get on a plane to paris facing new charges after attempting to sneak into canada and lobbying senators rfk jr.. on the hill, answering questions about his views on vaccines. >> what he wants with vaccines is. which is why i believe in is transparency i want to be the greatest

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win toward taking charge of your health. so this year you can say you did it belén news central today at seven eastern. >> breaking overnight, the leader of russia's nuclear protection forces killed in a bombing in moscow. russian officials say the bomb was hidden inside an electric scooter and detonated remotely outside an apartment building. today, the russian general was wanted by ukraine for using chemical weapons. a source with knowledge of the operation telling cnn ukraine's security service was behind the assassination. max foster joins us live now from london with more on this. max. good morning. a remarkable event here. tell us more about who this general is and why the ukrainians wanted to do this. >> well, what a brazen assassination on the streets of moscow, just four miles from the kremlin. a remote

controlled bomb planted on an electric scooter. and they got their man. because very quickly, we heard from sources within ukraine that this was a revenge attack. this was a general who ran the forces that look after the nuclear weapons, the chemical weaponry, and the ukrainians had very clearly accused him specifically of ordering the use of chemical weapons effectively on the battlefield against the ukrainian military. so they targeted him. they got him just four miles from the kremlin, as i say. so a massive breach of security for the russians. we await to hear their response. but, you know, you could call it a triumph for the ukrainians, but there will be a response as well to this. >> yeah, well, i was going to say, max, i mean, this is an

intriguing time, i suppose, for russia, considering, of course, the fall of assad in syria, where, of course, russians were. they've given him asylum there and putin making an appearance in public without even mentioning what was going on there, really, in many ways an embarrassment for them and potential security problems, since they have access to a warm water port through syria. now, something like this. and to have the ukrainians talking about it in public, it seems like putin is under some pressure. no certainly. >> i mean, syria was, you know, russia's only base, really reliable base within the middle east. they've still got their military installations there. i'm sure there's some negotiation going on between the syrian regime as it is now, and the russians, about protecting those assets. whether or not they'll be able to stay. but losing, you know, under a major pressure within syria, in the middle east also clearly under pressure in

ukraine, they have been pretty successful, though, on the battlefield, pushing forward on those front lines. so they've been claiming triumphs on the battle in ukraine. but this is a major blow. a big. embarrassment. which does show some vulnerability. to think that you could attack anyone in central moscow as a ukrainian agent is pretty extraordinary, let alone a top, a top general who was specifically targeted. >> right. well, and i mean, those electric scooters, they're all over cities around the world. i mean, what a what a, um, sort of sinister use of that, of that technology. but of course, all this, you know, coming as the russians are scrambling to, to take territory in ukraine ahead of. president elect donald trump coming into office and zelenskyy mounting a charm offensive to try to win him over quite a complicated battlefield, i suppose you could call it. max foster for us this morning, max. thank you. i really appreciate it. see you soon. all right. ahead here on cnn this morning. it's a bird. it's a plane. how

about a drone? we still don't know where they're coming from we don't see any public safety risk. what the federal government is doing to look into these strange sightings and what the defense for the accused killer could argue in court. we're going to talk to a state attorney i can't fool myself. >> it was the most exciting time in the world. >> his life has truly joyful moments and some really difficult moments. >> you'll come across an artist like luther vandross once in a lifetime. >> luther. never too much new year's day on cnn. from creating memories to finding the perfect gift let us make this holiday season a little easier

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some nefarious activity. all i can do is tell you that right now, we see none of that. >> white house national security adviser, communications adviser john kirby, acknowledging that the federal government is still not certain about the origin of all of those recent drone sightings. house intelligence committee members are expected to receive a classified briefing on the matter this afternoon a woman caught stowing away on a delta flight from new york to paris last month. remember this? yeah, she's been busted again. this time she was trying to get into canada. law enforcement sources tell cnn that she cut off her ankle monitor, and then she later boarded a greyhound bus headed for canada. she will be turned over to u.s. marshals later today wow. a powerful 7.3 earthquake hitting the island nation of vanuatu earlier today. it's just east of australia. the

u.s. embassy among the structures heavily damaged in the quake. right now, one person is confirmed dead. and it's unclear how many are injured. officials fear that people may be trapped under rubble. all right. time now for weather. a storm forming in the northwest today. apparently, it's going to bring coastal rainfall, mountain snow, lots of wind. and there's a new fire threat brewing in southern california. let's get straight to our meteorologist. our weatherman, derek van dam. derek. good morning. >> good morning. casey. so this storm system you're talking about is all related to each other. >> so the mountain snow is also going to yield in the stronger winds in southern california. and that, of course, equates to the potential for some fire weather conditions going forward in the future. so let me explain. here's the latest satellite loop. and you can see it's kind of a stream of moisture into the western parts of the u.s.. so this is gathering some shape. and it's produced a lot of snow, particularly across the ski resorts. this is what the snowboarder likes to see. look at that. almost two feet of snow at jackson hole, alta. coming in at 15in. so

additional snow still to come. so yeah. why are we mentioning this. yeah. some of the overpasses here could get a bit on the tricky side of travel, but it's all part of the same storm system that will impact a larger part of the western u.s.. so the radar very busy. again. high elevation snow, low elevation rainfall, a few different. few inches of rain possible from seattle southward towards portland, especially into the coastal regions. but let me show you what happens in the future as this system kind of departs. we have a high pressure that will settle in across the great basin. so what that does is it sets up this onshore or i should say offshore flow offshore winds across southern california. that equates to santa ana winds. and when that comes up and over these mountain ranges, this creates that drying effect. and also the increasing in the wind speeds. so the high wind alerts in place across the same areas that were impacted by the fires last week. so this is something we'll monitor here going forward today over the next couple of days. very dry conditions continue across southern california. casey. >> all right. for sure. derek

van dam for us this morning derek. thank you. always wonderful to see you. >> all right. >> take care. all right. still ahead here on cnn this morning rfk jr.. making the rounds on capitol hill. trying to win over skeptics as he's trying to convince them to let him be the next health secretary. plus, trump's mandate. the president elect leaning on his election win is a clear message from voters. can he deliver? >> america has given us an unprecedented and powerful mandate i want to be the greatest player that i could possibly become. >> joe guthrie elle reeve. >> they are trying to shut down this legal loophole to get 100 milligram generic viagra, or 20mg generic cialis delivered to your door for just $0.87 in less than two minutes. do this

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theaters christmas day. special engagements in dolby and imax. >> i'm oren liebermann at the pentagon, and this is cnn all right. >> 5:28 a.m. here on the east coast. a live look that's the embarcadero in san francisco. 230 2:28 a.m. pacific time. still quite as active as when we look at the vegas strip at this hour of the morning. good morning, everyone. i'm kasie hunt. it's wonderful to have you with us, robert f kennedy jr.. will be back on capitol hill today continuing his series of meetings with key republican senators this week, crucial to his potential confirmation as the nation's next health secretary. the former presidential candidate working to ease concerns over his history of vaccine skepticism. but walking the halls of the capitol yesterday, he stayed mum when he was pressed on whether or not he believes that vaccines are linked to autism. that's a claim that's been debunked. and he briefly weighed in on his reported link to an effort to nix the polio vaccine you

can't believe in the polio vaccine. >> should the polio vaccine be revoked. you're going to take away their vaccine. should. >> should the polio vaccine be revoked? >> polio vaccine, sir. >> do you stand by your previous comments about vaccines being linked to autism? >> do you stand by those comments, sir? >> president elect donald trump, in his first post-election news conference monday, appeared open to exploring those theories do you believe there's a connection between vaccines and autism? >> do you believe there's a link? >> well, i don't. look, right now you have some very brilliant people looking at it. i think everything should be looked at. you're not going to lose the the polio vaccine. that's not going to happen. >> do you think schools should mandate vaccines? >> i don't like mandates. i'm not a big mandate person. >> all right. julia manchester, national political reporter, joining us now to talk more about this. julia. good morning. good morning. thank you so much for being here. so trump also said a little bit

more about rfk jr. and whether or not he's radical or extreme or too, too much. so for this job. here's what donald trump said. we'll talk about it what do you say to people who are worried that his views on vaccines will translate into policies that will make their kids less safe? >> no, i think he's going to be much less radical than you would think. i think he's got a very open mind or i wouldn't have put him there. he's going to be very much less radical. but there are problems. i mean, we don't do as well as a lot of other nations, and those nations use nothing. and we're going to find out what those problems are so, julia, how is rfk's attempt to say to these senators that he's not as radical as some people think playing so far? >> well, look, compared to someone like tulsi gabbard or even pete hegseth, maybe a few weeks ago, i don't think it's as dire for rfk jr.. >> that being said, though, i think there are a lot of senators, particularly someone like mitch mcconnell, a polio survivor himself, who have a lot of questions about rfk jr..

>> going forward, i think for the most part, republicans are relatively more united around him. but look, he can only afford to lose, what, 3 to 4 votes. >> so he's got to be careful going forward. >> but i think it's more than just this question of vaccines. >> i mean, there's a lot of questions as to how a lot of his policies, for example, on limiting gmos and. >> food additives out of food. how would that influence, for example, the agriculture sector? >> it seems that senator chuck grassley from iowa has a lot of questions on that. >> so a number of things to keep an eye on with him. >> yeah. well, so the food question, i mean, there's a couple different things and areas going on as well. with his nomination concerns on the right about abortion. but let's start with potential crossover appeal on some of these food issues. there are people like senator cory booker who have made some noises about, hey, maybe this is actually the right thing to do. maybe we should have guidelines that are more similar to the europeans about food dyes, for example. is there crossover? i

mean, i also don't think we should forget that rfk jr.. is part of a storied american democratic political dynasty. yeah. >> look, i think you could potentially see some weird coalitions or what we would say are weird or different coalitions forming around rfk jr.. particularly on this, you know, the topic of food when it comes to snap benefits, for example, there have been lots of calls from democrats to get a lot of these, you know, food programs for lower income individuals to feature more healthy foods. and, you know, i think democrats see an opportunity for someone like rfk jr.. there, you know, when it comes to abortion, for example, that's a question that a lot of republicans have about rfk jr.. >> remember, he may be a populist. >> there may be this horseshoe where you see the left and the right populist sort of coming together in. rfk jr. is emblematic of that. that being said, though, i think you have republicans and democrats who have their own individual different questions about rfk jr.. and he's going to have to overcome that on capitol hill this week. >> well, an abortion in particular. i mean, the hhs

secretary does actually have a lot of authority over places that certainly the anti-abortion movement is very focused on. have you heard much about how aggressively they may push him on that? i think it could be aggressive. >> look, one thing that helps republicans, at least rhetorically, is they say, look, the issue of abortion has been punted back to the states with the overturning of roe versus wade. that being said, though, when it comes to abortion pills and those pills being delivered, how they cross state lines. >> et cetera. there are a lot of questions as to how hhs could impact that. so you could see that question from not only republicans, but also democrats. that's going to put rfk jr. in a very interesting, peculiar situation, given that he himself is more so liberal on the issue. but he's working for an administration that has had a pretty big impact in at least the federal level, sort of pushing back that abortion access. >> all right. julia manchester, thanks for being here this morning. i appreciate it. all right. let's turn to this as

the president elect prepares for the fight to have his nominees confirmed in the senate, congressional republicans are leaning on what they call his mandate from the presidential election. but our next guest, ron brownstein, argues that mandate may only go so far with some of the more reluctant voters who cast their ballot for trump based on the economy. brownstein writes this quote above all, the key to trump's success among these divided voters was their discontent over the economy and their belief that trump would improve their financial situation. molly murphy, a lead pollster for harris, told me she believed voters who thought trump would improve conditions on the issue. they cared the most about usually inflation, but also in some cases reinforced by immigration or crime, minimized any of these other personal or policy concerns about him. if they thought that trump was going to be better on their primary concern, they either forgave the other concerns or convinced themselves that the elements of the trump agenda, they just they disliked just won't happen. and ron brownstein

joins us now with more on this. ron, good morning. always good to see you. >> good morning. >> so of course, donald trump is leaning into the mandate that he says he has pretty aggressively. and i want to play a little bit of the press conference that he held yesterday, because you can kind of see how this mandate that he seems to feel he has is playing into his thinking, where he says, everybody wants to be my friend. take a look. yeah i did have a dinner with tim cook. >> i had dinner with sort of almost all of them, and the rest are coming. and this is one of the big differences, i think, between we were talking about it before, one of the big differences between the first term and the first term. everybody was fighting me in this term. everybody wants to be my friend. >> so, ron, how long do you think that's going to last? >> yeah. look, there's no question donald trump goes into

office the second time in a much stronger position than he did the first time. i mean, it's easy to forget that the leaders of the republican party in congress when he first entered were mitch mcconnell and paul ryan, both of whom were skeptical of him. the supreme court that was much more narrowly divided. a business community that was much more leery about being associated with him in all those ways. his position is obviously much stronger and in some, to some extent rooted in the fact that this time he did win the popular vote. but i think what's very clear from looking at both the exit polls and the ap votecast, which are our two principal, you know, surveys of what voters did on election day and why trump again, won because he won support from a significant minority of voters, a significant slice of voters who held still held reservations about him, whether personally or his agenda, but voted for him anyway because they thought he'd be better on the issue they cared most about. as molly murphy said, usually the

economy and i think that frames the dynamic going forward. if trump can deliver what those voters hired him to do, which is a more stable economic situation, they may continue to look past a lot of other things that they're less enthusiastic about. but if he doesn't and you know, as you know, there are a lot of economists who think his agenda is more likely to rekindle than suppress inflation if he doesn't, there's plenty of doubt, even among people who voted for him, that could quickly come back to the surface. >> yeah. and ron, you talked to whit ayres, who, you know, i'm sure you've known for a long time. he's been on the scene for quite some time. a really smart guy. he told you this? he agreed that if trump overreads his mandate, he could quickly strain his support among the voters. ambivalent about him, including not only the racial minorities he drew into his coalition, but white collar republicans who reluctantly backed him because they viewed biden and harris as too liberal. if trump provides his most controversial nominees,

such as robert f kennedy jr., to lead the department of health, kash patel as the fbi, a blank check to pursue polarizing agendas. ayres said, quote, we are going to be looking at joe biden level job approval numbers before we turn around for trump, say a little bit more about this. >> yeah. well, look, i mean, as i said, you know, trump was hired above all because voters who were uneasy about the economy, i think, look past other doubts about him. we've talked about it before. voters who were pro-choice but negative on the economy. there were a lot of them, 36% of the entire electorate. they split almost exactly 5050, which meant trump won a lot more pro-choice voters than democrats did, and republicans did in 2022. if you look at voters who said that he was too extreme, one third of them still voted for him. if they also said they were worse off than they were four years ago. so you can see how the doubts about trump have not been

extinguished within the electorate. it's not like, you know, all of the accusations that the harris campaign leveled against him failed to land. it's that for voters at this moment, the economy, you know, over overshadowed all of that. trump viewing his position, his win as a clear mandate, you know, an historic mandate, the fact that he has less guardrails that may not be an unmitigated blessing for him because he it will allow him to move, in all likelihood, more aggressively in directions that are still very fraught for him. the january 6th pardons questioning childhood vaccines, rolling back access to the the aca block granting medicaid. i mean, there's a lot of things on his to do list that will face pushback from the electorate as they go forward, particularly, as i said, if he cannot make progress on the biggest issue, he was hired to deal with, which is getting people's cost of living more under control. tariffs, mass

deportations, big tax cuts. most economists think that's more of a recipe for fueling than stifling inflation. >> yeah, there's a there's a lot on the table. and while of course, the president elect is acting as though he is already the president, he of course isn't yet. so we haven't started to feel some of these things for real that you outlined there. ron brownstein, always grateful to have you on the program, sir. thanks so much for being here. >> thanks for having me. >> all right. still ahead here on cnn this morning, a potential preview of luigi mangione defense. what the lawyer for the suspected killer could argue in court. plus, the falcons stay alive. a monday night doubleheader that's next in cnn sports grief isn't talked about much, but that's what my podcast is all about. >> join me in my guest for a new season with new conversations about loss, life and love.

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>> join aarp for $12 for one year and get instant access to member benefits and social programs. >> join and get an insulated trunk organizer. >> free plus aarp, the magazine it was cold blooded, just a cold blooded, horrible killing. >> and how people can like this guy is a that's a sickness. actually, that's really very bad, especially the way it was done. it was so bad right in the back president elect donald trump blasting social media support for the suspected unitedhealthcare shooter. >> luigi mangione remains in a pennsylvania state prison and has been fighting extradition to new york. top new york attorney karen friedman agnifilo, a former manhattan prosecutor, is representing mangione, and he is facing a possible 15 years to life in prison if convicted of second degree murder. agnifilo, a former legal analyst right here at cnn, saying before she was hired that he could have a clear defense strategy. it

looks to me like this. there might be a not guilty by reason of insanity defense that they're going to be thinking about, because the evidence is going to be so overwhelming that he did what he did. and i hear what you're saying about being radicalized. >> i hear what you guys are saying. but as a former prosecutor in that office, i would be concerned that you have someone who is a valid valedictorian of his class. he was brilliant his whole life. he comes from this great family. i mean, something changed, right? significantly. something changed. >> joining us now, dave aronberg, state attorney in palm beach county, florida. dave, wonderful to have you on the show. thank you for being here. you and i have spoken many times from far away from each other, but it's really nice to see you in person. let's talk a little bit about this defense that karen floated that before. of course, she ended up taking on mangione as her client. but do you agree with her? is it plausible that he could mount a defense by reason of insanity? >> casey, it's good to be with you in person. i think insanity is going to be very difficult.

>> you have to show you had an established medical condition and did not know the difference between right and wrong. well, he wore a mask to hide his identity. shows you he knew what he was doing was wrong. and then he fled and he had fake ids. he tried to hide out. that shows you he knew what he was doing was wrong and illegal. so i think that's going to be a hard defense. better one would be manslaughter using extreme emotional disturbance, saying that that was his mindset as opposed to murder. so i don't think they can get him an acquittal. but i do think they can get him a lesser conviction. >> so dig in a little bit more to this. the insanity defense. you have to you have to not understand the implications of your actions, basically. i mean, where does that come from in the law? >> the law is established that you just can't know the difference between right and wrong. so if the martians told him to do it, and then when the cops showed up, he hugged them, that would tell you he didn't know what he was doing, was wrong, was illegal. but when you have meticulous planning for a crime, when you wear a mask to hide your identity, when you flee and have fake ids, that shows you that you

knew the implications of your actions, you knew that it was illegal, it was wrong. and that's why i think it's going to be very hard to have an insanity defense. i think you could also perhaps get jury nullification, which is where the jury hears the evidence and the law and disregards both because they feel sympathy for him. and we see the public, at least some segments of the public supporting this guy. so that's always a possibility. that's a prosecutor's greatest nightmare. >> so under those circumstances, if you are defending luigi mangione, it sounds to me like you're saying there are a couple different ways you could go. if you're saying he has an emotional break, right? and that potentially reduces the charges, can they make that argument and also argue make arguments that engender sympathy from the jury? can they do both of those things at the same time? >> yes. you can try to argue in the alternative. i think he's going to have to take the stand to show that he had this emotional break where he just felt so outraged about the insurance industry. that's why he had this emotional

disturbance, because of his own experience with his back surgery, where this family's experience and he reflects the public's mood, the frustration with the insurance industry, i think that may be his best chance. but, you know, if you get sympathy from the jury, the jury can go in that jury box and in that room and decide that we like this guy not guilty, even though that doesn't follow the evidence or the law. that's why i say it's the prosecutor's worst nightmare, because you're supposed to follow the evidence and the law. but juries have a lot of independents. the only thing predictable about juries is that they are notoriously unpredictable. >> have you ever worked on a case where you feel like that's happened, where the jury has had sympathy for someone? >> oh, yeah. yeah. in fact, in my office, we lost the case, a self-defense case where the guy ran after people and shot 39 times from behind, killing one. but because they liked the defendant and didn't like the victim's not guilty. so it really does happen. >> all right, dave aronberg for us. very grateful to have you. thank you very much. hope you'll come back.

>> i'd love to. >> thank you. time now for sports. the playoff bound vikings handle the bears while the falcons keep their postseason hopes alive with a win in a monday night football doubleheader. carolyn manno has this morning's cnn sports update. carolyn good morning. good morning casey. the nfl season in the homestretch. >> as you know three weeks left and conference races are really heating up now the vikings clinching a playoff berth yesterday when the packers beat the seahawks last night. >> they wore white helmets for the first time in their history as they took on the bears and the new look definitely seemed to work for minnesota wide receiver justin jefferson, scoring the first touchdown of the game, then giving a shout out to vikings hall of famer randy moss as he continues to recover from cancer surgery. nice gesture there. minnesota punched in two more scores on the ground in the second half to walk away with a 30 to 12 win. >> it's the team's seventh win in a row. >> it goes to 12 and two. our potential is so, so high every game. >> you know we're expecting you know the offense to be the best on that field. >> it's going to be incredibly

competitive down the stretch here. >> and we're going to have to play well and continue to improve. chasing our best football in the other game, the falcons did just enough to beat the raiders and keep pace in the nfc south race. >> atlanta quarterback kirk cousins threw his first touchdown pass in five weeks. >> a 30 yard strike to a wide open drake. london vegas still had a chance to pull off the upset in this game, but atlanta's jesse bates ended up picking off desmond ridder's hail mary attempt in the end zone on the final play to seal the 15 to 9 win and snap a four game skid for us to go out there and find a way to win, i think the most important thing when you come off a couple losses in a row, particularly when you're the falcons, you want your falcons fans to feel good about it. >> you got to find a way to get a win, and you gain confidence through getting wins. and i think that's what our guys did today. >> so if you look at the nfc playoff picture case the lions, eagles, vikings are all tied for first. but detroit holds a tiebreaker over both teams. the falcons on the outside looking in right now, but they are only one game behind tampa for the division lead. atlanta holding the head to head tiebreaker

there. so that should be a really fun race to the finish. and it all comes down to tonight for the nba cup. in a matchup featuring two of the hottest teams in the league right now. after navigating a really tough schedule in the knockout rounds, you've got the thunder meeting milwaukee for the championship in vegas. it's the teams first meeting this season. and the bucks, as you know, a veteran laden squad full of star power. okc really young team on the rise in the hunt for the number one seed in the west for a second straight season. and do not forget about the payday here. each player on the winning team of the season tournament finale is going to earn around a half million dollars. >> it's a life, life changing money okay, obviously 500,000. >> you can. put a down payment on the house. you know, you can put the down payment on two houses. uh, some, some players, like, might not make that money ever in their career even the losers casey will make about 200 grand in this game. >> and for those of you debbie

downers at home that are saying nba players make way too much money, giannis is actually right. i mean, the nba minimum for players coming into the league is just over a million. so for some of the younger guys, a half $1 million is nothing to sneeze at. >> indeed it is not. all right carolyn, thanks very much for that. i appreciate it. all right. coming up here in our next hour on cnn this morning demanding answers. what's behind all the drone sightings? the white house is trying to tamp down panic. plus two dead after a school shooting in wisconsin, the whip of the gun violence prevention task force, rep mike veasey is here to discuss if your kids are at school, they are not okay. >> if they are church, they are not okay if they are outside elsewhere, they are not okay. where where are they going to be safe? >> can't fool myself. it was the most exciting time in the world. >> his life had extremely joyful moments and some really

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join me@chime.com and get paid when you say this is cnn the world's news network it's tuesday, december 17th right now on cnn this morning. >> you're not going to lose the the polio vaccine. that's not going to happen. >> confirmation fight donald trump trying to tamp down concerns about rfk jr.. s history of vaccine skepticism and and see what's going like. >> oh my leg. help, help. >> tragedy in wisconsin. two dead after a school shooting. what we're learning about the 15 year old shooter and we should be treating it like a national security issue. drone drama. today, the white house intelligence committee demanding answers about the uptick in unexplained sightings and i had dinner with sort of almost all of them, and the

rest are coming flocking to mar-a-lago tech ceos making the pilgrimage to palm beach to buddy up with the president elect all right. 6 a.m. here on the east coast, a live look at boca raton, florida, not too far from mar-a-lago. good morning, everyone. i'm kasie hunt. it's wonderful to have you with us. robert f kennedy jr. on capitol hill and in the spotlight sir, do you stand by your previous comments about vaccines being linked to autism? >> do you stand by those comments, sir trump's pick to lead the department of health and human services, refusing there to clarify if he still believes the vaccines cause autism. >> that claim, which kennedy has made for years, has been thoroughly disproven by multiple studies.