in the region. >> does isis have the ability to shoot down an airliner? >> it's unlikely, but i wouldn't rule it out. mr. fix-it. jeb bush tries to restart his campaign with a promise to supporters. >> i'm running this campaign on my own terms and let me tell you something. when the dust clears, and the delegates are counted, we're going to win this campaign. coming up, we'll talk to a top advisor to ben carson, the republican front-runner. and assassination plots. nbc's richard engel speaks to the brother of a man beheaded by isis which threatens more killing in the middle of the interview. >> translator: the message says we called him to break your hearts. >> reporter: he admits it. he says i did it and we're coming for you. >> translator: yes. he said just wait, your turn is coming in a matter of days.

good day. i'm andrea mitchell in washington. russian officials have not yet identified the cause of saturday's metrojet plane crash in egypt that killed all 224 people on board, almost all russians including a number of children. airline officials said today an external impact is the only probable cause of the crash. they're trying to rule out technical flaws or human error. nbc chief global correspondent joins me from cairo. it's understandable this airline would try to rule out anything that would imply or suggest any problem that they could have prevented, but what do we know so far? >> reporter: well, it's a very good question, because separating what we know from what we don't know is absolutely crucial. at the moment we know that the plane fell apart in midair and

we know there was no distress call from the pilot, so it was a sudden and catastrophic plunge to earth. beyond that, there's not a great deal that we know, but we have got the two black boxes that were being worked on by russian and egyptian officials here today. we understand they have downloaded the data but haven't yet analyzed. so that's what we know. what we don't know is, well, everything else basically. as you say, metrojet is an airline with a great deal at stake. their statement was really, it was both, well, it was quite vague in one respect. what they are trying to do is say that there was no human error and there were no technical faults with their aircraft. what they said was there was some kind of mechanical impact which caused this crash. they even used the word external at one point. now, the russian officials very quickly slapped down the airline and said that is simply not

based on the facts and it's premature. but here is an airline with a questionable safety record desperately trying to defend itself. i think the one other thing that we do know is regarding this plane. we know that 14 years ago in november 2001, it was landing here at cairo and the nose was up and the tail was down and the tail hit the runway. it caused substantial damage. now, that was repaired and it was 14 years ago and it's been inspected regularly since. but on two other occasions, planes which have had tail damage and in one case, it was 22 years earlier, have mysteriously split apart in midair, killing all those on board. so that we know there is a link between the tail damage to a plane and many, many years later, the catastrophic breakup of that plane in midair.

so this is another fact that we can cling to amid all the theories and uncertainty. andrea? >> bill, let me share with all of our viewers what james clapper, the head of the director of national intelligence, had to say at a defense briefing today, because isil or isis is in that area, affiliates of isis, isis did make a claim, we don't believe that they have the ability to shoot down an airliner at 31,000 feet. they do have shoulder-armed missiles but not anything that could reach that range. here's what happened when clapper was asked about this today. >> we don't have any direct evidence of any terrorist involvement yet. isil had in a tweet claimed responsibility for it and there is a very aggressive isil chapter in the sinai, but we really don't know and i think

once the black boxes have been analyzed, which they have recovered, then perhaps we will know more. >> so bill, what he's not ruling out and i did follow up with officials there, they're not ruling out some kind of terror involvement, not necessarily a shoot-down but something that could have happened on board the plane but they want to be careful until they see what's in the black boxes. >> reporter: exactly. for once, the u.s. and the kremlin are speaking with one voice because the kremlin said exactly the same thing. you cannot rule out terrorism, unlikely that a missile would have taken the plane down because as you say, the people who are operating in that area clearly don't have the kind of machinery like a buk that you can shoot a plane down from the sky but that doesn't mean a bomb couldn't have been put on board the plane at sharm el-sheikh.

russian investigators are all over that airport interviewing baggage handlers, baggage loaders, to see if there was anything untoward there. at the minute, the wreckage tells its own story. people who have seen the wreckage say there is no immediate evidence of any kind of explosion. as you say, the black boxes will be the definitive proof. >> bill neely on this terrible tragedy, thank you very much. for more, i am joined by jay rollins, retired american airlines captain. thanks for being with us. this is obviously a mystery and the black boxes will, we hope, be more definitive, but how unusual is it for a plane to blow up this way, to break apart in midair at 31,000 feet? this is not while climbing, this is not while landing, which are the two most dangerous times in an airline's flight. >> well, it's definitely an unusual occurrence but not unheard of. just pressurizing the aircraft

and then depressurizing as it descends, that's considered a cycle and that puts stress on the skin and other parts of the aircraft so that it's susceptible over a long period of time, older aircraft that they can have sudden failure of structure. there are any number of things that could have caused this, like they said, there could have been a device planted aboard. there may have been some sort of external attack. there are so many things out there and then on the other side, you have so many reasons that the various players don't want the finger pointed at them. so we are left with a dilemma waiting for those black boxes. >> how much can we trust the analysis of the black boxes given the stake of all the players involved? >> that's very insightful. i'm actually starting to get a little bit of a creepy feeling that this could be like the malaysian 17 shoot-down where there's a lot of cover.

the malaysian plane that went missing, the same thing. the various players don't really want to come forward and be transparent. it makes it all the harder for people like us who are just distant observers trying to make sense of it. you end up with conflicting stories and conflicting statements like the one from the airline that are intended to affect our judgment but really, what we're looking for is raw data and then we can look at it and analyze it for ourselves. >> the american investigators are considered really the best in the business. they and others in europe as well. but no one's asking for our help in this case. >> i found that interesting as well, and as far as i know, i don't think the french are involved. so it's really between the russians, the egyptians. you know, the egyptians years ago had a crash with a co-pilot and they never did admit that the co-pilot brought it down. so everybody has a reason to say

oh, no, not me, it's somebody else. >> jay rollins, thanks so much. this is a real mystery. lot of foreign intrigue as well. thanks for being with us today. the president's decision to send up to 50 special forces into syria against isis, will it make a difference? is it too little? is it too much? i'm joined by senator ben cardin, ranking democrat on the foreign relations committee. thanks for being with us. >> good to be with you. >> your initial reaction to what the white house ultimately called just a change of tactic, not a change of strategy but which others are saying is definitely not just an adjustment? >> i'm very concerned about this. look, we all want to do everything we can to stop isil, to degrade it, to destroy it, but we have got to be very careful about ground troops in syria. there are two concerns we have in syria. one is isil, one is the aad regime. some players are playing both sides and it's very difficult

for us to differentiate that mission with ground troops. i'm very concerned about the interjection of american troops. >> some have suggested there already have been quote, boots on the ground and that there have been special ops already, and that we have had people in but not as effectively calling in air support. >> well, there's no question that we have used our military in syria against isil. we know that. when you have your airplanes flying, there is going to be some logistics that are going to put americans at risk. we always run the risk of a pilot being shot down. there are always risks of having the need to rescue, et cetera. we under stand that. but my concern, this is a deliberative effort to interject american troops on the ground. i understand they are special forces. i understand they are doing special missions. i understand they are aimed at isil, not the assad regime, but it seems to me, it is difficult to differentiate at times who we

are fighting in syria. >> now, on the other piece of this, which also took place on friday, coincidentally or not, was diplomacy. another attempt by john kerry but this time, with iran and russia at the table, to try to get some kind of political solution to this civil war going. what is your reaction to including iran in these negotiations? >> well, clearly there's no military solution for the united states in syria. we need a negotiated settlement. the negotiated settlement must involve president assad leaving office. he has lost all credibility. the sooner, the better. he needs to be held accountable for his war crimes. the fact that iran is engaged in these discussions, russia is engaged in these discussions, we have different final objectives but i think we all want to see a negotiated settlement, so look, the proof will be in the pudding. we will see what comes out of this. we can always talk with other sides but let's make sure that

we don't lose sight of what we are trying to achieve and that is a government in syria that represents all of its people, that can defend itself against extremists such as isil. that's what we're looking for. it's got to be a government without assad. the people of syria need to make their own decisions. iran cannot interfere. russia cannot interfere. it's got to be an independent state. >> although kerry seemed to be acknowledging that assad will play a role longer than we had previously said so these negotiations seem predicated on assad being part of an interim government, plus you've got iran grabbing an american dual citizen, we now learn, a fourth iranian american who is a businessman based in dubai who is now under arrest in iran. >> well, first, in regards to president assad, there can be no diplomatic solution where president assad remains in power. we understand there will be a

transition. we understand there may be a period of time of uncertainty as to who the new leaders of syria will be. but ultimately, assad must be part of the plan that he leaves. i believe he needs to be held accountable for his war crimes. yes, we have other issues with iran. there's no question about it. many of us have said there's many nefarious actions that iran does on terrorism, supporting terrorism, human rights violations, detaining people that should not be detained. all that are areas that we need to be aggressive, not just u.s. action but working with our international coalition to make sure we won't tolerate that type of action by iran. >> senator ben cardin, thank you very much for being with us today. >> thank you. >> good to see you. up next, we will talk to one of the top advisors to the front-runner in the republican race right now. ugh! heartburn! no one burns on my watch! try alka-seltzer heartburn reliefchews. they work fast and don't taste chalky.

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i'm just going to say i think the rnc has some cleaning up to do. i think they're in the process of doing that and i expect them to be a very valuable partner going forward. >> do you think chairman priebus needs to go? >> i think chairman priebus is demonstrating he understands the distress that all the candidates are feeling and that he's willing to work with us in order to alleviate the situation. >> the republican presidential candidates, ben carson there, using their frustration over the primary debate process to try to wrestle control over the negotiations back from the republican national committee which has been doing it this year for the first time. the draft letter composed last night obtained by nbc news details some of the campaign's demands including both opening and closing statements, equal time or equal questions to the candidates and keeping the room temperature below 67 degrees.

these developments come after last week's widely criticized cnbc debate. the republican national committee has suspended next february's nbc news/telemundo debate. cnbc is a sister network to nbc news as is msnbc. well, so we get this whole flap over the debate. what were ben carson's main complaints going forward? what would he like to see as we see these negotiations that took place last night or i should basically say conversations that took place last night? >> dr. carson has been arguing for some time since the first and the second debate that the republican brand is being damaged. all of the candidates. the rudeness, there doesn't seem to be an order. he will always respect the guidelines. many in his organization argue

to his detriment, he will never cut somebody off. he will never go over the allotted time. he feels that's not his role. that's the moderators' role. you need to have more control over the process itself. he does feel that an opening statement of a minute is necessary to sort of establish the foundation for the debate and also, a closing statement. and then focus on if you are going to say at cnbc that you are going to focus on economic policy, then there should not be anything about gambling and gay marriage. if that's what it's going to be, at least tell them and stay with that script but to come with questions that really didn't have nothing to do with policy and blind-side any of the candidates is just unfair. it's unprofessional and it's unacceptable. >> jeb bush today is out with his mr. fix-it campaign and he's laid out a speech. do you think that he can restart, rebrand himself, or are we now facing a winnowing out of

this very large field? >> we are in the new season, andrea. many of the experts have never seen anything like this before. we have seen it early on on the democratic side also with mr. sanders and mrs. clinton, and we don't think it's anything that mr. bush is saying because he certainly has served this country well, his family, we have deep respect for them, but we are in a different season. so i think what people are going to finally figure out, it doesn't really matter what the establishment candidates say and what they do and the ads they run, the american people are just not in the mood for it. particularly the foundation of the republican base. because i think you and i would agree it does seem as though no matter what mr. trump and dr. carson says, they are almost bullet-proof. it doesn't affect them, their poll numbers go up and i think that's an indication of the angst the american people have at this upcoming election. >> there are new monmouth poll numbers out today which show

trump in the lead in new hampshire, ben carson behind at 16 points. so we still see trump doing very well in new hampshire. it's 26, 16, 13, marco rubio getting a bump. john kasich who has some strong institutional support in new hampshire with the sununu, former senator sununu and a couple others and ted cruz and jeb bush far behind in single digits. >> i think you will always see, you saw in a previous debate that mrs. fiorina did very well. she was outstanding. you know, many of these politicians are master salesmen. they are experts on eloquence and opine and say all the right things. these forums don't necessarily play to the strength of mr. trump and dr. carson, so the bar for them is quite different in these debates. in order for these candidates, the establishment candidates to get any kind of bump, they've just got to do outstanding off the charts in these debates.

that's not the bar for mr. trump and dr. carson. they can be mediocre. they could not even show up and say much. then look at what happened to mrs. fiorina two or three weeks later. she's gone back to the bottom rung of the pile. it could happen again with mr. rubio. they could rise from the debate but will it last? >> i noticed in watching abc yesterday with dr. carson that he is really picking up his game, if you will, on foreign policy. i want to play a little bit of that interview. >> reporter: what's your much bigger plan for syria? >> my much bigger plan involves, you know, putin and iran also. i mean, those are the forces that are propping up the assad regime. look where most of the refugees are, at the turkey/syrian border. we should establish a no-fly zone there and we should enforce it. we should be doing this in communication with putin to try to decrease the likelihood of

conflict in his own area of the world. the whole baltic basin. we need more than one or two armored brigades there to show some strength. we need to recognize that his fuel is oil. we need to do everything we can to develop our energy resources in an economical rate so that we keep the oil prices down, which keeps him in his little box. >> tell me if i'm wrong, i think that when dr. carson began this campaign, as unlikely as it seemed at the time, that he didn't expect to be where he is today and that he's now beginning to take himself seriously as the front-runner. >> that's a fair observation. dr. carson realizes that any time that you're in that rarefied space of front-runner or top tier candidate, it's not just enough to tell your life story. you've got to get into the details of the substance of the issues because you know, there

have been candidates that -- who would ridicule him that he doesn't really understand taxes, he doesn't really understand foreign policy, and between you and i and the flag pole and everybody else listening, that's the last thing that you can say to him. he surrounded himself with the experts with the depth of foreign policy and economics and the economy and he's found himself back in school and he's talking, he's listening, he's learning, and you begin to see it play out in that interview yesterday. you will see more of it that he's at a stage in this election cycle where he has to put serious meat on the bone for people to really say wow, he knows what he's talking about, he's substantive. it's not just his personal story which we find remarkable but can he lead, does he understand the issues, can he gather and understand the information and process it in a way where the american people will continue to trust him. i think given what we saw yesterday, it's just the beginning of what's to come. >> armstrong williams, thank you very much. thanks for being with us.

this friday at 8:00, rachel maddow will host a forum in south carolina with the democratic candidates running for president. we will have special coverage right here on msnbc. for the first time in 30 years, the royals take the crown. >> the royals 2015 world champions! >> the come-back kings of kansas city are now the world series champions. after another stunning extra inning rally against the new york mets last night to take the series four games to one. mets starting pitcher matt harvey dominated, shutting out the royals until he talked his way into returning to the mound for the ninth inning. controversial decision by collins which led to the royals tying it up and sending the crucial game into extra innings. then in the twelfth inning, one morally and the royals shot ahead to beat the mets 7-2. a humiliating defeat for all of us former new yorkers. kansas city will celebrate their

second ever world series win, the first since 1985, with a parade tomorrow. the mets won't get their next shot against the royals until next spring when they are paired for a rematch on opening day as the team tweeted today, royals, congrat os a well deserved world series championship. guess it's only fitting we will start 2016 together. see you opening day. surprise!!!!! we heard you got a job as a developer! its official, i work for ge!! what? wow... yeah! okay...

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ship apache has a remotely operated vehicle that they are going to be placing into the water and then sending down three miles. understand, this is even deeper than the "titanic." they are going to take that rov down first of all to try to confirm that indeed this is el faro. then they are going to see as you know many of the crew members are still missing, only one body was recovered, to see if they can find any of the crew members to recover those bodies for their loved ones. most of them in jacksonville, florida, who would like to have some type of closure and then they are going to try to use the arms on the rov to remove a black box, as it were. the same sort of thing that see on airplanes or ships and these voyage recorders gather very important data not only about the heading and the speed, but also what may have been going on with the vessel, its engines, why it began to list and if it

did list and that's what caused the problems. all of this including the audio recordings of the captain speaking to folks both on the two-way radio as well as the on-board ship communications system, could all lead to an answer as to how it was el faro found itself in the position it was in and how it ended up going down. as we know, it was a category 5 hurricane, 120 plus mile an hour winds but more incredibly, waves that exceeded 50 feet. andrea? >> thank you very much. even as he fights cancer, former president jimmy carter is still doing the work he loves. 91 years old and he's in memphis, tennessee today, building homes with habitat for humanity. carter revealed in august he is undergoing radiation treatments for cancer which has spread to his brain. today he said he feels fine. >> i've had four treatments so far, once every three weeks. i continue with those treatments, but it will be a little while before we know what

the results have been. we haven't cut back on my schedule yet. i know it's going to come, particularly if my cancer progresses but we don't yet know what the result will be from the treatments. >> on a personal note, suzanne wright, who with bob wright is the co-founder of autism speaks and has devoted herself to helping millions of families, bringing awareness to a new level by lighting up landmarks blue, she wants her friends to know that she has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. we are with suzanne in this fight and our thoughts are with her and bob and the entire extended wright family.

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interviewed last year by richard engel when a ransom had already been placed on his head. >> reporter: by the time the emergency services showed up in an apartment building in the turkish city this weekend, all they could do was carry out the bodies of two young syrian men, farris and ibrahim, both members of a group of activists who risked their lives to tell the world what's going on in their hometown of raqqa, the isis capital in syria. both men were beheaded. we knew one of the victims. ibrahim. we interviewed him in turkey almost a year ago and asked him about the threats on his life. he didn't flinch. of course there is danger, but we are the sons of our country, he said. if we don't show the crimes of isis to the whole world, who will? ibrahim was proud of his work with a group of citizen journalists which calls itself raqqa is being slaughtered silently. they secretly film and smuggle out videos designed to embarrass isis like this one showing bread

lines in raqqa contrary to isis' claims that the so-called islamic state is prosperous and thriving. we asked him if he was afraid. they have put a ransom on my head, he told us, for anyone who kills me. we told him we hoped he would stay safe. i'm taking precautions, he told us. i rarely leave my apartment. so how did isis manage to reach and brutally murder ibrahim? stabbing him nearly 50 times? today for the first time, we learned the answer from ibrahim's brother, akmed who said it started about six weeks ago when an old family friend rented an apartment next door. he came in a smart way. ibrahim was a good guy, welcoming, so he knew he could get to him. this is that man who unexpectedly moved in next door. he claimed to be an isis defector and befriended ibrahim and the other murdered activist. here they are together. both activists were killed in

the apartment. a turkish police source tells nbc news they have other evidence against him. akmed says he slipped back into syria to rejoin isis but hasn't kept quiet. as we were filming, akmed received a text message on his phone, he says from the killer. the message he just sent me said we killed ibrahim to break your hearts. he admits it. he says we did it and we're coming for you. yes, he said just wait, your turn is coming in a matter of days, he says. akmed showed me the window of the rented apartment across the alley. he says the windows were covered with cardboard and blankets right before the murders and invited over two suspected accomplices. if they think this will stop me, they are wrong. just the opposite. i'm more determined. we will keep going until we are finished with isis. this is a promise for ibrahim and all the victims of raqqa, he says. >> richard engel joins me now

from istanbul. richard, this is just horrific. how do they have the courage to keep fighting after what's happened in his own family? >> reporter: well, some of it's courage, some of it is determination and some is that uniquely human quality where you have gone so far and you are not sure if you are going to make it, but you can't go back. take akmed, for example, the brother of the victim, the brother of ibrahim. he told me that as he walks around the streets now, he's getting these threats that he's afraid he's going to be killed at any moment. he looks over his balcony and he thinks that isis are going to climb in and kill him. he was telling me, he was pointing out the rooftops where he thinks they could be coming to get him. his entire family spent last night in a tool shed effectively on the roof thinking that perhaps isis wouldn't know where it is. this is all happening in turkey,

mind you. he told me he's terrified and he's determined to keep going but also he doesn't have enough money to relocate. so he's doing the best he can and he doesn't see a better alternative if he stops. >> is there any sense that the decisions that were made by the administration last week are going to make any difference? now you've got a new majority in the turkish parliament, perhaps that gives the turkish leader some more power? i don't even know where to go with this. >> reporter: well, think of it this way. this is a nato country. and the air strikes against raqqa and other places are being launched from turkey, and now we have a situation where isis is operating inside turkey, actually not very far from those same nato air bases, so they can't be bombed here and they can operate with a great deal of

impuni impunity. this is the one place in the world where they know nato planes aren't going to come and get them and they have started to hunt down the people who are working to embarrass isis, media activists. there have been assassinations. if the u.s. is going to be successful sealing off that border and preventing isis from moving back and -- between these two countries and having a safe haven in parts of turkey, it will be essential. >> wow. plus the ankara bombing. thank you so much. that was an extraordinary report. thank you for being with us today. coming up, the reset button. jeb bush, a new message, new campaign trail.

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hey! how are you?g? where are we watching the game? you'll see. i think my boys have a shot this year. yeah, especially with this new offense we're running... i mean, our running back is a beast. once he hits the hole and breaks through the secondary, oh he's gone. and our linebackers and dbs dish out punishment, and never quit. ♪ you didn't expect this did you? no i didn't. the nissan altima. there's a fun side to every drive. nissan. innovation that excites. i believe america's best days are not behind us but squarely in front of us. if we elect the right

leadership. the answer isn't sending someone from one side of the capital city to the other. the challenges we face as a nation are too great to roll the dice on another presidential experiment. to trust the rhetoric of reform over a record of reform. >> jeb bush taking a veiled swipe at his opponent marco rubio and some of the other outside candidates during the first stop of a push through florida as bush tries to restart a struggling campaign. joining me for our daily fix, national political reporter robert costa and "wall street journal" political editor jean cummings. robert, first to you. as you look at these republicans and at jeb today, is this a good reset for him before he goes on a bus trip through new hampshire? >> governor bush is looking for some kind of lane moving forward and he sees he's falling behind in new hampshire and he needs to establish more support with those center right voters, those republican moderates, who are in new hampshire and want to give him a look but are already tempted by rubio. this is bush speaking to them.

>> speaking of speaking to them, you have got paul simon, the hedge fund billionaire in new york who was sought desperately by both rubio and bush and signed up with rubio. >> that was a very big development behind the scenes. mr. singer is a billionaire, he's got a lot of money that he wants to invest in politics. he's done it in the past. he was a big fish who was on the sidelines and both -- well, all sorts of candidates had appealed to him for him to side with marco sent a major signal to other big donors and there are lots of them who are still looking at the field and haven't engaged yet. >> robert, singer was someone that jeb's people had personally gone to in new york and tried to woo. have we seen any sign that other bush people are defecting for marco rubio or is this just the

first warning sign? >> within the republican establishment, you see there are two main camps, the bush loyalists and others. what rubio has found is he may not get the bush family people, the people who have been ambassadors for bush and bundlers for george w. bush, but there are other donors, paul singer types who are not as close with the bush family who could be leaning toward rubio if rubio pursues him in the right way. that's been the strategy behind the scenes for months. >> on the democratic side, we see the first ad that's going up tomorrow. bernie sanders going to spend some of that money, some $25 million that he's already got in the bank, will start spending some of it on ads. here's a look at the first bernie ad. >> people are sick and tired of establishment politics and they want real change. >> bernie sanders. husband, father, grandfather.

an honest leader building a movement with you to give us a future to believe in. >> jean cummings, this is the sort of soft and fuzzy approach to bernie sanders which according to all reporting on the campaign trail, he's not. he's not really a people person. he's great with big audiences and has a huge following among millenials but this is an attempt, tad devine and the other smart guys around him -- >> trying to round out his image. yes. absolutely. he is not on capitol hill, he's never been known as being a really warm and fuzzy personality. he's a little rough around the edges but he's very policy oriented and you know, those things that are important to him, he will fight very hard for. so -- but they do realize that to expand his support, they've got to finish out the picture of who he is and he also is doing new kinds of events. he's not just doing the big

rallies now. he is doing some of the smaller meet and greets and taking questions from voters. so it's both image and tactics that they are now introducing new elements of. >> and robert, they even tweeted out a picture of him trick or treating in lebanon, new hampshire, with his grandchildren. there's much more of the family and the man around the policy wonk. >> this is a different time for the sanders campaign. remember, he started the year going around the country to liberal hot spots and drawing huge arena crowds. he's really focused at the moment on new hampshire and iowa. he sees secretary clinton, her strength in the polls and this is a folk, a concentration on those voters and introducing himself to new hampshire and iowa residents. >> thank you both so much. sad note. former senator, actor and presidential candidate briefly, fred thompson, has died in nashville, tennessee. after a recurrence of lymphoma he had been battling for years.

thompson first became famous as the republican counsel for the watergate investigation. he later spent much of his life moving back and forth between politics and a very successful career as a television and movie actor. most famously as d.a. arthur branch on "law and order." thompson served nearly a decade as a senator from tennessee and ran unsuccessfully for president. he was only 73 years old. our thoughts are with his family. ♪

♪ [ girl ] my mom, she makes underwater fans that are powered by the moon. ♪ [ birds squawking ] my mom makes airplane engines that can talk. [ birds squawking ] ♪ my mom makes hospitals you can hold in your hand. ♪ my mom can print amazing things right from her computer. [ whirring ] [ train whistle blows ] my mom makes trains that are friends with trees. [ train whistle blows ] ♪ my mom works at ge. ♪

which political story will make headlines in the next 24 hours? nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker joins me. i think it will be the president going to new jersey. we have lester holt interviewing him today. >> reporter: that's right. lester will do a two-part interview with president obama. the focus today for the president, he's going to be

visiting a treatment facility in newark, new jersey as well as holding a roundtable at rutgers university and his goal is to highlight ways to get ex-offenders back on their feet and back to work. so here are a few of the announcements today. he's going to announce an $8 million grant that will go toward educating ex-offenders as well as providing them with tech and job training. he is also announcing a presidential order that essentially bans the box for would-be federal employees. that means if you are applying for a job with a federal agency, you would no longer have to fill out that box that says you have a criminal record, essentially delaying the time that a potential employer learns about an employee's criminal history. he is also going to press congress to pass legislation that would apply that ban the box to federal contractors and he's going to push congress to pass legislation that would lower mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent ex-offenders. now, actually, it's interesting, there is actually a fair amount

of bipartisan support for both pieces of legislation so there's measured optimism that will get passed. we have seen this president make criminal justice reform a key part of his policies here at the white house. he's held a number of events in recent weeks including a stop last week in chicago where he spoke with police officers about this. over the summer he became the first president to visit a federal prison. that was in oklahoma. we heard him speak very personal terms about the fact that in his words, he could be in the place of those prisoners if he hadn't had so many opportunities. he's really focused on giving ex-offenders opportunities so that they can get back on their feet. this is a key legacy issue for this president. you can expect him to continue to work on this once he leaves office. lester holt will be asking him about all of it later today. >> kristen welker, thank you so much. of course, tune in tonight to "nbc nightly news."

that does it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." tomorrow, the department of health and human services secretary. remember, follow the show online and on facebook and twitter. "msnbc live" with thomas roberts is here next. rice of 10. that's 5 extra gigs for the same price. so five more gigs for the same price? yea, allow me to demonstrate. you like that pretzel? yea. 50% more data for the same price. i like this metaphor. oh, it's even better with funnel cakes. but very sticky. get 15 gigs for the price of 10. and now get $300 credit for every line you switch. now at at&t every insurance policy has a number. but not every insurance company understands the life behind it. for those who've served and the families who've supported them, we offer our best service in return. ♪

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oppenheimerfunds believes that's the right way to invest... ...in this big, bold, beautiful world. hey! how are you?g? where are we watching the game? you'll see. i think my boys have a shot this year. yeah, especially with this new offense we're running... i mean, our running back is a beast. once he hits the hole and breaks through the secondary, oh he's gone. and our linebackers and dbs dish out punishment, and never quit. ♪ you didn't expect this did you? no i didn't. the nissan altima. there's a fun side to every drive. nissan. innovation that excites.

today on "msnbc live" mystery in the air. conflicting theories fly about what caused a russian passenger jet to break up midflight, killing all 224 people on board. we are live in cairo with the breakdown of what we know. plus, fast food danger. an e. coli scare forces chipotle to close down locations in two states. officials warning the number of cases could grow. details on that. happy monday to you. i'm thomas roberts. we start with dueling republican 2016 stories. jeb bush revamps his campaign while the candidates try to revamp the debate rules. first, bush at any moment in orlando, one of several florida stops today, trying to reinvigorate a run that suffered from gaffes and poorly received

debate performances. the new mantra, jeb can fix it. here he is a short time ago in tampa hitting back against his debate critics. >> as you may have heard, last week i was in colorado for the third republican debate. if you watched the debate, you probably came away thinking that the election's about sound bites or fantasy football or which candidate can interrupt the loudest. i'm here to tell you it is not. this election is not about a set of personalities. it's about a set of principles. >> msnbc political correspondent kasey hunt joins us from tampa. let's talk about jeb bush's attempt to readjust and improve quote, jeb can fix it. for instance, we understand he also got a new endorsement today. break it down for us. >> reporter: thomas, good afternoon. great to see you. jeb bush is starting here in tampa, started here in tampa, with a speech aimed at pushing that resetbu