>> neil: all right half past the hour want to give you a little bit of an update on harvey and what the fall out is a category 1 storm remember it first hit the state late last night as a category 4 with winds in excess of 130 miles an hour it quickly slowed down but it is still dumping a lot of rain and is expected to be in the neighborhood for days dumping depending on the report up to 5t period. more than 211,000 are without w. that effects better than 20,000 cruise travelers in and out of this normally friendly neck of the woods, not so today. to rockport, texas where we're getting indications of 10 injured, you might recall that the acting mayor of rockport had been telling those who refused

to evacuate, do me a favor and write your social security number and name on your arm in case we collect your bodies, that was not well received but the message was what are you thinking? also, fema has indicated right now that this is looking like a very extensive storm, some are putting estimates of at least $40 billion on it. meanwhile president trump is at camp david this weekend is being regularly briefed on all of this , from his acting in command tweeted out a number of developments on this that we are leaving nothing to chance coming from the president, also saying that city, state and federal governors are working great together and so far, that seems to be quite clear that everyone seems to be on the same page and some of the political back and forth and whose in charge the kind of stuff that russel had raised with me earlier in this broadcast do not appear to be evidencing themselves yet. of course there's more problems to come with the flooding after the storm and that's something that could be a big issue in

houston, texas and that's where you'll find griff jenkins. what's going on there? >> reporter: [laughter] neil you're just seeing first of what is expected to be days of harvey really hitting houston hard. the national hurricane center reinforced in their last update that houston is facing a major catastrophic flooding event because of the rains just because she was downgraded or he was downgraded harvey to category 1 doesn't mean it's any less rain over the course of the next several days. where i'm standing is in southwest houston, in a major affair sitting in the middle of west belford road and we're just off the southwest freeway. you can see there in the car behind me came running down this road, to charge these waters and got stuck, just about 20 minutes ago the driver of that vehicle was having an assistance, not necessarily a rescue, neil but

assistance from several police officers who had to sort of talk him out and he got really rattled and spoke briefly with the gentleman he worked overnight and said he thought he could make it, he needs to go this way. clearly he can't and that is the danger. you've heard that you don't want to get stuck in these floodwaters. the phrase turn around don't drowned. well if you look back to 2001 at tropical storm allison that hit houston so hard, upwards of $10 billion of damage, 23 deaths in texas because of that, over half of them were because of flooding and they were mostly automobile-related. people got stuck in these floodwaters. there are more than a dozen high water areas playing all across houston right now in the southwest because the heaviest parts of the band of harvey were hitting the southwest dubbing upwards of four to five inches several hours ago and we've been sort of going through the

various areas. this is certainly the worst we've seen but officers telling us there's other ones and certainly emergency crews, neil all over the city waiting to shut roads down. clearly, this road is shutdown. you see over here just one hpd officer but there was an entire crew there and they also have a high water rescue vehicle ready because just about oh, say 200-yards behind my cameraman is keegans bayou and it it has crested several hours ago and that's where this water is coming from and it's not showing any signs of getting less as we expect a lot more rain over the next couple days neil. >> neil: griff be safe my friend thank you very very much. way before harvey was forming texas land commissioner george bush was calling for funding for a barrier system to at least mitigate the damage the texas land commissioner joins me george p. bush. commissioner very good to have you. >> how is it going neil?

>> neil: very well how is it going there for you? >> we're thankfully in higher ground in the capitol city but a lot of work is ahead as griff had mentioned we'll probably see about four more days of precipitation in an area that will affect 12 million of our 26 million that reside in the state of texas. 300,000 people are without power and right now, we're in the process of assessing last night 's damage, as you've seen with some of these images on the coast in rockport, even corpus christi, we've got a lot of work ahead of us and so we're on stand by to be of assistance. >> neil: those without power has gone up substantially from the earlier numbers we had commissioner so 300,000 at this point. you know, your father comes to mind in how well he handled so many hurricanes in florida. i can remember them quite vivdly but it was always a matter of communication and i remember with governor jeb bush as i'm sure with you now as texas commissioner, the idea is to keep reminding people that

safety comes first, possessions after that but many stick behind as you know, commissioner and its caused a bit of a difference not a nasty one between texas governor abbott and the mayors of some cities the democratic mayor of houston comes to mind between urging an evacuation and the mayor saying that it could cause more problems than its worth. where do you stand on this whole thing? >> well, i think if my dad were here, he would say that after helping florida recover after eight storms in eight years and four storms in one hurricane season it's all about inter governmental relationships, partnerships with non-profits and the private sector, and i'm confident that we will come together as texans. the federal government has stepped forward with preposition ing assets in segine, texas to provide basic terms that just hopped off a state operations center call where commodity trailers are loaded up and ready to go.

as i mentioned first responders now are assessing damage in dealing with the priority right now and that's rescuing folks that have their lives threatened and on the coast and then they're thereafter as you mentioned with upwards of 30 inches in some areas, griff was just southwest of houston in fort bend county cities like rosenberg could see historic flooding, so we've got a long way to go but it's the final tail will be told that texans will come together at all levels of government representation to take care of our people. >> neil: commissioner i remember from your dad and others in dealing with such things that the real problems, the real danger comes after the immediate hurricane making landfall and i was startled to hear two out of three deaths are attributed to days after with follow-up flooding, this will have a lot of follow-up flooding maybe

biblical flooding in excess of 50 inches depending on who you talk to. how do you deal with that and do you advise residents in those areas if they haven't left too late? >> well, you hit on the head over 90% of fatalities that occur after a hurricane are actually water-related not wind- related so we are going to see historic, we're already see ing some cars being flooded and swept off of streets, griff had mentioned for automobile drivers throughout the state to turn around don't drowned. that's a saying that we have in texas. we actually had three floods in the last two years our agency is still managing grants to help communities recover from that and now we'll be assisting in connection with this event but people need to heed these warnings and take them very seriously. there's professionals committed throughout the state to make sure that we have appropriate advisories that are out there, so folks need to pay attention to national weather service, tune into weather channel, your channel, and keep abreast of

this historic flooding that's about to take place. >> neil: commissioner you've got a crazy and busy schedule we appreciate you taking the time sir, thank you. >> thank you, neil. >> neil: commissioner george p. bush. he was just saying he announced better than 300,000 without power and a lot of you looking at this would say this is very unfortunate for texas but how does it concern me? what if i told you that whether you're near this region or not the fact of the matter is you're going to be paying for it and soon. i'm going to explain after this.

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which saves money. insurance a smarter way. they offer paperless billing and automatic payments. which saves paper. which saves money. they offer home and auto coverage, so you can bundle your policies. which saves hassle. which saves money. and they offer a single deductible. which means you only pay once when something like this happens. which saves money. esurance was born online and built to save. and when they save, you save. that's home and auto insurance for the modern world. esurance. an allstate company. click or call. >> neil: you know every time we're covering a hurricane i can understand this and say well you know it just doesn't affect me. we were watching this we feel for the people in texas and surrounding area but it's no big deal for us so why don't you move on? so we would move on without pointing this to you though that this is a big neck of the woods for energy. it accounts for a quarter of our oil production, almost the same

of our natural gas production, 45% of our overall petroleum producing capacity i could go on and say that when conoco phillip s and exxon-mobile and anadarko petroleum are evacuating facilities and maybe keeping them evacuated for upwards of a week, that's production. that's stuff that doesn't come out of there to get to you which could lift the price of i don't know gasoline and who knows that better than bill flynn an oil analyst fox business and fox news, bill spell it out for me because a lot of people who say okay, well how could that have such a dramatic impact. explain. >> reporter: what happens is because when you have a storm like that going through the heart of the refinery it's like the rest of the country catches the flu and the ramifications from this is just beginning to be felt. neil i'm very concerned about this storm that we're going to be paying a lot more at the pump because of where this storm hit.

we hit three key refineries right in rockport, texas with a category formed storm and we have never hit it directly with that kind of force and those three refineries. those three refineries could be down for months and on top of that with those storms still continuing to generate along the gulf coast, it could impact operations across the way. refineries could be down, power outages 300,000 people without power trying to bring the power back on but it's not just gasoline. it's food. you know, three major ports are being shutdown. that means higher prices at the grocery store and it's going to take some time for us to recover from this so we're going to feel a big slap across the country. >> neil: you know a lot of people look at it though as sort of like pulling out a rubber band that there is that point at which you don't get any production but then things snapback when everything is back online. i guess your point is and i

didn't even think of the direct hit these refineries would take besides just being shuttered for a few days, some of them could be down for months, but that that will have an economic impact. >> it absolutely could and the other thing is the storm will not go away. there's going to be flooding and rains that could go on for weeks so we might not be able to get the workers back. a lot of their workers homes could be gone. this is going to have a psychological impact and a big impact on the economy. i think initially could hurt the gross domestic product of the country at least initially, actually slowdown growth. now we do get that back on the back end when we start to rebuild but the next couple of weeks are going to be really rough. >> neil: buddy thank you very very much. bill flynn spelling it all out want to remind you by the way to put this in some perspective on how wall street plays these games and i know it might seem heartless, but stocks in wal-mart, kroger, costco, albert s and safeway, those issues are moving up on the idea they have their own self

distribution centers and they can get aid to the people that need it that losers would target and amazon if you can believe it , the dollar stone and other chain drug stores that don't have that ability because they rely on outside suppliers. this is how wall street thinks in the middle of panic. little more after this.

>> neil: do you ever wonder how they came up with $40 billion in damages right off the baton this hurricane? still early by the way. well tracy has been crunching a lot of numbers, tracy? >> reporter: neil we're seeing images of damage from harvey already coming in but really far from knowing the full extent of how catastrophic it will be and the estimated price tag is at least $40 billion in

reconstruction costs with more than 200,000 homes at risk of storm surge damage in texas and the figure doesn't account for storm surges as far north as morgan city, louisiana and that's some 400 miles away from harvey's landfall, however according to fema hurricane katrina is still the most costly hurricane in u.s. history destroying some 300,000 homes and causing $108 billion in damage. now that's roughly four times the amount of damage caused by hurricane andrew in 1992 and coincidentally thursday marked the 25 year anniversary since andrew slammed into south florida. it was the last category 5 storm to hit the u.s. and its impact is still felt today by those who survived it and andrew caused nearly $25 billion in damage destroying more than 25,000 homes and damaging 100,000 others, but texas also has its own history of deadly storms that caused billions of dollars in damage. harvey is the first significant hurricane to hit texas since ike in september 2008. ike was one of the most

destructive hurricanes to ever hit texas and one of the deadliest. it brought winds of 110 miles per hour to galveston and houston areas and caused $22 billion in damage and killed 84 people. harvey is also the first big storm along the middle texas coast since hurricane claudette in 2003 when it caused $180 million in damage and now harvey is hitting the same area as hurricane carla. in 1961, carla came ashore with wind gusts estimated at 175 miles per hour and caused more than $300 million in damage so time will tell where harvey's impact will be remembered in history. but today people in texas are hoping it stays far from this list. neil? >> neil: tracy thank you very very much. now the president has already indicated as he said at the top of the hour he wants to visit texas next week. he's going to be a busy bee next week because he's also leading the effort to get tax cuts done next year so a lot riding on the president's busy schedule in the next few weeks.

chuck roach is here rachel duffy , and rachel on the tax cut thing he's leading a charge saying a lot of republicans are dropping the ball. where is this going? >> reporter: well i think he's tweeting to set the stage that listen if this fails if you guys do what you did if you in congress do what you did with healthcare i'm not going to take the blame but make no mistake republicans understand that tax reform is a key item in growing this economy and growing jobs and it's the quickest way to shutdown the left wing critics of this administration and of the republican party, so i think they both want to get this and then there's a lot of pressure from democrats who are from conservative states and also from conservative districts to get on board with this. >> neil: those left wing critics no doubt include you, chuck right? >> reporter: absolutely. good texas left wing critic but i would be remiss if i didn't think about my family and friends in texas. i was just in rockport this weekend with my friends stan and glenn and thinking about my

captain and octavius sidekick. we're all small business owners and we used to talk about girls and football but we found ourselves talking about donald trump, talking about taxes and i think gary has taught me a lot about this issue which is individual businesses like minor tax at an individual rate, the problem is we're paying too much while a lot of people ain't paying enough and i think that's the key with this. if you really want to get something done there is common ground in the u.s. house between republicans and democrats who like to see relief for all americans. >> neil: but what we see this year, gary i've got mixed signals when mitch mcconnell says we'll get it done in congress he seems to be hinting not necessarily this year. what do you think? >> reporter: i don't think it's going to get done. i agree with everything that rachel and chuck said. there's common ground there. this should be a slam dunk for the republicans, but if you couldn't solve healthcare and now that looks dead, i don't see how you're going to solve a puzzle like tax reform. maybe you could if donald trump

was a different kind of politician with the emphasis on politician, but he doesn't seem to want to mend fences and realize that congress makes the laws. instead, it's all about ego. maybe on both sides and for that reason, and the puzzle part of text reform period even if it was my gosh, lbj or kennedy as president i don't see you're going to see it getting done. >> neil: well those guys certainly have their own party members to get something done. this president is a little different publicly doing so but he's already, rachel gone after jeff flake, john mccain, mitch mcconnell before, paul ryan on his disappointment on all of this stuff that hasn't gotten done, what happens then if they just breakout into an intraparty boot fight? >> reporter: well that would be really bad for the party and it would be really bad for the economy and the country. i'll say this on those senators are getting a lot of heat because of those tweets and that may help but i'll tell you there's a wildcard in here and

that is senator menendez's corruption trial. right now a judge says he cannot move the date of his trial. he's requested to do that. if he is convicted or if he doesn't show up to make these crucial votes, the senate-- >> neil: they have one more senator. >> reporter: and they could pass even healthcare based on this and the media is not covering menendez but it's a big deal. >> neil: what's for democrats if this doesn't come to pass do you think? >> reporter: i think you'll see a lot of this play out in 18 neil as you know people on both sides will use it as a way to motivate voters to the polls. there's things going on in the country that people don't know about that the administration is working with congress like trying to raise taxes on fishermen and people who use the everglades park and the budget is so depleted they're trying to raise money to go into the park for things i pay with for my tax dollars to raise the amount of money just to pay for our park services and things going on which is really crazy. >> neil: well guys i want to

thank you all very very much and in the meantime we are hearing from texas governor greg abbott, fema director michael brown who has a warning for this president don't let this become your katrina. we'll explain after this. yeah, 103. well, let me ask you guys. how long did it take you two to save that? a long time. then it's a fortune. well, i'm sure you talk to people all the time who think $100k is just pocket change. right now we're just talking to you. i told you we had a fortune. yes, you did. getting closer to your investment goals starts with a conversation. schedule a complimentary goal planning session today.

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edible arrangements for summer. order in store or online. >> all right. of the president is getting a briefing on this whole thing as we speak right now. we'll keep you posted on that and what if anything we're learning of what he plans to do or commits to do. again, all local, federal, state authorities are working in unison to deal with this crisis. it's a crisis now, even though it's a category 1 storm. it's going to stick around and that can be the dangerous type. and joe was among the earliest to say this could telegraph a very, very busy hurricane season, but joe, first to this one and what happens now? what are you worried about? >> well, it's the flooding and this is why we, from the beginning t