live where you live, this is abc 7 news. >> a hearing is underway to draw the voting districts in one south bay city to ensure fair representation for minority groups. the decision will have important implications for the mid term election in november. >> thank you for joining us. a judge is hearing arguments after siding with an asian american group that the voting districts violate state and federal law and discriminate against asian americans. matt keller is live at the courthouse in san jose. >> reporter: in this courthouse right now a lot at stake for the voters in the city of santa clara, how they vote this

november will change. this is video from inside the courtroom this morning. in june judge thomas gulet determined the voting system was inconsistent with state and federal voting rights acts. basically no districts in the city and everyone votes for all six seats on the council plus the mayor. a hearing started today for both sides to present plans for dividing the city up into districts. plaintiffs say the votes of asian americans have been diluted. they want seven districts. they say there hasn't been an asian american voted into the council in the city's history. >> the point is that the voting group of asian americans need to be heard and need a seat at the table. >> reporter: attorneys representing the city of santa clara presenting three proposals to the judge. two are for two districts. the third proposal would break up the city into six districts.

they say doing too much into a short amount of time could lead to errors and unintended consequen consequences. matt keller, abc 7 news. happening now, pg&e is unveiling dozens of new weather stations to keep you safe from wild fires. it is part of the utility's community wildfire safety program launched after the north bay wild fires to try to prevent a repeat. the stations help track temperature, wind speed and humidity levels. the goal is for crews to be able to respond more quickly. pg&e says it has added 50 new stations this year and expects to have about 200 total by the end of the year. help for families left homeless by the wild fires, a new rental assistant center opens today providing families with financial assistance like rental deposits and helping to find places to live. there are certain requirements and an application process. you can find more information at the center.

it opens at 557 west college avenue in santa rosa. in a rare move president trump is in damage control mode working to clarify comments made during his summit with russian president vladimir putin. president trump walked back on comments that appeared to side on putin discounting intelligence that says russia medalled in the election. >> reporter: this morning new details about president trump's russia reversal. >> i have a full faith intelligence agency. they just turned off the lights. >> after that interesting moment sources shedding light on what led the president to back track on his answer in helsinki about russia election meddling. >> i have president putin who said it is not russia. i don't see any reason why it would be.

>> reporter: trump said he misspoke. >> i said the word would instead of wouldn't. i don't see any reason why it wouldn't be russia. >> reporter: abc news learned the president came up with the clarification after bipartisan condemnation after he appeared to side with vladimir putin. >> the russians need to know there are a lot of us who fully understand what happened in 2016. >> reporter: on the trump walkback. >> i don't accept the president's comments today. if he wanted to make those comments he should have had the strength to make them in front of vladimir putin. >> reporter: the attempted cleanup muddied more when trump says he accepts russia interfered but others may be to blame. >> could be other people also. there are a lot of people out there. there was no collusion at all. >> reporter: democrats are fired up more than ever demanding top trump officials and the u.s. translator testify in front of

congress about what was discussed. new at 11:00, this is video of president trump and the first lady heading to joint base andrews about an hour ago. they are paying their respects to the secret service agent who died during the president's overseas trip. he suffered a stroke monday in scotland. the president said prayers to the agents wife and two young children. six uc berkeley police officers are expected to fight back after being fired for lying about what they did during midnight shifts. our media partner says the officers would radio in that they were checking buildings on campus. instead they are accused of sleeping and hanging out at a library. the officers had been on paid suspension since late october. they were terminated yesterday thmpt officers are expected to take their cases to arbitration. east palopgo

relieve the housingthci c ave t parking program hoping to team up to open up a city-owned lot and allow rvs to park safely. those involved admit the one year pilot program has its challenges. >> i want to assign case managers to each of the families so someone can help navigate them to the role of self-sufficien self-sufficiencies. >> there have been concerns about the potential impacts of this program. >> those concerns include security and sanitation. organizers say mobile hygiene units will be available once the site opens in november. the area will only accommodate about 20 rvs. two firefighters have been injured fighting an out of control wildfire. the firefighters were injured last night. the cal fire just made the announcement this morning. the ferguson fire west of the park has burned more than 17,000

acres since it started friday night. no structures have been damaged but flames are burning close to four evacuated communities. highway 140 into yosemite is closed. officials warn visitors to not exert themselves because of all of the smoke the fire is producing. san francisco bulliesbullies francisco police want to find two men who robbed neighbors. ten minutes into the robbery the gunman heard his neighbor come home. that is when they tired her up, too. >> ran down and grabbed her at the gate and dragged her up in my apartment and duct taped her feet and hands and mouth and said tell us where any valuables are in the house or we are going to shoot her. >> the robbers stole the man's wallet, car keys, phone and

watches before they ran off. the two victims were not seriously hurt. the supreme court will discuss a proposal to split california into three states. prop nine qualified for the november ballot. opponents sued arguing the proposal abolishes the state constitution which cannot be done in a ballot initiative. happening now a stretch of highway 1 closed for 14 months is open again allowing access down the central coast. heavy rains caused mudslide that buried the roadway. cal trans says it was the biggest debris slide in its history. repairs cost $54 million. cal trans says there is still more work to be done and drivers could encounter traffic delays. a pilot program to discourage people from urinating inside b.a.r.t. elevators is going so well officials say they are extending it.

you can expect to see elevator attendance through next year. you may remember they joined forces earlier this year after complaints from customers at the civic center. the elevator attendant pilot program was supposed to last six months but now has been extended through november 2019. the 2018 espy awards tonight. aly raisman is among a group of brave women being recognized. they will be honored with the arthur ash courage award for coming forward with larry nassar's sexual abuse. about 140 female gymnasts will take the stage with raisman who led the charge against the team doctor. >> i know for myself when i speak i do the best that i can to speak on behalf of people that don't feel heard because i think everyone deserves to be heard.

it doesn't matter if you are an olympic athlete or an actress in hollywood. we are all human and all deserve to be heard. >> nassar was sentenced to 40 to 145 years in prison back in january. sports director larry beil will be there before and after the show. you can catch live reports on abc 7 news at 4:00, 5:00 and 6:00. the e.u. just slapped google with a massive fine. the action regulators are accusing the company of doing resulting in a $5 billion penalty. and the rescued teenagers are back in their respective homes. a look at their debut shortly after being released. a foggy start to our wednesday morning. sunshine prevailing and we have spots exceeding 80 degrees

new this morning google is facing a $5 billion fine. e.u. regulators say it is from breaking antitrust laws. google is accused of taking advantage of its android dominance to promote apps and services like google search. we all watched the heroic rescue of the 12 thai boys and their coach who were trapped for up to 18 days underground. now for the first time those boys are sfepeaking with the m a

media. we have more on the soccer team's debut. >> reporter: it's the moment the entire world has been waiting to see, those 12 boys and their soccer coach trapped in a cave in thailand for more than two weeks now out of the hospital for the first time, walking, talking, even kicking around a soccer ball. >> so this was a miracle moment. >> reporter: one by one they introduced themselves. themselvh >>. [ speaking non-english ] >> reporter: doctors say the boys are in great shape. each has gained roughly six pounds back. >> yes, i am okay. >> reporter: the only one of the group who speaks english talks about how he communicated with the british divers uttering this now famous phrase. they spoke for the first time about how they made the difficult decision on who would leave the cave first revealing

they simply asked for volunteers. up on stage standing along side the three navy s.e.a.l.s who led the rescue effort the doctor who stayed with the team underground for nine days. and the boys also take a moment to honor the navy s.e.a.l. who died trying to find them. >> i want to say i'm thankful to you and your family members. >> reporter: they will be ordained as monks to honor his legacy. their main concern are for the boys minds. they are taking things slowly and questions were filtered from the doctors. the hospital says they will keep monitoring them for quite some time. abc news, new york. tesla's ceo is apologizing for calling a british diver involved in the thailand cave rescue a pedophile. musk addressed the issue saying he had spoken in anger on sunday. it started when a diver accused

musk and space x engineers by orchestrating a pr stunt. musk said the diver's criticism upset him but should not have branded the diver a pedophile. ford announced a new recall effecting more than a half > a incceather onwn. y willehe e

now your accuweather forecast with drew tuma. >> and we are seeing cloud cover

decrease on our way to a beautiful afternoon, but it will be rather hot in a lot of spots away from the coast. live doppler 7 we will take you through the past three to four hours. you can see the gray contour. that was cloud cover early on. you can see it has really compressed and moved back to the coast line. earlier this morning visibility was an issue. we had areas down to less than a mile but were good to go. visibility is increasing. we will take you outside golden gate bridge camera showing you low clouds. exploreatorium camera showing you the bay is getting soaked in sun. inland we had sunshine from the get go this morning. look at numbers right now. walnut creek at 85 degrees. 83 in 82 that current number in dublin. warmest spots are well into the 80s even before lunch time. right now we are at 59 in san

francisco with the cloud cover limiting or warming early on. 72 in santa rosa. clear lake at 96. on our way to triple digits at clear lake. highs later on this afternoon will be a warm day in the south bay. a lot of sunshine will get us to 93. 87 for san jose. santa clara up to about 85 later on this afternoon. peninsula looking bright and beautiful. 82 for red wood city. a little bit cloudier on the coast line and cooler, the breeze kicking in half man bay. seeing sunshine in downtown san francisco at this hour. we will reach about 71 later on this afternoon. the clouds will be stubborn around daly city. it will be breezy. temperatures about mid 60s later on today. we will be warm. 90 in santa rosa. 88 in sonoma. there is lake port up to 103 later on today. the east bay a lot of 70s to low 80s. 77 in oakland. 79 in castro valley.

inland hot spots. 99 in brentwood. 97 the high in livermore. much of the state is baking. 107 later on today in fresno. 111 in reading. 102 in palm springs. today will be the warmest day all week. here is the accuweather s day forecast we have the cool coast but we are hot inland. take it easy out there in the upper 90s. by thursday into friday high clouds move in. we will see an increase in humidity. it will feel muggy to finish off the week. saturday and into sunday becomes cooler. sunday is less humid so the weekend looking fantastic. you can track warming temperatures inland. they are heating up really quickly. >> feels so summer like. ford is recalling almost 550,000 cars and suvs because the vehicles could roll away

unexpectedly. the recall effects 2013-2016 fusions and 2013-2014 escapes built in flat rock michigan. ford says there is a problem with a gearshift. even though the shift indicator says automatic transmission is in park it might not actually be. stay with us because a stunt is caught on camera. find out how many water melons this man sliced on his stock marketic in just 60 seconds.

with pg&e in the sierras. and i'm an arborist since the onset of the drought, more than 129 million trees have died in california. pg&e prunes and removes over a million trees every year to ensure that hazardous trees can't impact power lines. and since the onset of the drought we've doubled our efforts. i grew up in the forests out in this area and honestly it's heartbreaking to see all these trees dying. what guides me is ensuring that the public is going to be safer and that these forests can be sustained and enjoyed by the community in the future.

a reminder we are on 24/7 on the app. today we posted a super cute story about how starbucks saved the day after a senior photo session got rained out. be sure to download the abc 7 news app to get breaking news alerts and tune in here on our next newscast, abc 7 news at 4:00. the man who holds more w in he set a new record for this, the most water half on his own stomach in one minute's

time. he sliced 26 watermelons six more than organizers said he needed to establish a new record that he invented himself. >> i am relieved that i didn't kill myself. i'm exhilarated because it not only is a skill for the record but something that i invented and now it is something that is out there and other people can challenge it. >> i'm not sure how many people want to challenge it. i'm good. i'm good just watching it. he says he has gone into -- guinness world record book more than 250 times. >> how does one come up with this idea? on your stomach, slice a watermel a wave a few seconds. i want to talk about the ry the

we'll coolffay all o us hebcoin whwas to be a millionaire is coming up next. have a great day.

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>> hey, it's just answering a bunch of questions in front of a nation of viewers with $1 million on the line. what's the big deal? come on, let's play "who wants to be a millionaire." [cheers and applause] [dramatic music] ♪ hey, everybody, welcome to "millionaire." you guys ready to go today? [cheers and applause] i hope so 'cause we're in the middle of a good game with a good contestant. from los angeles, california, let's welcome back muffy marracco. >> thank you. [laughs] [cheers and applause] >> just 5 questions in, but you scorched right through 'em. you already got to that threshold of $5,000. you're still 9 away from that $1 million, but we're closing in. all the lifelines are available today. are you ready to get back to your game? >> oh, yes. >> all right, let's make some more money. >> let's. >> it's nice when you have $5,000 in your pocket already. >> yeah, i-i--well, yes. >> it'll be there soon. >> okay. [laughs] >> but we can do better