. good morning and happy fourth of july live from msnbc world headquarters in new york. on this already very busy independence day, we are keeping an eye on the controversy touched off by the president headlining his own fourth of july spectacle with your tax dollars at least partially footing the bill. we have two breaking stories unfolding this morning. a congressman who is on this july 4th is declaring independence from the republican party he no longer recognize says and the controversial citizenship to the census. in just the last hour, axios is

reporting that the president is considering an executive order to get that question back on to the census. a potentially major escalation in a battle that looked like it was settled. on twitter the president is trying to brush off any problems, but there is a lot of confusion following his decision to contradict his own justice department, catching them completely off guard. let's do a run down of how this unfolded. on tuesday, following a series of court decisions that went against the administration, the justice department said it would remove the controversial question from the census, asking people if they are u.s. citizens. justice officials were backed up by wilbur ross on that. the very next day, yesterday, president trump did an about-face, tweeting that plans to add the question were absolutely moving forward. that pushed the justice department into a frantic search for a legally viable path to include the question. a path the president said is

being worked on even as we speak. geoff bennet is at the white house and the president is considering an executive order on the citizenship question. what more do we know about that? >> i have been making calls about that all morning. i'm told by a source familiar all options are on the table as it relates to this and one option would be the president taking executive action to get that census question on the census. this is the situation where the president is not taking no for an answer. remember last week when the supreme court blocked the administration from moving forward with this. it left the door open for the administration to try again, to make a more persuasive argument. the justices said they didn't buy the official argument that the citizenship question was about enforcing the voting rights act and enforce the voting rights of racial minorities and that was

contrived. the government lawyers ordered by the president's tweet to find another way. the clock is ticking. you have the federal judge wanting an answer from the government by tomorrow at 2:00 sk p.m. and as we understand it, they are being printed without the citizenship question. there is another important point to make, we are not talking about the census. we are talking about political power. the way that people are counted across this country directly relates to how billions of dollars are federal funding are distributed across this country. it directly relates to how congressional districts are drawn and how many members of congress each district gets. that is clearly part of the motivation as the administration tries to get the citizenship question on the census. if you count people based on whether or not they are u.s. citizens, roorth how many residents are in a given area,

that directly will change the overall count. >> and in key states that are important to the citizen. geoff bennet at the white house. u.s. navy veteran and house armed services committee, mikey cheryl of new jersey. columnist for theda daily beast and msnbc legal analyst, someone who knows the doj well and washington bureau chief for the texas tribune. i want to start with the fight we are seeing over the census and the possibility that the president would say okay, courts aside, i will use an executive order. >> i think it's concerning because we know how important the census is in new jersey. we just lost a congressional delegate member in the last census. we're a state with immigrant and urban populations.

it stands at risk of not being counted. this not only affects the billions, but the planning for social security and how are we going to make sure it remains solvent. planning for the future and where the money will go. i think any move to violate what the court has said and the enumeration clause is really important. >> you make a good point that this is so much broader as geoff said than the count and the implications are tremendous. you have the axios reporting about the action that all things are on the table . is that legal? >> i don't think so. it shouldn't be surprising though. the supreme court of the united states and the chief justice has written that what the government said to them was basically a lie. they used fancy words like pretext and condrive and all

these fancy legal words. they said the attorney general has lied to us and said they wanted to have the voting rights act and that's not what they were trying to do. you absolutely may not do it. the white house said we will do it anyway. forget the census. fundamentally, our system is based on when the supreme court said you can't do it, you cannot do it. >> i want you to put yourself of the justice department. they think this is settled. they went and the best argument was already made. the best argument what they thought has been rejected multiple times and if you head the back and forth, it sounds like the judge just about had it. they said can we have until monday. he said no, i want to know by tomorrow, friday.

>> the career lawyer thought it was settle and went on vacation and the judge called him back and said we have a problem because i readed tweet. the career lawyer said i don't know anything about this. i thought it was settle and asked the political guy that admits we have been instructed to find a new rational. think about that. they already have been told they lied in the last rational. who is going to listen to a new rational? nobody. the white house figured out that's not going to work and they have a new plan. recognize at 40,000 feet, they do not respect the checks and balances in our government. they don't respect it in the daca case and they don't admire mar bury versus madison. this is what they do. the attorney general unfortunately seems to be supporting this type of behavior. we know he believes in the unitary executive that said the president can do whatever he wants. it's gut check time for career

lawyers at the department of justice. they didn't go forward when the supreme court says no, they cannot say we will do it anyway. career lawyers are going to have to stand up and either resign or just have a press conference or say to the political people of justice, we are not a party to this. our system relies on checks and balances. the white house is not respecting it. this is a bigger problem than the census. >> let me go to this phone call between the judge and the special counsel for the justice department. this is that special counsel's words, jonathan. the tweet this morning was the first i heard of the president's position on this issue just like the plaintiffs. your honor, i do not have a deeper understanding of what that means at this juncture other than what the president tweeted. obviously as you can imagine i am doing my absolute best to figure out what's going on. >> it's now clear he doesn't have to figure out what's going on and make an argument on

friday before the court. they are changing gears and moving to what i think cynthia would agree is close to a constitutional crisis. >> i do. >> they're going to sign executive order and have that go back to the supreme court. there is some indication that the supreme court being conservative will side with the president's powers under article two of the constitution and say yes, an executive order trumps everything else. that's what they are betting on. what happens in the meantime, he messed with the census, which we had since 1790. he is basically trashing another constitutionally incorporated part of our system. president trump is assaulting our constitution on two fronts today. on separation of powers and on messing with our census. we are in for a very rough ride

in the next few weeks if he continues on this path. it is possible that the supreme court will back him up and the census will be delay and he will get his way. i don't think people should underestimate the will of these folks to wreck our constitution which is what they are in the process of doing. >> i want to get to a couple of breaking stories including the president just tweeting on justin amash and his decision leave the party. great news for one of the dumbest and most disloial men is leaving the party. knew he couldn't get the nomination to run again and already being challenged for his seat. a total loser. as a member of congress, what's your reaction to that? >> i probably disagree with just about every political belief representative amash has, but i have been impressed with his

independence and his deep desire to uphold the standards of our constitution. i have to agree with him. the political partisanship, the focus on fulfilling the needs of your independent party whether democrat or republican are all too often trumping the need of people in congress to serve their country. while i see it on both sides, you do see in this republican party very few people standing up when you hear issues that you know are contrary to our values. >> he inside his decision do this, because our politics is in a death spiral and partisanship has gotten so bad. what do you think? >> we have huge issues and i see why he is saying that. something that gives me hope is the freshman class in the democratic caucus. i don't think we were elected to do what our party says.

many of us come from districts where there is broad political beliefs on both sides of the aisle and all parts of the political spectrum. we were not sent to congress to fall in step. the people in our districts think they need new leadership and new voices in congress. >> let me get the big picture. you have a president who in a compressed period of time is going against probably advice that he is getting. certainly against the advice of his own pentagon about the effect that's going to happen tonight at the mall and bringing in military equipment. going against the advice of his justice department and they thought the whole thing on the census was settled. he decided he is going to go forward with this and not surprisingly going after amash, but doing it on the fourth of july, something heavily political. what's going with all of this?

>> the larger theme and the question is how do you make an executive branch tasked with executing or not executing laws do something that the executive does or doesn't want to do? it's an extraordinary moment. with regards to the parade and the fireworks and the fourth of july, one thing to remember what's different between this and a political rally and inauguration in tallahassee or somewhere like that, people want to be there to support the president. there are thousands of families who have been planning this vacation whether or not they liked president trump and may now be in a captive audience where they have to listen to the president. >> congresswoman, before we let you go, we want to ask you about this other question as a member of the military. you have strong feelings about this. that's about the decision by the president of the united states of something that was always nonpartisan and presidents did

not participate in the fourth of july. those events will continue as they were planned. there will be a concert and fireworks that are separate from this speech he is going to give. there have been a lot of ex-members of the military who said this is not the place. this is not the time or the place. by the way, bringing out a bunch of tanks is not how in the united states we honor our military. what's your thought about what's going tonight on the mall? >> there have been a lot of celebrations i have been a part of and seen in washington. we love the fireworks and the bands and the singers and it brings out the sense of who we all are as americans. thinking of our country breaking away from a machino lie monolit inspiring to me. i don't want to demean it. i hate to see it politicized and i hate that the president is taking our taxpayer dollars to

do what seems to amount to a political rally. i don't mind fly overs and i love airshows. i'm sorry to go against the grain, but it's intrinsic in being an aviator. that's exciting, but to think we are dividing out the country and trying to make this a political issue and trying to take the fourth of july and drag it down into the political washington is disheartening. >> we will talk a lot more about this. i know you have a busy day today. abby livingston, you will stay with us. coming up, we will have much more about the controversy of the july 4th celebrations. we will take you live after a quick break. joe biden versus kamala harris, part two. both 2020 hopefuls are in the crucial state of iowa and they are not alone.

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he misses the whole point about why we are the country we are. >> this business of diverting money and military assets to use as a kind of prop to prop up a presidential ego is not reflecting well on our country. >> for he's going to do a campaign event, then it should be paid for by his campaign contributions. it should not be paid for by the

american taxpayer. >> that's 2020 democrats on the trail and they are seizing on tonight's independence day spectacle, arguing what is supposed to be a celebration of america is a campaign rally, starring and produced by the president. the white house, pentagon and other agencies reportedly scrambling to pull it all off. the president said this is what he wanted. all that pageantry doesn't come cheap, featuring millions of dollars in military assets. 2.5 million from the park service, according to the "washington post." white house officials are worried there won't be a big enough crowd to keep the president happy. hans nichols is out on the national mall in washington. still so much we don't know about what will happen tonight. what do we know and what's up in the air? >> well, the president was able

to squeeze in golf this morning. that was a good idea because it feels like it's going to rain. i'm not going to play meteorologist, but when it's this humid this early, you can almost guarantee rain. that's an indication that the military assets at least up in the air could be actually grounded. here's what they have planned. they have all four service. they want to show force across the board. you have the navy, you have the marines and apache helicopters and f-22s and the bombers that do fly overs at football games and a static to play. tanks and abrams and fighting vehicles there on the lincoln memorial. they are still in prep work. they are trying to get everything set up. not a lot of crowd just idea. we have lines for the bathrooms there, but right behind me is the white house. up there is the truman balcony.

typically presidents stand up there and watch the fireworks. it bears noting that harry truman was the last president to address the country on independence day celebrations. chris? >> on the national mall for us, joining us to talk about this. abby livingston for the tribune. "the washington post" is reporting on the planning between the white house and the pentagon. i will quote here. the white house did not want defense officials to detail involvement oust deference to the desire to have surprises for the observers in the aerial show. the situation created a dynamic in which it appeared they were less organized than it really was, one of the defense officials said. what's going on? >> if you have been tracking pentagon reporters all week, they have been more frustrated

than usual for not providing details. this is basic stuff. what planes are going to be flying over and what units are tasked to be a part of this parade and how much is it going to cost? the pentagon said we have no idea and if we do, we can't tell you. the president wants an element of surprise. this is so unusual, so unheard of that it seems to have been frustrating for the pentagon to neal for the white house. they are saluting smart. >> what do we know about cost? the president suggested it doesn't cost anything. you already have the planes and all this equipment exists. basically what he tweeted all you have to pay for is the fuel. >> that's a myth. even with the fly overs. for years, when the nfl starts up and the super bowl, there is news reporting about the fly overs and how much they cost. the response is usually, the

association or whatever the group is, they pay back the fuel cost. really it takes hundreds of different people and assets to get these things in the air. there will be drones and satellites monitoring where the president is. some are coming from california. the pentagon is trying to work around it to say it will count towards training exercises and they'll get their flight hours. in no sense of the imagination is the cost just the fuel cost. there will be members of the military on the mall and at bases and at ready and all of the maintenance crews and you name it that go on with every one of the flights. >> in addition there were reports this morning that the president -- he automobile doesn't seem to know how much all of this is going to cost doesn't understand the logistics of it.

didn't have an understanding of what he was asking. a lot of this took place over the last couple of weeks. >> that's not enough time to pull this off. i engine it rains, he will offer that as an excuse for why nobody showed up. there lots and lots of people who are specifically not going to send a message that this is the wrong thing to do. dwight eisenhower was clear that this is america's holiday. it's not supposed to be for any individual. now it's become donald trump's high end barmitzvah. he seized control over something that belongs to all of us. it's not about him. he acts like he's living in a banana republic. he is backed up by banana republicans and it's another example of how he is wrenching our system away from its origins.

the founders would have hated this. we know this for sure. george washington bristled when someone tried to describe him as your excellency. when kim sent a letter to trump addressed as your excellency, trump loved it. the founders were very clear that people like julius caesar and oliver cromwell were what we were not supposed to be. on this most patriotic day, we have a president that acts in a very unamerican fashion. >> there is reporting that there is concern in the white house that the crowds won't be big enough and this is going to be sprayed from the concert and so on. they are worried more people will go to this traditional event rather than necessarily here at the president's. to the question of his speech, we know that he has been advised to keep this a political. what are you hearing? how concerned are republicans and the white house that he will

go off script and what was written for him and veer into political territory? >> when he has stayed on script and the attendance thing is everything people in washington are talking about. inauguration was 2.5 years ago and we are still talking about crowd size. this could backfire if the crowds don't show up and i could say i was at the rolling stones concert and mission jagger mentioned the attentions and the stadium erupted in boos. there is not a lot of enthusiasm for people who live in washington coming down for this. it will be interesting. >> i didn't hear anything you said after i was at the rolling stones concert. >> my ears are still ringing. >> a small price to pay. we want to let you know too that hillary clinton just tweeted about all of this. she said we need a strong national defense, but a

president shouldn't need it next to him in a parade to show his patriotism. the battle over bussing as joe biden tries to fend off a surge in the state of iowa. one week after biden's underwhelming debate performance. can he stop the bleeding? next. can he stop the bleeding next the best way to hit the beach? with neutrogena® beach defense® sunscreen. helioplex® powered, uva, uvb strong. beach strength protection for the whole family. for the best day in the sun. neutrogena®. your daily dashboard from fidelity. a visual snapshot of your investments. key portfolio events. all in one place. because when it's decision time... you need decision tech.

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no holiday today for the democratic presidential hopefuls spending this fourth of july out on the campaign trail. 11 of them crisscrossing the states of iowa and new hampshire. joe biden is getting ready to march in an independence day parade in iowa as he fights to get back on track after his shaky debate performance last week. let's go to the road warriors in iowa. mike, what is the campaign doing to try to turn the page? >> reporter: good morning from independence, iowa. where else to start the fourth of july. for joe biden and his campaign it's about getting back to basics. he had his first rally in waterloo where he was again tough on donald trump saying he can't stand the abuse of power

from the administration. we saw yesterday the biden campaign announcing the second quarter fund-raising total. $21.5 million. that puts him near the top of the democratic contenders and pointing out he joined in the middle of that quarter. if you average per day, he is ready of the contenders like pete buttigieg with $25 million at the top of the pack. joe biden loves nothing more than a parade. we will see him here at the independence day parade. nothing he likes more than doing that. that poor performance is following him here to iowa. we had a chance to ask the vice president about that performance for the first time. let's take a listen to what he to say. >> how do you feel after that performance and can you make a come back? >> no, look. it was a -- it's hard to respond in 30 seconds. >> thanks, guys. you going to prepare more

next time? >> no. i just have to -- we will see next time. >> you can see the vice president there choosing his words carefully what not to say in some respects. i don't think he liked that question. the vice president will be here in iowa doing what he loves best interacting with reporters. the parade he is marching in here includes beto o'rourke. you can hear them behind me. more vocal than biden. they will attend an iowa cubs game to end the day. >> thanks for that and kamala harris engaging in the debate over busing and integration and a lot of people responded to. what is she telling you? >> good morning, chris. kamala harris has been on the campaign trail in california over the weekend for fund-raisers in san francisco pride. yesterday she had two campaign events here in the greater des moines area and she talked to

reporters and subjected herself to questions, particularly following that debate in miami around the debate over busing and school integration. i had the chance to ask kamala harris yesterday. the campaign as pointed out, look at joe biden's record going back to the 70s on the issue. the concept of busing and segregation, an aconine concept. questions turn back on to kamala harris about her position on busing today. this was a little bit of the back and forth yesterday. >> just to clarify, you don't support federally mandated busing and for de facto? >> i believe any tool in the tool box should be considered by a school district. >> there is so much that joe biden and kamala harris has to answer around the question of integration today. she said segregation may be worse today than when she was a child and that's where the questions for both of the candidates if from here.

those are the questions they are looking at going forward. >> thanks to you as well as mike. joining me is strategist danielle mills and matt gorman. the ap put that comment in the debate and what you just heard. harris's comments were far from the indictment she delivered in the debate last week. how do you see this? is it a reversal and will it hurt her and do we need clarity? >> we're probably need a little bit of clarity, but she came out strongly against joe biden and his record. for people who have been following joe biden for the past 30 years, they need to understand the decisions he made and the ripple effect it caused. whether it's the crime bill or whether it's his anti-busing or uplifting segregationist anita hill.

there is a long record that needs to be looked at. what kamala harris did was put a magnifying glass that. biden is running for president and running from his record. >> we have seen biden's campaign pushing back against this on twitter, saying that this is not right. having said that, should he just drop it or can't they, given that harris got such glowing reviews when she said that little girl was me resonated so strongly? >> she took to national tv and catapulted into the top tier. in the long-term, she hurt herself in the possibly in the general election. not only on busing where she espouses the position that she criticized joe biden for, but on health care, she said she supported eliminating private insurance and waffled again the

day after. this is like the fifth position she had in health care. i saw a report keeped deep root and they said swing voters are following the democratic primary debates as closely as democratic voters themselves. gone are the days where you can say anything you want in the primary and put it to the general. everybody is watching and paying attention. >> let's go back to joe biden for a second. danielle, i want to get your reaction to the question mike asked. it almost seemed like he was trying to formulate an answer in his head. he had to know at some point that that question was going to be asked. were you surprised that he was not better prepared for that question? >> i was. i was taken aback. i was in the room in miami and i was surprised he seemed so under prepared for it. even the questions now, i can't respond to you in 30 seconds. that's kind of your job of being a politician on television.

you are able to give digestible information in small packages. i'm concerned. >> he was not asked about nuclear policy. it was just about his debate performance. >> how do you think you did? we can come out swinging next time. it's easy to respond, yet he is fumbling over the questions. for me it's concerning that joe biden while he is still ahead in the polls doesn't seem as intellectually nimble as he was before. his team needs to regroup before the second round of debates. >> he is ready in the polls and had a good fund-raising quarter and he got in late. he raised $21.5 million as mike pointed out. he is behind mayor pete buttigieg who brought in $25 million, but buttigieg is not gaining in the polls. you need to have both. do you see a way that somebody like a pete buttigieg has the financial wherewithal that most

people don't can use that money to gain in the polls? how do you see that going? >> he needs to use that money to build a robust organization, especially south carolina. he needs african-american voters. what he needs to do is take that $24 million which by the way, outraising a former vice president as runner up is staggering. absolutely staggering. one other point is during this time, president trump raised over $100 million and unlike the democrats, he is not going to spend it to win a primary. that's one of the advantage that is an incumbent has. we ran against president obama and he had the same advantage. that's an important thing to point out as well. >> i talked to the chairman after the numbers came out from the president and the rnc.

he said remember he won the race with almost no money and he starts out with $100 million. thanks to both of you and happy fourth. tonight on msnbc, you can catch a reairing of the presidential debates. night one and night two. the president's remarks will be carried live on nbc streaming service. nbc news now and our website, nbcnews.com. president trump has the new message for migrants being held in detention centers facing unsanitary and nightmarish conditions. unsanitary and nightmarish coitndions this is the couple who wanted to get away who used expedia to book the vacation rental that led to the ride ♪ which took them to the place where they discovered that sometimes a little down time can lift you right up.

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now to the growing outrage and concern over border detention facilities with a lack of food, water, and medical help including children. while president trump is sending a message to migrants saying if you don't like the conditions, don't come to the u.s. gabe gutierrez has the latest for us. harsh words from the president of the united states. >> reporter: hi, chris. good morning. president trump saying border patrol agents are not doctors or nurses and that migrants are living far better now than they did in their home countries. doctors here on this side of the border are warning of the deep psychological toll the crisis is

taking on children. this morning these drawings are painting a heart breaking picture. the american act of pediatrics said they came from 10 and 11-year-old kids after they were released from the custody of customs and border protection in texas. >> what are do the pictures tell you? >> it's horrible. i can guarantee in the next few years, the psychological effect it will take on these children is -- you can't even explain. >> dr. carlos gutierrez is a pediatrician who volunteered to treat children after they are released from custody. >> you don't believe children should be in detention centers at all? >> absolutely not. >> they said the border patrol is not doctors or nurses. the migrants are living better than now. if they are unhappy with the conditions, tell them not to come. with the lack of necessities like food, water, and clothing in some locations -- >> my goal is to dispel the

information out there. >> they posted this video showing a processing center in arizona stocked with supplies. >> we have supplies of our diapers, baby wipes, clothing for children marked by gender, age, clothing for men and women. >> acting homeland security secretary is launching an immediate investigation after a report highlighted disturbing and inexcusable social media activity that includes active border patrol personnel. according to pro publica, the facebook group included crude and sexist jokes that mocked migrants. >> we're don't know that our agents are officers. we certainly don't condone that. >> cory booker visited in mexico where thousands are waiting for applications to be processed.

>> this president is doing by executive order things that are hurting our country and saulth human dignity and human values. >> the president of the union here in el paso said his members are overworked and overwhelm and morale is very low. he and other officials are urging congress to set aside more money for the border. chris? >> when i saw that video, i thought we don't know how many people are there and it doesn't look like in any given category there is a lot of stuff s. that enough to deal with what those folks have to deal with on a daily basis. gabe gutierrez, thank you very much for the report. >> game on. the u.s. women's soccer team looking for a world cup victory this sunday when they face off against the netherlands. but not so fast. why the netherlands says don't overlook us. e netherlands says t overlook us. that verizon is supporting military families.

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...and brake too hard. with feedback to help you drive safer. giving you the power to actually lower your cost. unfortunately, it can't do anything about that. now that you know the truth... are you in good hands? the u.s. women's soccer team now knows who they will face in the world women's cup final after netherlands beat sweden in overtime in the semifinal match. so the match for it all is on sunday as the u.s. women's team goes for a record fourth world

cup title. goalie alyssa naeher on "today" show responding to critics who say the u.s. women's team has been unsportsman like at times. >> we can't control what other people are saying, we can't control those narratives but we can control how we react and how we play and how we step onto the field. we step onto the field as 23 women and we've all got each other's backs and we fight together and celebrate together. >> nbc's kelly cobiella has been following the team. she joins us from lion, france. good morning, kelly. >> reporter: good morning. it's another scorcher in liyon. that's not keeping americans away. they are enjoying the sights of the city where the finals will be held on sunday while the u.s. team is preparing to face-off against the reigning european champions, the netherlands, trying to go for that record fourth world cup title.

the heavily favorite american squad now knows who they will be facing in the finals. the opponent standing in the way of another world cup, the netherlands. the women in the distinctive orange uniforms beating sweden with a single goal in extra team last night. the u.s. players with a light practice and a rest day after their own bruising battle with england, incredible headers from kristen press and alex morgan had the u.s. up 2-1. but late in the game, a heart stopping penalty kick. an unbelievable save by american alyssa naeher that sealed the victory. naeher's family celebrating in the stands. it's carli lloyd's third straight final. >> not everybody can say that. although we know the job hasn't been done yet. we've got to finish it off on sunday. >> from their very first game that included a record breaking

13 goals, the world has been watching and judging. the u.s. women told they celebrated too much. british media branding alex morgan's tea cup celebration against england as rude. >>oiro we're at the world cup. >> i don't think anyone believes we disrespect the game or disrespect our opponents. >> now one last game. you're going to the finals. >> all of us. >> what do you think that's going to be like? >> scary and exciting. >> thousands of dedicated fans and two determines teams. the u.s. and dutch teams have never met before at all in any game in a women's world cup. the last time the dutch team beat the american team was nearly 30 years ago. make no mistake, chris, both teams are focused on this. in fact, one of the dutch players said after their win last night when asked about alex morgan's celebrations and

whether she might be preparing something for the u.s. game against the netherlands, she said i don't think she's score against us. chris. >> kelly cobiella at the world cup in france of she's got the best assignment. thank you. we're just getting started with this fourth of july with several developing stories this hour, including brand-new confusion over the census. explosive battle other the question about citizenship is far from over. the justice department reversing course after president trump unloads on twitter. plus a partisan death spiral. the surprise announcement from one of the president's most vocal republican critics. congressman justin amash explaining why he's quitting the gop. amash explaining why he's quitting the gop. wrinkles just won't. neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair's derm-proven retinol works so fast, it takes only one week to reveal younger looking skin. making wrinkles look so last week.

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good morning, and happy fourth of july. i'm chris jansing. right now on msnbc and new this morning, a new front in the increasingly contentious fight over the census. president trump reportedly considering issuing an executive order to add the controversial citizenship question to the 2020 census in defiance of the supreme court. justin amash, the only republican to call for impeachment, says he is declaring his independence and leaving the gop. the 2020 front-runners descend on iowa, where our road warriors are on the trail with all, or at least almost all the contenders, 11 of them in iowa and new hampshire today alone. right now on the national mall, the final preparations under way for the fourth of july celebrations ahead of what the

president is calling a absolute to america. but let's begin at the white house where the president is reportedly getting ready for a fight with the supreme court over adding controversial citizenship question to the 2020 census. axios is reporting the president is considering an executive order to try to get the question, are you an american citizen, added to the 2020 census after the supreme court ruled against them. a senior administration official reportedly telling axios, quote, we didn't come this far just to throw in the towel. but they also report there's scepticism within the administration that an executive order would actually succeed. that scepticism adding to records of anxiety. anxiety about tonight's fourth of july spectacle on the mall headlined by president trump. our team is here with developing stories and more on this independence day. i want to start with kelly o'donnell at the white house for us. good morning, kelly, what do we know about the reported

executive order? >> reporter: we know the president isn't giving up, even after his own administration, department of commerce, just this week said they would abandon the attempt to add the question and go ahead and print the questionnaires for 2020 census without a citizenship question. as a part of this, this is part of the legal case where the administration was turned away from the supreme court, told to go back to the lower court to try it out. there's a deadline to get the first tranche of questionnaires printed. how many millions of these have to be ready to go for 2020 head count of all those in the united states. that's a practical problem. the legal question has been that the executes that have been brought to challenge that as an inappropriate question for commerce department to insert on the census. so the president has made clear he's not giving up on this o he

has ordered the lawyers in the case to look for other options. there's very little time to do that. so a judge has said tomorrow he wants an answer about a legal plan going forward or what decision will ultimately be made. so after we had gotten on the record statements from the secretary of commerce himself and other officials in the department of justice that they were simply going to move forward with the printing, and perhaps continue the legal argument separately, the president was not satisfied by this. so something like an executive order is one of the types of tools in the legal toolkit that they would review to see if that could pass muster to add this question. there are these logistical problems of getting everything set in time to distribute the census and to do the work of carrying that out and the legal question of the challenges that the president is not yet willing to give up that fight. chris. >> so much up in the air except a lot of justice department

lawyers who thought they were going to be barbecuing today are doing something else. >> they are working. >> kelly o'donnell, thank you for that. joining me to weigh in former chief of staff to president clinton mcclarity. happy fourth of july. it's good to see you. we started the week with the census sent to the printer without that citizenship question and now we're here. you know how government typically works, how the west wing typically works, what's your reaction to what we see going on here with this census. >> this is unusual, unprecedented i think in many ways and unfortunate, chris. happy fourth of july to you. i wish we were talking about the women's u.s. soccer team and hopefully their winning the world cup. all attempt at humor aside, it's unfortunate we're discussing this on the fourth of july, our independence day, which people look forward to. it's a festive day, a time for family, celebration, just a

little bit of relaxation. instead, we're in this, as you said, contentious period, considering an executive order, which is not governing. we finally quickly say u-turns and undercutting your cabinet members not the best way to govern. >> yeah. "the new york times" actually detailed the chaos that ensued after the president tweeted. i strongly urge people to read this article because they have the transcript of a conference call between the federal judge and justice department officials. you kind of felt for this guy from the justice department had had to admit the tweet was the first he heard of the president's position. in fact, they are trying to figure out exactly how to come up with something that can do what the president asked them to do. what does it mean for government when a process breaks down like that? >> well, i guess this is the new world of governing by tweets.

clearly the judge was not pleased with any of these circumstances, was very direct and firm in his comments, of course laid down this friday deadline that you've already noted that there will be a lot of people burning the midnight oil tonight in the justice department. clearly the department of justice lawyer, who i do not know personally, but certainly, i think, enjoys a fine reputation, was just unsettled. he did the best he could being surprised and caught off-guard. but we'll just have to see how this plays out. executive orders have been overused and abused maybe appropriately descriptive term by both democrat and republican presidents. but in this case, this is such a serious issue. of course, canada criticized president obama for executive orders so the shoe is on the other foot now. >> is it ever.

i want to bring in jonathan allen, national political reporter and republican strategist susan. doj forced to change what they said after the trump tweet. obviously they are in an uncomfortable position because they are now under a deadline for something they thought was long done. what are the politics of this? >> it's obvious that the president had a reaction from the conservative media sphere and he got nervous. he got nervous his base may think he gave up on something they deemed important. what's particularly frightening to me is the role of the attorney general in all this. william barr just keeps going to the whims of the president. he's not president trump's lawyer. he's the lawyer for the united states of america. that is particularly disappointing to see this. the president does what he does on a whim. what can you say? it is unprecedented and yet it's

exactly what this guy does. >> jonathan, to be fair, the supreme court did say the administration could try again by coming up with a more persuasive argument. obviously their argument that this was going to make everything fair was completely contradicted by the evidence, but that's different than an executive order, which is not about doing the legwork, not about coming up with an alternative argument. what do you make of where this is going? >> this is a very unusual area of the law, chris. i'm not a lawyer, but i certainly talk to them pretty frequently. if you look at the constitution, enumeration clause article 1, section 2, one of the few places in the constitution that is so specific about something when you're talking about the census. it's to be taken every 10 years as prescribed by law made by congress, according to the constitution. so the idea of an executive order bearing on a piece of the census is just on the face of it

somewhat at odds with the spirit of the constitution, which says it is the role of the congress to say how the people should be counted. here is why the census is such a huge, huge political fight and really has been for generations. the census is what determines the apportionment of the house of representatives. basically which states get how many house democrats every 10 years and then becomes the basis for redistricting and ultimately how many seats each party ends up with in congress. it affects the electoral college. this is a huge partisan fight because of that. i think that's why you're seeing the president get so much pressure from his white flank to get involved in this, to not give up this fight. at the same time it's one of the reasons the supreme court is taking this very seriously, that members of congress are taking this very seriously. again, really interesting to have this going on on independence day. you know, the united states declared its independence to get

outside of a superpower executive and wrote a constitution with balance of powers and here we're seeing that tested. >> jonathan allen, susan, thank you. mack mclart y, always good to see you. i hope you'reing to something fun and it's not too hot where you. we'll turn to somewhere it's hot already, the national mall, a preview of the big and controversial event there. hans, the president putting out the word on twitter we're going to have this party, it's the biggest, the best. what is on tap for tonight? >> the president is trying to drum up support. let me show you that tweet here, "people are coming from far and wide to join us today and tonight for what's turning out to be one of the biggest celebrations in our country, salute to america. all day event at the ling memorial culminating with flyovers of aircraft. perhaps air force will do a low

and loud sprint over the crowd. i have to say low and loud sprint over the crowd is not a military term i've heard before. you do sometimes fly low and loud. a sprint, it will be the plane when it's air force when the president is on it but it's not "air force one" when he's not on it. you mentioned the heat here. you don't see a lot of crowds. you mentioned heat. we're standing in precious real estate here, that is the shadow of the washington monument. it's a little bit cooler here. it is quite hot here. you want to contrast, though, what the president is tweeting about and the somber tone that mike pence took earlier today. >> history records that anyone who was to sign a declaration of independence was to be hanged by the neck until they were dead. they risked all for us and for you to be able to have this moment. >> now, they will have a lot of

military hardware if the weather cooperates flying up in the air. that includes f-22s, b-2s, o ospreys. you'll have all five branches. we'll see to what extent president trump keeps it about declaration day or political. in the past he'll rale against democrats, make statements traditionally partisan. we'll see if he sticks to the script. >> thanks hans, on the mall for us. joining me, a surface warfare officer in the navy reserves after serving six years on active duty. happy fourth of july to you. i know you tried to get to a

studio and there were some technical difficulties, though. thank you for calling in. i read the piece you wrote saying you believe the d.c. celebration is not the best way to honor the troops. why? >> thanks for having me on. i appreciate it. i'm sorry you can't see me in person. appreciate you having this conversation. the point is -- the point of my piece and we are trying to make, we appreciate the attempt to show support for military and veteran community but we're at a time when we still have 20 veterans a day dying by suicide. we have women veterans that aren't getting the care and support they need, stigt fighting for v.a. to take comprehensive research to find out if medical cannabis would be a treatment for wounds of war we're dealing with, still fighting for legislation to manage results from exposure to burn pits and other toxic exposures. we have so many issues that veterans in the military community need to have taken

care of that we're fighting for on a daily basis. we would rather see the focus on the veterans getting taken care of when they deploy and when they come home from deployment. that's what we need, not so much a national force on the mall. our military is on display around the world on a daily basis. i think everyone knows how strong our military is. we ned to show how strong our support is when veterans and military come back from deployment. >> the tanks, logistical problems with that, 60 tons plus, questions whether the streets could hold them. the military aircraft, the flyovers, do you think they are inappropriate? >> i don't think it's inappropriate because they do need to get out and train. it's probably an inappropriate use of them in the sense, as you were discussing earlier, what we don't want to see is the military ever being used as a political backdrop. they are honorable men and women that are looking to serve in a nonpartisan standpoint and

that's how our leadership should treat them. i think bringing the tanks might be a waste of money because it's expensive and it's not easy. you can make the argument that pilots still need to fly and get that training in but just not sure this is the best use of resources in that sense. they could probably be on better training missions that would be more useful than a quick fly over the national mall. >> one thing we can say apolitically that the fourth of july is one of 365 days that it's good to say thank you to our active forces and to our veterans. jeremy butler, thank you for your service and thanks for speaking with us. >> thank you. appreciate your time. >> on this independence day, why another republican lawmaker is declaring his independence, quitting the gop. plus joe biden campaigning in iowa right now as polls show his support slowing in the first in the nation caucus state. he was asked whether he's the best candidate to beat donald trump and about the president's

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independence day you can argue has new meaning for congressman justin amash. he's the only congressman to

accuse president trump of impeachable offenses. today he says he's leaving the party. he september out this tweet this morning. today i'm declaring my independence. in a "washington post" op-ed, amash says he's leaving gop after growing disenchanted and says he's frightened by party politics, which amash says is trapped in a partisan death spiral. president trump firing back on twitter last hour writing, great news for the republican party as one of the dumbest and most disloyal is quitting the party. no collusion, no obstruction. couldn't get the nomination to run again in the great state of michigan, already being challenged by his seat. a total loser of i'm joined by political reporter jonathan allen and republican strategist and msnbc political analyst. john tacloban, it's interesting

johnit's into to note he didn't mention donald trump. what's the upshot? >> the upshot is what you heard from both those people, justin amash and president trump, like any good political move, it has some noble bearing behind it in the mind of the person declaring it, justin amash that he's fed up with party politics and this has become a terrible thing and a pox on both houses. yet donald trump it's absolutely right, justin amash is going to have difficulty winning a republican primary with the president lined up against him. the only way to win his seat in the house and he may not do it anyway, is to run as an independent. >> we got some of his constituents going off on him. take a listen. >> i've been your supporter since you started running for congress, and i can't even tell you how disappointed i am.

>> please be respectful. s sir, sir, please calm down. >> susan, is justin amash standing up for his principles or moving away from a party he knows he can't win? >> both. he was looking to make a significant move, it seems, for a while. this was not a decision he woke up yesterday and said i'm going to announce this tomorrow. it's not just about justin amash in this move with republicans. a the lo of people ask me why am i a republican with lack of support for the president's agenda. this was a very good first step. the question is what's the next st step. to me is justin amash going to get involved in a movement starting at the state level to start independent candidates on the ballot. we always talk every four years about an independent candidate. i don't see -- that's not where the change is going to happen.

either going to happen from the ground up. it may be a very good start but what else is he going to do? >> there's always a message, not just for republicans but both parties. in his op-ed he wrote, most americans are not rigidly partisan and do not feel represented by either of the two major parties. in fact, the parties have become more partisan is part because they are catering to fewer people because they are rejecting partisan in numbers which does make a wholed idea of an independent candidate more interesting. i know out on the campaign trail, i hear from a lot of people sort of more in the center that they don't want to be affiliated with a party anymore. >> no, they don't. the way our partisanship has become so toxic. he's absolutely right. this op-ed is very well written. everything he said in there. i don't agree with his politics whatsoever. everything he said is absolutely right. we have become so partisan. we have become a very tribal,

political force. there is no room for conversation. there's no room for compromise. everyone is just in their corners. i think when i talk to people on my show on sirius, they say they want a party that is -- that addresses their needs, right, that isn't just an opposition force against the president and isn't just complacent and rolling over for the president. there is no party right now that is doing either of those things well. you have democrats on one side that are really not using the power they have been given back in the house. you have republicans saying i can't hear, i can't hear, and i know nothing that's going on. that seems to be okay with them. the people want more. i think if we had a multi-party system, we would be in a better place. i agree with justin amash. two-party system is kind of failing the people right now. we need to think broader and bigger. >> meantime, jonathan, as you know, justin amash previously said he would not rule out a presidential campaign against

donald trump. i wonder if he's looking at the fundraising prowess of the last quarter and having a reality check. what would that look like? >> justin amash has as much chance of beating donald trump in a republican primary or winning the presidency as an independent or anything else like that as i do of starring in the nutcracker on broadway. it's just not going to happen. i think he would largely embarrass him. he might get a platform to talk to issues that he cares about. there's not anybody that's going to beat donald trump in a republican primary. >> jonathan allen, susan del percio, thank you. happy fourth. the front-runner for the nomination into to msnbc news about busing, fourth of july celebration and why he still believes he's the best candidate to beat donald trump. we'll take you live on the

ground as the presidential contenders make their case to voters. you're watching msnbc's fourth of july coverage and a live look at the capital in washington where you can now see the p.o.w. flag flying beneath the american flag. we'll be right back. h the amerin flag we'll be right back. a lot will happen in your life. wrinkles just won't. neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair's derm-proven retinol works so fast, it takes only one week to reveal younger looking skin. making wrinkles look so last week. rapid wrinkle repair® pair with new retinol oil for 2x the wrinkle fighting power. neutrogena®

. on this fourth of july many democrats are celebrating independence day out campaigning in iowa and new hampshire, a lot of them. kristen gillibrand and amy klobuchar at a parade in new hampshire. joe biden and beto o'rourke are both in the same town of independence iowa. throughout the day, a total of 11 candidates are crisscrossing those early contest states. our nbc news road warriors are covering them all. mike, von, and in slater iowa where bernie sanders is coming out in a few minutes. let's start with you, mike, what is biden up to today. >> this is not a drill.

joe biden in full parade mode. that means there are some handshakes, selfies. you might remember this from the last time i was with joe biden at a parade, we had a chance to speak briefly with them. this has been a rough patch for the biden campaign since that shaky debate. nothing he'd rather be doing than shaking hands. he's running back and forth along the parade route in iowa. let's take a listen to the conversation i had with him just before the parade start add few minutes ago. >> vice president, how do you compare what you see in independence, iowa, on fourth of july to what's happening in washington. >> these people are here to celebrate values. it's an idea, not about militarizing the world. fourth of july the way i was raised, you bring people together. it's about celebrating what happened in philadelphia. we, the people, you know. not we, the tanks. >> what do you say to voters who saw your debate performance and wonder if you are the best

candidate democrats can offer against president trump. >> i'll let them make up their mind. i think i am the best candidate. >> senator harris is offering more of her position on busing. do you think it was an unfair attack now that she seems to be in option to you. >> say i was surprised. >> chris, i'm literally in the middle of parade as we speak. you might be able to see the president running back and forth shaking hands. a little more about the parade, not just joe biden, beto o'rourke part of this parade. he said earlier he hopes he has a chance to speak to the vice president during the day. let's see if we get a little bit of him. chris, i'll let you talk to -- mr. vice president, if you could do this every day of the week, this campaign style -- >> you know i would. >> i'll let you see the vice president literally running in front. >> some would say he outran you

and now he's running backwards. >> it's a young man's game, let me tell you. >> i know you're going to stay on that and let us know if he has anything else to say. but can you hear, what are the conversations as he's talking? is it just shaking? are people talking to him? i'm getting tired watching him. >> i think there's a little bit of a signal here that the biden campaign wants to send, especially after that shaky debate performance when people are questioning whether he has the stamina. he feeds off the energy of a crowd like this. he loves doing what autos doing right now. the fact he's literally going to be running back and forth across the street, they are showing he has a lot of fight in him in this campaign, taking this seriously. campaign advisers say last week was something of a wakeup call for the vice president letting him know not only does he need to show more fire in the belly, the other candidates, democratic candidates aren't afraid to go after him as well. >> mike, as always, watch that

suv behind you there. is that the vice president's car there? does he have a car just in case? is that his car? >> they have a truck here. some of our colleagues are on the back as well. i don't think we're going to see him -- yeah, i don't think we're going to see him riding the truck at all. he's determined to keep running back and forth throughout this whole parade. >> mike has to keep up with him. we'll come back. let's go to von and talk about kamala harris and what she's focusing on today. >> reporter: yeah, kamala harris started this fourth of july week yesterday in july where she went over to a local picnic in west des moines and a town hall at a local brewery in des moines. today she's heading to indianola for a house party before heading west to council bluff where she'll take part in another picnic. this is iowa. it might be fourth of july but

this is fourth of july retailing. kamala harris has kept an eye on house parties, doing festivities. she now that 65 staffers on the ground. the campaign sees a lot of energy. i had conversations with several democratic voters over at the brewery about what brought them out. they told me it was the debate performance. over the last several months, i spent most of my time in iowa. i was constantly hearing from folks who said they hadn't made up their mind who they are going to caucus for. what i heard last night was a lot of definitive answers from kamala harris. i note a bit surprising here. iowa caucus, people usually wait until the end. she will continue to sioux city iowa friday before heading over to texas, new orleans, and south carolina here later this weekend. chris. >> all right. thank you for that. bernie sanders also in iowa. there's a new poll there shows him dropping to single digits behind biden, harris and warren. so what's the feeling inside the

campaign and what are they planning to do to try to turn that around? >> you kind of get a sense of it right now with supporters cheering behind me. senator sanders is not here right now with the parade starting in a half hour. that's what the whole iowa swing is about. he's here on fourth of july to spend with iowa voters. he's doing ice cream socials, selfie lines. that's what the campaign is trying to highlight. they understand, watching the polls. they see the peaks and valleys. they are not focused on that. they want him to be out with the voters. yesterday he was out. he walked a three-mile long parade, walked nearly the entire thing. today he'll be doing four parades with iowa voters. i can tell you his team, as his team has been coming and gathering, they have been pulling people aside and asking for buttons and stickers and getting voters registration and get them into the system. that's what the campaign wants to stress, they have 25,000 volunteers here. they are organized by 43

staffers they have in the state. they acknowledge that's less than some of the other campaigns. they think when you look at what's going on behind me, they think that's what's going to deliver them to victory come february. >> shaquille, mike, vaughn out on the trail for us. thanks to all of you. joining me to talk about this white house correspond and editor-at-large of the magazine. almost to me the tale of two bidens this morning. first he answered plenty of mike's questions, right? you're seeing him jogging literally from group to group and shaking hands and doing selfies and all that. then oerpd, when he was asked what i thought was the most obvious question that was coming, it was a very different kind of response. take a look about what he said when he was asked about his shaky debate performance. >> how do you feel after that performance? do you feel like a comeback.

>> look, it was -- it's hard to respond in 30 seconds. >> thanks, guys. >> do you need to prepare more next time? >> no. i just have to -- we'll see next time. >> ann, i wonder what you make of that. that question he knew was coming at some point. >> right. it actually sort of reinforces a lot of the questions people have had coming out of the debate, which is he should have seen the debate question coming, too, and he seemed defensive an not quite ready for it in the debate. i think the interpretation many will have of that answer he just gave will also fall into defensive and not quite ready for it. he's clearly trying to counter with the super energetic, friendly, uncle joe, running the lines, the rope lines at the parade. thais the image that a lot of

people really do carry of him as, you know, this pretty avuncular guy, who is a good campaigner who jumps into the crowds. he's trying best to put that image forward. >> if we want to talk about images, i guess on the front page of the local newspapers and elsewhere, it's not going to be a picture of him not answering very well the question about what about your shaky debate performance, it's going to be him in the crowds. >> sure. his poll numbers took a beating after the debate and kamala harris went up 10 percentage points on average. she absolutely vaulted into competition. >> can i say when you see the video of her, she was at that event last night. when we've seen her since the debate, she looks like somebody who went up 10 points. she looks like she's having the time of her life. >> the thing the debate performance showed more than policy, because she's already sort of backtracking on her busing policy, it's not that different from joe biden's at

this point. that isn't what matters in that exchange to voters as much. it looks like she is absolutely ready to take the fight to trump from an energetic standpoint. joe biden looks like he's backpedaling, apologetic for his past record. kamala harris has a problem, doesn't have the same story about her policies, she's slippery with that. she's taking that fight forward. he seems like, is he really all that ready for this fight. if his candidacy is based on electability, which a lot of it is, this is the problem with the electability candidate, the moment you don't look electable is the moment you see a whole lot of support evaporate overnight. that's what's happening so far. >> on the other hand as people point out, ann, the biden camp also knows they are at the top of the polls still. in the second quarter joe biden raised $21.5 million. they will tell you he got in late, which he did. he announced late. nonetheless, he's behind a guy

behind him in the polls, pete buttigieg who had almost $25 million. do you ascribe any significance to those numbers as we see them right now? >> i think i would say two things. one is that biden has spent an enormous amount of time raising money. that seems to be his primary occupation off the campaign trail. sometimes he's actually out of sight on the campaign trail for a day or two because he's raising money. to come in with numbers which in an ordinary year would look normal, and this year looks support of disappointing, has to be a disappointment for them. the second is from an optics standpoint, for the former vice president of the united states to have raised less money than the sitting mayor of south bend, indiana, is also not the best look for them. they can totally make it up going forward. he's a good fundraiser. there's a large well of support

within the democratic party, kind of the mainstream money pits of the democratic party are presumed to be coming toward him, so he can make it up. >> we're out of time but i want to ask you really quickly, how worried do you think the democrats are about the fundraising numbers on the other side, donald trump rnc over $100 million in a quarter. >> probably worried but money is not totally determinative in politics as 2016 should have taught us. >> on the other hand he didn't have much money and he won. matt, ann, thank you for coming in on the fourth of july. it's good to see you both. we're two weeks away from the much anticipated testimony of former counsel robert mueller. how his testimony could help the multiple congressional investigations into president trump and his interests. investigations into president trump and his interests. look limu. a civilian buying a new car. let's go. limu's right. liberty mutual can save you money by customizing your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need.

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take show. from your perspective, what could it be. >> a couple of things congress could get out of testimony from aren't mueller. first, what lessons should we learn from your investigation to protect our country against future attacks against russia and other foreign adversaries into our election. that's number one. another is what changes in the law should we as congress be thinking about to protect our elections from foreign influence. for example, he wasn't able to stand campaign finance violations but there was evidence that russia offered information to donald trump jr. and others at trump tower. it came down to technicalities whether information could be value going forward. >> we all remember what robert mueller said at his news conference in may. let's play that. >> any testimony from this office would not go beyond our report.

it contains findings and analysis and the reasons those were made. we chose our words carefully and it speaks for itself. the report is my testimony. >> so a lot of republicans have said to me, look, he's made it clear, you're not going to learn anything new. subsequently this could backfire on the democrats. what would you say to though. >> well, although he said the report speaks for itself, nobody has listened because not too many people have bothered to read it. i think testifying, if what he does is explain the report can go a long way to explain to the hub about what happened. a lot of people buy into the narrative william barr told, and i think did this country a great disservice, when he was able to give trump the talking point there was no collusion and no obstruction. i think if members of congress ask robert mueller to read portions of his report, it will be illuminating about the numerous contacts with russia such as polling data about

michigan, pennsylvania and wisconsin, states where trump won upset victories and also some of his efforts to obstruct the investigation, including trying to get attorney general to limit the investigation to future elections so he can shield himself, his administration, campaign from scrutiny. i think detailing all of that for the american public will be eye-opening. >> it's going to be fascinating to watch. barbara mcquade, thank you for coming out. >> thank you. >> thunderstorms are threatening many parts of the country. it could rain on the president's washington, d.c., parade if you listen to hans nichols who says it feels like rain. we have your actual holiday forecast next. we have your actual holiday forecast next.

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was located just to the west of the manhattan, cbs. kansas is not pretty right now. let's get into the fireworks forecast. as i mentioned, hit and miss storms are going to pop up rapidly this afternoon. midatlantic renal. washington, d.c region. washington, d.c., hope the storms clear by 9:00 p.m. new york city, a lot of rain in nrs from nebraska northwest. anyone watching the macy's fire this afternoon on tv, it should be perfect. all the storms will stay south of philadelphia later on this afternoon. if you're on vacation, let's talk about the rest of your forecast. hot and humid conditions continuing in the southeast. hit and miss storms throughout the ohio valley. hit and miss ohio valley, upstate new york and through the southeast as we go into saturday. middle of the country dries out and that happens into sunday too. >> but looking if he map it's hotter in anchorage than los angeles?

>> anchorage is off the charts. so a lot of people in anchorage don't have air conditioners. and they're about to go -- >> reasonably so. >> right. the normal high is 65 degrees this time of year. and they're about to go through a stretch of their hottest temperatures that they've ever seen. they've ever recorded. they're going to be 86 today. 86 friday. 85 saturday saturday. 85 sunday. again, their average suspect is in the mid-60s. the all time hottest is 85 degrees. they have a chance of breaking that or beating it four days in a row the 'the health dmept anchora department had to send out telling them what heat exhaustion was and heatstroke was because they're worried about elderly people in their apartments, four days off the charts heat never happened before. >> thank you very much, bill. coming up in the next hour, what will we hear from the president tonight in his controversial salute to america? s controversial salute to america? (vo) parents have a way of imagining the worst... ...especially when your easily distracted teenager has the car.

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thanks so much pore watching this hour of the msnbc live. i'm chris jansen. hope you have a great fourth. more news here with my colleague. >> good morning, everybody, and happy forth to you all. i'm kendis gibson here at head quarters in new york. planes in position, tanks ready to go after weeks of planning and a swell of criticism. could president trump's big fourth of july celebration be a bust? an old issue threat evening to spoil the production. plus, the flock to the

hawkeye state as they spread out across iowa for parades, barbecues and fireworks. sparks are flying between the two top tier candidates. and caught off guard again. another tweet from the president twigering triggering a scramble to reverse course on the census. thank you they plan to make another push for the citizenship question. but we begin with the massive show on the mall and perhaps the biggest fourth of july celebration in decades. the plans include military vehicles and flyovers from the navy's blue angels and the presidential jet and of course fireworks. the president this morning promised that people would be coming from far and wide for the celebrations. but as "the washington post" reports, they have been scrambling in the recent days to line up enough attendees as they feel that the thunderstorms or traditional free concert on the

other end of the mall could diminish the crowds for trump's speech. let's get to details from hans nichols on the national mall and monica alba who say long the parade route. and also we have retired four star admiral. the admiral is also msnbc's chief international security and diplomacy analyst. hans, let me start with you in all of this. how concerned right now is the white house bsabout a big show support and people being out there. >> well, the president's tweeting trying to drum up support, so they want to make sure that the president's message gets far and wide. you see this space between me and the lincoln memorial, that's about a mile to give you a sense to make sure that fills up with people. the challenge for the president on this entire ordeal is going to make sure how he feels ha his base are being listened to and addressed and also that he keeps it nonpartisan. listen to what hogan giggly, one

of the president's spokesperson said earlier today. >> i was with the president for quite some time this afternoon talking about the speech, listening to him talk about the themes that he wants to address. and there's not a political bone in the entire speech. >> now that could be true, there isn't a political bone in the -- that could be true it's not a political bone in the speech, but that doesn't mean the president sg isnisn't going to off-script. often what's in the teleprompter isn't what he says. he feeds off the energy of the crowd. people are starting to show up here, security's allowing peoply in. you also see down there the balloon. we're going to call that a likeness of mr. trump. it can get quite windy here. we'll see in that actually goes up. normally people are flying kites and looking at the flag there's a slight breeze i'm going to say

4 to 5 knots, butting i think monica alba is a better meteorologist on the national mall so i'm toss it over to her. >> monica is along the parade route. what are you maerg righearing f people there for the festivities? >> exactly. i'm actually going to show you, we are here on constitution avenue along the parade route where there are already hundreds if not thousands lined up for what is a very typical feature of the fourth of july holiday. this event takes place every year, rain or shine and it doesn't take place until later in the hour. but you have people here already and they're planning, many of them who i've spoken to, to aend it the president's event later today. there is mixed reactions. some folks i talked to think he is politicizing the event too much. but others are happy to see america's military on display, all the branches represented in a different way. they want to see that and they feel it's an appropriate time. we have a kind of different view. but that event isn't for many

hours. the heat is threatening here, the humidity very high. and then of course we have thunderstorms that may also effect the event. but i want to bring in lisa who is a trump supporter and this is the first fourth of july event she's come to attend. tell me why you came out here today. >> because president trump asked us to come out and show our sblup what do you make of his event and the salute to america which is an unprecedented take on this typically nonpartisan holiday? >> i think it's fantastic. it's great to show support for our country, which he loves, which we love. >> the price tag is high with reports of $2.5 million being diverted from national parks entrance fees, and it's not clear how much it will cost overall. is there any concern of that to you? >> no. i'd rather spend money on this to unite the country than for other things that are being spent where money's being spent that i don't feel it should be going towards. >> and what are you hoping to hear from the president tonight?

>> anything he says is wonder. i've been to two rallies, i listened to every speech and every time he's on, i listen to him. >> and what do you say to critics who say that tonight's event may be too political? that is may be more campaign rally than your fourth of july holiday celebration tends to be that kind of leaves politics aside? >> he's the president. so, i mean, it's supporting the united states. why divide the country? we're all americans. and that's what he's supporting. >> lisa, thank you so much for chatting with us here. so, kendis, that's the sense here. again, a lot of people already lined up. an interesting point, we don't know how many people will actually be at the event tonight because the national park service doesn't do crowd counts for fourth of july events. they expect hundreds of thousands to attend, but they won't have an exact count. but we do know somebody who is quite, you know, familiar with crowd sizes and likes to talk about them, and that's the president. so my bet is i guess he may put

a number on it, but, again, those storms may affect the turnout. we didn't know how many people are going to be here. we'll know in the next few hours. >> and quickly, you heard lisa you can tag and obviously she's a supporter of the president. only about 4% of people living in d.c. voted for this president. are most of these people from out of town? >> so sorry, kendis have that to me? i can't hear you very well. >> leave it there. i was just curious whether or not most of these folks from out of town who you've been hearing from so far. all right. it's getting loud on that parade route for monica. >> sorry, i don't have you anymore. >> going to move on. thank you, to the admiral and get your thoughts, admiral, on the increased military presence there at today's celebration. what do you make of that? >> yeah, i don't want to rain on anybody arizon anybody's parade but it's worth thinking about three things that we ought to process as we see a

different style of fourth of july celebration. first of all, it's the resources and a couple of people had mentioned that this will cost millions of dollars more to do this type of extravaganza. and could those resources be devoted to other situations that might make more sense, frankly. secondly, it's the politicization, here i speak as a former military officer. when you array the u.s. military as a backdrop and then you make a speech in front of them, what everybody -- every military person is hoping is that that speech will not be political, will not be partisan, that it really will be a speech of unity and talk about patriotic values. i think if the president gives that kind of speech, it will be okay. but as hans pointed out, he does have a tendency to kind of go off script. my guess is on this one he'll stay on script. he knows the critics are out there if he tries to take this in a deeply partisan direction.

and so i'm hoping for that uplifting, unifying, teleprompter speech. and third and finally, this is something that comes out of 37 years in uniform. i just feel for those troops that are not getting the day off. believe me, they would rather be at home at a barbecue having a beer with their families. instead, they're going to be marching up and down, standing in front of tanks. and they're the ones who are going to be there at 2:00 a.m. cleaning up after all this is over. so, again, don't want to rain on the parade. i think if the president takes an uplifting unifying tone it will be okay. let's hope that's how it comes out. >> picking up on what you were dropping down there about the troops, many who would love a day off, let's talk about the military leaders in particular here. how do they deal with trump's style of leadership? >> this is a great question. and it goes right to the heart

of one of the great strengths of the united states of america, which is that we have an apolitical, a nonpolitical military. i, for example, throughout my career was not a republican or democrat, i was a registered independent. many military people are. we are absolutely constrained from being involved in partisan politics. our military stays out of that lane. there are few things i'm certain of in this world, but one of them is that we would never have a military that would try and influence political events. it's kuc one it's one of our great strengths. how they deal with it is they will be serious and respectful of the office of presidency, but they will not be dock ra, ra cheering 'this turns into a political rally. which i hope it does not. >> a lot of people are hoping that indeed. we'll leave it there. our thanks to all of you. many of the 2020 democratic presidential candidates are

hitting the holiday parades in iowa today. moments ago we asked joe biden about president trump's military style spectacle. >> america's an idea, it's not about mill tar rising, you know, the world. whole idea of the fourth of july, is you bring people together. it's about celebrating what haps happened in philadelphia. we the people, you know, but not we the tanks. >> not wet tanks. well, we have our nbc road warriors. mike is with biden campaign in independence and vaughn hillyard is with the harris campaign near des moines, iowa. mike, i want to start with you because we noticed in the last half hour biden was literally run the parade route there in independence. no doubt that being a vigil that his campaign is hoping will speak volumes. >> yeah, that's right. i came to independence iowa expecting to cover a parade and

a 5 k broke out. i wasn't expecting to do as much running as happened here today. but i've been covering the former vice president for a long time and there's few things he enjoys more than a parade. he loves walk back and forth, shaking hands, interacting with voters. it was interesting here in the heartland the iowa, the vice president, occasionally there were some hecklers shouting out at him. at one point somebody was shouting out sleepy joe, sleepy joe. he heard him, went over and talked to him and invited the person to join him running the rest of the parade route in the is coming after his shaky debate performance last week. a way for him to rebound and show he still has a little bit of energy and fight in him. also had a chance to ask him about that debate performance earlier today. let's take a listen to his answer about that. >> what do you say to voters who saw your debate performance a week ago and wonder if you still are the best candidate to run against donald trump. >> i'll let them make up their mind. i think i am the best candidate. we'll find out. >> do you think she was in a

better position? >> just say i was surprised. >> he was surprised to hear that's in reference to kamala harris that athat she made at him in the debate last week over busing. in recent days we tried to press senator harris on that and it sounds like she's articulating a former position to what the vice president has in the past. we're done with the parade now and expecting him to come and take questions from reporters here in a little bit so we'll probably hear more from him short. >> i no doubt getting in his steps today reaching his goal. let's go to vaughn hillyard who is with the harris campaign. vaughn, you've been following this campaign from the very start. you get a sense that they feel as though they have momentum going? >> yeah, they have momentum. and the campaign that they've been stepping more than just today, they've been on the road for essentially since that debate. they were holding multiple fundraisers over in california. over the weekend she took part

in san francisco pride parade. she had two events taking part in the picnic outside of town before going to a local brewery and going a town hall. he they're trying to capitalize off that energy from the debate. she's going to be down in end ola at a house party before driving to the western part of of the state over in council bluffs where she'll take part in another fourth of july picnic. this is a campaign that continues to put itself out there. candidate consistently takes questions from the press. we should note she has been open and engaged on that conversation around busing and around integration of schools. well, there's so many questions that joe biden has to answer when it goes back to the 1970, his stance then. but also on the case of thousand better integrate schools here today. i think, you know, we're seven months away from the iowa caucus and if this last week indicates anything, it's that there is a much policy discussions to be had and perhaps reasons why there are going to be a debate tend of the month and then another one next month.

because as you've seen, kamala harris has shown a willingness to take on the former vice president and draw those contrasts between her and him. and now with the rest of the field, that's where those questions are. today may be a fourth of july celebration, i think in he's days ahead you'll continue to see these democrats draw contrast when it comes to policy between the two. >> and the polls are showing the importance of all of those debates, each and every one. going to leave it there, our thanks to you both on this fourth of july. well, tonight on msnbc you can catch reairing of the first democratic presidential debates. night one from 7 kplk to 9:00 and night 2 from 9:00 to 11:00 p.m. eastern time. in the meantime, the president's remarks will be carried live on nbc's streaming service, nbc news now and on our website nbcnews.com. coming up right here, biden and harris aren't the only ones hitting the pavement today. bernie sanders is set to hit more parade roots after walking nearly three miles yesterday. we'll go back to iowa where he and a slew of other candidates

are out in full force including mayor pete buttigieg who weighed in on the president's big plans. >> one of the reasons i joined the military was to do my small part in order to make sure my country that i live in was not the kind of place where the fragile ego of the strong man leader made it necessary for him to feel like he needed to roll tanks down the streets of the capital city. >> plus, the census citizenship question is very much a question mark. a federal judge orders the administration to provide answers by 2:00 p.m. tomorrow. the new reporting this morning on what the administration may do to force the citizenship question on the census. question on the census but do you take something for your brain. with an ingredient originally discovered in jellyfish, prevagen has been shown in clinical trials to improve short-term memory. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. i have one kid in each branch of the military. when i have a child deployed,

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we got word this morning of a possible major move by the administration to force a citizenship yes on the 2020 census. according to axios, the president is considering an executive order, the justice department initially said it would not include the question. and then backtracked after president trump tweeted, we are absolutely moving forward. and according to a conference call with a judge overseeing the census case, even the president's own administration was caught off guard by the tweet. a doj lawyer said the tweet was the first i had heard of the president's position on this issue, just like the plaintiffs and your honor. i do not have a deeper understanding of what that means at this juncture other than what the president has tweeted. but obviously, as you can

imagine, i'm doing my absolute best to figure out what's going on. joining me right now is the chief washington correspondent for bloomberg news and jill former assistant watergate prosecutor and msnbc contributor. jill, i want to start with you. you saw the axios report right there. the president considering an executive order to keep the sit sn citizenship question on the census. can he do that? >> the president has shown that he can and will do almost anything. but i think what we need to keep in mind is how very serious this is. it goes way beyond the citizenship question and it goes to the question of the celebration of powers and the role of the supreme court. the supreme court has already ruled that there was a pretextual reason, a fake reason, a made-up reason for adding this question. it was clearly done for political gain of the republican party. and that is not permissible.

and the court said they cannot add it. and now they are trying to come up with a different pretext. one that maybe they can try to foot supreme court with a second time. i hope they do not succeed. i don't think they will succeed. they should not be allowed to. >> but they have been told, the administration folks have been told that this is within the president's right and his purview that he can do this executive order. so many who are saying that the slaw on their side, is it not, jill? >> an executive order might succeed, but it still will not go against what the supreme court has said about the citizenship question. the other thing that it shows in this whole case is the lies that were told by the government. and i'm not blaming the government lawyers who probably were told these things by the administrative heads who may also have been misled about it by the secretary of commerce. but it does show -- they said

they don't it unless they had the decision by the end of june in order to print the census. now all of a sudden it's july 4th and they're saying, well, maybe we still can add it. so that's another lie that they made to the court. it will undermine the administration in any presentation to any court if they continue to lie. and we should not have this kind of a ruling where the supreme court can just be ignored. >> all right. kevin, let me get you to weigh in because as you know on tuesday the department of justice said no citizenship question and they were printing the census without the question. then of course the president tweeting yesterday and now they're reversing course. what is going on here? >> well, three things. first and foremost, look, this census has to get printed eventually if folks want to make the deadline in order to get the census out in 2020. so from a practical standpoint they're coming up against the wire here, down to the wire in terms of actually getting this census printed. the second point that i would make is that i remember back

during one of the recent court hearing appearances at the supreme court when i was at the supreme court interviewing folks on both sides of the aisle about what has become a very contentious issue. republicans say they need to have this data in order to know precisely how many illegal immigrants are in the country. but critics of that thinking, including the business community, and that's the point i really want to hammer home here, big business, small business, medium size businesses rely on the u.s. census data information in order to compile many of the economic indicators that are factors into and calculated on how the economy is doing. so they're very apprehensive to have this type of citizenship question asked which could impact anywhere according to the chief economists of the u.s. census burr bureau of 6 million folks. and democrats are saying this is just the latest indication of the president's immigration policies and one that is something that has divided the

issue of immigration, particularly when there's so many other contentious fights being had in a very polarized congress on the issue of immigration as a whole. >> and, jill, in the meantime of course you know that is that deadline that's expected to happen tomorrow, 2:00 p.m. a federal judge expecting and wanting some answers from doj on a holiday weekend no doubt. what do you expect to happen tomorrow? >> it's very interesting and i think that i agree with everything kevin said, but i'd like to add a few things to that. one is that the president is not a party to this lawsuit. the lawsuit was brought against the department of commerce. and, yes, he is the supervisor of that, but for him to by tweet change the legal proceedings in front of him and embarrass the department and the lawyers who had to represent the department is really a strange thing. the other thing that we need to know is that the census is important not just for redistricting, but also for all the benefits.

the schools, for example, will be given certain amount of federal funding depending on the outcome of the census. and the students who are getting educated in our schools need to have the funding allocated to them. and if there is an undercount, that will hurt those schools dramatically. so we need to make sure -- it's impossible to predict what will be told to the judge tomorrow because this all happened behind closed doors and was the result of a tweet. so it is incumbent upon the lawyers now to be able to get a final answer to be able to say, yes, it's going ahead without the question on citizenship and no more hearings need to be had. or, i'm sorry, but, yes, we are going to hold off printing. and that raises the issue that there may not be time to conduct the legally constitutionally required census. >> and as a result, there are a lot of doj lawyers who are spending this july 4th day --

>> they're not at a barbecue. >> our thanks to you. joe biden by the way, is speaking in independence, iowa. you saw mike there with him earlier. let's listen in, shall we? is with what she was saying to you in the debate last week versus today. >> look, she's a good person. she is as smart as can be, and she feels strongly. it came out of nowhere, didn't seem to be consistent with anything i've been accused of before. i think bussing is something that 99% of the american people don't even know what we're talking about. but i've always supported volunteer busing which she was part of. and in fact when we were president and vice president we provided money for volunteer busing. secondly, i do support -- i do support -- those kids are going to get hurt.

hi, buddy, how are you? be careful. i'm sorry, they're dropping their -- this didn't help very much. i apologize. beyond. look, we've got to move the question is what are we going to do in neighborhoods that in fact have substandard schools in what are we going to do for all those kids who have enormous potential but are left behind because no one recognizes them? and that's why what i propois pose i'm not going to bore you all with this now, but the fact is that that's why we should triple fund for charter one schools, schools in distress. so from 15 to 45 billion aids year we should get more people engaged in a way that teachers get more help. there should be preschool from 3, 4, 5 years old. we should be able to provide for 65 and 100 right now require something to have a high school degree. that's what we should be talking about and debating about. that and healthcare and a whole range of other things. >> you made a distinction in the

past between segregation. >> yes. >> what's your position ton today especially when the line is blurred? you have some jurisdictions succeeding from school districts for bussing. >> we should be making the lines gerrymandering. we should be in a situation where we're making sure that everybody is able go to a school that has real quality. what we tend to do is there's only one reason why my community there was overwhelming opposition among even african american community to what was going on. and so, look folks, let's move on and talk about what do we do now? we have such incredible possibilities. our kids have such enormous potential. and we're wasting it. we're wasting it. here's the thing i absolutely reject. i reject the notion because a child comes from a poor family where there's no books or mom or dad can't read that somehow they don't have the capacity to do exactly what anyone coming from your homes is able to do. they are. they are. but they've got to be nurtured. we've got to bring them along.

that's what we should be debating. i have a clear plan on how do that. >> some of your rivals are saying this is less even about the policy position and just some of your past staimts statements you called busing a asinine in the past. >> my record stands for itself. i've never been accused from anybody in my state or running as not being an overwhelming supporter of civil rights and liberties. this is kind of new thing. you know, we're going back, you know, 40, 50 years now to a vote. i mean, you know, look. the last thing as barack said, we need to have a circular firing squad here. the idea, i mean, i'm not picking out votes of others have cast or that they weren't democrats or they were doing -- i mean, you know, this is about today and that's what i want to talk about. >> will it reflect the reality that the democratic party in the country has changed especially around race just even in the last five years? >> absolutely positively i do. as much or more than anyone. >> so you've been directly

absent from the homestead facility last week when other democratic candidates made visits. what do you say to critics -- >> i wasn't conspicuously absent, ways doing other things. i've been to the border before, i'm going back to those places, i've seen it, i'm going to go back. i'll be back to whether it's homestead or down at the border, i'm going to be there. look, the idea, guys, is that i'm not following anyone else's rules. i'm following my rules. and what i'm going to do and how i'm going to make my case to the american people. and let them decide. >> to that answer, do you think that your party what -- beating president trump next year if you come out for opposing private healthcare? does that worry you? >> say that again. >> if the party comes out for eliminating private healthcare insurance, do you think that could imperil your party to combat the white house next year? >> that's a decision for others to make. that's not my position. my position is we have a great -- barack obama and i spent a lot of time and did something -- he did something no other president has done. he built an incredible foundation for healthcare.

the affordable care act, obamacare as the republicans call it. i'm proud to be associated with him. what we should do is build on that. it took a long time to get there. it's solid. it's put 100,000 -- 100 million people who are out there and who were in a position where they had preexisting conditions in america that, in fact, they're all covered now. it's put 20 million people got coverage that didn't. the numbers go on. we've done something really good. now we should build on that. first thing i would do as president is go out and say, look, here's the deal. we're going to eliminate all the changes that this administration made trying to kill obamacare, number one, and we're going to add to it a public option. and the public option says whether you are an employer-based insurance or private insurance or you're in the exchange, you can join up for a medicaid/medicare like provision. >> right. >> in the law and not dump 300 million people on medicare all of a sudden. you'd be able to if you don't like your employer listen based health insurance, well, you can

sign up and get this other plan. but if you like it you're able to keep it. that's, to me, seems -- i'm opposed to any republican who tries to take down obamacare and i oppose democrats that try to do, i think it's a mistake. >> you said that you wanted to focus on the future and the debate. now that you've come out of this first debate, how do you plan go forward with the second debate? what changes do you need to make to your preparation? how do you prepare? >> it depends on whether or not the rest of the team on stage wants to talk about the future. if -- here's what i'm not going to do. i'm not going to go back and use the same tactic they're trying to use. if you notice, i'm the guy everybody's talking about, you know? i mean, somehow -- anyway, but i'm not going to go back and talk about the record of anyone from ten, 20 were 30 years ago. there's a lot out there that a lot of people would like to do differently than they did. but everything is lost in context as well. the context at the time is something that the vast majority of people don't know from 25 or

30 years ago. and so you can easily distort it, particularly in 60 seconds if you have 30 seconds to respond. and so what i'm going to is answer the questions i'm asked and try to move the debate where i think the democratic party needs to go in order for any one of us to win. how are we going to distinguish ourselves from all that trump stands for? what are we going to do to bring back the working class and middle poor? what are we going to do to restore some civility and honor and decency to this country? the fourth of july, i was raised and i'm not allowed to ask you questions, you were raised the fourth of july is to celebrate our togetherness, what we did, what they did on philadelphia was they said we're bringing desperate groups of people together, colonies that didn't like one another very much, they brought them together and it says we, the people, we, the people.

and it talks about honor and dignity and it's missing now and it's hurting us terribly, terribly around the punt. i'm going to be speaking a little bit later in marshal town after the -- anyway, so -- anyway. >> you said you -- >> are you happy with your debate performance? >> yes. >> are what do you say to twhos might -- >> justin amash announce egg was leaving the republican party today and is going to be -- do you have any reaction to that? >> well, you know, where there's faith there's hope. >> sir, you've been dropping in the polls. what do you make the polls where you've been dropping since that debate performance and -- >> i'm still way ahead. >> all right. >> thanks, guys. >> thanks, everybody. >> an extend and impromptu press conference as you can see in the aptly named independent, iowa. let's get reaction on all of this right now. adrian who is the former senior

adviser for hillary clinton's presidential campaign is joining us along with michael singleton, republican consultant and former campaign staffer for ben carson and mitt romney. appreciate you hanging out. adrian, i want to start with you what do you make of what you just heard from the former vice president doing a little bit of spinning one week after the debate. >> yeah, i mean, my first reaction is where was that joe bide he last week on the debate stage? that's the joe bide than we love. he was right on message. you know, he made it clear that he wants to stay above the fray, he's not going to get involved. he's not going to criticize other campaign opponents. he made it very clear that, you know, things that he said 40, 50 years ago are in the past and he wants to move forward to the future. and i think something else he just talked about is his support and protecting obamacare versus many other candidates on that debate stage last week who support medicare or all and want

to get rid of private insurance. i think this will be an issue that really becomes one of the most defining issues of this democratic primary. and here's joe bind saying, you know what? i want americans to be able to keep their private insurance. they should have an option whether or not they want to go on medicare for all. that's obviously a stark can trast to what we heard frorth candidates on that debate stage. . >> this is the joe bide than we love. he made it about trump, he didn't making it about other candidates. i hope to see more of that joe biden in the future, and i think we will see more of that type of personality from him in the next debate. >> you mentioned bob here because that certainly is an issue that's top of mind. it's actually the top of the polls as far as issues go for many of the voters there in iowa. busing, mike shermichael is not. and we're still talking about. he's still talk about it 40 years after his vote and a week after the debate. >> i think he's talking about it because reporters are asking about it. but i think to his point, kendis, most voters are not

concerned about this, to be quite honest. they want to know from the democratic candidates how are you going to distinguish yourself from donald trump? what policies are you putting forth and how are you going to accomplish making sure they pass through the legislative process? what's interesting to me is david axelrod tweeted out a couple hours ago that kamala harris essentially said that pus bussing shouldn't be mandated. she's not for man dating bussings. so david axelrod essentially tweeted what was the whole kerfuffle about going against joe biden a week ago. it seems that kamala is flipping her position somewhat on this. i think this is a great opportunity for her if the did show a weak spot for the vice president. but i think the vice president is doing what voters within the democratic party and even independent voters would like to see from democratic candidates. that is how can you distinguish yourself from donald trump? what bro posals are you going to put forth that we haven't seen from this president that will

better my current predicament and how can you get that done? i think that's what joe biden will continue to focus on. if he can do that, think that will benefit him and continue to showcase that his ability to go head to head with donald trump is what many of the other candidates just can't quite do doh. >> i'm curious to get your perspective, adrienne, because you were there with the hillary clinton campaign when she was fighting back that insurgent campaign for barack obama there in iowa, sort of similar to what joe biden is going through right now. are they fretting? >> you know, cain kendis, i don't think they're fredding because number one it's early and, sure, he's taken a dip in the polls and that was to be inspected regard let's of his debate performance because he was riding so high with 24 other candidates in the race. you can't just judge that from pennsylvania. so it's not a surprise regardless of his debate performance that he's sinking back into very realistic poll numbers. however, it is never a desirable position when you are painted as

the inevitable candidate. i don't think that his team or himself are considering himself to be in that position. but when the media, when the polls, when the establishment class looks at you and says, well this person is the inevitable candidate because they're polling so much high, he it creates that much of a difficult situation to maintain that status in the polls. i think biden's people are probably a little happy that his numbers are settling back down to reality a little bit. and i think for him he's got to go out there to the point that shermichael just made, make the case to the american people that he's the best candidate to take on trump without getting into the muck of going back and forth with different democratic candidates for primary. that is where i think he gets himself in trouble. he's got a very long record, a voting record that started when he was age 29, was elected to congress. he's now 76. so he's got a lot -- huge voting record. if he goes back on that debate stage in july and plays defense

the way he played defense in this last debate, then it's going to hurt him even more. i think if he can rise above, play offense and focus on trump, he'll be in a much better position. >> we have these two new polls, nbc news, "wall street journal" poll and a research poll that took a look at voters attitudes on race. the peer poll found among white adults 77% of republicans say when it comes to racial discrimination the bigger problem for the country today is seeing people seeing discrimination where it does not exist. while 78% of democrats say not seeing discrimination where it really does exist is a bigger problem for the country. it does appear to be a country very much divided when it comes to discrimination, doesn't it? >> it is. but, kendis, you know this being an african-american man it's not a new phenom noon non. and a think for a lot of people the lingering question is how can we see equity and opportunity in this system?

i think something that joe biden said that stood out to me talking about education particularly for inner city schools, how can we make sure that every single child many this country has the same advantage? starts at the same starting point and makes sure that they have the same resources so that they can sort of access everything that is available to those from let's say wealthier districts merely because of their zip codes. i think the notion and idea that we want "equity and treated fairly and have the same opportunities and access as other individuals, that's not something that's too far to ask for. and talking about how you make sure you bring that equity through the legislative process through policy, again, is something that i think democrats need to continue to harness on to distinguish themselves from donald trump i think you heard a little bit of that from joe biden. >> yeah, he was weighing in on a number of different things, including that. we're going to leave it there with you guys. adrienne elrod and shermichael singleton, happy fourth of july, everybody. and we've been following all the democrats who are flooding the

state of iowa today. it's not just biden and harris. our nbc road warriors are blanketing the state. garrett haake is with pete buttigieg and we're with bernie sanders. garrett, we've seen mayor pete take selfie after selfie. what else is he actually doing today? >> well, he'll be taking part in the parade this afternoon and then he has a house party event a little bit after that. i suspect we might here some spanish from the multilingual mayor of south bend today. it's the most diverse county and city, almost 40% hispanic here in iowa if the this is a place that all of the democratic candidates have targeted. it looks more like the rest of the country, perhaps, than does the rest of iowa. now the mayor has been unveiling this new national service program. he rolled that out yesterday at his stop in sioux city, iowa. i've had a chance to talk to him a little bit about what has become this interesting gap between his fundraising number, which was extraordinary, nearly

$25 million raised in the second quarter of this year leading the democratic field and his poll numbers which are less than extraordinary, hanging on to a spot in the top tier essentially by the skin of his teeth. he's in a distant fife being place in most of the recent polling he said he's going to use that money to solve that problem or try. expect to see him staffing up in a major way trying to reverse engineer a grassroots campaign out of what has been a big national campaign so far. but there's no more pure retail than you could possibly do than shaking hands in a fourth of july parade in iowa, so that's where we start today. >> that's where a lot of the candidates are today and that's what a lot of them are doing. should point out those are life pictures that you're seeing there on the left of mayor pete in iowa along with his husband. in the meantime, shaquille just spoke with senator bernie sanders. and bernie sanders is coming off a pretty rough patch for him, shaq, raising only about $18 million in the last quarter. that's pretty low compared to

mayor pete who just a few months ago nobody knew his name. >> right. that's exactly right. and that's why senator sanders is focused on, as garrett said, the retail politics. shaking as many hands. he's having ice cream socials on this trip. he's opening field offices to out to his volunteer in the ground game. he's really just trying to make the point that he has grassroots support. he has support that came from 2016 and that has shifted to 2020, he believes. and that's not being reflected in the polls as much. we're seeing polls that show him -- his support decreasing a little bit. there are also polls as the campaign points out that show his support increasing just a hair. i asked him about that he's was at this parade in iowa. listen to what he said. >> i've been talking about poll numbers and how much they're changing. are you concerned about that at all? >> yeah, the last two polls had us doing very well. a few points behind biden. >> the good ones. >> these are national polls, they're pretty good. bols are going to go up and down. i think we should take

everything with a grain of salt but i'm very appreciative that two of the major polls had us closing the gap with biden. >> that's why you hear his team highlighting the 25,000 volunteers they have in iowa, highlighting that they have 43 staffers, which is less than some of the other campaigns, but they feel that the volunteers they have fills in that gap. sanders was also asked about that military parade going on in washington, d.c. or the festivities, president trump sa salute to america tonight. he said instead of spending money on tanks, money should go to affordable college. you see he's trying to play to them here but he's trying to keep the focus on president trump on this fourth of july holiday. >> and he's keeping the focus on the polls, the good ones at least. garrett haake and shaquille brewster, thanks to you guys. take a look right now at the parade route in our nation's capital. it's a live picture so you can understand things are choppy at times. the clouds are getting there, the weather is threatening to

spoil today's festivities. we'll get a live check of the forecast coming up. plus, the president is again weighing in on what he calls a crisis at the border, this time defending the reported abysmal conditions at migrant detention facilities even as his own administration sounds the alarm. n administration sous ndthe alarm. no matter what i wore, i worried someone might see my bladder leak underwear. so, i switched. to always discreet boutique. its shape-hugging threads smooth out the back. so it fits better than depend. and no one notices. always discreet.

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well, the president is trying to defend his administration's stance on conditions at migrant detention centers along the southern border. sent out a group of tweets

calling for immigrants to return to their country if they're unhappy with the treatment here in the united states. nbc's geoff bennett joins me right now from the white house. geoff, happy forth of july to you. i how is he responding to the criticism about the conditions at these facilities? >> reporter: good to see you. the president is coming to the aid and defense of the border patrol and trying to blame democrats for immigration laws and policies he says that are creating the crisis that's unfolding along the border. as evidence of that, i'll read some of what the president had to say. our border patrol people are not hospital workers, doctors or nurses. the democrats' bad immigration laws which could easily be fixed are the problem. great job by border patrol, above and beyond. many of these illegal aliens, the president says are living far better now than they were where they came from and in safer conditions. what's not debatable is that

democrats and republicans have failed time and time again to reach any sort of immigration compromise. when it comes to the situation right now unfolding along the border in these detention facilities, it's directly the fault of the administration's approach. its approach hones family separation policy, the policy from last year. changes in asylum laws. that's one of the reasons why we're seeing these mostly central american, men, women and children being detained in fucemenf facilities that were not meant to hold anyone for long period of times. on this july 4th what we're hearing from the president is not the message of send me your poor, tired and huddled masses, what we're hearing him is a message he said on twitter where he says to these undocumented immigrants, if you don't like it go back to where you came from.

that is the message from the president of the united states. >> not necessarily the welcoming message on this fourth of july. let's mnot forget the administration has cut funding to many of these countries where a lot of these people are coming from in central america. jeff bennett at the white house for us on this fourth. thanks, jeff. the president is in candidate of a number of things,nthings, including the u.s. military. it could have an impact on how many people show up frutor the celebrations in washington, d.c. new york's east river will be the scene of the largest fireworks display in the country. summer heat could affect celebrations across the country. joining me now right now is our meteorologist bill karins. >> all eyes will be on d.c. they do have the chance of seeing some showers and thunderstorms. this morning, the worst of the weather has been in areas of

northeast kansas. topeka and emporia have gotten it. let's focus in on washington, d.c. here's philadelphia, baltimore, d.c. at 1:00 p.m. showers and storms beginning to pop up. looks like it could be over the beltway 3:00 to 4:00. by 5:00 they're hit or miss. what you'll notice, it's typical of the summertime as we go throughout the evening everything dries up. for the fireworks show it looks great. as we go throughout the late afternoon we'll be dodgeliing storms. we showed you the ending of the showers and thunderstorms in the mid atlantic, if you're in virginia and north carolina you'll be dodging storms, too. our friends on the west coast are looking for a fantastic forecast. salt lake city, a hit or miss shower or storm. a lot of people on vacation through the weekend. not a lot changes, still hot and

humidity in the southeast. still going to be scatters storms for the beaches on saturday afternoon including new jersey down through the southeast. the middle of the country dries out. no problems in the west. on sunday, we'll be looking at less humid conditions in the northeast and nice forecast for anyone traveling back for the upcoming work week. notice alaska here, 85 in fairbanks. 84 in anchorage. we're about to see something that's never happened in recorded history in alaska. anchorage average high is 65. hottest ever was 85. look at the forecast. today 86, friday 86. saturday 85. sunday 87 degrees. and one thing that we have learned from all the scientists about our changing weather on our planet, climate change, it happens faster the further north you go into the arctic circle. you can't attribute any one event to climate change, when you see stuff like this, this sets off alarms.

>> europe was just having -- >> yeah, hottest june ever recorded. you know, a lot of people don't have air conditioning in anchorage. they're concerned about the elderly and we'll see how it goes. >> happy fourth. still ahead, in the next hour, more on the controversy surrounding president trump's big fourth of july celebration. retired jeffrey barry mccaffrey will weigh in live. first a live look at d.c.'s annual fourth of july parade. this is the stuff they do every year. you see the spartans, i believe, marching right now. we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ here ll you about the colonial penn program. if you're age 50 to 85 and looking to buy life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three p's. what are the three p's? the three p's of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price.

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that will wrap it up for this hour of "msnbc live." my colleague david picks up our extended coverage. going to be here all day. >> going to be here all day. happy fourth of july. we begin with live pictures from the nation's capital where the first events of the holiday are underway. a parade is ready to roll down constitution avenue. now the big question is will president trump's fourth of july bash draw a big enough crowd to satisfy the president. some in his administration are reportedly worried it will not. pl the 2020 candidates are chr crisscrossing the country today.

declaring his independence, a congressman is leaving his party and now he wants you to do the same. let's begin with president trump's fourth of july production. a celebration of his own design that has a decidedly military air. there are armors vehicles on the national mall and there are flyovers planned, including military jets and aircraft one as the president put it in a tweet. the president is expecting a huge turnout. the white house has provided 5,0 5,000 tickets. several fundraisers and political operatives were asked to hand out tickets. hans, let me start with you, we saw the pictures of the parade in real time. that's part of what happens year after here year in d.c. tell us when this new salute to

america is scheduled to begin? >> reporter: well, probably with these military flyovers around 6:00 p.m. that's where the air space is cleared. i'll have the camera pan out. you see the massive amounts of space here that there is for everyone to gather and to wait to hear the president. against the lincoln memorial, that's where the president will be speaking on the steps. so there's a lot of space for the president to fill up. about those flyovers, you'll have all kinds of assets in the air. weather permitting. you've got the president is talking about air force one coming low and slow. you have b-2, f-22s. could be a demonstration from the blue angels. f-35s as well. the genesis of this was the bastille parade two years ago in france. here tanks are a static display. that is to say they're not moving. yeah, that's the backdrop.

we'll see whether or not this foreground fills up with the crowd. we see people gathering over here. i'm not going to do my best to do crowd estimates. there are a number of people lining up here. that's where the security checkpoints are. we'll have to see how big it gets and whether or not the weather cooperations. >> a lot of green grass. general mccaffrey, you're an infantry man from south georgia. that's where these tanks are from, made their way to washington, d.c. the military brass have reacted to the partisan squabbling by hiding out and hoping it all blows over. give us your read what you've watched, and pentagon's reaction to the celebration the president has planned. >> i think you made the most important point. the armed forces do not want to get drawn into a political divisive event. and we have laws prohibiting us

from endorsing, from participating in political events. that's the only concern. there is an element of hysteria about the whole day which i think the president probably takes. two tanks and two bradley fighting vehicles are hardly the stuff of red square or kim jong-un's annual military parade. the flyover is probably fun for the participants to see. it happens all over the country all year long. listen, my colleagues talk about how sad it is the soldiers don't get a day off. we have hundreds of thousands of soldiers and airmen and sailors and marines all over the face of the earth right now on duty. so i think the bottom line is this is all a great event if the president doesn't make a divisive speech. and in addition, i think, you know, there's an element of hope that he'll stick to a script and

not be -- not attack the democrats. >> how optimistic are you on that note, that that's going to happen in light of what you've read going into the event, what the president has said about his hopes for this event. hans nichols bringing up the point this could fall apart if the weather turns as it might with 50% chance of thunderstorms. your optimism that this isn't going to be about donald j. trump. >> no, i think it will. that was the whole intent of it. it's a jarring change from the past when we just had that wonderful evening concert of patriotism and songs down in the capitol hill. i think that's what it is. you know, again, the only question is will the president use it as a campaign rally attacking people. my guess is no. he'll recognize the critics are ready to pounce anyway. so, you know, let's keep our fingers crossed it's another

nice day in washington. that city loves its annual fourth of july celebration. and hopefully we'll have not a bunch of counterdemonstrators and angry rhetoric. instead, remembering the 243rd birthday of this unbelievable experiment in democracy. >> hans nichols i have been down there for the fourth of july in years past. we saw reporting about how hastily this was put together. we're a few hours out from when this is supposed to start. what do we know of who is going to be there? allies and white house officials are wringing their hands of this morphing into trump's inauguration 2.0 where the crowd doesn't meet the president's expectations for the event. the rnc is trying to use his speech. few if any want the tickets

because they have already escaped d.c. what do we know? >> reporter: there's a little bit of back biting in the papers. they seem to be laying the predicate for if this goes badly who gets blamed. some are traveling. we expect mr. esper could potentially come. he's thei acting secretary of defense the president wants to nominate. for members of the military when they appear with the president -- this happens all the time to general mccaffrey's point. they get up on stage with the president and the president tries sometimes to stay within the bounds and other times he goes and makes it a little more political. to general mccaffrey's point about this being slightly different, it's true there are flyovers all over the country. we know the president particularly likes flyovers.

remember, just a couple weeks ago outside the white house they had the f-35s do the demonstrations for the polish president. it's clear the president likes these demonstrations. we'll have to see about the crowds and the tenor and tone of this. you've been here before. i don't want to make too many suggestions that it's still green here. it's early. if you're getting here six hours in advance for an event that will starts after the sun goes down. either you really want to see the president or you're immune to the heat. >> hans nichols, general mccaffrey, happy fourth of july to both of you. several 2020 democrats are heading parades across iowa today. in the last hour alone, we heard from senator bernie sanders, pete buttigieg and joe biden. we asked him about that moment everyone is talking about on

that debate. >> first of all, i think we should be making sure school districts aren't gerrymanders. we should make sure everybody is able to go to a school that has real quality. >> reporter: do you need to atone -- >> look, my record stands for itself. >> our road wars are following all the action. mike, let me start with you. i saw a hit you did earlier. joe biden is in full parade mode. i should say you're in full parade mode. we saw you running alongside the vice president. >> reporter: trying to, at least. >> what more did he have to say about where this race is? i'm old enough to remember he said he wasn't going to attack his colleagues. how much has that changed since

that first nbc debate? >> reporter: we're at the end of the mile plus parade route here in independence where the voibd did as you saw participate in the parade today. thfs joe biden i think at his strongest. we've seen how much he loves the parade. he was walking, jogging and running throughout this parade route. we saw how much he continues to struggle with the status of being a front runner in the race. when he has pledged himself not to attack his fellow democrats, but his fellow democrats are very much eager to attack him to try to knock him off that perch. we talked about the shaky debate performance last week, he said he will let the rest of the country decide how he did. he said he's not going to be changing his preparation for the future debate. back and forth with senator harris about bussing is defining the race at this point. the vice president and his team are taking note of the fact that senator harris has been asked

more questions about where she stants on bussing. she's articulating a position that sounds like what the vice president has articulated. we heard from the vice president that, listen these decisions that were happening 40 years ago are lost on voters. he's determined to keep the focus on the future as much as he can. at least try to do so. >> shaq brewster. we're talking about through this dynamic that emerged between the former vice president and kamala harris. what is bernie sanders doing now? there's a void that's opened up as a result of that. how has his message changed as a result? >> reporter: he's taking away from that debate. he's focused on retail politics here in iowa. like many of the other candidates here in iowa, he's going around, going to parades, going to four fourth of july parades. he's having an ice cream social. he's trying to focus on his grass roots support and galvanizing his supporters. i can tell you the people that he was marching with, the group of volunteers and supporters, they were registering voters.

they were pulling in people along the parade route, taking bumper stickers. they were getting them in the system, getting them registered. we did get a chance to ask a couple of questions of bernie sanders as he was on the parade route. he talked about his polling. when ienti mentioned there weree polls he was ticking down, he said there were some he was ticking up. >> i think we need money to go into rebuilding our infrastructure. i'm not quite sure we need money to go in to put tanks in downtown washington, d.c. >> reporter: this campaign is focused on their volunteers. there's 25,000 volunteers they have here. it's a campaign that's been scaling up in many of these early caucus states. they have 43 staffers here. in some of the other states they doubled and tripled their staff. despite the headlines that question if the revolution is

stalled, he's focused on trying to focus on meeting with voters one selfie at a time. >> the vice president will watch an iowa cubs game a little bit later. i think they're playing the memphis redbirds tonight. what else does he have in store for the weekend? what does he want to be talking about? what is his hope the message will be here as we go through the weekend? >> reporter: what we saw time and time again whenever the biden campaign hits a road bump here, he often likes to turn the focus to president trump. and that contrasts the urgency of preventing another four years for the president. we saw him today discussing that parade in washington saying this is out of character for what the fourth of july is supposed to be. it's supposed to be a celebration of what happened in philadelphia. the vice president will be heading to houston to talk

education, but then back to south carolina. a state where the african-american vote is so critical. i think that discussion on bussing may follow him there. he'll have to continue to talk about that before the african-american voters there in that state, which make up a majority of the vote in that primary. >> a number of candidates heading down to houston for that conference. thank you very much, my thanks to shaq brewster. tonight on msnbc, we're going to reair the first democratic debate night one from 7:00 to 9:00 eastern time. and night two from 9:00 to 11:00 eastern. nbc now, nbc streaming service will carry president trump's remarks live. up next, more questions about the census. president trump orders his administration to keep trying to include a citizenship question. lawyers don't seem to know how to go forward. the humanitarian crisis w e worsens at the u.s./mexico

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the supreme court said no so president trump is considering an executive order to keep the citizenship question on the 2020 census. that's according to a new report. the justice department said it would not include the citizenship question. after a tweet from president trump saying he was moving forward with it everything seemed to change. even the president's own

administration was caught off guard. in a conference call with a judge over seeing the census case, the doj lawyers said the tweet was the first i had heard of the president's position on the issue, just like the plaintiffs and your honor. i do not have a deeper understanding of what that means at this juncture other than what the president has tweeted. i'm doing my absolute best to figure out what is going on. joining me now is joyce vance and maria kumar. joyce, let me start with you and the idea that an executive order could give the administration some leverage here. hugh hewitt tweeted something about this yesterday. it isn't rocket science an executive order moots the prior controversy. anticipating a negative reaction from a circuit court. it would spell intentions of

president trump in such event. as we remember the supreme court ruled on this, basically sent it back to the commerce department. what do you make of the argument that's being floated by axios. >> this started as a case that the state of new york brought. it skipped the appeal that would have normally gone to the second circuit and went to the supreme court which ruled against trump's efforts to include the citizenship question on the census. the quotation that everybody's heard from the phone call yesterday is in a separate case down in the fourth circuit in maryland which is proceeding on a similar timeline. will trump write a new executive order and say he wants a citizenship question and that will overrule the supreme court's decision. it's not quite that easy. the issue here is why that question is being included.

the administration originally said that they wanted to use it to help enforce the voting rights act, which was almost laughable on its face. the supreme court held it was pretextual. then it got more complicated when new evidence came to light that a republican operative who was a gerry mandering expert needed the data to do radical gerrymandering. tough to come up with an excuse even in a new order. >> the president said so important for our country the very simple and basic are you a citizen of the united states question be allowed to be asked in the 2020 census. he adds department of commerce and department of justice are working very hard on this, even on the fourth of july. help us understand the import of this, what's at stake. this could be used for more than just keeping count of who is in the country. >> that's the change. we have actual e-mails from this

operative saying the reason they want to ask the citizenship question is to, and i quote, white republican districts to disenfranchise hispanics. hispanics, we are the second largest group of americans. we have 16 million of us live in mixed status families. someone in our family will be undocumented. it's used as a scare tactic to insure white republican control. it wasn't all republican control, specifically white republican control according to the e-mails that were unveiled. the fact that chief roberts, mostly uniform on the conservative court sided with the four liberal judges speaks to this. the reason why we do a census is because the constitution demands we know who is living within our borders. we also have other ways to actually understand who is a citizen, who is not through other information that's done, other surveys that the census bureau does.

we already know that answer. the whole citizenship question is to do disenfranchisement. we have a litany from this president that he wants to insure there's some sort of control. that's actually not reflective of this country. that's anti-democratic. the more people fight for this that we're a reflective robust government that allows people to vote in those districts as they should. this actually is something that should send flags for everyone. david, the fact that the supreme court has already ruled and the president is now trying to go over that check and balances that's part of our constitution should worry people of all stripes. specifically today on july 4th when we're celebrating our patriotism and what it means to be american and a robust democracy. >> i want to return to the transcript we were talking about a moment ago, that conference call a judge convened yesterday. an attorney for the aclu argued

this case. chris hayes asked a question about what we're witnessing here. >> you have been a litigator for a while. you've worked on a bunch of different cases. have you ever -- you've been on the other side of the government. have you ever seen something like we're seeing play out today? >> no, it's remarkable. the trial lawyer for the department of justice didn't know what the government's position was at a hearing today. i've never seen anything like it. >> let me put some version of that question to you. you and i have talked in the past about what it's like to work for this president, to work in this administration. your reaction to this, what you read in that transcript. the about face we saw, the secretary of commerce coming out with an official statement saying this question was not going to be included on the 2020 census and then having this about face, only a matter of hours later. >> really just an incredible denigration of doj's reputation

for integrity. one of the things doj lawyers routinely do is they speak with their client agencies and they develop positions that they can take in court. and courts know when a doj lawyer walks in and says a certainan certain agency says x is the truth, you can rely on that. now the doj is in the position of taking a position that isn't true. and it seems like doj has sacrificed its credibility on the altar of this president's whims. it's a bad place for the justice department to be. i would expect we'll see a lot of people resigning. the only question is whether it will be career people or whether some of the political people might also grow a little bit of gumption here. >> thank you very much for joining us here. stay with us, we'll come back to you in a little bit. up next, hot dogs, fireworks and politics. that's what the fourth of july looks like in iowa this year.

the 2020 presidential contenders blanked the hawk eye state. we'll get a live report from there next. we'll get a live report from there next oh my, this heinz mayonnaise is so creamy, one day you'll tell your grandkids about it. and they'll say, "grandpa just tell us about humpty dumpty". and you'll say, "he broke his pelvis or whatever,

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democrats. candidates are flocking to the hawk eye state to campaign on independence day. i want to check in with two more of our road wars who are in iowa. garrett haake and vaughan hilliard. garrett, let me start with you. it's the day of the star spangled spectacular there in storm lake, iowa. what are we hearing from mayor pete who got some good fund raising numbers a few days ago? >> reporter: this is the most diverse county in the state of iowa. but it's dropped right smack dab in the middle of steve king's congressional district. go figure. it's an interesting place. you've seen a lot of the democratic candidates come and campaign here. as for mayor pete, he's keeping the politics a little bit of a light touch here, marching in the parade. i had a chance to hop in the parade and ask him about how this compares to south bend and how he would compare it to what president trump is throwing

tonight in d.c. >> reducing our nation to tanks and shows of muscle just makes us look like the kind of loud mouth guy at the bar instead of the extremely diverse and energetic nation we are. >> reporter: how does this compare to the festivities in south bend? >> reminds me of home, but i like the lake to the side. >> reporter: what do you think of this next to what we'll see in washington, d.c.? >> you don't have to work too hard to prove it, you can tell that people love their country, they love their community. >> reporter: you got a little bit of bonus pete on the front end. i think that's from talking to another group of reporters further down in the parade route. the point is largely the same. he addressed this more folsomly yesterday. essentially saying what the president is throwing in d.c. is more about ego than it is about patriotism. as to all that money that mayor pete has raised, $25 million

give or take in the second quarter alone, he told me yesterday we'll see that money getting spent, a lot of here on the ground in iowa. he's got to hire more staff as this campaign tries to essentially reverse engineer what was a national campaign, a television campaign now building out what they need in terms of grassroots support and infrastructure in the early states if he's going to be a major competitor come february. >> vaughan hilliard, let me turn to you. we were talking a few minutes ago about this debate over bussing between joe biden and kamala harris has continued via proxy. you've had staff members continuing the back and forth we saw during the nbc news debate. help us understand the other side of the coin. we heard about the way the vice president biden is addressing it. how are we seeing kamala harris address it there in des moines? >> reporter: i think there is a lot more that joe biden needs to address about his positions and statements back in the 1970s. he says that his positions stand

for themselves. i think there's a lot of questions of what position did he actually hold back there in the 1970s? when it comes to senator kamala harris, we had the chance to talk with her yesterday. went back and forth over the idea of mandatory bussing today. kamala harris has suggested school segregation is perhaps even worse today than it was back in the 1970s. so that goes into the conversation of what do those policies look like going forward? i think there's much that joe biden and kamala harris have yet to offer on that conversation and on that front. joe biden, you heard him there saying essentially that his record stands for itself. yet at the same time, it's that question of what would joe biden do in today's present time? and the same goes for kamala harris. i think that's a conversation that will continue to be had between these two candidates as this marches on. >> i want to ask you about comments you made yesterday as you talked about president trump as a predator.

she said she knows predators. this is part of her personal history. she was a prosecutor for a very long time. help us understand the forcefulness of the message she delivered on the stump yesterday. >> reporter: exactly. as you heard her say there in miami, she looks to prosecute the case against president donald trump. prosecute the case that he should not have another four years. yesterday she was in west des moines and she was there for the explicit political reason of making the case that democrats need to find somebody who can make the case against donald trump on policies from foreign affairs to trade. essentially what she did, she used the word predatory. the president showed predatory behavior and that includes bullying. she said that she feels she is in the best position to take the president head on during a potential general election. >> last question to you, garrett. that's about the call to service that we heard from pete

buttigieg yesterday. modeling this from what we saw of jfk. how resonant that in iowa today? >> reporter: really just starting to break through. this is a policy that mayor pete rolled out yesterday. it's an interesting idea. it's gotten plaudits from other folks not necessarily aligned with the mayor's campaign. trying to increase by a million americans the number of people involved in national service in some significant way over the next six years. whether it's through programs that already exist or by trying to create new programs like a climate corp. an idea that has gotten some applause from around the horn. just rolled out late yesterday afternoon. i don't know if it's entirely broken through for a lot of folks still enjoying their holiday. not watching as much as news as they should be. >> yes.

joining me now is david goodfriend. he's an professor at georgetown law. the proxy debate we were talking about between the the former vice president and senator kamala harris. your sense of it? >> it's been a good couple of days for senator harris and we're seeing a surge among the women's candidates. you look at senator warren and harris, they both increased in the polls. what i'm paying attention to, i like most democrats have one major goal in mind and that is beat donald trump. what i'm looking at is polling out of states that trump carried. let me give you an example. in florida just a couple weeks ago, all of the democratic candidates we've been mentioning, vice president biden, senator harris, senator sanders, senator warren, they all beat president trump head to head in florida. so i want to make sure that we

don't lose sight of the fact that the big fight is to take out this president. on that score, the democrats in general are doing very, very well. let's not lose sight of that. i think vice president biden has gotten something of a wakeup call here. it's not going to be a coronation, it's not going to be a coast he's going to have to fight for it if he gets it. i don't think that's bad for the party either. whoever emerges from the primary will be ready to take on the fight of their lives against president trump. i want to come back to this. we are focused on who is up and who is down in the primary. let's not lose sight of the big fight, which is who is going to take out donald trump. when i see poll numbers out of florida, double digit lead, that's outstanding. >> you've got the polls on the one hand and the candidates and issues on the other. we're seeing some differentiation. when you look at joe biden on the issue of healthcare, he is trying to stake out ground that sets him apart from the other

candidates when it comes to what his vision for healthcare might look like. he's not afraid of talking about the affordable care act and modifying that. >> well, i think as the candidates hone in on the issues more and more, we go from high level talking points to specifics. beto o'rourke did not do himself any favor. others like vice president biden will be able to show some nuances there. looking at this issue as well, healthcare, through the political lens, is the tactic of the party going to be to fire up the base and get more enthusiasm out of the base, or to reach across to independent voters to people who voted for president trump after voting for president obama? i would argue that in staking out support for the aca, the affordable care act, as it stands today, president biden --

vice president biden is probably thinking to himself i'm going to still be reaching out to those independent voters who might feel that medicare for all is one bridge too far. i think. i don't know. i haven't talked to anybody on the campaign. but it does seem as though that would be a tactical maneuver for the vice president to say i'm not going to veer too far from what we've already put our muscle behind as a party getting health reform enacted for the first time in 100 years. that's important to him. i do think it reflects a tactical variation among these different candidates. i want to throw in one tidbit for you. you had these reporters coming to you from iowa. iowa caucuses are unlike just about anything else in american politics. people have to physically go to a meeting place, a school gym, for example, and stand publicly to support a candidate. the firefighters union came out early for vice president biden.

the firefighters union was instrumental to john kerry carrying iowa because they're so good at getting people to actually physically come to the polling places. these are things that are not covered in polls. these are not things that are covered necessarily by reporters. that on the ground intimacy in iowa is incredibly important. the fact that vice president biden secured an important endorsement right out of the game, that's not something that's reflected. this will be early february next year. >> thank you very much on this fourth of july. he's leaving the gop and the president said good riddance. congressman justin amash calls partisan politics a threat to the country. his declaration of independence next. country. his declaration of independence next hold my pouch.

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i was hoping to set an example for people. i've been involved in party politics for a while. and i believe very strongly that it's hurting our country at this point. and i think people need to stand up for what's right. stand up for what they believe in and be independent of these party loyalties that divide us. >> that was congressman amash earlier today in his home state of michigan. he's declaring his independence from the republican party.

he made his announcement in the washington post writing our politics is in a partisan death spiral. until today he was the only republican in congress accusing president trump of itch peampea acts. president trump responded that he knew he couldn't get the nomination to run again, already being challenged for his state. a total loser. joining me now is david drucker. he's calling for people to rethink the party system. how in line is that? >> he's never been a mainstream republican, even prepresident trump. he's always sort of marched to the beat of his own drum. practices what he preachers in terms of really believing in a

leaner government that spends less, that's involved in less. that's set himself apart from his former freedom caucus colleagues. and justin amash was there at the beginning. but even they have proven a lot more flexible, at least since trump has taken office when it comes to government spending, whether entitlement should be reformed and things like that. i don't think any of this is that shocking. i do think a lot of what he seems to be worried about in terms of extreme partisan politics has sprouted at a time when the political parties are weaker. historically as much as the founders warned americans, future americans about the dangers of party politics, what the parties have been able to do over many years is sort of synthesize a lot of different

viewpoints so that we don't ever lurch too far to the left or right. in order to be a governing party you have to have soft edges. parties have lost a lot of their power. candidates can go to the voters. we like these sorts of things. we don't need the parties to elevate us. they can't squash us. the flip side is, with weaker parties you can have more committed candidates to a particular point of view. some might say extreme. that's the kind of thing that amash seems to not be that comfortable with. >> help us understand the phenomenon of justin amash over these last few months. we laid out on twitter his thoughts on the mueller report. he read it which set him apart from his colleagues. until then you had a republican member of the house who said it was time to call for impeachment. he's the pied piper of something. he played that role a couple months back.

you described him as somebody who is operating alone. how much power do you think he has? he's >> look, i have to say as a matter of politics, the politics, interesting with the president's tweak, politics is about addition, not substraction. he does not hold influence with anybody other than justin amash. he's an interesting figure to cover. he lays out a strong case for his point of view. he has done this over the course of his career explaining every single vote in a facebook post laying it out. words too much for me to read. this is what they pay me for. >> hypertransparency. >> yeah. does he represent a constituency in congress? no. we're in an area where politics has become tribal. people are members of a team. i think voters like to say all

of the time i wish we had members of congress who would do what's right and not what the party wants. of course, they mean do what's right as long as you agree with me. justin amash is doing what he thinks is right. i don't think he has as much support as people might prefer. >> great to see you. >> you, too. coming up, outrage over the treatment of immigrants held in border facilities across the country. and president trump's response which is basically if you don't like it, don't come. his message to migrants, next. s! there's a lot that needs to get done today. small things. big things. too hard to do alone things. day after day, you need to get it all done. and here to listen and help you through it all is bank of america. with the expertise and know-how you need to reach that blissful state of done-ness. so let's get after it. ♪ everything is all right what would you like the power to do?® ♪ all right

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president trump is pushing to keep immigration a top issue in the 2020 campaign. he's now defending how customs and border patrol is treating migrants in facilities along the u.s./mexico border. our border patrol people are not hospital workers, doctors or nurses, he tweeted wednesday. many of these illegal aliens are living far better now than where they came from. and in far safer conditions. i'm joined by nbc news correspondent gabe gutierrez who joins us from el paso, texas. we've seen democratic lawmakers come through el paso and look at the facilities. the inspector general report from the department of homeland security and a lot of people are wondering when are things going to change? what's going to change the

situation we've seen there? >> certainly, david, that's a huge question. this is a crisis with no end in sight. trump with this message if you don't like the conditions on this side of the border, don't come. now some doctors here have a message about the devastating toll they are warning about this devastating toll that this crisis is taking on children. this morning, these drawings are painting a heartbreaking picture. the american academy of pediatrics say they came from 10-year-old and 11-year-old kids after they were released from the custody of customs and border protection in texas. >> what do these pictures tell you? >> it's horrible. i can guarantee you that within the next few years, the psychological effect that it will take on these children is -- you can't even explain. >> reporter: dr. carlos gutierrez is a pediatrician who volunteered to treat children after their release from cbp

custody. >> you don't believe children should be in detention centers? >> absolutely not. >> reporter: trump saying migrants are living far better now than where they came from. if they're unhappy with the conditions, just tell them not to come. with evidence of crowded conditions and a lack of necessities like food, water and clothing in some locations -- >> my goal today is to dispel some of the misinformation out there. >> reporter: cbp posted this video showing a processing center in arizona stocked with supplies. >> we have supplies of our diapers, baby wipes, clothing for children, marked by gender, age, clothing for men and women. >> reporter: meanwhile, acting homeland security secretary kevin mcaleenan is launching an immediate investigation after a report highlighted disturbing and inexcusable social media activity that allegedly includes active border patrol personnel. according to propublica, the private facebook group included

crude and sexist jokes that mock migrants. >> we don't even know that all of those people that mocked them are agents or officers. so we -- but we certainly don't condone that. it's not the way we act. >> i'll take that to donald trump any day. >> reporter: democratic presidential candidate cory booker visited with asylum speakers in juarez, mexico, where they're waiting for applications to be processed. >> this sprt doing things that are spiriting our country, making us less safe and assaulting human dignity and values. >> reporter: the head of cbp's union here in el paso says his members are overworked and overwhelmed. and that morale is very low. he and other dhs officials are urging congress to set aside more money for the border. david? >> gabe, thank you very much. up next, we are live at the national mall to look ahead to president trump's big event. he's producing it tonight. controversy and all.

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that wraps up this hour of msnbc live. my colleague ali velshi takes it over from here. >> happy fourth of july. >> there's a burger and a beer waiting for you? >> one hopes at the end of the rainbow. thank you. hello. i'm ali velshi. you're watching msnbc live. it's thursday, july 4th, independence day. right now, crowds have gathered in washington for the national independence day parade. viewers are celebrating with

marching bands and dancers and patriotic displays. in just a few hours, president trump's very first salute to america celebration will kick off nearby. the extravaganza will be a mass display of military strength, including tanks on the national mall and flyovers from all five branches of the u.s. armed forces. the celebration it mired in controversy with critics alleging the president is using it as an opportunity to politicize the military. and it comes with a hefty price tag. although the president and his administration are refusing to say exactly how much it will cost. the event drew more scrutiny when "the washington post" reported the national park service was ordered to divert roughly $2.5 million in funding to tonight's event. the president will deliver remarks at the lincoln memorial on the national mall later this evening. while the white house has insisted the president's remarks will not be political, he's known for going off script at these other apolitical events.

joining me is hans nichols who is live from the national mall. hans, how is it looking now and is there a sense the folks around you are involved in this political mess or just enjoying their july 4th, as they should be? >> looks like a split. we have the traditional and untraditional. here's the traditional. this is just the parade. the white house in the distance. marching bands, color guards. that's all very normal. what's new this time around, i'm going to walk you around. you see this expanse, the apron of the washington monument. you're starting to see crowd comes down here. those could be normal crowds that want to see the fireworks and be on the lincoln memorial. it is pretty nearly this whole process, right? we're looking at our watches now. it's 1:00. things don't really kick off on the mall until 6:00 or 7:00. you want to get here for a good spot if you are supporting the president or justice want to celebrate on the mall. you see right here the tip of what is the trump doll, the tip

of the head there just by that group of trees. they haven't gotten permission or that hasn't gotten airborne yet. normally a lot of kites out here. i don't know if the trump doll hasn't gone airborne because they don't have the right permitting or it's too windy. we're praying for the wind. it is hot out here. >> we do know with those tanks relocated into washington, i don't know, you know the figures, 60 tons. very heavy. very hard to move. they can cause damage and the d.c. government is planning to bill the federal government for any damage. >> yeah. so there will be a back and forth on who pays for this if there is any damage that ruins the apron of where the lincoln memorial is, if they did any tread work on the grounds. you saw the way they were tracked in. they took them very gingerly to their staging position. if there's anything back and forth you can expect there to be

some sort of dispute between the d.c. government and the white house on who is going to pay for it. remember, the initial idea for this was to have it on veterans day and the price tag which the d.c. government put out was in the $90 million range. the white house thought that was too high. thought they would be falsely billed and that led to the president saying he was going to cancel it. the overall cost will be difficult to figure it out, even if the white house wanted to be transparent and forthcoming on this. in the past they haven't exactly been on these sorts of events. >> hans nichols for us on the national mall as the president prepares to host what he's calling the show of a lifetime. many of the democrats hoping to take him on next year are spending today on the campaign trail. the candidates are visiting the early voting states of iowa, new hampshire and nevada where they are taking part in parades, cookouts and other events to celebrate america's 243rd birthday. as the candidates work the campaign trail, our reporters are right out there with them.

garrett haake is with south bend, indiana, mayor pete buttigieg. mike memley is also in iowa following the biden campaign. appears to be in a car. we'll start with him who is following, literally, i believe, joe biden as he heads to the next event in marshalltown, iowa. what's going on, and why are you moving? >> well, we are trying to keep up with joe biden. we've been trying to do that all day, frankly. we were with him this morning in independence, iowa, at their fourth of july parade. what better place to be than there. you may have seen earlier, i was trying to do my best to jog behind the vice president as he was running back and forth. we're on our way to marshalltown where he'll have a traditional town hall meet with iowa voters. what was interesting today, obviously, we saw joe biden doing what he loves the most which is interacting with voters. doing a lot of that retail style of campaigning which he has excelled at over the years. we saw also this ongoing back

and forth between the vice president and senator harris on the issue of busing. she had that moment in the debate where she pressed him on his past position to bussing. since garrett haake tried to press him on that after the debate, we had a chance to talk to the vice president about where he stands in the '70s when this issue first came up in his political career but also where he stands today. let's take a listen to him talking to us earlier today in independence. >> my record stands for itself. i've never been accused by anybody in my state or when i'm running as not being an overwhelming supporter of civil rights and civil liberties. it's just -- this is kind of a new thing. you know, we're going back, you know, 40, 50 years now for a vote. the last thing we need to have a circular flying squad. >> so the vice president still on the defensive there on the issue of busing, but his campaign also trying to point out that it appears senator harris as she's been asked

questions about her position now seems to be articulating a position awfully close to what the vice president is saying. >> mike memley on the road, literally, not figuratively, in iowa. let's go to garrett haake with the south bend, indiana, mayor pete buttigieg in storm lake, iowa. sort of moving but not nearly as much as mike. you had a chance to catch up with mayor pete. what did he have to tell you? >> a little context. there's no emergency behind me but we're at the end of the storm lake parade. this is an interesting place on the map. storm lake, iowa, is in the most diverse county in all of iowa but also smack dab in the middle of steve king's district. it's a bluish dot in a very red part of the state. you've seen a lot of democratic candidates come out here and try to make inroads with voters in a part that otherwise gets written off. today that candidate was mayor pete buttigieg. he took part in the parade today. i asked him about how what he saw here compares to back home

and what's going to in d.c. tonight. >> how does this compare to the festivities in south bend? >> reminds me of home, but i like having the lake off to the side. >> how does this compare to what we'll see in washington, d.c.? >> this is a cheerful celebration of patriotism inside us. you don't have to work too hard to prove it. just tell that people love their country and community and that's what this holiday ought to be like. >> a little basit of a light toh from mayor pete as if he's trying not overtly politicizing the parade he's walking in to the one donald trump will be taking part of tonight in d.c. he's got one more stop after a big town hall last night in sioux city. it's been interesting watching the buttigieg campaign reverse engineer a ground game in iowa after starting off as more of a national campaign. now they are investing some of that $25 million in staff and resources and organizing here

trying to play catch-up with some of the candidates on the ground a bit longer. >> garrett haake in storm lake, iowa. tonight on msnbc, you can catch a re-airing of the first democratic presidential debate from 7:00 to 9:00 and all the fireworks of night two from 9:00 to 11:00. the president's remarks will be carried live on nbc's streaming service nbc news now and on our website, nbc news.com. a day after conceding the census would not include a citizenship question, the justice department has reversed course. that reversal began with a tweet from president trump who wrote that news reports that the administration was dropping its quest to put the citizenship question on the census were fake. quote, we are absolutely moving forward as we must because of the importance of the answer to this question. what came next, according to "the new york times," was, quote, a chaotic chain of events with justice department representatives summoned to a phone call. a phone conference with a federal judge in maryland. in a transcript, the doj lawyer

leading the case revealed he, too, was caught off guard by the president's tweet saying, it was the first i had heard of the president's position on this issue. i do not have a deeper understanding of what that means at this juncture other than what the president has tweeted. but, obviously, as you can imagine, i am doing my absolute best to figure out what is going on. this is why it is important. a lot of people criticize us for talking about the president's tweets but this is a perfect instance where it's not fake news because the commerce secretary himself, who is in charge of the census, put out a statement that says we are going to move ahead without the citizenship question. that's what we the news reported. the president didn't agree with his commerce secretary. that's between him and the commerce secretary. it's not actually fake news. joining me now is msnbc's legal analyst danny civalos. the president says stuff that if we didn't cover, we would not understand that we thought there was a citizenship form being

processed according to a judgment, according to a ruling by the supreme court. and then we find out, because of the president's tweet, that he's not. >> then supreme court census case is a difficult opinion to read. hard for most lawyers to understand. not surprisingly, it seems president trump simply may not understand what that opinion means. and so there is no citizenship question on the current census. the supreme court said there could be. the supreme court said that the government has a lot of power in this area and that they could find a way to have that question on the census. >> but you actually have to work to find a reason or justification for it. >> you really hit it. the supreme court essentially said government, you need the barest amount of justification for this citizenship question and you didn't even do that. you didn't even show your work. so theoretically, it's possible that a question could be on the census, but it would require light speed in the government, and i can tell you working around the government in my business, it doesn't move at light speed.

and the other part would be this. imagine if tomorrow or monday the government came back and said, you know those forms we're trying to print out? we're going to include that question but now we have a brand-new reason. a brand-new reason we never mentioned once in all of our supreme court litigation. >> not only that, the government made a point of saying that we have got to have an answer to this by june 30th. so they caused the supreme court to work at light speed in order to give them a response by that time. last night i had a conversation with the former acting solicitor general who said that this now poses a different problem for the government. let's listen. >> when i sat in that chair, the government's top lawyer for litigation, the thing i was most concerned about was protecting the credibility that prior generations of government servants had built up with the federal courts and right now president trump is threatening to torch whatever credibility the justice department has left because of what he's doing. and that will be a huge, huge

error for the country and for him. >> the point is the government based its case on the idea that we need a decision on this by june 30th because we have to print these things and get them out. when they go back, the judge is going to say, didn't you tell us you were in a big hurry because you needed this by june 30th? >> i have so much sympathy for the government lawyers, especially in that piece you played just before where you have this conference call and the government lawyer saying, your honor, i don't know what the heck is going on. and that is really concerning. even as a defense attorney, often goes up against the department of justice, it's deeply concerning that they are that out of touch that they're not in on the memo. they don't know what's going on and learn about it via tweet and are left to understand what the president means. the president is effectively their boss. a lot of sympathy for government lawyers who are given orders, carrying them out, serving their country in the sense they're working at the department of justice but also maybe getting a lot of messages mixed over there at the doj. >> so the judge is also joining

the party confused about this and said to the government if you were facebook and an attorney for facebook told me one thing and then i read a press release from mark zuckerberg telling me something else, i'd be demanding mark zuckerberg appear in court with you next time because i'd be saying, i don't think you speak for your client anymore. that's problematic. because the solicitor general or the government's lawyers in court, i guess any lawyer, in any court, is meant to be speaking on the authority of their client and in their best interest. now i don't really know what your client wants, president yo -- what your boss, the president of the united states wants. >> one thing they can do is get off message with their attorneys. in the corporate context, maybe it's more closely held. there's separation between the doj and the white house. however, you're exactly right.

when the government is fighting that hard for what it is advocating for and the boss, the client essentially is going in a different direction and creating new work because a judge is concerned about what the doj and what the government plans to do, that's not necessarily a very good thing at all. no matter what the president thinks is right. maybe it's just the case he doesn't understand the strictures of that supreme court opinion because it's admittedly complex. but as the president, you probably should. >> just to be clear. the president cannot work around the law on this one. can't be they somehow print a citizenship question on the census without a court, and i don't know if it's the supreme court, ruling on this? >> i rarely say constitutional crisis because i think most thing norare not a constitution crise, i but directly disobeying a supreme court order, an opinion, would potentially rise to that level. i would hope the president wouldn't do that. >> danny, good to see you. danny cevallos. one of the president's

critics on capitol hill used the forth of july to declare his independence from the republican party. justin amash announced in a "washington post" op-ed, he was leaving the gop after growing disenfranchised. he'd remain in congress as an independent. he writes, we owe it to future generations to stand up for our constitutional republic so that americans may continue to live free for centuries to come. preserving liberty means telling the republican party and the democratic party that we will no longer let them play their partisan games at our expense. amash was asked about his decision when he appeared at a fourth of july parade this morning. >> i was hoping to set an example for people. i have been involved in party politics for a while. and i believe very strongly it's hurting our party at this point. and i think people need to stand up for what's right.

stand up for what they believe in and be independent of these party loyalties that really divide us. >> president trump responded with a tweet in which he called amash a total loser. he said it was, quote, great news for the republican party as one of the dumb of the and most disloyal men in congress is quitting the party. happy fourth of july to you, too. kelly o'donnell joins us now. you're at the white house but spend a lot of time covering capitol hill. tell me about this. it's not a common thing where we see a member of congress leaving their party, deciding to become an independent. what are the stakes for justin amash. >> the stakes are, will there be a challenge to his seat? that would certainly be an immediate one and remaining a member of the republican party, it would seem he would have drawn a more conservative trump friendly candidate. i've been to his michigan district in the past. he's won multiple elections and

has long been someone who walks his own path. he'd go against the administration, both republican and democrat from time to time. he was a member of the very conservative freedom caucus. he previously, in the last couple of weeks, resigned from that position so stepping away from the party is in some ways jarring but in others, not a big surprise. the big question will be, he has name recognition. has a following in his home district, if he chooses to keep running for congress. can he do that in an independent role? in that sense it may be a way for him to remain on the ballot and let the republicans pick a new candidate and fight that out. we'll see what his long-term ambitions are. certainly being the only republican to come out calling for impoochment put a target on his own back for the trump machine to work against him. and we've seen how they pick winners and losers in terms of the loyalty test. those are some of the real world

implications. there's also an implication for democrats who have a desire to see an impeachment inquiry move forward. one thing we've heard again and again from speaker nancy pelosi and some of the top committee chairman is to try to push the republicans in congress to join democrats in significant enough numbers to support impeachment so that it's not one party alone. he was the only republican now stepping away. that means they've got to begin again to search for any republican that would join them on that march toward an impeachment inquiry toward the president. >> i hope you have a good and fun fourth of july. even though you're working. kelly o'donnell at the white house. a blow to president trump's plans to build a border wall. an appeals court blocks the administration from using pentagon money for construction. so what is next? we'll talk about it after the break. you are watching msnbc. exactly! liberty mutual customizes your car insurance,

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welcome back. the trump administration suffered another legal blow on wednesday when a federal appeals court upheld a freeze that blocks the pentagon from using military money to build a u.s. border wall. the news marks the latest development in the president's long-winding fight for a wall along the southern border. back in january, he ended a 35-day government shutdown after battle with top democrats and effectively failing to get the funding for the wall he requested. a few weeks later he declared a

national emergency which the white house said would free billions of dollars from the pentagon available for a border wall. the decision to uphold the freeze could also mark a major political setback to the president as his chances to deliver on his signature campaign promise appear to be dwindling. joining me now, white house news correspondent geoff bennett. what's this latest development mean? >> white house officials are echoing their boss, the president, in accusing the court of being political. so here's a statement from deputy white house press secretary hogan gidley who says this. we have a national security and humanitarian crisis at our southern border, and every court ruling based on politics, not faithful application of the laws already in place, deepens the crisis, further emboldens child smugglers and drug cartels and endangers the lives of the-mile-an-hour people. so quick fact check here. the two judges of the three on this 9th circuit panel that ruled against the administration, one was a george w. bush appointee and the other was an obama appointee. and part of the ruling is pretty

instructive. it says the public interest is best served by respecting the constitution's assignment of the power of the purse to congress. and it said that the panel noted that the money was not unforeseen and that congress had already refused to allocate it. so the president when he dipped into those military funds and tried to build the wall himself by declaring a national emergency, that he was doing something that effectively was not constitutional. so now there's this effective freeze on rebuilding any more of this wall with these military funds. >> all right. any levers or things the white house can do at this point? >> well, the case is still being considered. it certainly could still be considered but they could not build any more of this wall while this injunction still exists. they can't build the 46 miles in yuma, arizona. the five or so miles in new mexico. and so it means when the president is campaigning on this long-promised southern border wall, frankly, he can't do it in

the way he has tried so far. at least not for right now. >> jeff, gogeoff, good to see y always. enjoy the rest of your fourth of july. in a move the administration claims is going to save the government money, the trump administration will replace in-court interpreters at initial immigration hearings with informational videos. at the san francisco -- as the "san francisco chronicle reports," those videos would play informing immigrants of their rights and the course of the proceedings. after that, immigrants have to answer questions. if they want to say something to the judge or if the judge wants to confirm they understand, no interpreter would be provided. joining me is -- from washington is the correspondent for the san francisco chronicle who reported on this first. tal, the sort of -- this belies, you know belief. how does this actually work? >> we're talking about here the first court appearance for immigrants in immigration court

which is a separate system from the federal courts. it's entirely run by the justice department. it's a very unique setup. and the justice department has decided that there is so much of a budget crunch, there's some ongoing issues that sources tell me have been happen with the interpreters' contract because we tend to think that perhaps this is only a spanish issue. but there are a myriad of indigenous languages that central american migrants speak, and people are coming from all over the world to these courts. there's a range of interpreters needed. they're seeing this as a way to cut back on that interpreter cost. they are telling the immigration judges they can no longer book these in-person interpreters to run through these first court appearances. they are instead recording these videos that are supposed to run through what the judges normally inform the immigrant in a variety of languages and they're saying playing that video and then having a backup sort of telephone, dial an interpreter service if other questions should arise. they say will be sufficient rather than having an actual

interpreter in court who can help the immigrants understand as the hearing progresses what is actually happening. >> you make the point there are a diverse number of languages. a lot of people showing up from all over the world. but even those coming from the northern triangle countries in south america, in central america, many of them don't speak spanish. they speak certain indigenous languages or certain di lects. is there a legal challenge that says their rights are being undermined by the fact they won't have an interpreter? >> we don't have one yet. i just reported this yesterday. i've not heard from any groups yet that tell me they plan to challenge. there's a couple ways this can go. first of all, the union that represents immigration judges is not happy with this change. they say they have not been given sufficient notice. this is not something that they can bargain exactly as to whether or not it can go into effect but they say they should be given an adequate opportunity to bargain over the implementation and impact of it. and they say they are not being given that opportunity. so they could potentially try to file some sort of grievance from

their end. but the -- one of the reasons they say this is such a short-sided move is because the way this could play out is that every immigrant who goes through a proceeding like this could potentially have grounds for appeal years down the road because, for example, if they show up at this first hearing and the judge tells them about their next court appearance and the fact they could potentially get a lawyer if they misunderstand that and think they shouldn't come back without a lawyer or don't understand when they are told to show up or don't have the correct address on file, they don't show up for the next hearing, they could get a deportation notice. five years later, i.c.e. could pick them up and say, you have a deportation notice. at that point, they could file an appeal and say they were inadequately informed of their rights. so this type of thing could play out in the federal courts for years. and so critics of the move say it's so shortsides because in reality, it's not going to promote efficiency. it could bog down the system for years to come. >> and the system is already bogged down. we're looking for things that make it smoother, not harder. >> tal, thank you for joining

me. as the united states and iran trade jabs over nuclear weapons, there's word that iran might consider restarting talks with the united states, but only under certain specific conditions. that's coming up next. you're watching msnbc live. cond? while you ponder that, consider adopting a rescue pet. there are 6.5 million of them; they all need a forever home. it would mean the world to them, and they will love you forever. ♪ ♪ in big ways and in small, bank of america is here to help you get things done. what would you like the power to do?® ♪ done

okay. tehran could be open to diplomatic talks if ayatollah ali khamenei approves. that's according to iran's intelligence minister who, according to state media said holding talks with america can be reviewed by iran only if president trump lifts the sanctions and our supreme leader gives permission to hold such talks. this comes after iran threatened to enrich more uranium if european union failed to help ease sanctions. trump fired back at iran's warning with a tweet saying be careful with the threats iran. they can come back to bite you like no one has been bitten before. joining me, former treasury spokesperson, hagar shamali. obviously, nothing in iran at a government level, at that level would happen without the ayatollah, the supreme leader

being involved. that part of the message is insignificant because that would have to be the case. the other precondition is that sanctions be lifted. >> right. >> that appears in our current time to be a nonstarter. >> for this administration, it's a nonstarter. generally, though, even with previous administrations, they didn't use to lift sanctions as a prerequisite for negotiations to start. under obama in 2014, at the time when i was at the treasury department we gave sanctions waivers and a hold on certain sanctions. they were minor, related mostly to iranian trade. to kind of -- part of it is a good faith but a small step on our side, a small step on their side so negotiations could carry over. >> it was a carrot tied to a stick. >> a little, yeah. >> the sanctions exist. we don't have to go through the whole process to get them reinstated because that's difficult. but we'll lift them or give you a waiver and if you do what you say you're going to do, the sanctions remain in obeyance. >> the idea was if the agreement comes through, those sanctions

that had been on hold or for which they received waivers would be permanent and then, obviously, more sanctions would be lifted. >> when trying to make sense of the messages coming every two or three days from iran, what are you sensing? that they're saying there are potential openings for you, america, but we're going to enrich more uranium and surpass the amounts? at this point iran appears to be in breach of the deal. >> right. >> because they've said we've gone beyond the limits they're allowed in terms of enriching uranium. >> at the end of the day, both sides are trying to increase their leverage for ultimate negotiations. so for iran, their messages are very clear. it's two goals. one, we want sanctions relief. two, we want to increase our own leverage which we would have if we break part of the deal and go back to nuclear proliferation efforts. for future sanctions relief efforts or future negotiations. and president trump is really no different. that's what he's doing, too. he's increasing his leverage with the idea in mind of

potentially, ultimately down the road also to strike some kind of deal or negotiations. and for him, i think he's thinking, i want the maximum pressure so that i can negotiate everything, right? everything that the obama administration didn't. >> so is it your view that neither side is ramping up for war? >> neither side is ramping up for war. they're just increasing their points of leverage for negotiations. and furthermore, iran steps -- they have taken one step so far in breach of the deal which is to increase their uranium stockpile. and the second step that they've announced is coming as of sunday would be to enrich their uranium past the 3.67%. set in the 2015 deal. those two steps, although i don't want to dismiss them, they are concerning, but that doesn't mean they're close to a nuclear weapon. >> you've authored an article calling for the united states government to take the lead in pressuring countries to adopt the magnitsky legislation.

the idea that you can impose sanctions onned haves in countries or on countries for human rights abuses. this is part of what came out of the death of sergei magnitsky, who was the lawyer for bill brouder, and it was imposed against the russians. it's what became the adoption story that we thought that meeting in trump tower was all about. >> right. >> what's your argument here? this should be global? >> that the global magnitsky act which targets human rights abusers needs to be passed in countries that don't have it. and those countries that have passed it, of which athere are handful, haven't really used it. they need to be pushed to take action under those pieces of legislation. >> but there are things that have happened, for instance, where members of congress have said this would be somewhere where you would use the magnitsky act. in fact, i -- if i'm not mistaken, after the death of jamal khashoggi, a lot of legislators were saying, we have an act. we have a way to deal with this

if we believe a country has committed human rights abuses. >> right, absolutely. on saudi arabia specifically, the administration sanctioned 17 saudi individuals allegedly involved in the killing of jamal khashoggi, right? which, there could have been more done there, frankly. but the thing about the magnitsky act and of all the sanctions, these are my favorite sankss sanctions, it's because they work and achieve a really good means to -- it's a really good means to an end when talking about fighting for human rights abuses. the example i cite in the article is turkey specifically where the trump administration sanctioned two senior turkish government officials last summer for the detengss tion of pastor brunson and we know sanctions had a role in his release. i also mentioned this in his piece. somebody came up to me, a belarusian politician and activist who was detained for his political activities for peacefully protesting and was

released specifically because of european sanctions. so it's just a great tool. i know that i speak a lot about sanctions. i love -- but these are my favorite. >> you know them well. >> they work. >> i had never known which -- if somebody asked me which are your favorite sanctions, now i know. thank you. enjoy your fourth of july. the price of some prescription drugs is skyrocketing. coming up next, we'll take a deep dive into medicare part d which provides prescription drug benefits and why it might be changing. you're watching msnbc news. you're watching msnbc news

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the presidential candidates have made health care a major focus of their campaigns. this week we've been looking into medicare for all. and the current plans offered by the government. today we'll look at medicare part d. remember, medicare for all is not the same as medicare but we want to try and give you as many breakdowns about what's in medicare so you understand what we're talking about. medicare part d is designed to help improve affordability of medication for people who are on medicare. to refresh your memory, there are two major federally funded health insurance programs in place right now. the original medicare and medicare advantage, which is an all in one alternative to the original medicare, including additional coverage like vision and dental. med scare manaicare is managed government. covers adults who are 65 and

older. it's made up of three main parts, a, b and d. part c is medicare advantage. i want to focus on part d which provides prescription drug coverage. offered through private companies and is approved by the federal government. it approves -- it covers most outpatient prescription drugs. each part d plan has a list of covered drugs called a formulary. all part d plans are required to cover all drugs available in certain categories, including hiv treatments, antidepressants, antipsychotics, anticonvulsives and anti-cancer drugs. enrollment stands at nearly 45 million people for 2019, which is double the enrollment numbers when you go back to 2006. but high costs associated with the program are leading for a lot of calls to change this and to explain that, i want to bring in dr. kavita patel, a practicing physician and vice president of payer and provider

integration at johns hopkins medicine. she served in the obama administration as director of policy for the office of intergovernmental affairs and public engagement. thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> what's the thing people who don't understand part d, what do they need to understand? >> the basics you went over. the thing people need to understand, it's private insurance companies who run the part d program. in fact, three insurance companies really have almost a monopoly on all of the private part d plans. so people think of this as the government controlling prescription drug plans. they don't. the government just sets the standards, and the private plans have to compete for the lowest premiums and then the government says, okay, we've approved your plan and the beneficiaries, people like my parents have to pick those plans and then they have to play the game in january of every year of being able to afford medications, like cancer drugs. if these cancer drugs continue to escalate at the prices we've

seen, a cancer drug in 2006 might have been $50 a month. today, out of pocket costs can be as high as $3,000 a month. >> when we're looking at these statistics like we've got on the screen that in 2019, 3400 drugs -- drug prices went up. 17% more than increased in 2018. and when you look at the average price increase in drugs, it's 10.5%. which is five times the rate of inflation. if you're older on a fixed income, your income didn't go up by anywhere near this. >> no. >> if you are getting your prescriptions through medicare part d, do those same increases affect you the same way? >> they do, yes. they do affect you. however, you -- there is also the government didn't leave people empty handed. 1 out of 5 medicare beneficiaries get a subsidy called a low-income subsidy. and many, including myself, have advocated that that actually be increased because the average medicare beneficiary only makes between $17,000 to $30,000 a

year because they are retired. they don't have income. so this is something that i think is critical. something the presidential candidates have not really addressed. >> yeah. >> but i think we'll have to. >> it's worth noting under the medicare for all program as suggested by bernie sanders, which is -- that would replace this. you'd get your prescriptions. everybody would get their prescriptions paid for. that's further than a place like canada goes. >> it is. an element people should take home from this is the government does not negotiate drug prices. and i think one thing that medicare for all or even just thinking about what could be done today is more active drug price negotiation -- >> right. this is an important point. medicare is not able to negotiate. >> correct. >> those drug prices. i assume that is a strong pharmaceutical lobby or insurance lobby? who got that into place. that's a difference like in canada or the uk where the

government does negotiate those prices and your prescription drug prices are lower. >> the part d plan started when george bush was president. and it wasn't actually completely easy to get this through congress. there were a lot of concessions, just like with obamacare that were made. so the concession made to get seniors their drug benefit was to not have the government actively negotiate drug prices. but that is going to come back around because what drugs cost in 2006 has absolutely dwarfed by today. >> in 2010, the price of drugs in medicare part d has gone from $8.7 billion in 2010 to $32.8 billion in 2015. so that is a major, major issue. kavita, thanks for helping us through. we carve this into little bits and you always help us understand them. following breaking news right now. there's been a major earthquake in southern california. joining me now, nbc's joe fryer. what do you know and where this

was earthquake and how powerful was it? >> we're just now collecting information. we know right now preliminary is magnitude 6.6 earthquake centered near ridgecrest, california, about 140 miles north and east of where we are in los angeles. we can tell you, we felt it here. we were all working in the newsroom. suddenly everyone started looking around. it was one of those rolling earthquakes. not an aggressive shaking one but a rolling earthquake. everyone could feel it. it felt like it kept going longer than we're used to with some of the short earthquakes here in l.a. some people decided to hide under their desks quickly. the news room picked up to check what we can find out. preliminary information is magnitude 6.6. if you look on social media, you see throughout the los angeles area and beyond, there were people who felt it. we're still waiting to see if there's any reports of any significant damage anywhere. we'll try and collect that information and see what else we can learn about it. but this took place about

two-hour drive outside of l.a. to the north and east near the mojave desert in ridgecrest, california. a rolling-type earthquake that pretty much all of us here could feel and was felt throughout the area. i got a call from my home about ten minutes -- >> i'm going here -- >> joe, i'm going to interrupt you. stay with me. i want to go to our local affiliate knbc in los angeles and listen in to their coverage. >> caller: my cat was startled and there was the most intense shaking and rolling, mainly rolling. and it went on. the thing is, it went on, on and on and on. and i thought, is it ever going to stop? and my house is up in the hills, it's built on stilts and i could feel the foundation of the house shaking. and my flat screen tv was going back and forth and i kept saying to myself, let it stop, let it stop. it has to stop now. >> you know, that's the unsettling part, right, diane,

is that you think it's just going to happen in that one moment, but it continues to go on. anthony yanez is actually looking about information about rolling earthquakes and what that means and we'll bring that to you later on. but right now, do you have your own earthquake kit. are you settled in that if you need to move, you have that ability to do so? >> well, i have plenty of bottled water here and i have flashlights and so forth and the first thing i think i would do is take my cats and my important papers and my briefcase and my jewelry box and -- >> you know, you make a good point there. we think about the humans, but we also have the pets involved here. my husband actually was testing me that the dog started howling at our home because of what was happening. and actually gave the first indication of what was going on. diane, please stay safe. thank you so much for joining us from woodland hills, where she

felt the effects miles and miles away. we also now want to go to mekahlo medina. he is down on the ground with folks who felt it where you are. hey, mac, what are you and what did you feel? >> reporter: we're in downtown l.a. and boy did we feel it. it was a rolling earthquake. in fact, i didn't even know it was an earthquake while it happened. we were sitting here in the live truck editing some video, right in that live truck, and the truck just started shaking like someone was on the back bumper. our photographer said, is that a quake? yeah, boy, was it ever? and we actually found some folks here. david actually felt the quake. he was sitting nearby on a bench. what'd it feel like for you? >> it felt like it was rolling and just like shaking quite a bit, for at least 10 or 15 seconds. and then i saw the windows shaking at the building, i was right nearby. and then it seemed to last for at least 15 seconds and stopped for like, die out, and started

up again for another at least ten seconds. >> and you were there for northridge back in the '90s. how does this compare to what you felt in northridge. >> this was nothing compared to that. northridge was a lot more like shaking, more of a rolling effect. >> also with us was gerald, who was actually on the road. >> on the road. >> reporter: when you felt the quake. tell us what you felt. >> i was driving with my kids and i got dropped off in downtown l.a. and it was a weird experience, on the freeway, the car just started shaking. it sound like car had batteries in it. but it was a weird experience. but it wasn't that heavy. i had earthquake experience before. but it was all right. nothing too major. but, yeah, it was -- it was weird. >> reporter: i know you told me earlier, you didn't know what it was, and your mom texted you and was like, did you feel the quake? and you knew it had to be the quake. >> i got back on the freeway, and my mom started calling us,

wanting to make sure everything was okay. >> caller: thanks so much for talking with us. we have another person here, mac, who felt the quake as well. tell us what you felt? >> we were walking back, i thought it was just a heavy truck, but there weren't any heavy trucks around. and i turned -- i was up by the broed and there were people that were filming and then it clicked in my mind that they were filming the high rises swaying back and forth. >> how long did it last for you? were you freaked out a little bit? >> no, i mean, i'm a californian, so you kind of expect these. but it was just kind of puzzling, because it felt like a heavy truck going by, but there weren't any heavy trucks. that's when it clicked that it was an earthquake. >> reporter: we now know it's a magnitude 6.6 earthquake, so a big one, but pretty far away from us. the fact that we felt it so strongly here shows you just how big it was. as a californian, this is a good time to remind people to get ready for a big one when it happens. everyone says it's going to happen. are you ready for that big one? >> no. i hate to be so nonchalant, but

6.6, when you see the predictions about what it's going to be when the big one hits, this is nothing. it's going to be a lot larger and i'm not ready when the earthquakes come, i stand up and ride the wave and that's not what you're supposed to do. >> reporter: well, will this reminder to get ready, get a kit ready to go? >> probably not. >> reporter: all right, well, speaking the truth. thanks so much, mac. appreciate it. there's a few folks here in the downtown area that felt it. once again for us in the truck when this happened, it felt like somebody was jumping on the back bumper, we weren't sure if it was an earthquake until we actually read that it was, such a large earthquake. mekahlo medina, back to you guys. >> and that's exactly what we felt here in the studio, that kind of rolling feel, not a sudden jolt or that kind of shaking, but that kind of roll. and as you mentioned, the person you were just speaking with, it felt like a truck driving down street. >> we're listening into our affiliate in los angeles. it does seem to be after 6.6 earthquake. there's some uncertainty about

whether it was 6.4 magnitude or 6.6. knbc is saying it's 6.6. some other places are zpsuggestg 6.6, we have actual reports that it was 6.4. but somewhere in that vicinity. which is not an insignificant earthquake. it is not, as you just heard someone say, the big one, that people in california often prepare for. but we have various descriptions about how it felt. there was a description joe fryer was talking to me about, sounding like a rolling earthquake. the kind of thing that continues and moves as it rumbles through. the reporter who was in the knbc van was suggesting that it felt a little bit like somebody was jumping on the bumper a little bit and they had to ask each other, do you think that was an earthquake? so that's what seems to be going on. we have not heard from anybody who was fearing for their life, but they all sort of seem to be looking over and saying, that definitely doesn't feel like something normal. it feels like it might have been an earthquake.

one person who the knbc reporter spoke to said it felt like a heavy truck was rumbling by. the earthquake apparently occurred at 10:02 pacific time, which would be 1:02 eastern time. and it was centered six miles from ridge crecrest, california. we'll put a map up when we get one to show you where ridgecrest was. that's all of california, i can guarantee you that ridgecrest is in california. the earthquake occurred 30 miles from california city, 59 miles from barstow, if you know where that is. 65 miles from rosamond. in the past ten days, by the way, there have been two earthquakes of magnitude 3.0 or higher centered nearby. centered in that same area. and just so you know, if you don't live in that area, there are an average of about 25 earthquakes that have been a magnitude of between 4.0 and 5.0

per year. that's according to a three-year sample that has been done. so it is not an entirely unfamiliar thing to happen in california. but at the moment, 6.4 is what we're going with. we're hearing some reports it was a 6.6 magnitude earthquake. often with earthquakes, a lot of the importance is how deep the earthquake actually was. this one occurred at a depth of 5.6 miles below the surface of the earth. though obviously, when you're a small animal, these things feel larger than they do to the larger humans who we've been talking to, who seem to be taking it in their stride. this is a helicopter shot over los angeles right now. nothing seems to have changed in terms of activity. what we do not have is reports of damage.

either from the scene or los angeles, which is 113 miles away from the epicenter. so give you some context on this, 6.4 is the magnitude at the epicenter, 5.6 miles below ground in ridgecrest, california. we did hear peopfrom people in angeles that they did feel it, they felt something that occurred, but it felt like rumbling. it felt like, as the reporter said, somebody jumping on the bumper of their vehicle. the u.s. geological survey, which is where we get our information from about the magnitude of these earthquakes is suggesting a 6.4 earthquake. i want to welcome viewers who are joining us now at the top of the hour. we have breaking news from los angeles where there has been an earthquake felt. the earthquake was not in los

angeles, but it has been felt if downtown los angeles. we don't have reports of damage right now, but the earthquake did apparently take place about an hour ago. almost an hour ago at 1:02 p.m. you can see there a helicopter over los angeles, flying over to sort of get a sense of what's going on. you can see traffic on the freeways there. we don't have reports of any activity coming to a halt because of damage. but what we don't is damage reports from the scene in ridgecrest, california. we do have lester holt on the scene in santa monica, california. he's joining me now. lester, did you feel this earthquake? >> reporter: absolutely felt it, ali. i was sitting in my living room and felt the shaking. now, as a new yorker, there's a moment of processing, of, is it a subway underneath me? i've been in buildings that shake a little bit because of a subway. but quickly processed that out, realized what was happening, got up away from the major glass door where i was sitting, got up and called out to my family.

and the strange thing about this one, it kept rolling and rolling and rolling. it felt like it lasted a good minute. i didn't have my phone in my hand at the time, but i had time to find my son and get my phone and it was still rolling and shoot a little video of the dining room lights swaying a little bit. and i actually did take cover under the kitchen counter for a moment. but nothing fell, there was no sense of damage. it was just, when they go on that long -- and i have been through a number of earthquakes -- you never know if they're going to rapidly intensify. sometimes they hit you with a sharp jolt and then a little valley and it hits you again. this one continued to roll. my son and i looked at each other for a few minutes like, i think it's still going. and there's that moment of uncertainty before it finally settled down. and went on the usgs website to find out where it was. my first thought was, i don't think this has hit where i am, which means this was a big quake from quite far away. and in fact, we're about 15

miles from downtown l.a., so that puts us about 130 miles from the epicenter. and again, it was felt pretty strong, ali. >> this is interesting, you are describing it as a rolling earthquake, something that kept on going for a while. the reporter from knbc said they were inside their live truck and it felt like somebody might have been on the bumper for a little while. somebody else described it as a big truck driving by, but it had that continuous feel as opposed to sort of the immediate short-lived jolt. let me tell you what we're getting about this right now, lester. the quake was about 6.4 magnitude, according to the u.s. geological survey in ridgecrest, california. as you said, about 130 miles from where you are in santa monica, about 114 miles from downtown los angeles. it is also now, we are getting reports, felt in las vegas. we do not have reports of damage as of yet. and a tsunami is not expected,

according to the national tsunami warning center. there were two recorded earthquakes on thursday in san bernardino county, which were 4.0 and 2.2. and this is actually a third earthquake this week, but it was smaller. in 1994, there was a large earthquake, lester, in southern california, northridge, and it actually killed dozens of people and caused billions in damage. so a 6.6 earthquake is not a small matter. >> no, not a small matter at all. we look through these numbers and they mean different things different places. i covered the horrific up with in 2010 in haiti and, you know, the construction standards there were so low that there was, as you remember, a huge amount of death and destruction. at the same time, one of a similar magnitude in chile did not cause the same kind of urban damage that we saw in haiti. and again, that was because of better construction standards. although, that was a devastating earthquake. so the numbers don't mean a lot

at first. 6.4, 6.6, thacht's a sizable quake. here in a modern place like los angeles, 130 miles away, i don't think you would expect any damage. maybe some things falling off shelves, although i didn't experience that at all. i looked up at the chandelier for that sect confirmation that, yes, this building is moving. i'm on the fourth familiar of a ten-story condominium building. and so, you know, you have that high rise maybe amplifies it as it sways just a little bit. but there was no sense of panic, just that concern, again, having been through these things, that sometimes the first wave can feel very minor and then there's a second jolt. in this case, it was just kind of a continuous rolling motion that i experienced. >> the reports we're getting now from people in los angeles say that they felt it as you described it, slow and steady, not sort of ramping up or going down over the course of about 30 seconds.

by the way, for those people watching this coverage in the region, local emergency agencies are being flooded with calls. and officials are asking that people only use 911 for emergencies, not for information. we'll try and give you the information here. our local affiliate on the ground, knbc, will give you information if you're watching it locally, but don't call 911 for information, because they do need to know if there are rescues that need to be undertaken, whether there is damage. often, leverage, something you'll know from your coverage is that fires can occur as a result of ruptured gas lines and things like that. the idea that it lasted about 30 seconds and was sort of slow and steady, is that how it felt to you? >> yeah, slow and steady again, but there's always this anticipation of how long is this going to go on. and sometimes time and intensity will increase. and i don't take these things lightly. i've covered the horrific earthquake and nuclear disaster in japan and certainly the

disaster in haiti back in 2010. i grew up on the west coast and quite familiar with earthquakes. and though new york is my home. i'm a part-time los angeles resident as well. and i have -- the first thing i thought of was, where's my earthquake kit? and i have one of those in a closet ready to go with water and flashlights and all sorts of other things might be required. it's the reality of living in this part of the country. >> lester, thank you for that. make sure everybody around you is safe. we'll check in with you in a little bit. lester hotlt for us in santa monica. we are covering this earthquake, a 6.4 magnitude earthquake in ridgecrest, california, about 114 miles away from downtown california -- downtown los angeles. the tremor, the earthquake was felt in downtown los angeles. it was felt in las vegas, as well. let's tune into our local affiliate knbc. >> -- saying that this was not

the san andreas fault, but this is an area known for a lot of little faults, this is not a big fault, so it's one of those little faults that slipped, causing this 6.4 earthquake. and we don't want to make it seem like this was any kind of small earthquake, this is what we consider a very, very strong quake. right now we want to get to brian stevens with los angeles county fire department. brian, are you on the phone with us here? >> yes, how are we doing? >> we're doing okay. we felt that rolling around about 32 minutes ago now here at the nbc studios. we're based year in universal city. and we want to know just what you're hearing potentially about any reports coming in in that area? are you sending any crews out there and what did you feel? >> right now, we don't have any requests for resources up there. obviously, this is still early stages. it's just been about a half hour ago that this earthquake initially hit. we have had all of our 22 battalions report in that some of them did feel it, some of them didn't. however, we do not have any report of injuries or damage right now along the county area.

>> and brian, here we are. so that is good news for what we're hearing from your end. this is just outside of los angeles county. in this situation, would you send any crews, preliminary, to help out crews? >> so we have urban search and rescue teams, search dogs, and resources that we will definitely provide, if requested. there's a mutual aid agreement throughout the entire state, where everyone comes to help each other. and if requested, we would send resources up there to assist. >> and brian, you know, in this type of situation, i think we just want to remind our viewers why it's so important to be prepared for something like this. my understanding is this is the first 6 plus, you know, 6.0 plus earthquake since 2014. that would have been the napa quake. here in southern california, i think we go back as far as '94 for this size of quake. but it's just another reminder that we always have to be

prepared. these things can happen at any moment without any warning. >> absolutely. it has been quite a while, so it's probably not on a lot of people's minds. that's why we would like to go ahead and remind everyone to be prepared, have an evacuation plan, have contact lists for people, energy contacts, have some water, food storage. don't forget to drop and cover. find a strong table you can be under. and really important, too, is a lot of us are dependent on our wi-fi, our internet, our cell phone these days, which may not work in a strong earthquake. you might be resorting to a.m. radios if that's the only thing that's up. if not, referencing the news on the television. it's a good thing to have and get prepared with an emergency earthquake preparedness kit. >> brian, thank you so much. that's a good point. >> and what brian's mentioning there, the difference between now and '94 was the amount of technology that we now rely on, how quickly that technology can disappear from our hands, just simply not work in a situation like this.

just another reminder that we have to rely on battery-powered or solar-powered technology to get us through something like this. brian stevens with l.a. county fire, we want to thank you so much. >> thank you so much for coming by. we appreciate your help in all of this. we also want to talk to you about l.a. city fire, as prepared as l.a. county fire. they have all 106 fire stations conducting a strategic survey of their districts to determine if any damage exists there. once the process is complete, they'll do an overall assessment to see about any impact that the city of los angeles may have had with this earthquake. but right now, we want to go on over to toni guinyard to see what you guys felt. >> reporter: good morning. we thought we would be talking about the huntington beach fourth of july parade, it's the 115th year. but then the earthquake. we were in the truck. i felt some rocking. i thought it was a young boy who was leaning up against the truck while his mom was taking a photo. i went outside and said, stop doing that, and then realized the earthquake had happened.

marie knight, communication -- community affairs with the city of huntington beach, i know you must be breathing a sigh of relief given a crowd of 300,000 here. >> absolutely. it's a beautiful day in surf city and i guess we can now say, surf city really rocks and rolls with the earthquake. >> you felt it. where were you, what did you feel? >> just sitting up in the grandstands and it felt like somebody was walking up or walking down and it shook a little bit. all is well here. we're hosting the biggest parade west of the mississippi and it's a beautiful day and we could be happier. >> reporter: they couldn't be happier because a lot of people in the crowd did not feel it. but i want to meet someone else. excuse me, sir. mike newton. mike, can i talk to you real quick. we're live on nbc 4. mike newton, you were standing near the grandstand but you also realized a couple of things. >> i noticed a couple of people kind of, what's that? and then i felt the ground just kind of rolling. >> reporter: were you in the stands -- >> i was standing right here. and i happened to look at the traffic light and it was moving around. >> reporter: were you concerned

in that moment when it clicked, this is an earthquake, this isn't just a band? >> i don't get concerned about them. >> reporter: i wish i was as cool as you. >> it is what it is. >> reporter: you lived in southern california for quite a while? >> all my life. 70 years. >> 70 years. >> today. >> reporter: happy birthday. >> thank you. >> we hope we don't have another earthquake. marie knight said she had visitors in from out of town who called her and said, what was that? and she said, now you're getting a full taste of southern california. but just thinking of the potential. look at the crowd. we are talking about 300,000 people lined along a two-mile parade route. think about what could have been had this crowd really felt the shaking. granted, they're listening to you, some people are walking up and telling me they're following developments on our app and nbc l.a..com. they want to keep an eye on what's happening. it's a distraction to a certain extent to the parade, but not a huge distraction, because so many people did not feel a

thing. i'm toni guinyard, reporting live from huntington beach, back to you in the studio. i'll look around and see if i can find more folk who is experienced it. >> absolutely, toni. one thing we'll always remember about this earthquake today, not only july 4th, obviously, people were out when this happened, people are out with their families, they're typically not at work like they would be on a normal thursday, so to speak. and i think that's one thing that will bring some comfort to people. the first thing they think about is their family. my family told me the lights were shaking. make sure that they are doing okay. we want to give you a little bit more perspective. we have a "did you feel it" map here on our screen that you can see there in the yellow that is where most people felt it. we believe this happened near rid ridgecrest right on the edge of kern county and san bernardino county. this earthquake appears to be, if i'm looking at this map correctly, the northwest corner of san bernardino county there. and we want to give you a little

perspective of the last time we felt something like this in california. the 6.0 napa quake that was back if 2014 here in southern california, the northridge quake, january 17th, 1994, that was a 6.7? a >> and someone was mentioning, one of the geological earthquakes was talking about how the 6.7 earthquake in northridge was underneath us, which meant it was underneath where a large population lies. we saw the destruction there, obviously, because of where it was. this happens to be in an area that's more remote. not saying it's any more or less dangerous, but because of the topography that's there and the population that's there and the number of buildings and people, it did happen in a more remote area and as large as it is, didn't have the capability of destruction that could have been under more buildings and people. and people have been sending us, as you see here, pools, you know, with -- kind of like an ocean wave in a pool because of

this rolling earthquake that came through. thank you so much evan start 1 dieter for your tweet and letting us put this on our air. another viewer here -- >> all right. so we've got a 6.4 magnitude earthquake in ridgecrest, california, about 119 miles from los angeles. let's join in with our friends at nbc, picking up the reporting. at nbc, picking up the reporting. >> breaking news out of southern california where a strong 6.4 magnitude earthquake has struck and rattled los angeles. >> this happens to be in an area that's more remote. not saying it's anymore or less dangerous. >> the epicenter was near ridgecrest california. that's about 113 miles outside of los angeles, where you are right now. your family's okay. what did you all feel, lester?

>> well, i was sitting on a chair -- >> all right, there's lester holt who we were talking to just a few moments ago. he is at his place in santa monica where he did feel it. so los angeles is about 120 miles from the epicenter, lester is about 130 miles from it. this was felt there. lester felt it, it was felt in las vegas. now, we believe that the earthquake happened a little over an hour ago, about 102 p.m. eastern. but we're getting -- i'm seeing from people that they felt it around 1:30 eastern or so. and we keep hearing some description of how it was a rolling earthquake. it sort of felt like it continued. lester sort of had the analogy that i would have, that maybe it felt like a subway underfoot, but obviously, there's no subway where he is. some people described it as a heavy truck going by, lasting about 30 seconds. a reporter in los angeles described it as somebody jumping on his bumper, maybe. another reporter thought maybe somebody was leaning against their truck and shaking it a little bit.

so that's sort of how it felt. let's go back to nbc and see what they've got. >> this was felt all the way to vegas and southern california. in an area with poor construction, that can be devastating. we've certainly seen it in other parts of the world, as well. by the time it reaches us, we felt it widely. it put it out on twitter and quickly people were chiming in from different parts of california, hundreds of miles apart, declaring that they had felt it. >> was this stronger, lester, than other earthquakes that you've experienced? >> it's among the strongest. keep in mind, i covered the earthquake disasters in japan and also in haiti and they were very sizable aftershocks after that i felt, but it's been a long time since i felt one that went on this long. i think the length of it is what

was disturbing. sometimes it will feel like, okay, it's a little rocky, and boom you get almost a second shock. this was like a steady little roll, like you're on the ocean. >> and lester, in the past ten days, there have been two earthquakes of magnitude 3.0 or greater centered nearby where this one hit. so what extent is there concern about aftershocks and potentially more earthquakes? >> not having spoken to anyone about this particular quake yet, aftershocks are almost a certainty when you have an earthquake of this size. if they'll be of a size that we feel here in the los angeles area is to be determined. but i would expect just from the experience of covering a number of earthquakes that we would get some aftershocks along the way. >> lester, we're thankful you and your family are safe. our joe fryer is in los angeles as well. i want to get right to him. joe, at this point, what's the latest? any reports of any significant damage or injuries? >> kristen, we're checking

around. so far, there are no reports of any significant damage or injuries. we know it was felt in the los angeles area, but we also know l.a. is a good distance away, a good two-hour drive from where this earthquake was centered. we are here in universal city, much like lester, we could also feel the earthquake. it was one of those situations where everyone sort of started to look around and go, is this an earthquake? again, we felt the same thing lester did. sort of a rolling motion, which is very different from an aggressive jolt. but it did seem to last longer than most of the earthquakes that we feel around here that aren't terribly aggressive. so the good news is, no reports of any injuries or damage so far. though we're certainly still checking on that. we do know it was felt across the california area. one reporter with our local if i felt here in los angeles says he was sitting in his live truck. it felt like someone had sort of jumped on the back bumper and was jumping up and down. another person said that he was riding in a car and said he could feel the motion. some people looked up and they

could feel the buildings swaying a little bit in downtown los angeles. it's something that nearly everyone seemed to notice, but it wasn't so aggressive that we were seeing things falling off of shelves or being damaged to a serious degree. the big question will be, if there are people who live closer to where this was centered, it's not as well populated out there, but was there more severe damage out there? all indications are this was a relatively shallow earthquake, those tend to cause more damage. but it depends on how powerful the earthquake is and exactly where it happens. kristin? >> and we will continue to track that and those questions throughout the afternoon. joe fryer, thank you for that reporting. and we will have much more tonight on "nbc nightly news" and continuing coverage on our nbc news app. for now, i'm kristen welker, nbc news new york. that's nbc's news special. let's go to knbc, our local affiliate in los angeles, about 120 miles from the epicenter.

it has been felt in los angeles. >> so the system worked and said there's an earthquake of about 6.2, producing energy and the warning came through. do we have a time of how much warning we got in pasadena? and the final magnitude -- okay, so in los angeles, there was 48-second warning that the shaking was arriving. obviously, it was not damaging shaking. that's one of the downsides to this only approach that we have. the farther away you are, the more warning you get and the less likely it is to be dama damaging. >> and there are censors buried somewhere or satellites? how do we know? >> so how do we ever know there's an earthquake? we have censors called seismometers distributes around southern california. we record about 500 censors here at the caltech usgs seismic network. and they are distributed widely

so we can try to catch them. as soon as we get enough nearby, we can see that it's -- that an earthquake is underway and we send that information out. and in fact, one of the exciting thin things, these biggest earthquakes aren't at a point. so when we're trying to predict where we'll be affected, we need to know which direction the fault is going. we have a prototype system and that worked here, too. so we got an estimate of the fault growing as it was happening. so it's the first time we've really ever had that work. >> can we talk a little bit about the motion. to me, it felt like i was on a boat and i've felt a little nauseous and i've heard others say the same. >> okay, so, an earthquake produces energy at many different wavelengths. there's high-frequency energy that jerks you around and loaf frequency energy that rolls. the high-frequency energy dies off with distance more quickly than the low-frequency energy. think about a boom box. you hear the car going down the street when it's a long ways away, all you hear is the drum

beat. that's the low-frequency energy getting farther than the high-frequency energy. so if you feel it as a rolling motion, you know it's pretty far away. so when i felt the motion, it felt pretty rolling motion and it lasted for ten seconds, i could estimate that it had to be at least a magnitude 6 and it had to be pretty far away. zblf for tho >> for those just joining, can you back up to the beginning. are we having any reports of damage? where was the earthquake centered exactly? the basics? >> the basics of the earthquake, the earthquake is near china lake and ridgecrest. so the area to the east of the southern-most part of the san andreas fault. the nearest fault is the little lake fault and that might be associated with it, but we don't know. we'll have to have a field geologist to tell us. it is a relatively uninhabited -- it's a sparsely inhabited area, so the number of people who would have received damage is much lower. i think we need to check what's

happening in ridgecrest and china lake. damage reports do not come here. we are seismologists measuring the movement of the ground. damage reports go to the governor's office of emergency services. rob, can i ask you to come join us? >> sure. >> so rob graves is a seismologist with the u.s. geological survey and the regional coordinate for southern california, so -- >> and let me just -- obviously, we're here because we had an earthquake to celebrate fourth of july. we're going to have people out, our geologists are heading out into the field right now to see if they can document any fault displacement, obviously, if any damage reports will come in. you know, this earthquake was large enough where the shacking could have caused damage. one thing i would like to note is that here in the l.a. basin area, because as lucy was explaining, the waves -- the low-frequency waves tend to travel further than the high-frequency, many people out

in the l.a. basin would have felt that rolling and shaking. whereas up here in the mountains, people didn't feel it as strongly. even in the l.a. area, we'll zpra disparity in terms of the reports of the shaking. >> i know it's still early, but any takeaways in terms of this quake? wrap it up for us. >> i'll let lucy do that. >> there is a definition in the change of the news cycle. usually at this point, you're still asking us what was the magnitude. luckily, now we can give an accurate magnitude very quickly. it's not yet an hour since the earthquake. one comment i would make, if you've noticed, we've had a lot of aftershocks. those in general are not being felt down here in the l.a. basin. up in the owens valley area, i'm sure they are feeling lots of these aftershocks. but we've had dozens, i think about three at this point.

we will continue to being a lot of aftershocks. this area is also characteristically, tends to have very robust sequences. the magnitude 5.1 happened very near this in 1982. and there were, six or eight magnitude 4s associated with that event, as well as dozens of magnitude 3s and it went on for six months. so we should be expecting lots of aftershocks and some of them will be bigger than the 3s we've been having so far. i think the chance of having a magnitude 5, i don't -- this is an off the top, not calculated thing, is probably greater than 50/50. some time this afternoon, we'll be having a larger aftershock within this sequence. >> question for you. considering its location to the san andreas fault, is there any threat to the san andreas because of this? >> no. no increase in risk. well, maybe slightly. but we have never seen a

foreshock more than 10 kilometers, 6 miles, away from its main shock. and this is substantially farther than that to the san andreas, or to the garlock fault, which is another large fault capable of big earthquakes. that is significantly closer to this event and would probably have a slightly increased risk on garlock, but i think the san andreas is too far away, even for this-sized earthquake. >> but keep in mind that the san andreas is an active fault, so there is always that risk at play. >> it doesn't increase the risk, it also doesn't decrease it. >> can you describe the activity in that area in the months leading this quake? >> yeah, we -- we don't have that data right at hand -- >> no swarms? >> no, we have had a couple of other swarms in areas of southern california in recent days. nothing like that was occurring in this area. >> there was a 4.2 about 30

minutes before the main shock and that is a classic foreshock. but i know that when i saw that page come through this morning, i went, i haven't seen sirl's valley in a while. >> and i think there's a slight chance that we could have an event larger than what we're calling the main shock right now. >> that's about 5% chance for every earthquake and like any other earthquake, this probably has about a 1 in 20 chance that this is not the largest event q within the sequence. >> could you spell your name real quick? r-o-b and last name graves, g-r-a-v-e-s. >> and your title one more time? >> seismologist with the u.s. geological survey. >> we're getting some feedback from viewers and users of the alert system and they say that in los angeles, it did not work. >> it worked. it was not broadcast on shake alert. the system worked, but the usgs

parameters -- >> could you elaborate on how the system operates? >> yeah. and unfortunately, i don't have the details, as to what didn't occur or what didn't work properly. we're looking into that right now. so the system actually did detect the earthquake, it did work in terms of estimating that there was shaking that was going to occur. the signal apparently did not get out. so the system is still being tested. we're going to have to, you know, figure out what's going on with that. obviously, we'll have updates later on today. i will also point out, the shaking in the los angeles reason was not strong enough to be damaging in that sense. >> so to be clear, the signal was supposed to go out. it should have gone out? >> do you know what? >> i don't know. i want to hesitate before making any definitive statements until i can sort that out exactly.

>> you don't know at this point whether it was -- >> the system in the lab worked. so, you know, physically, it worked. the shake alert l.a. system was set up -- >> all right. we're hearing from folks from the seismologists with the u.s. geological survey in los angeles. however, we are discussing how it was felt in los angeles and las vegas. joe fryer is joining me now from l.a. we are getting word, joe, from kern county, which is where ridgecrest is, about 120 miles from where you are, and they are saying they are working on nearly two dozen incidents ranging from medical incidents to structure fires in and around the city of ridgecrest, california. urban search and rescue teams are en route. so for all of the discussion about how it's felt as a rolling earthquake in places distant from the earthquake, it was a 6.4 magnitude earthquake, about 5.6 miles under -- below the

surface of the earth, and it does seem to have caused something. typically you have fires because you've got gas main breaks, but we are now seeing at least two dozen incidents, according to kern county fire being responded to in ridgecrest, california. officials around the area are saying, do not -- please do not call 911 for information. call 911 if you need rescue, if you need fire, if you need ems. if you need police. they're getting flooded with calls. don't do that. so this is an interesting development, joe. while it felt like a rolling, slow, not very serious earthquake in las vegas and los angeles, it does seem to have been much more serious at the epicenter. >> and that's is not surprising, really, obviously. the closer you get, it is a more isolated area. certainly far more isolated than los angeles. but you are still dealing with some significant cities in that part of california that are in that area, kern county being really the biggest county in

this vicinity. it's just a matter at this point waiting to see, hear from officials there and hear what kinds of damage they're hearing from, whether there are any sort of medical emergencies, and waiting to see what kind of video surfaces to maybe compare the shaking that we experienced here in the l.a. area, which was a rolling shaking, it wasn't this severe jolting. i've seen one shot of video coming out of that area, within ten miles of ridgecrest, where there were bottles on the ground and things that had gotten taken shaken off the shelves. the closer you get to the epicenter is where we would expect to see more damage. now it's a matter of sort of keeping tabs on what's happening in kern county to get a better idea of the extent of any injuries, the extent of any damage there. we know that our local teams with the nbc affiliates out there are working to respond to get to the scenes of areas where there are calls going out to kind of get a visual on what exactly is the damage, as you get closer to where the epicenter is.

this is, we've been told, is the largest earthquake we've seen in california since 1999. it has been 20 years, but the key really is, exactly, where it is, how shallow the earthquake is, and of course, how strong the earthquake is. we know this wasn't the san andreas fault. we're still trying to learn a little more about the actual fault where this did happen. early indications are that it was a fault that did see some activity back in the '80s, but not anytime more conveniently than that. >> 1994, there was a 6.6 in northridge, but there were a lot of people who lost their lives in that, caused billions of dollars in damages. but it does have to do with where the earthquake is. that was much closer to a metropolitan area. this area, i don't know much about ridgecrest, california, i don't know if you do, about 119 miles, 120 miles from downtown los angeles. but it is not a major population center. >> no, it is not. in fact, it's in and around the mojave desert, which is obviously not a very -- an area with a lot of activity or a lot of people living there.

but we do know, you know, kern county, bakersfield, you have a lot of cities that have a significant number of people that are much closer to the epicenter of the earthquake than we are here in los angeles. while we're here and felt something right away and the first ones who can jump in front of a camera and tell you what we experienced, we can't tell you what the people there experienced that are much closer. so we're making phone calls and reaching out to get more information about the extent of what people experienced. >> there is air station china lake nearby, so we're waiting to get word from them about what's going on. tell us again, joe, where you were in relation to this earthquake and what you felt when it happened. >> our studio is here in universal city, california, which is not too far from downtown los angeles, just right in the valley near hollywood. so most of us who were working on the fourth of july were sort of sitting at our desks. i know i started to feel sort of a little bit of the rolling shaking. i sort of looked to the producer who was sitting next to me and said, could you feel that?

another producer sitting a few feet away from us wasn't feeling anything at that time. and that's what happens times. i can think of an earthquake that happened just a few months ago here, smaller than this one, but there were only two of us in the newsroom at the time. the other person stood up and said, did you feel that earthquake? and i hadn't felt it at all. this was obviously a stronger one. pretty much everyone in the newsroom did feel it. but it was more a rolling motion, not an aggressive jolt or shaking. and that seems to be consistent with what we're hearing people experienced at least throughout the los angeles area we know some crews from our local affiliate knbc here were out in the field. they've talked to people or talked about their own experiences. one crew was in a live truck at the time and they say felt like someone sort of jumped on the back bumper and was jumping up and down. that's still a little bit of a rolling motion, not an aggressive jolting motion. some people in downtown l.a. say they looked up and it appeared that they could see the building swaying. one person who was in a car said they actually felt it while they were driving, which sometimes is

surprising to know whether you would feel it while you were driving. that is certainly what we experienced here. it's consistent with what lester was experiencing on the other side of the l.a. area in santa monica, this sort of rolling motion. it's kind of thing where your tv starts to sway. if you have hanging lights, they're going to be rocking back and forth. but what we experienced wasn't powerful enough to jostle a light from high above down or anything like that, ali. >> lester holt said that in his place in santa monica, he saw a light fixture moving and felt sort of a rolling thing. he's been in some earthquakes, so he had some familiarity with the idea that it may be an earthquake. but he suggested that it felt, the way it might feel in our building here in 30 rock, sometimes you feel the subway. others said it felt like a heavy truck rumbling by. we heard that went on for about 30 seconds in l.a. it would be interesting to know what you felt or how long you felt it for. but we do understand from usgs

that at least four large aftershocks have been recorded measuring 3.7, 3.5, 3.8, and 2.2 magnitude. we also understand in the area in the last week there have been three earthquakes. i don't know if you felt any of those in the last few days, but how long did you feel it for when you felt it today? >> it felt longer. i haven't experienced that many earthquakes. i've lived in l.a. for about six years. on st. patrick's day a few years back, they nicknamed it the shamrock shake. that was a rolling earthquake but didn't last as long and wasn't as high as a magnitude. this one surprised me in that it went on longer than i expected an earthquake to go on. i would have to guess it was maybe 30 second, maybe longer. so certainly the longest one i've experienced in my relatively brief amount of time in los angeles. some people have said it felt shorter. i know lucy jones, the respected seismologist said in her house,

she felt it for more like ten seconds. so a short period of time for her. other people say it seems like it was even longer. so definitely longer than what most people normally experience, especially when you consider however it was. >> we are getting word from the local fire department in ridgecrest, saying that, the kern county fire department saying they're working on nearly two dozen incidents ranging from medical assistance to structure fires in and around the city of ridgecrest, california. urban search and rescue teams are on the way, but we do not have a clear sense of what the damage is in kern county and in ridgecrest. it does not seem -- we have no reports of damage in las vegas or in los angeles, two major urban centers in which this earthquake was felt. but police are saying, we're getting word that 911 is being swamped with calls all through the region and they are asking that have if you do not have an

emergency and you do not require fire or ems or rescue or police, please don't call 911 for information on this. get your information from the local media. joe, do you have this app? you mentioned lucy jones. she had just commented on the fact that there's an app that tells people in the area, it's called shake alert. and that this message didn't go out on shake alert. there was a warning. the early warning system for an earthquake did work. but for some reason, it didn't go up on shake alert. do you know about shake alert? >> yeah. and this is a reminder to me, i need to make sure i get shake alert, as well. i didn't have it on my phone. obviously, she said the warning didn't go out, but she said there was a 48-second warning in los angeles, at least to the seismologists keeping track of these things, and that's really some of the key technology as we talk about earthquakes and as california braces for the so-called big one, which many say is inevitable at some point, is whether we will be able to predict it and warn people so that they can take cover and

make sure they're in a safer position. and so all of these earthquakes are sort of a test of that system and how well it works and how much notice it gives people. she just said there was a 48-second warning in l.a. obviously, they're going to want to review that and kind of talk more about the systems in place and giving people warnings and if people weren't warned in this situation, why. those are certainly some follow up questions we want to ask. we should also note, kern county, the fire department there did put out another new tweet saying -- >> hold on, joe. i want to go to individuridgecr right now. i've got the mayor, peggy breeden. you are feeling an aftershock right now? >> it just ended. yes, we've had several. >> we've got note of about four of them since then, and that was before you got on the line with us. so this would be at least the fifth one since you felt this about an hour and a half ago, is when the earthquake struck. >> yes, approximately, yes.

>> all right. we are getting word from ridgecrest fire that you are -- or from kern county fire, that they have at least five fires underway. what do you know about damage and/or injury in your town? >> i do not know specifically. i know that there's gas lines that are broken. i know that people are very panicky. i had to go over to our senior center, because i understood that most of our elderly people were there because of the holiday and panic had broken out. we went there, there were no injuries, we got everybody out, told them to go home. i'm asking everybody to please, if you have neighbors and you do not know the condition of them, please go next door, go around your neighborhood and make sure that they're all right. there is a lot of damage of things falling off walls, hitting people, things like that. i do know that the condition is

this is unusual for us. we are used to earthquakes, but we are not used to things of this significance. i do know that [ inaudible ] has set up an assistance facility here to deal with all of the issues as well as our own police and fire department. and all of our police volunteers are out. the entire community is on alert and we're all trying to watch out for each other. >> all right. you understand that there are five fires burning? >> i understand that. i've only seen one. >> okay. >> i understand that from one of our people in the city that there is five. i do not know that as a fact. >> i got a tweet from kern county fire saying search and rescue, you're getting urban search and rescue teams. is that something you have in place in kern county or in ridge crest? >> yes, we do. we have volunteer search and

rescue. and we have many, many organizations that are out walking the streets and trying to find damage and people, because we are a close community of 28,000. and we are all working to make things better for each of us, but it is a difficult situation right now and very fluid. >> and mayor, for our viewer who not in the region, if you know someone in kern county or in ridge crest, the mayor is asking, contact those people and ask them to check on their neighbors. they may be fine, but we do know that we've got dozens of calls going into kern county. there are dozens of responses, in other words, these are not calls about information. kern county fire is saying ems has been dispatched. the mayor says five fires underway in ridgecrest or the area. mayor, have you heard from, are you getting aid from the state and other regional ems in the area who can send help to you? what sort of facilities do you

have? >> i have heard from assemblyman vince song's office. they've offered any help they can possibly do. i have talked to kevin mccarthy, our congressman. he has offered, tell me what to do. everyone has been very generous. what we need is prayers and obviously, people on the lookout for others in need. >> do you -- what do you have in terms of medical facilities there and what have you heard, if any, about anybody being transported to hospital. >> i've seen ambulances going by. i haven't been to the hospital yet. and we have a number of ambulances and i'm surprised you're not hearing sirens, because they just ended and i'm not very far away from the hospital. >> all right. and what's your saying -- as i said, before we got on the phone with us, there have been four aftershocks reported. 3.7, 3.5, 3.8, 3.2, and moments before you and i started talking, there was another one.

so in your estimation, there have been five aftershocks? >> i'm taking that as fact. i wasn't counting. >> i understand that. and for these people calling you and asking you for help, while you are here on national television, what do you need in ridgecrest now? >> we need, as i said, please check with your friends and neighbors and ask them to go check especially the elderly. we have a significant elderly population as well as the military base china lake naval weapons center is here. they are out working. everybody is out. just ask people to look and check, if they're okay, that's great, but please check with your friends and neighbors. >> at china lake naval weapons center, which is very nearby, how far is it from where you are in ridgecrest and do they have personnel that, deployed to assist in what you need? >> less than a mile, and yes, they have many, many personnel. >> all right. mayor, can you just tell me what

it felt like there? because we've been talking to people in las vegas and los angeles about what they felt. they said for at least 30 seconds, they felt a rolling earthquake. now, that could have been because of the distance that they are from the epicenter. what did it feel like to you when it happened? >> it was is same thing. a long -- i thought it was extremely long. we feel aftershocks here, small arcs, but i never felt one like that. i was driving my car, headed to a facility and i put my emergency brake on and just sat there and rolled. >> mayor, we will stay in close touch with you. you know how to find us. if you've got a message for us, let us know, we'll put it out there. our thoughts are with you and we'll continue our coverage, mayor peggy breeden from ridgecrest. we'll continue to cover that. we have, by the best of our count, five aftershocks now in ridgecrest, five fires burning. fire department in kern county,

that is the county in which ridgecrest is, say that they are responding to dozens of call. we'll take a quick break and our coverage of this is going to continue on the other side. is supporting military families. when i have a child deployed, having a reliable network means everything. so, when i get a video chat, and i get to see their face, it's the best thing in the world. and i've earned every one of these gray hairs. military moms, we serve too. (vo) the network more people rely on, gives you more. like military plans with a special price on unlimited, $100 per line, and big savings on our best phones when you switch. that's verizon.

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our you coveracoverage cont earthquake that occurred almost two hours ago in southern california, it was centered? ridgecrest. you can see it there in relation to wabakers field. it is about 120 miles between los angeles and ridgecrest, california. this earthquake was felt in los angeles and las vegas, but it is centered in ridgecrest. it was a 6.4 magnitude earthquake. we do have reports of active fires in ridgecrest probably caused by broken gas mains. we have reports from emergency response that they have more than two dozen calls under way. we have had requests from emergency services in the entire region to say please don't call 1 911 unless you need rescue, unless there is a fire, unless

you need medical aid because they are becoming overwhelmed with actual calls. but we have reports of some damage and fires in ridgecrest. in los angeles, this was felt over the period of about 30 seconds. and it felt like people -- to people like a rolling earthquake is how they are describing it. i want to go to our los angeles bureau where joe fryer is standing by. he felt it in los angeles. what are we hearing about what has happened? i had a conversation with the mayor and just as she got on the phone with me, she had felt another aftershock which by our rough estimate is now five after shocks in ridgecrest as a result of the earthquake. tell me what you're learning. >> reporter: and because they are much lower magnitude, we have not felt that here in los angeles. the one we felt was the big one, the 6.4 quake that hit as we've been describing it, more of a rolling earthquake, but it did last longer than most of the

ones that we seem to experience around here. so the question right now on our minds is how bad is the damage and situation up around origir e ridgecrest. the police department put out a note telling people to be careful of downed power lines and check on your neighbors. we know that the county has search and rescue out, but we don't know the extent of what they are responding to. ridgecrest is a town of about 28,000 people. we're seeing initial reports when 5800 customers are without power in that area. so the big question, how much damage, whether there are any injuries. we've heard reports the mayor talked about people in ambulances she heard going to the hospitals, the question is what type of injuries are those or just people in shock or of a frafd. she talked about going senior citizens home where a lot of people were panicked because of what they just experienced. the los angeles police department says there are so far no reports of any damage here.

same with l.a.x. airport. so what we experienced here seemed to be more of sort of a swaying shaking here in los angeles. but not strong enough to cause any sort of significant damage or any significant injuries that have been reported so far. same thing in las vegas. people felt it there but no reports so far of any injuries there. but much -- as we get closer to the epicenter, it is a more isolated area which is a good thing, but that doesn't mean that there aren't people who live there and structures there and you can see some of the things that were knocked off of the shelves that certainly has impacted people who felt this at a much stronger -- felt a much stronger earthquake than we felt here in l.a. >> and we are hearing about structural damage in ridgecrest, that is typical. a 6.6 magnitude earthquake would obviously cause some structural damage. the idea that we have fires means that there was probably gas main breaks or gas pipe breaks.

again, that is typical. we have not got confirmation about what kind of damage we've got. have you heard of any damage in los angeles? >> reporter: no. lapd did just put out a note not that long ago say nothing reports of damage in the los angeles area so far. so that is the good news. it is interesting to note, this is the largest earthquake we've seen here in california since 1999. that was a 7.1 magnitude, but it was in such an isolated area, it really didn't cause much damage. really this is the strongest and has had the most impact since of course the north ridge earthquake in 1994, that was a 6.7, but because it was so much closer to a bigger metropolitan area, dozens of people lost their lives in that earthquake there. >> joe, at this point about 120 miles out in los angeles, have you felt -- as i said, we've had five aftershocks after this one, they were 4.7, 3.5, 3.8 and 4.2. that is obviously a much smaller matter. i'll get a seismologist on with

me in a few minutes to explain how these things work in terms of orders of magnitude. have you felt any aftershocks in los angeles? >> reporter: so far we have not here felt any of the aftershocks. we haven't seen any reports of that in the laid ar.a. area. s it is so far away. so where they are feeling the after shocks is closer to the epicenter and certainly after what the people there experienced with the 6.4 earthquake, each of the aftershocks obviously has people on edge. certainly rattling nerves along with any damage that may have been caused throughout the area. >> all right. we've been talking to a few people and our affiliate in los angeles has been talking to people who did experience it. let's listen to it. >> it was rolling, like shaking quite a bit. for at least 10 or 15 seconds. and i saw the window shaking.

and it seemed to last for at least 15 seconds and then died out and started up again. >> and also with us is gerald who was actually on the road when you felt the quake. tell us what you felt. >> i was driving with my kids and i got dropped off in downtown l.a. and it was a weird experience. on the freeway, car started shaking. sounded like the car had batteries in it. but it was a weird experience. but it wasn't that heavy. i've had an earthquake experience before. but nothing too major. >> so joe, that is what we've been hearing from a lot of people. we heard somebody say this isn't the big one. obviously in los angeles a lot of people expect the big one. there was an early warning system. what do we know about that? >> reporter: yeah, there is an early warning system that is being worked on, there is an app that is supposed to send out messages to people. we're hearing that there was a 48 second warning in los

angeles, but for some reason a broadcast did not go out to people who are signed up for that alert system. it is unclear why, that is something that we'll have to follow up on and check in on. >> all right. joe fryer, you'll stay with us and we'll continue our coverage of it. i think we'll take a break and our coverage will continue on the other side. the other side

we're continuing live coverage here of an earthquake in ridgecrest, california. this was a 6.4 earthquake according to the u.s. geological survey. for those of you not as familiar with california, it is about 120 miles from downtown los angeles. this earthquake was felt in los angeles and in las vegas. it was felt -- it was described by various people who felt it in those urban centers as rolling. lester holt was in santa monica and he described actually the swaying of chandeliers like you are seeing here, the swaying of a light fixture. others described it as something that you might find in new york city a subway underground, someone described it as a big truck passing. reporters in los angeles who were in their live trucks said it felt like somebody jumping on their bumper. so that was the feeling in los

angeles. but closer to the epicenter in ridgecrest, california where this took place as a 6.4 magnitude earthquake, we've got much more damage. we do actually have structure all damage there. the fire department in the county which is concern coukern county fire saying that we're working nearly two dozen incidents ranging from medical assistance to structure fires in and around the city of origin ridgecre ridgecrest. and we also have a situation where the mayor of ridgecrest with whom i just spoke a few moments ago said that they have at least five working fires, that is typical of an earthquake because you have pipe breakage, gas pipe breakage. so they are working at least five fires. 911 emergency response, they have sent out a message through local media to say please don't call unless you need a recent could i or unless you have a fire or you need medical assistance because they are

being overwhelmed by calls. we do know that there is structural damage in and around ridgecrest. what we don't have is word of injuries right now because we have heard that there have been ambulances going by. the mayor of ridgecrest said that she heard ambulances and fire trucks but we don't have word of any injuirany injuries. jo ling kent is with me now. >> and i remember the 1989 earthquake and feeling that in san francisco. but we are seeing from the kern county fire department that they are responding to about two dozen incidences ranging from medical assistance to structure all fires in and around the city of ridgecrest. and the lapd -- l.a. fire department has said that there are no actual issues in los angeles. but this is centered just to the north of los angeles in ridgecrest. >> do you have that app that they were talking about, the

shake app or something? because people are worried about this in california. they are always worried about the big earthquake and there are questions which we're trying to get some answers to about was there warning and were people able to do what they needed to do 37. >> and i actually don't have it, and i do live in los angeles. so i probably should get on that. but we did hear from joe fryer that there was about a 48 second warning for those in los angeles. but that is certainly very small amount of time to take cover or to grab your earthquake supplies at this point. but we're seeing ridgecrest, california 6.4 guided down from the original 6.6 from the usgs. but there have been about five aftershocks so far. >> at least five. four were recorded and the mayor on the phone said she felt one. itched does that make five and she said i haven't been counting. >> when you're in the initial quake, you do feel it and there

were a lot of questions, there were several individuals, celebrities in l.a. saying we weren't sure if that was the big one because it kept rolling. so you wonder about the intensity, does it increase or decrease. and it decreased in this particular case. >> and let's good of these questions answered by the geo physicist paul caruso joining me by phone. paul, for those of us who are not the experts on earthquakes, tell us what you make of a 6.4 magnitude earthquake centered 5.6 miles under the surface. >> it is very strong and shallow quake. this is the type of quake that can cause significant damage in the epicentral area. >> and tell me what you believe happened. you've heard the descriptions of a rolling quake lasting possibly 30 seconds or are more and then after shocks that are of smaller magnitude. maybe five. what do you know about what has happened and what has handed since? >> we're continuing to have

aftershocks and they will continue for probably for week. they should get smaller and smaller as time goes on. >> tell me, do you know anything -- and this may not be your department. but do you know anything about the type of damage that you would see in a place like ridgecrest which fortunately is not heavily populated but it is not nothing they have 28,000 or 30,000 people there, many of whom were out because of the fourth of july. when you put the 6.4 magnitude together with the shallowness of it, about 5.6 miles underneath, what kind of damage do you think that we can see? we're looking at some video right now that shows what appears to be a shop with stuff having come off the shelves, some things toppled. is there a way to associate the magnitude with the damage? >> well, there is, but i think what you are describing is a lot better than what i could speculate might have happened. you actually have footage of

what did happen. so i think that is more powerful. >> and how do you describe the magnitudes, the way we think about, the way we use these numbers? because most of us think, well, 6.6 versus a 6.4 that we've heard of or a 7.3, how does the scale work? >> well, each time you go up a magnitude, it is ten times more powerful. usually we see damage and significant casualties from earthquakes above magnitude 5.5 if they are near a populated area. >> so as much as we've not heard word of injuries yet and it is quite early so we don't know, but one shouldn't dg miismiss a even if it is not in a heavily populated area? >> yeah, that is a very strong earthquake. and in that area over the past four year, we've had eight other earthquakes that were larger than magnitude 5. >> paul, thank you for joining us. paul caruso is a geo physicist

who we rely on to get the details of the type of earthquakes that we've had. >> and we also have gadi schwartz on the line with us from studio city, california. you felt the earthquake, you documented it. tell us what it was like. >> yeah, it was a pretty rude awakening here. we were both in our living room, my fiance and i, and you started feeling the shake. we're both journalists, so we reach for the phones and when we started recording, when you pick up the recording, it is about 10, 15 seconds in and you can see the apartment is shaking. outside you can see there is a pool and the water is sloshing around. inside there were chandeliers shaking. we're about 120 miles away from that epicenter. but we definitely felt it here. it felt like rolling, almost like when you are taking off in an airplane and the engines start to rumble and then you go down the runway.

that is exactly what it felt like. for us, definitely a reminder that you're in southern california, this could happen at anytime, anyplace. so try to keep ourselves well stocked with food and the earthquake kit that question we quickly. fortunately it started subsiding before we started scrambling for the doorways or there is a hallway just beyond our apartment where there is the stairwell that we've identified as a pretty safe place. but yeah, very strong shaking here for sure. >> and both you and i have reported on retrofitting strublgtss throughout southern california in the case that the big one hits. how prepared is southern california for something that would be longer or higher magnitude than what we felt today? >> it all depends on how recently your building was inspected or retrofitted. a lot of the newer buildings are

retrofitted. the los angeles bureau that we have,have bumpers that we walk by every day and you see the rubber bumper that acts as an earthquake damper. so there are a lot of buildings here that are retrofitted, but the majority of the buildings in southern california are not ready for a large earthquake to happen in the metro area. fortunately this was 120, 130 miles away. but it is definitely one of those things that reminds you how this could happen at anytime anyplace, how we need to be prepared and how the reality is, los angeles just isn't ready for the big one just yet. >> los angeles certainly doesn't feel very ready for the big one. and i wonder, if you svelte a y aftershocks? we know that the los angeles fire department says there have been no injuries so far. >> yeah, as soon as the earthquake was over, we went out on that balcony and all kinds of

people were coming out on their balancing connies and there was this kind of community conversation, did you feel that? yeah? did you feel is ththat? so swapping stories there. it doesn't look like there is any damage in this immediate area. but, you know, we're watching twitter just like everybody else and the images that are coming out of up north are pretty stark. we've seen video from inside local stores and it looks like the damage is pretty extensive temperature. >> gadi schwartz, thank you. and let's talk more about an understanding of how these things work. professor of seismology at the university of southern california is joining us. john, we have been covering this f over an. give us your analysis of what you believe happened and what is still happening. we know of at least five aftershocks in ridgecrest.

and they may continue for weeks. >> that is correct. in fact surveys already found dozens of affater shocks oig an put them on the map on their website. there will be more. there were three or four events that the network noticed in the half hour before the earthquake. and this is an area that is prone to a lot of earthquakes over the years. there is gao he ois geothermal the region, it is one of the hot spots in california. >> and our local affiliate knbc was interviewing people in los angeles who were sort of saying, well, it wasn't the big one, it felt serious, but people who have lived in l.a. for a long time have felt certain earthquakes and certain tremors at times before. what do you do to put this in that con steks? because obviously it is not the big one, but it sounds like it

was pretty significant and if it had happened closer to a populated area, we could be seeing a lot more damage than we're getting reports of now. >> yeah, that is exactly right. 6.5 and if it had been right under a city, there would be a devastating toll. new england had an earthquake of this size a couple years ago and it ghknocked out christchurch a they are still building. we're fortunate that it was in an area that wasn't densely populated. >> is there something to be done -- if you are in southern california right now, you've been woken up to the idea -- by the way i understand that there have been three lower level earthquakes in the region over the course of the last week. does this cause anybody to think about it differently, does it cause anybody to do anything differently other than make sure that they have that shaker app on their phone or that they know what to do if you get word that there is a hurricane or if you

feel the rumbling underfoot? >> well, it is hard. earthquakes are something where you have to think long term. and we're preparing for the next 20 or 30 years. so this week isn't anymore dangerous in l.a. than last week. but it is on our mind and we should do the things that we know that we should have done a long time ago. the retrofits, packing food and supplies, having plans in case there is an earthquake. when we're reminded, it is the time to do the things that should have been done a long time ago go. >> and many of us know that new structures built in los angeles or in that area, things are retrofitt retrofitted. lester holt was saying that the earthquake in haiti was much more damaging because the infrastructure didn't exist to withstand earthquakes. basic things like small

structures like houses weren't built in a way that there was any flex in them. did you feel after all of the attention that earthquakes in california have gotten and san andreas fault that 6.4 earthquake closer to an urban area can be handled well, can be withstood? >> well, we've been working on the problem for a long time and we're doing all the right things. it is just there is a tremendous amount of work to fix up especially the old buildings. so we can't be complacent. so a reminder like this just tells us to take a close look at the next steps and it is largely retrofitting and making sure that the new buildings are as stringent as they need to be. >> and when you say retrofitting, what does that mean? what do you do? i heard joe talking about the -- what does retrofitting involve? >> there is a wide range of

things. the infrastructure like the water and the gas and electricity, we've improved how they are installed and the buildings, many different styles of buildings have deficiencies that we've come to recognize. there is not a single policy. and largely it comes down to the city governments making sure that there are rules that all the buildings eventually need to be made safe. it is not really one or two things. it is many dozens of rules that need to be made and followed. >> in your opinion, john, as somebody who studies this, are we going in the right direction, do we have most of those things in place? i mean we are looking at a man of one of the most densely populated parts of the country. the earthquake did not occur in one of them. i think ridgecrest has a population of about 28,000 people. but are we mostly there, do people take these things seriously enough so that when the big one hits or when

earthquakes of this magnitude hit, that we're largely prepared? on your own personal scale, where would you put us? >> well, i look at it that we're on the right path. we're doing the right things. it will take decades to make sure that the buildings are all what they should be. we can't do it all at once. so i think that we're doing what we should and we just need to keep working on it. >> all right. john, thanks very much. professor of seismology at the university of southern california. >> and we have new information now from the ridgecrest police captain. he is saying that the regional hospital has been evacuated due to possible structural damage. and engineer is en route to look at what has happened here, but they are saying that they are getting aftershocks here. but that is what the police is saying that the regional hospital now being evacuated for structural damage. and that really is the crux of something here when we're talking about a 6.4, an earthquake that is about 5 miles deep, you do get these

structural issues, things begin to crack. >> and it is described as a shallow earthquake. 5 miles is considered shallow. and when people say they feel like it was a subway or truck rolling in los angeles, imagine what that means for a building. and if you have people in a hospital, you can't take that risk. so maybe somebody saw a crack somewhere, maybe no walls have come down. but they cannot have hundreds of people or dozens of people in a hospital in a situation where something might collapse. >> and we're hearing city hall is open for those who feel like their homes are not safe and there have been reports of gas leaks and reports of fires. we've not confirmed that yet. >> the mayor told me she saw one fire and had heard of five fires in ridgecrest. joining me now is jessica weston, city editor of the kael independe daily independent. what do you know about the

situation on the ground? >> pretty much what you have been saying. i would say there has been more than five aftershocks. driving around town, there is not a lot of damage visible. the lights are out. i spoke to the chief of police and he told me that there is a string of stretch of fires that they are putting out. he said at this point there have been -- when i spoke to him like ten minutes ago, he said that there were no reported serious injuries at that moment, but that could change. always no road damage had been reported. however, originridgecrest polic department were being assisted by concern okern county who wer in a helicopter and as well as highway patrol and police departments from bakersfield. and there is concerns that the power is out in specific portions of town, we're concerned about people with no air conditioning in the homes. i guess they can go to city hall. because it is the desert, it is hot here.

there is -- like i said, when you drive around town, there is not a lot of visible damage going on, we don't have very men tall buildings here. the typical structure is a single story. as far as i know, there are no parking structures, no concrete parking structures or anything like that that could collapse. i was in my mother's house when the earthquake mihurt and it shk a book shelf off the wall and it was pretty dramatic. so all of the stores in town are closed. >> talk to us about this ridgecrest regional hospital that is being evacuated. what does that look like, is it a large facility, does it have a lot of people in it? probably one of the biggers things in town. >> yeah, it is our central medical facility in town, yes. things in town. >> yeah, it is our central medical facility in town, yes. i had heard that they were thinking of doing that. and i'm sure -- i'm guessing it is a precaution. but yeah, it is our central medical facility in town.

>> all right. we've got report of a few fires as you've heard, the mayor told me maybe five, what do you know about that? because that is often one of the most dangerous things particularly in a place if you don't have large structure, then maybe the danger of a large building collapsing is not the issue. fires and gas main breaks are an issue. >> i know they are concerned about it and the police chief told me obviously even should shut off the gas and that there were concerns about the power companies taking -- because of the number of responses, that they yusly can obviously can't even right away. >> and we're looking at a fire right now on the screen. and it is a house that looks completely engulfed in fire. and it is the kind of fire that looks like it would have been triggered by gas because there is something fueling that fire which would explain -- it may explain, you would know more

than i do because i don't know what your electrical infrastructure is there, but it would explain why in some places they may be turning the gas off. >> yeah, well, i mean that is kind of the standard advice in the case of an earthquake anyway. s to tuit is to donurn your gas. >> and there is another possible be earthquake predicted in 15 minutes in or near kern county. >> jessica, do you know what is going on there? >> i'm sorry, could you say it again? >> there is an alert about another possible earthquake, i'm not sure where they get that information from, but they are asking people to prepare for another possible earthquake. >> no, i had not heard that. i've been concentrating on talking to you. >> which we appreciate. what is the situation for you? are you able to move freely around, are people out in the streets, are they moving around? is traffic moving? >> well, yes, and it is kind of unnerving because -- i'm having

an aftershock right now. >> you're feeling an aftershock right now as you are talking to me? >> yeah. right now i'm sitting on the couch and my othin my mother's and we just had an aftershock. there have been more than five. and you can feel them. when you are driving in your car, you can feel the ground shaking. >> do people there take that seriously? i don't live in a place -- i've felt one little earthquake in my life. and it is quite disconcerting when the earth moves below you. is there a a familiarity around there with earthquakes, have you experienced a lot of them? >> yeah. people here -- ridgecrest has had a series of serious earthquakes. none this bad. so a lot of people are pretty prepared and we also have a very line civic community, a lot of people understand seismology out here. but it depends on a person's experience. i was interviewing a woman from chile and she said it wasn't the

worth quake she'd been in either. but people are driving kind of strangely. innoticed that some were driving really fast and some were driving super slow and the traffic lights are out. like completely dead in certain parts of town because the power is out. so that adds to the confusion. >> and i wanted to update folk from the pes pooress pool, the president has been briefed on the earthquake and he will continue to monitor the situation. and we know that center kamala harris who is campaigning currently in iowa for president, she has been briefed as well and her thoughts are with the folks in southern california. >> and jessica, the mayor when i was talking to her said she's talked to kevin mccarthy and your state assembly men and they have offered all the help. at this point do you have any information about whether hch lo

-- look, a city of about 28,000 and you have infrastructure and nn emergency services and the county services. and the mayor was saying that you have a volunteer urban search and rescue. what do you understand happens in things like this? do you get neighboring counties and towns sending in the help that you need or do you think kern county and ridgecrest has what it needs? >> yes, they get a lot of -- i spoke to the chief of police and he said that the neighboring agencies from kern county, california city, baker's field, highway patrol and i'm presuming at some point the red cross will probably step in. they all do reach out. i don't know that the red cross does. i'm guessing. but the chief told me that they have enough resources to run independently for two days. >> that is very good news. and of course access to ridgecrest is not closed off, right? >> as far as i know, no.

and i also know that congressman mccarthy is very close to our community. and i'm sure as the mayor told you that he would be assisting, i'm sure that that is correct. >> and we appreciate you talking to us throughout another aftershock. we'll stay in close touch with you about what is going on. we are looking right now at a fire burning in ridgecrest, california. >> and we also have a new president trump tweet here, he says he has been fully briefed on the earthquake and he says all seems to be very much under control with an explanation point. so reaction from the white house. and let's bring back in gadi schwartz who is now with us i believe on camera from studio city. you recorded a lot of what happened in the moment there. describe what you are seeing now. >> i got to tell you, we're watching the news here and hearing that there is another possible earthquake in 15 minutes, that alert, is pretty

concerning. i mean, it makes you think of what could possibly happen. it makes you kind of run through what the plan would be. and something that we're all preparing for. i wanted to talk to you a little bit about what we've done here. they were saying that they had two days of supplies. so i just want to show what you a lot of people in southern california have. i guess we'll start here in the kitchen. sorry, my apartment is a little dir dirty. but in this drawer is where we keep most of our food stuff. >> and what do you -- >> this is about a month eye supply of food. these are like mres, easy meals to put in hot water. we have a hot water stove here and it goes all the way back. so we have about a month of food that we've prepared for. a lot of water down there. and then we have an earthquake

go bag over here. let me show you what that looks like. you can buy these-46 y -- you c order them online or buy them at a lot of different store. but i made my own just based on a lot of the lists that we've seen online. here is just in a backpack, a normal backpack, i'll go through some of this stuff. this is a jet boil, this is basically for boiling water. these are emergency ration business can you te biscuits. we have more of these ready to eat meal. i have a little solar panel charger that i keep with me. >> so you really have all the supplies for a couple days. do you believe that the other folks in southern california are ready to go like you are. >> >> no. and this is one of the things that you really have to think about. and sometimes it is nice to build your own because you actually take into consideration all the things that could go

wrong as opposed to just buying something off the 14e68 and thinking that you were prepared. this right here is a water filtration pin that you could filter water with. in fact there is stuff that you don't think about. masks for breathing. we have a sleeping bag in here. there is actually a radio that we have. i know that you have one of these. >> yeah, we do. that is how we stay in touch. >> basically a short wave radio. >> that's right. >> absolutely. and so if something went wrong in southern california, everybody from the los angeles bureau has one of these radios. and even if the phones go down, we can communicate with each other and check in with the bureau and that way we can coordinate a lot of our coverage if cellphone service goes down, electricity goes down. on the top of the mountains, antennas allow us to communicate. >> and i'm glad you and kim are

okay there. thank you for walking us through your earthquake kit. >> and on the phone we have dr. jennifer andrews who is a seismologist at caltech. jennifer, that think you for being with us. we just have seen a tweet that is warning of another earthquake coming in about 15 minutes, probably about 8 minutes old. how does one know about these things? >> i'm surprised to hear that anyone is sending that kind of information. we can't predict earthquakes. what we do know is following a magnitude 6.4, we do expect an aftershock sequence. and we've recorded about 18 so far up to about 4.5. and there is a small chance about 5% chance that 6.4 could lead to something bigger. but there is no way that we can predict that. so we can't say hold on to your hat, it's coming.

>> i'm sure kern county fire is trying to be helpful. they said another possible earthquake is predicted within the next 15 minutes in or near kern county. so just are to be clear, and i'm sure they are doing this to be helpful, do whatever you need to do in case there is another one coming. but scientifically how long ahead of time -- we had heard from the usgs that about 48 seconds before people felt it in los angeles, usgs knew that they were going to. what does that mean? >> so that means that shake alert earthquake early warning system is operational right now. and so as soon as that earthquake started, our systems picked it up and before strong shaking arrived, we could tell certain people that it was on its way. but that system is in its infancy and it does rely on the fact that the earthquake already happened but we can defectect i very quickly. >> so the first and earl years sig -- earl jest siiest signs that

earthquake is happening. you're saying it is expected that there would be aftershocks and you have percentage probabilities of that. is that what this might be about? >> it could be about that. but we certainly couldn't do to the time accuracy of 15 minutes. we're working very much on a likelihood basis, expect this in the next hours to weeks this kind of behavior, but nothing is definite that it is on its way on this time scale. >> and tell me again the probability that you mentioned that there could be after shocks that are bigger than the original. >> that is about is 5% or 1 in 20 chance. >> and what does someone do in this instance? if are you in or around ridgecrest and we're looking at video of damage and fires, we just heard from the city editor at the newspaper that the power is out, we don't know whether it has been shut down deliberately or out because of other damage, what do you do knowing that there are going to be

aftershocks and that they might be more serious? >> i think all of our standard southern california earthquake advice applies. making sure that you have food and water, making sure that you are with your family. and if you feel stronger shaking, just know what you and kr your family are planning do. >> and hurricanes are hard to figure out what the terminology means. the magnitude changes when you talk about a 6.will magnitude earthquake, it matters a lot where the earthquake is and what the population is around it and what the structures are like and whether it is deep or shallow. we understand this one to have been 5.6 miles deep. what does that all mean. >> so for this magnitude 6.4, we would expect to feel significant

shaking out to about 17 or 18 miles. it is in a fairly sparsely populated area and there is a lot of mountneof mountainness ad which would reduce the amount of shakiness. but 6.4 is sizable. we'll certainly be sending scientists out to understand more about this event. >> and talk to me about -- people were clear that it wasn't the big one. this isn't what people in southern california or along the san andreas fault are expecting or thinking might happen. when you see a 6.4 earthquake of this magnitude, does it tell you anything else about other earthquakes or the behavior that you have been able to predict? in other words, when you put the data from this earthquake into the calculations that people like you do, does it inform you in any other ways?

>> 6.4 is not what we talk about the big one certainly. magnitude 8 is a very different beast and will have a significantly greater sort of widespread hazard and damage associated with it than the 6.4. but this is still sizable especially for those people who were close by. comparable to our 6.7northridge which is very present in people's memories. this could have an effect on nearby faults so that is why we ask people to be prepared, that there is some chance that something else could be triggered nearby. or there is chance of other earthquak earthquakes. >> that is the question that i was getting at temperature does -- does an earthquake like this

unsettle something either that might have baenk set een set to? >> if those faults were already very stressed and very close to failure, then this could be that extra kick that causes them to run dhrupture. but that likelihood decreases through days and weeks. so people don't need to be on high alert for a long time into the future beyond the fact that we all need to be in southern california of course. >> and there was a foreshock around a magnitude 4 felt about half an hour before. does that help in the prediction, does anyone know that foreshock is a foreshock? >> unfortunately not. we certainly don't see foreshocks ahead of all earthquakes that we record. so right now and as far as the scientists can tell, we'll neff

be in a position to say maybe in an hour that you will experience this. >> this isn't the sort of thing where you or other seismologists who i've spoken to tell me that there is some breakthrough on the horizon. will we just not ever be able to know that an earthquake is coming? >> at in point we don't think so. lots of different 34e6ds hameth been tried. it is an area of research of particular interest. but i haven't heard of anything that promises to give us a meaningful prediction with magnitude and time enough to take action to evacuate and so on. >> we understand this is 5.6 miles below the surface. and that is described as shallow? >> that is the point at which it starts. it is about an average depth for southern california. it may be rupturing up toward the surface as well. so the sign tests will definitely be studying that because it will have affected how wide an area was impacted

and what it might mean for the activity on that particular fault. >> jennifer andrews, we appreciate your insight. if you have any new developments and you hear anything about this glad they are warning about another earthquake, which we don't know where they are getting that information from, please let us know. we are now at the bottom of the hour here out east, 12:30 out west and we'd like to get to joe fryer at our nbc los angeles bureau. but i just want to update the l.a. fire department says they are complete with all 106 sur y surveys and they found no signs of significant damage in the city of los angeles. but joe, what is the latest there on the ground? >> that is the good news that we've heard from the fire department which has done the more than 100 surveys so they are not seeing any reports 1/2 i damage or any injuries. the police department in l.a. earlier put out notice that it also had no reports of injuries. so that is the good news. not surprising for those of us

in the l.a. area. almost exactly two hours ago, many of us in the newsroom here and all of a sudden we could feel this rolling shaking and not this aggressive necessarily jostli jostling, but the rolling. and we all looked at each other and realized hey, this might be an earthquake. and it almost seemed to keep going. it seemed to go a little longer than what we're used to, so we were getting concerned as to whether it would intensify and pick up at all. i would guess it lasted around 30 seconds where we are. dr. lucy jones in the pasadena area said it felt 10 seconds there. so people seem to feel it for different links throughout tenge area. and a lot of people have been talking about the shake alert app. and we're getting more information on this. this is sort of an l.a. system. so people in l.a. county can

sign up. and possibly if there is any sort of warning that will come out, they could get an alert about this. we're told there was a 48 second warning but it didn't go out because what was shaking in l.a. wasn't as severe as it is in other areas. >> joe fryer in our bureau in los angeles, thank you. >> dr. lucy jones from the u.s. geological survey is joining us now -- she is giving a press conference actually. let's listen in. >> we call it conjugate faulting. it is a common feature. and we'll just have to see. we're only two hoyers into the s hours in to the sequence, we'll see how it develops. >> and what about the app? >> yeah, i can give an update. there is a little bit of misunderstanding. the system actually worked as designed. so an alert was sent out by the u.s. geological survey.

the app for the city of l.a. is set up with various thresholds. the first threshold is a magnitude 5 earthquake or greater in l.a. county. it will send out an alert. this earthquake was outside of l.a. county, so it didn't satisfy that condition. the other condition is intensity greater than 4. the intensities in l.a. were 3 and lower. so the app performed as designed, it is just that the intensity levels were below the threshold that had been set by the app. so the system actually worked as designed. it is something that we need to look into though as to whether maybe the threshold should be lowered or adjusted for future. and just to reiterate though, there was no -- the level of shaking within the city of l.a.

was not damage. so in that sense the app worked as designed. >> if it had worked with the levels set correctly or -- >> lower. yes. >> what would very with seen on the app? >> so for example if it had been 3, intensity 3, then people would have gotten notification to expect shaking. i don't know the exact wording on the app, but there would have been a significant nnumber of - seconds before the shaking actually arrived. so the alert would have worked beautifully in that sense. but again, the shaking levels would not have been damaging. certainly it would have been great to kind of know ahead of time -- >> does it have a sound, like a text? what is it? >> i'm not sure.

>> it has never gone 06 ooff on phone, so i'm not sure. they were going to be using a chiming alert that is used in japan, but there was some -- i'm not sure which one they ended up using. >> you don't want to start getting so many alerts that people don't pay attention? >> right. and this is something that has been studied. >> can you explain that? >> sure. just to repeat, the question was -- or the reason why potentially that the alert level isn't set lower is so that you don't have a large number of alerts with minimal shaking. and that is correct. and this is a subjective judgment. so some designing the app, you have to make a decision on that. there has been a fair amount of research looking in to this in japan and mexico. and there is some sense that

people don't mind getting an alert even if the shaking is not that severe. and which would have been the case here if it had been set to intensity 3. so this is something that maybe we need to -- again,e tweaked o. >> and so to clarify because there has been talk about two earthquakes today? >> for a while the website showed two magnitude 6.4s. there is a lot of us recording earthquakes around the world. and we have a system that if somebody else puts up an alert and there is always the chant that the great pasadena earthquake means that we aren't giving out anything so you want to have somebody else be able to say it if we're not here. and so there is a system to try

to negotiate that. there was a warning, we think it was from the tsunami warning center actually. and usually the system can recognize that they are the same earthquake. if one of the systems gets the time a little off, they look like different earthquakes and the automatic system allows to go in. so for a short time, there were two alerts, one from us, one from the tsunami warning center. and when we recognized it, we cleaned it up. that was not getting rid of an earthquake by the way. i've heard the conspiracy theorists about that. it is just that we cleaned it up. >> and just to clarify additionally, we had been talking about two faults and so forth. that is still the case. it is not the two earthquake issues. >> does it have a name? >> not until we get a geologist on the ground. >> occasionally there are reports about faults that we did not though about. >> we know a lot of faults in this area. i mean if you look again at the

picture -- which just disappeared on us. if we could maybe reload the page i would guess. but look up in that area, there are lots of little marks. it is one of the areas with a denies distribution of map faults. so i need a geologist to say how does it line up with the ones that we know about. >> is it relevant that there are -- >> not to us. i think that it is a psychological issue. if it is an unknown fault, my god, then we didn't thougknow! it makes it scarier. reality is that we have a lot of faults that don't have names because they are too small. >> was this one particularly strong for this area? >> this is the largest in the little lake area in the last century. but in general, the owens valley, the sort of geologic structures up there, have had a lot of earthquakes like this. there was actually a 7.5 in 1872

that ran through- -- usually called the independent he s ear ear or owens valley. that area, largest earthquake in 100 years. does that make it unusual? no. from geology, we need to look at any l millenia to show what is standard. there is one level at which it is simple. the geologists presuming there are fault offsets will probably be mapping it in detail over the next month. >> are they in trucks or helicopters? >> trucks. we don't have enough money to send helicopters. >> the national guard does. i don't know how you do this. >> yeah, not the geologists.

look at our budget sometimes. >> but they are en route. >> they are en route. and as soon as we have information regarding fault offsets or anything like that, we'll provide it. hopefully within the next briefing or so. >> and since we don't have any pictures yet, can you illustrate what that will look like, what a seismologist would want to take a photo of? >> we're speculating a little bit here in that -- >> you think? >> we don't know yet if this fault actually ruptured at the ground surface. magnitude 6.4s in california sometimes break all the way to the ground surface and sometimes don't. so until we actually have some definitive information. if it did break up to the ground surface, what we should see is where two sides of the ground that were close together have slid horizontally relative to each other. and there may be some vertical

displacements as well. but given the information that we have recorded, the seismographs, it looks like the offset on the fault if it has broken the surface will be that more amazon moti-- horizontal motion. >> how does that information help you? >> in terms of damage, if you have a pipeline or structure that straddles that fault, and it moves sideways, that could be very devastatindevastating. i don't know if that is the case here again. also in terms of the ground shaking that was experienced in the ridgecrest area, lucy was talking before about how the earthquake started off to the northeast and propagated to the southwest towards ridgecrest. with this type of horizontal motion, that can k can be ampli. so until we get definitive information from some folks there, can't be sure about that. but it is a possibility.

>> also, we now do a better job of correlate wlag we ging with from the instruments with what is in the ground. it used to be we needed the geologists on the field and in fact we'd get more details by walking down the fault than we'd ever get from the instrument. we now over many years are recording them and comparing them, we have a guess that that magnitude 6.4 is partially a statement of how much slip happened, how much mud slide we would expect. and with this fault length, it is under a meter. about half a meter, so a couple feet. so potential lay receipt big y offset. the question is whether it made it up to the surface. and there are hypotheses that if it comes to the surface you get

a different shaking pattern. not everyone agrees with that. and so it would be a really -- that is aen interesting pie nan scientific testing. >> and what is your knowledge as far as how deep it is? a different kind of shaking. most faults, we don't even know what fault it is yet. if it is little lake fault, that is mapped to the surface. most earthquakes begin 5 to 10 miles under the surface. there is not enough confining pressure. by the way, if a fault can open, there is no shaking. think of snapping your fingers,

if your fingers can't touch, there would be no sound. if we map it at the surface, it probably goes at least ten miles down. probably more than that. it gets further down and behaves differently. [ inaudible question ] >> there are some active volcanics. and the china lake geothermal center runs tests there. it is a potentially volcanic area. >> what did you say about a likelihood of a earthquake above 6.4? >> 9%. over the next week.

if we get through a day, then we get lower. okay. okay. the rate of after shocks is substantially lower now than it was in the first briefing. >> holding a news conference there right now at cal tech in pasadena. we are following the 6.4 earthquake. the news chopper over the community of ridge quest. president trump's tweet saying been fully briefed on earthquake in southern california. all seems to be very much under control. we understand there is a closer community to where the epicenter was. we want to talk about that.

>> in sears valley. this is truna. small town but it is the epicenter of the valley. of the community seeing a lot of damage as well as ridge quest, population of 29,000 people. megan reyes is up in news chopper 4 at the hospital there that is seeing evacuations happening there due to possible structural damage. >> we've been listening to dr. lucy jones over at cal tech giving a summary of this earthquake. it was 6.4 out of ridge crest, california. she says there is likely two faults involved in this earthquake.

it is the largest in the little lake area in the last century. really interesting information. the ridgecrest regional hospital has been evacuated because of concerns. the president has tweeted, it looks like things are under control. we have had reports of fires and things coming off the shelf. this was a rolling quick. things falling off the shovels. they do better at doing that. ridgecrest there, there aren't a lot of big buildings or large structures. it appears the hospital is one of the largest structures there. there is a military base nearby. if there is a large structure,

they want to evacuate. or with the after shocks. we talked about hearing five but people have said there are more than 30. you want to make sure people aren't in continuing danger. >> you want to make sure -- the district representative is in touch with the folks on the ground. it is an ongoing situation. we have some incredible pictures from trona, california. >> kelly, what do you hear? >> reporter: that really cover all of it. in this kind of a situation, in this new report who said the president had been notified and would be monitoring the reports, then shortly after the president's tweet and you probably noticed kevin mccarthy,

this is his diz. being the representative with ties to this area, one of the president's closest allies in congress. in terms of the president having another resource of information, that friendship could bode well. that is the extent of what we know. the rain has come here in washington, d.c. the president has a big speech tonight in a couple of hours. one question we've asked is will this have any effect on the speech, will he acknowledge it? the situation here at the white house is 24/7. they are getting information from all of the local agencies to relay information from the president and his team quickly. >> kelly, thank you at the white

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