today in an hour and a half in tucson. before landing in arizona walz was at a fundraiser in california advocating getting rid of the electoral college. jill biden will campaign in arizona. trump will be here on sunday. a narrow race here. trump leads harris among voters 49, 47%. 1% supporting other candidates. 3% undecided. close here like many other states. >> dana: one to watch. rich edson, thank you for joining us. we are awaiting two major storm updates. florida governor ron desantis and fema are both supposed to speak shortly as hurricane milton charges closer to shore.

forecasters are warning this will be a catastrophic-level storm when it makes landfall overnight along florida's west coast. welcome to a new hour of "america's newsroom," i'm dana perino and hi to you, bill. >> bill: good morning to you. bill hemmer live in orlando 100 miles due east of tampa, florida. the entire part of this state will get whacked starting later tonight. as we track this storm, right now 155 mile-per-hour winds, category 4 storm. a track we're watching between clear water near tampa and down to fort myers. at some point somebody will feel the effects of this monster out there that is milton. look at the size of this. remember we were in studio yesterday and janice was with us and j.d. was talking about the eye of the storm and how perfectly formed it was. almost like a pin right there. overnight it tended to change its shape a little bit. so the storm is shifting

somewhat. still moving east/northeast but we won't know who is going to take that wallop until milton makes up its mind. naples at the southern end of the cone is kendall smith watching things from there. kendall, good morning. what do you see? >> good morning, bill. conditions are beginning to deteriorate in naples. we're in the golden gate area just off i-75 and pine ridge road and things are very busy. temperatures are in the low 80s, overcast, gloomy and muggy, tropical downpours all morning long. we're dealing with a break in the rain. as the bands of rain do so they produce intense downpours. one to three inches of rain in the heavy downpours and the potential for thunderstorms to produce tornadoes or water spouts.

in fact, as of right now, we have two active tornado warnings in effect just to the east of us here in naples. one warning that was to the east did include portions of collier and broward county. that was confirmed moving over a nature preserve. it has been allowed to be dropped back down by the national weather service to a radar-indicated tornado warning. what that means is we're watching areas of rotation as milton is swinging its way on shore, the outer rain bands and the big concern now through the next few hours. so as we're concerned here in naples, we have the potential or rotation but we see here. we have flooding that's already occurring. this is all ahead of milton's arrive all later tonight. the biggest issue is storm surge perhaps up to eight feet high by the time milton roars ashore. >> bill: thank you in naples,

florida. thank you very much. we're watching the storm here. you can follow this on the fox weather app, too, live there 24/seven. you think about the storm for a moment, how big it is. it is moving east northeast at 16 miles-per-hour. that may not sound like a lot to you if you are driving a car, but if you think about a storm of this size with that amount of forward motion, she is a doozy. 12 hours ago that speed had been cut in half and you can ask different meteorologists about what is better, last night when we went to bed it was moving at only eight miles-an-hour. you don't want a storm to stall right over lands. it creates massive problems. at 16 miles-an-hour it will bring the storm surge that will crush some town sometime in the next 12 to 16 hours. bruce is the mayor of clear water across the bay from tampa

and sir, good morning to you. thank you for your time. listen, you are one of those towns that could take this hit. what are you thinking and seeing now, sir? >> bill, we're as prepared as we can possibly be. we had a significant event two weeks ago. our barrier islands, that gave people a sense of seriousness about this storm. so we believe we have evacuated almost everyone from our barrier islands here in clear water and our emergency operations team is set up at our center and ready to respond. >> bill: everybody evacuated. i don't know a, if you have ever seen that before and b, how many people would that be? >> thousands and thousands. we're one of the top vacation tourist destinations in the entire country. because of helene we had a lower

population due to tourism. >> helping our floridians in danger. florida weathers this storm and emerges stronger on the other side. we are prepared and we will respond. i have spoken to the president. we remain in regular contact with fema and we are marshalling all available resources to prepare and respond to hurricane milton. i also want to thank the 20 other states who are assisting florida ahead of the storm. this is just what we as americans do. we have had opportunities to help other states in the past, including western north carolina and i think it shows the spirit that these states are stepping up and providing really valued support. we still have a state of emergency for 51 florida counties. hurricane milton is still a

major, very strong hurricane. currently a category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 155 miles-per-hour. that's just a whisker shy of a category 5. while there is the hope that it will weaken more before landfall there is high confidence this hurricane will pack a major punch and do an awful lot of damage. as you can see behind me, the florida division of emergency management is fully deployed and active. this has been for over two weeks given both of these storms. the state is actively fulfilling over 1500 missions. we've delivered massive amounts of supplies, meals, water bottles, sandbags, generators to help our local communities respond to this storm. we've also deployed more than 11,000 feet of flood protection systems and erected around critical infrastructures like

hospitals and waste water treatment facilities and electric infrastruck tours. generators have been deployed at shelters to support sheltering operations. starlink internet has been deployed across the entire state of florida. we have surged an additional 600 ambulances currently in operation helping in the effort. the state of florida has considerable fuel reserves ahead of milton and it is staged and utilized as needed following the storm. we've already dispatched a lot of fuel in the lead-up to this but still have on hand 1.6 million gallons of diesel and 1.1 million gallons of gasoline. there is no -- right now fuel shortage. demand has been very high and some gas stations are run out to be able to help. the florida highway patrol has

facilitated 106 long distance fuel tankers courts with sirens getting through traffic totaling almost a million gallons of gas aileen with ports around the state. they are continuing with the fuels courts as we speak. i'm in contact with the ports on the west coast of florida. we'll see how this storm impacts those. clearly there is a chance that you could have a major impact on port manatee as well as port tampa bay. that could interrupt their ability to receive fuel shipments. we're working on contingencies to keep fuel flowing throughout the state of florida. as we saw the new storm develop it was clear a lot of the hardest-hit areas on the west coast of hurricane from hurricane helene had not had major robust collectors in place. you had a major hazard on

barrier islands and manatee and sarasota county. so this weekend i authorized mandated 24/seven debris removal. we took all the florida department of transportation and other agency vehicles, brought them from across the state engaged in other missions as their normal court of business and dedicated it to debris removal. they were working all through the night in the wee hours of the morning. they were able to remove 55,000 cubic yards of debris. so that's over 3,000 truck loads of debris and it is our estimation that on those barrier islands, they were able to make a dent in the debris and reduce it by about 50% just from what the other agencies were able to get done. i want to thank everybody involved in that.

it did not stop since this weekend and now in a sings where it's likely the conditions will deteriorate and so we'll have to wind that down but they did make a difference and there will be less stage from this storm as a result of getting the debris out than there otherwise would have been. the department of transportation is staging 150 bridge inspectors. 350 cut and toss personnel and pieces of heavy equipment. florida national guard and fish and wildlife and highway patrol have activated additional personnel in advance of the storm. we have hundreds of states search and rescue people on hand. 26 total teams embedded in the potential impact site along the west coast to begin immediate rescue operations as soon as the storm passes. the national guard is deploying

6,000 florida national guardsmen and 3,000 from other states. we thank you for the support on that. we have search and rescue helicopters brought in from other states. 500 tactical vehicles including 180 high water vehicles. aerial, water and ground national guard search and rescue teams. this is the largest florida national guard search and rescue mobilization in the history of the state of florida. the florida state guard is deploying almost 200 soldier, three high water utvs, two blackhawk helicopters, four drone teams. 15 cut and toss crews. two amphibious rescue crews. we want to thank them. it was a dream a couple years ago they would have involved and a lot of unfair criticism when they stood it up. they have made a huge difference in this hurricane season and continue to do it here. we have also worked with the

utilities to have the largest staging of utility workers in advance of the storm. any time in american history. wealth owe have in florida by the time the storm arises over 50,000 linemen and those linemen are being brought in from places as far away as california. as soon as the storm passes, you will see the assessments and power restoration efforts commence immediately. the state of florida is assisted with the evacuation of healthcare facilities in the potential path of the storm. 16 hospitals have been evacuated. state veteran nursing homes that are in the cone are all accepting families of their residents to shelter with them. all of those are hurricane proof. all of them are outside of flood zone so if you have a family member in a state nursing homes. go and shelter with them.

that's a safe option and veterans would appreciate it. florida department of law enforcement has 500 out of state law enforcement officers. they will help respond after the storm to maintain law and order and there will be a lot of damage from this storm. there will be opportunities for people to try to take advantage of that. my message is don't even think about it. we'll come down hard on you. you will regret you tried to do that. i appreciate all the other folks from out of state coming in to supplement this effort, we need to maintain law and order. the mutual aid team is managing 70 active law enforcement missions identifying post storm response squads and important mission and we're happy for that. we're preparing for milton but also still recover from hurricane helene. when that hit we reactivated the florida disaster fund and we are

accepting donations for both storms helene and milton. a private fund affiliated with the state in terms of disaster but it is tax deductible donations. we distributed 63 million after hurricane ian to help people in southwest florida. this is something that is really, really important so i have directed val untier florida to keep the fund activated more milton. millions raised for helene. i want to thank corporations for making significant donations and a lot more will want to contribute to the disaster fund. text disaster 2022 or visit florida disaster fund.org. we're bearing down where the storm will arrive within the

next 24 hours. you still have time to evacuate if you are in an evacuation zone, particularly if you are in man torics sarasota, charlotte, those areas, the track can bounce around. not guaranteed it will hit there. you have time to do that. now conditions aren't going to be great today. i would say the roads and interstates are flowing. we've waived tolls. the best option would be to just evacuate within your own county to one of the shelters. all those counties have multiple shelters open. it would be safe to do a very short evacuation, tens of miles rather than get on the interstate and go. the roads are still open. people can do that but i want to warn people conditions will likely to continue to deteriorate the course of the

day. on monday when the initials evacuations. dot did the emergency shoulder plan. that helped but it was slow. those roads can be very slow anyway. by the time we got to the end of the night through the wee hours of morning it was going quickly. yesterday wasn't as bad as monday. we saw alligator alley down in southern florida was 150% of its normal capacity. i think as people saw the storm potentially bending further south. a lot of people in southwest florida decided to evacuate across the state. that's that. the roads now are good but i caution conditions are not great now and likely going to get worse as the day goes on. of course we do have a lot of mandatory evacuations in place. if you want to get a hotel, you can go to visit

florida.com/price line, expedia.com/florida. that's the emergency combination module there. i don't know what availability there will be in a lot of these places at this point. if that is something you are interested in, try it. we've worked with the florida lodging and restaurants and waiving pet fees. a lot of hotels in the state of florida have responded positively for that. i want to thank them for doing that and partnered with uber for hurricane milton to provide free rides two and from shelters with counties with evacuation orders. when you do the promo code, milton relief, one word. onstar has activated crisis mode. for chevy, buick, gmc and

cadillac owners. most of the school districts in the state are closed today. if you get out of the path and the panhandle not as much. in the peninsula all school districts are county. they are assisting the state with storm response and thank all those for their great work. we have 149 general population shelters that are open throughout the state. the current total shelter population is just 31,000 individuals. we have room in those shelters for a total population of almost 200,000 individuals. so there is space available in these shelters. i know a lot of people would rather stay in a hotel or with friends. but now as the storm is getting closer you may be able to get to a shelter, ride the storm out and then be able to go as you see fit and be able to get back

to your place quickly. space is available. 36 county-owned special needs shelters that are open and operating in counties in the path of the storm. schools and other facilities are now also used as state supported structures across the state. the state of florida has now opened six state-operated supplemental shelters. they may not be needed but you have a lot of people in the evacuation zones. i think most people decided to just leave and find something on their own. we have a lot of room in the traditional shelters but we wanted to open additional options so the six state op-ed shelters are hard rock event center, 5223 orient road in tampa. city furniture, 3205 south frontage road in plant city. bay care 1802 north -- in tampa. life science logistics in

lakeland. babcock ranch, sip -- the sports camp 3021 sports coast way and wesley chapel, florida. that site also has capabilities forservice special needs individuals and kevin is also working on setting up a seventh site. the state supported shelters have generators. you will have access to power. i think you have starlink at those. they have starlink internet. it is not the four seasons but there are things to make it tolerable to get through the next 24 to 36 hours. you can find shelter options at florida disaster.org/shelters. find your county's e.m. page. florida disaster.org/counties.

people have time now to evacuate if they're in the area of an evacuation zone. we see the storm as a very strong category 4. i have said from the beginning the prognostications it will likely weaken before it gets and it may not. even if it weakens it will be a major, major impact. you have time to make decisions to protect yourself and your families. massive amounts of space at the shelters. roads are flowing, conditions will get bad. you have to be very careful with that but certainly the shelters are a live option. i want to thank everybody. when you have these emergencies with a major hurricane it is a huge deal. we spin up allstate agencies, everyone here. >> bill: a lot of information. tick off the top line numbers there. he began which saying that 51 of

the 67 florida counties are under emergency orders. 20 different states across the country have offered assistance. he will gladly take that. i count 155 shelters that can house up to 200,000 people and some shelters can house special needs individuals. starlink has been deployed. bridges will close heading into tampa. that will happen this afternoon. a lot of depreon the barrier islands on the west coast of florida left over from helene. a major concern in florida for several days now with the storm developing. they are very concerned about this debris becoming like flying missiles that can be dangerous during the storm. with regard to fuel and gas in the tampa/st. pete area, 60% of gas stations are out of gas. disney announced it will close at 1:00 today for the 12th time in its history. if you look, dana, at the number

of times disney has closed, it is hurricane, after hurricane, after hurricane. covid is in there, too. largely because of hurricanes that have hit the sunshine state. >> dana: right now you are looking at key west, the southern-most point of florida. that's not even really in the considered to be that will get hit the most. so bill, you are in orlando 100 miles east but we'll see how this coastline takes a hit overnight and we'll see where you go from there. >> bill: yeah. you've got it. looking at the radar here you have the bands of rain leading the storm. almost like a full back trying to block for the running back leading him through the hole. those are the bands we've been experiencing in orlando. this is just a small little taste of what we're in for really overnight tonight and for most of the day on thursday. >> dana: i'm not sure i got the sports metaphor but when you are

back you can walk me through it. bill hemmer in orlando for us. one other news story we want to get. iran is in "focus." president biden is reportedly getting on a high-stakes call with israeli prime minister netanyahu today. former secretary of state condoleezza rice joins us next. inside an abandoned chicken coop. where our founder discovered a retired teacher living. no home. no health care. so she said no to this injustice and yes to transforming lives. it's this drive, this compassion that inspired aarp. today, we empower people to choose how they live as they age. as a wise friend and fierce defender, we advocate for better health, financial security, and stronger communities. aarp. join us in making a difference.

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west coast of florida. meanwhile helene is not forgotten still in north carolina. in the tar heel state people suffered unimaginable devastation. you have a lot of teams of volunteers now working around the clock to reach those in areas that have been cut off entirely in this deluge. madison is in banner elk, north carolina, 20 miles west of boone, north carolina. what do you have there? >> good morning, bill. two weeks after helene destroyed towns like this one, it is really -- the focus has been cleanup and recovery. when it comes to people out and about the only people you see are crews working on roads, volunteers handing out food and water and people trying to clean up their homes and businesses like this one. this was an antique shop. been in business for 31 years. i want to bring in the sales director, olivia.

walk me through when the flooding was the worst. >> this is my apartment across the street. we were up there watching the river just come down and within probably 15, 20 minutes it was just about knee deep and we just ran and got out as soon as we could. >> we're looking at some destruction to the building. windows broken, mud, you can see some of the antiques off to the side. what next for you guys and for this store? >> we just started our rebuilding process yesterday. we have had such great support from the community coming out and helping. we are just in the beginning of the recovery process. it will be a long road ahead. no power or water? we supply all the water here to the apartments and surrounding areas, no water and power. everyone has power except us. it's a waiting game right now. >> thank you for sharing your story and wish you guys the best. one thing talking to people out

here, bill, we've been reporting this and i want to keep on saying it. everyone feels a huge sense of community and it has been a lot of neighbors helping neighbors. so we'll be out here all day talking to more people and we'll keep you updated. >> bill: unimaginable thinking 13 days later. our best to that woman and everybody you meet there near the tennessee border with california. thank you, madison. >> we took out thousands of terrorists including nasrallah himself and nasrallah's replacement and the replacement of his replacement. today hezbollah is weaker than it's been for many, many years. >> dana: hezbollah on its heels and taking another blow. israeli prime minister netanyahu confirming that the new head of the iranian-backed terror group was killed in an air strike last week. he was expected to replace nasrallah. joining us now is former secretary of state condoleezza

rice. couldn't have a better guest on this issue. segue about the storm. joe biden made a decision yesterday as president that he needed to cancel his trip to germany and angola. good decision? >> i think so. i understand it. let me say to the people of florida, we're praying for you and of course the people in north carolina and parts of georgia, it's been awful and yes, i this i the president is probably smart to stay home. i remember katrina very well. these things are really difficult and nobody expects something of this magnitude. so it's the wonderful thing is to see neighbors helping neighbors. >> dana: the american way. benjamin netanyahue is saying if you are going to be in leadership in hezbollah or hamas we're coming after you. what do you think about this? >> i think what the israelis have achieved thus far with hezbollah is remarkable. both intelligence penetration of hezbollah, their intelligence

penetration of iran now very clear. if you are an iranian leader you don't want to be in your own guest house with the killing there. you have to decapitate terrorist organizations. we learned it with al qaeda. the first leader is pretty good. the second is not as good and the third not as good at all. it is a smart strategy. hezbollah after the 2006 war that i negotiated resolution 17.01 that ended the war hezbollah rebuilt and threatens the israeli border. it will make sense that israel weakens hezbollah. they also weaken iran which largely fights through its proxies. recently they've done a couple direct attacks. >> dana: a question about iran. call for number two is vice president harris yesterday talking about iran as our greatest adversary. >> which foreign country do you consider to be our greatest

adversary? >> i think there is an obvious one in mind which is iran. iran has american blood on their hands. this attack on israel, 200 ballistic missiles. >> dana: there are some who would say yes, iran, but also china and others. we have a lot of adversaries. >> i do think iran is the problem in the middle east, no doubt about that and they do after american blood on their hands. also true, though, that china, which is in many ways our co-equal in technological and militarily, economically as an overall threat there and vladimir putin is not off the page, either. so those countries and their little alliance between them to try to make life miserable for the united states and push us out of international leadership. there are plenty of threats to go around. >> dana: there is a call today

between biden and netanyahu. they have tensions between the two of them. partly even though they can say we're allies and i'm sure you can remember and telling us stories having an ally you get frustrated with. do you have an opinion whether the united states should say let israel do what it needs to do even if it has to do with oil facilities or nuclear sites in iran? >> the most important thing i don't think we need to have those discussions in public. it doesn't help anybody to speculate on what the israelis might do against iranian oil facilities or against nuclear sites. we would have been pretty ticked off if during our attacks on afghanistan to dislodge al qaeda we had somebody all day talking about what we might do. i hope this call goes well. the israelis are in the middle of a war. i think you support your allies in the middle of a war. when you have concerns it is fine to tell the ally that.

we had a lot of concerns in 2006. we didn't want them to go in the ground on lebanon. president bush was on the phone and the national security advisor, i was on the phone but you never read about it in the "new york times." so this is a time to absolutely apprise the israelis of our concerns but do so -- >> dana: do you think the israelis should have gone ahead looking back? i know hindsight being 2020. >> a ground incursion into lebanon as we're seeing is a very dangerous thing. it is a different level of warfare. i actually think the resolution there where we did not by the way call for a cease-fire for several weeks until israel had really damaged hezbollah so much that nasrallah in 2008 apologized for having started that war. i think that status quo lasted for maybe ten, 12 years. so no, i don't think at that time it made sense but hezbollah

is on the run this time in ways they weren't before. >> dana: i want to read this and get to the terror plot we thwarted. well, what do you know, hezbollah wants a cease-fire. getting your brains beaten in is clarifying. there is an afghan man who came to the united states in 2021 and the f.b.i. director said we have thwarted a terror plot saying the defendant motivated by isis conspired to commit a violent attack on election day in our homeland and proud of the men and women of the f.b.i. who uncovered and stopped the plot before anyone was harmed. terrorism is the f.b.i.'s number one priority and use any source to protect the american people. this is a generational problem, not something you solve immediately and you have to stay on offense all the time. they only have to be right once, we have to be right every single

time. >> afghanistan, once we were in afghanistan and had military bases there we actually had on the ground intelligence in a way that we don't now. i worried a great deal our withdrawal from afghanistan might actually increase the terrorist threat. it is also the case that withdrawal was so chaotic i'm not surprised some people got through on visas that shouldn't have. good for the f.b.i. we have to remain vigilant. we're safer than we were on 9/11 but not safe. this is just one of those reminders that fighting terrorism is a daily event particularly for the men and women of intelligence. >> dana: time to transition between one administration to the next is one time the country could be vulnerable. >> it worries me when we're in transition foes might try to take advantage of it. it's the reason i would strongly suggest that there be some

conversations maybe even now with presidential candidates about what we might expect about how that might look. certainly after the election there needs to be a very serious and systematic transition. we didn't really have that between the clinton people and the bush people not by anybody's fault but we hadn't experienced 9/11. now that we have that transition needs to be very systematic. we tried to make it systematic between bush and obama. it is important to keep that going. >> dana: great to have you. condie, thank you so much. bill hemmer, he says hello. >> bill: great to listen to dr. rice. hezbollah is on the run is what i heard from that and more coming up. we're 21 minutes away from the next update from the national hurricane center. it will give us the latest coordinates on milton as people abandon their homes and

businesses, milton barrels toward florida. this next guest stayed for helene but not sticking around this time. he will tell us why. p your memo? the secret is the powerful ingredient, apoaequorin, originally discovered in jellyfish and found only in prevagen. in a clinical study, prevagen was shown to improve memory in subgroups of individuals who were cognitively normal or mildly impaired. stay sharp and improve your memory with prevagen. prevagen. in stores everywhere without a prescription.

>> it was a wake-up call. this is literally catastrophic and i can say without any dramatization whatsoever, if you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you are going to die. >> bill: that's tampa's mayor there. a grim warning. pushing folks to head for safety before milton arrives. governor desantis telling people even ten or 20 miles go inland. elliott lives in st. petersburg, near the beach. he stayed for helene and got

rocked around. this time for the first time he has moved to higher ground. thank you for your time. you were telling me seven generations in clear water. what was your experience in helene that convinced you to not sit this one out. >> our island we live on has never flooded and when i saw the water get up to my front door and -- it was in every single house in the neighborhood. i was okay, maybe we made a mistake this time. seeing the magnitude of this stormy was like okay, we have family that lives two hours away, let's make the trek. it is a big farm. we're getting out of here. not going to do this again. so it's the safest thing. we have a 3-year-old daughter and don't want to mess around with the storm and especially something this size. >> bill: you are doing the right thing. i mapped doria, 100 miles inland and i take it there are three of

you that have gone there. >> my wife, our daughter, and then we have obviously our in-laws. my father and mother-in-law. they have a big farm. we're here and safe with hundreds of animals and we're safe and high and dry. so we're real excited to be safe. we're not excited about what is happening in st. pete now. still so much debris all over the streets in st. pete and it is going to be an absolute devastation. there is so much stuff in st. pete that hasn't been cleaned up and it will hurt marine life and the entire area. >> bill: did you get lucky with helene? what kind of damage did your home take? >> we got really lucky. we're fortunate enough and live on the water in st. pete and the water came up to our front door.

we're one of the higher houses in the neighborhood but i think there are ten other houses in the neighborhood that did not get water in the house. not water in their houses but every other house in the neighborhood was damaged. almost total. really, really not good for the neighborhood and this is just kind of -- it is just bad because we are all in it together but we're all trying to help each other fix our homes that were just destroyed and there is debris all over our front yards that will be projectiles now. >> bill: i don't know when you made the decision to clear out. 48 hours ago when the national hurricane center upped the intensity of this storm as it sped off the yucatan peninsula in mexico and it shocked a lot of people. was that the moment you decided to pack up? >> yeah. my wife and daughter, they

decided to leave two days ago when it started happening. i left yesterday and i stayed behind. i gathered all our possessions and passports, all our memorabilia from our travels, our artwork, anything that had any type of monetary value, i brought over to high ground. i brought it here. and we're just trying to save as much as we possibly can. we know there will be some type of wreckage and damage. it will be devastating for the entire area. >> bill: good luck to you. i think that last answer was so smart. go back in your home for one last time. what do you take? you took the pictures. they mean the most to you. my best to you and your family and your home that you have now abandoned. thanks, elliott. >> thank you so much. appreciate it. >> bill: back to dana in new york. >> dana: florida bracing for another destructive storm just

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>> harris: we're expecting any moment now the national hurricane center to give us an update on hurricane milton. we're all over that. widespread flooding catastrophic damage on the way, we're told it could look like katrina. plus evangelicals make up more than 20% of voters and both presidential candidates are fighting for their support. critics also are going after the white house, this time for labeling questions that we have as misinformation. they were all over us. the journalists, the citizens, everybody. florida lieutenant governor,

kellyanne conway and my special round table of evangelical leaders next. >> still a major very strong hurricane. it is currently a category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 155 miles-per-hour, that is just a whisker shy of a category 5. and while there is the hope that it will weaken more before landfall, there is high confidence that this hurricane is going to pack a major, major punch. >> bill: the governor would know. he has attended so many of those during his time in florida and speaking a short time ago about the prep and numbers and encouraging people to get out while you can. that window is closing quickly. also the national hurricane center is minutes away to give us the latest updates. the coordinates on milton. the storm changed overnight.

still moving fast but we'll get the numbers in minutes. first there is this. check it out. >> dana: floridians are racing to flee hurricane milton's but some can't get gas and stocking up on generators. the state is distributing the emergency supply. as of last night over 23% of pumps across the state have run completely dry. so that includes nearly 60% of stations in tampa, st. petersburg and 32% in gainesville and 35% in fort myers. so you think about all the things that people are going to go through in the next 24 hours, 48 hours or beyond, bill, and it is a lot and it seems -- i don't know what your conditions are there. i know you are 100 miles east but even you are getting pounded with some rain. >> bill: yeah, rain, rain but really overnight, all day

thursday will be the factor for us here. it comes in bands every 20 minutes or so. 20 years ago i can tell you florida was crisscrossed by three hurricanes, charlie, francis, jean all about 2 1/2 to three weeks apart. each one of them you remember as well. and they all came from the atlantic. this one is coming from the gulf. it is very rare when you get a storm of this size that moves west to east essentially. i know it's east/northeast. to take a direct shot at the west coast of florida. that's what they are dealing with and haven't seen anything like this coming off helene 13 days ago and now milton. and everybody is watching to see what milton makes its move. >> dana: good for our viewers to have you and the team across the region. everyone is doing an incredible job and we appreciate al